Carcetti Reloaded

Gentlemen (and ladies)! It's been two years, but I'm back.

Two years ago, I blogged my way through most of my first year of law school. Over those glorious months, my readership expanded from a handful of people to double digits as I held forth on politics, movies, sports, and everything in between. Unfortunately, an abortive summer job search led me to delete the old blog, as I was concerned about its effect on the job hunt. I walked away, deleting my articles and dreams and leaving them only as a memory.

In the interim, I discovered something: I missed blogging. I missed being able to scribble down my thoughts and post them. I missed running into friends in the hallway and hearing them say "Hey, I read that thing you wrote on your blog, let me share my thoughts on the topic with you." I missed being able to make fun of New York Times editorials firejoemorgan.com-style. I missed my recurring "By the Numbers" feature in which I figured out exactly how much time I had wasted that day. Most of all, I missed the sense of being able to communicate - albeit in sarcastic fashion - with the online world.

So, I'm back. We can call this version 2.0 of my blog (or, more appropriately 3.0, if one counts my very very old Xanga blog); my blog reloaded, if you will. The key difference this time is that I'll be blogging anonymously. I dislike anonymous blogging in general - if you're willing to put certain thoughts out on the World Wide Interweb of Tubes, you should at least be willing to put your name on those thoughts. My old blog was published under my real name for that reason. Unfortunately, I am concerned about the effect a blog with my name on it will have in my line of work. It's not that I generally publish articles that are offensive or inappropriate - it's just that my efforts at sanitizing Google of unflattering references to me have been largely successful up until now, and I'd like to keep it that way.

So, in the absence of using my real name, I've decided to adopt the pseudonym of Thomas J. "Tommy" Carcetti, the ambitious and sleazy mayoral candidate (and later mayor of Baltimore) from HBO's The Wire. I won't be blogging as Carcetti - these will be my thoughts, simply published under Carcetti's name. I'm not wild about this solution, but this seems to be best for all involved.

Enjoy. I'm looking forward to writing again. I've got a few things planned for the future - like a review of Grand Theft Auto IV, sarcastic discussions on NYT editorials, and even an analysis of who would win in a 2-on-2 basketball game between the Obamas and the Clintons. Check back soon!