My Last Post

Dear Y'all,

In trying to wrap things up, I got all nostalgic and went back to re-read my first post - the first post on TDJ ever:

Saturday, April 10, 2004
- posted by Mail Clerk @ 12:24 PM

WHO ARE WE?:
The folks who post here are mostly musicians and/or artists from Athens, GA who have day jobs and are often bored at them. Whatever subculture that creates, we write about it. From time to time, we'll have guest contributers who aren't afraid to be known by their real names (unlike the blatant cowards to run this thing), but mostly this'll hopefully just be a great place to kill some time, find links to other cool places to kill more time when you should be working, and read about things Athens.

So, welcome.

First thought: Why the hell did I start posting on a blog about wasting time at work while I was at home on a Saturday (and up early it looks like!)? Second thought: "...the blatant cowards to run this thing..." - A typo on post one. Some things never change. Third thought: I guess I stayed pretty true to that goal. Ran out of office culture to mock after a while, but the Athens thing kept on.

Time to spill the beans... Here's my contribution in a nutshell: returned to Athens from L.A. to make a documentary about Athens music (which I still haven't finished - grad school is what it is). Took a job at the UGA Office of Undergrad Admissions. Got really bored. Knew Computer Support who wanted to get in on this whole blogging thing. We decided to blog about the few things we had inside knowledge about: hating our jobs and loving Athens music/culture. So this was our blog.

Early on, a robot with Tourette's invaded the system. A few bloggers came and went over the years as Computer Support, Legal Bitch, Desktop Publisher and I remained pretty constant (cheers to anyone who remembers when No Job posted here). Sloan Simpson rose to prominence in Athens culture and we helped bug him till he started the awesomest blog ever. We had series such as "Time-Wasting Tips" and "Tales From The Real O.C." and of course "Tonight In Athens". We bugged Flagpole a lot, but in good spirits. The Heckler came to hang out. Pylon came back and it was awesome. We scooped that story and got a link from Pitchfork and probably like the most hits ever. At other times, mentioned by some great, well-respected music blogs and even the guy who was running Spin Magazine a few years back, which was odd. Had a significant negative effect on Google image search for local bands. Robo made fun of Overflo. Head made fun of Robo. I went back to grad school and stopped going out as much (the latter necessary but not necessarily great). CS left to go be a hippie and then returned to his hipster roots. Mike White brought us great photos. LB quietly stopped posting and then went to make jewelry. We continued to post EVERY workday (with very few exceptions). Great bands went, great new bands started. And Athens rolls on.

Sorry if all that seems self-important - I'm cashing in on 4 years and 3 months worth of nostalgia (and it's how I spent my late 20's). But the people taking over are fantastic. Desktop Publisher y'all know. She'll be running things here. Lazy Student and Library Troll have already done great work and I'm sure we'll read a lot more from them soon. I'll still be reading TDJ daily and probably jumping in the fray with the commenters.

THANK YOU VERY MUCH for reading all the crap I've been writing. We get about 300 separate people who read this site every workday - which I never would have imagined starting out. That's a lot of wasted work time and it feels great, doesn't it? Thanks also to the musicians... I've already thrown all the praise I can, but you know you make this town go 'round. Thanks to CS for starting this site and giving me something to do for these last few years and to all the TDJ bloggers for keeping me reading this site instead of just writing it - mostly, they all wrote better stuff than me. Thanks to my fiance (Vet Pharmacist) for weird news contributions, occasional hilarious comments, and general support or at least tolerance of being ignored in favor of a computer nightly (literally since we met). Lastly, thanks to my fellow bloggers (esp. Gardner who inspired us to start a blog and Hillary who supported us in the beginning), AMdC, AMdN, AthFest folks - you made us feel like real journalists!, club/bar owners (What's up Kaya?), students, real journalists (any of you out there?), commenters (keep 'em coming!), friends not otherwise covered, etc.

So now I'm old and leaving Athens to "work", and I have some awesome memories. Thanks y'all!

Rock On,
-Will
(Sorry if you thought I was someone cooler.)

PS See y'all on the 26th at the Caledonia. 5 PM. Be there or be square, Athens.