Mother, May I Sleep with Treacher?

You bring happiness into our lives when we read your posts. That's worth something, right?

Chicks?

Power, the ultimate aphrodisiac.

Didn't Freud say blogging was a form of masturbation?

dudes?

Adoration.

If that doesn't work...

Not getting beaten by a mob.

The private jet, multi-million dollar mansion, and fully stocked wine celler funded by your blogads revenue?

basically jack shit

Well, I guess this way you get to vent, and then you comments from other people, like us.

The alterenative is a lot of muttering in the dark (or, maybe, yelling at the tee-vee), and the only feedback you get from that sorta thing is from the voices in your head.

--Some kind of desire to KEEP BLOGGING. Sick addiction, man. Worse than methadone.

--Carpal tunnel - if you're lucky.

--The delay of the inevitable crowing by "SGT" Micah Wright that he "outlasted you on the Internet"

--a bunny, perhaps with a pancake on his head

--Occasional, intermittent ego strokes punctuated by scads of idiots telling you what a jerk you are

--The chance to sing a duet with the corpse of Al Jolson on "The Beer Barrel Polka" while half-naked, covered in Devon double cream, hanging from the roof by a wire rope that keeps digging into your lederhosen, and enthusiastically pelted with fresh garden produce from the neighbor's yard. Oh, wait. That was what I did last night, not blogging. Sorry.

--Ten more stinking comments on a five word post than I ever get. Feh.

--Nothing's "in" it, silly, it's just digital ones and zeroes! You have to think conceptually here. Try to stay with me on this one.

--The hope that some day, perhaps she'll see your plaintive squeaking on the 'net and finally come back to you, having forsaken the rutabaga salesman for a real man. Keep that hope alive, son, no matter how plainly obvious it is that nothing of the sort will happen. I need you to keep working on this so I can sell your work to Chinese protest poster manufacturers.

--It gives me the chance to say "rutabaga", and shouldn't that be enough? Here, I'll do it again. Rutabaga. Rutabaga. Ahhhhh.

--Me, me, me, always with the "what's in it for me". What about thinking about the Azerbaijanis for once? Heh? Who do you think put you through that school?

--Beatification two and a half years following your death, followed by sainthood and temples in your name. Prices on your used underwear on EBay are already skyrocketing, so it's a shoo-in.

--Nothing, nothing at all. There's nothing. Might as well pack it all in, and not just the blogging. Remember, regular not electric razor, and it's down the road, not across the street when you make that all-important first cut.

Getting the voices in print, and out of your head?

Dude, you were in the WSJ.

What about the great feeling you get from knowing you're better than regular people?

What about being an illiterate clown who's still more respected than all the educators in the country put together?

* the ego stroke of daily 100,000 hits (2500 uniques) of your loyal army who come back again and again (F5! F5!) seeking more, anything, just more, of you.

* Three words: Blog groupie chicks

* Keep the underappreciated and dying art of "comic book photoshop" humor alive.

* a loyal army of the most clever and witty commenters in all of "Wedia." Which leads us to...

* Get to coin new words, though I still liked "pajamedia"

* That whole Wall Street Journal thing was most cool. (Nothing like mocking someone without them knowing they're being mocked.) I'll bet that James Taranto even has you in his Outlook Address Book.

* You get to change the subtitle of your blogsite to cryptic things just to mess with people and impact Google searches.

* Michelle Malkin knows who you are.

* beat us, slap us, kick us... just don't ignore us. We'll come back in pretty much any of the above circumstances. Often, multiple times daily.

The incomparable joy of hearing people say things like "He's not as funny as The Superficial."

Instapundit keeps pimping your "we-dia" word.

You don't know either??

One word: validation

More pornographic spam than you could ever dream of.

Plus, the link whores....never underestimate the link whores.

"What about being an illiterate clown who's still more respected than all the educators in the country put together?"

I second that emotion.

From the sound of things, a mention on the Wall Street Journal opinion website and precious little else (though let's face it, you know Dan Rather's been hit with the "Queen of the Space Unicorns" joke to his face at least twice).

Well, I guess that depends on how that Oral Sex Donation button is working out.

Occasionally, Puce is in it for you.

Nothing.

Nothing at all. Ever.

Zero, zilch, nada.

Or, just a vague sense of regret later on, when you realize how much time and effort you put into something that ends up netting you nothing in return.

the ceaseless stream of witty tre(a)nchant comments?

Bitterness!

Guacamole.

A digital trail you can't erase.

Free animal sex pictures!

At least, that's what the comment spam will say here a year from now.

maybe you'll eventually give a shit about the people who post here. maybe you'll use words like "interactive" and "community" in public and not feel like you're selling dot com stocks to your poor relatives.

but i doubt it.

You get the validation that can only come from typing six words and then having nerds from all over the world flock to respond.

That Dolph stuff was pure gold! Just wanted to say ;) (Plus, us swedes are recognition whores - we get all soft and mushy anytime an american mentions anything/anyone swedish)

Highly intellectual and STD-safe mental mastubation...with friends.

Well, blogging gives you a place to give J.J. Abrams a big Fuck You.

Who the hell is J.J. Abrams, anyway?

Another day older and deeper in debt...

Not much, apparently.

A broader appreciation for your wit than could be had any other way short of writing a book or developing a killer standup routine.

Whether or not it produces any financial gains or losses, that's something.

If it can be translated into greater personal satisfaction, networked to reach a larger audience, or developed into a more commercially rewarding activity, there could be much more in it for you.

Until then, though, just recognize how many hours of lost productivity you've caused in your readers. That's lowered the GDP of the strongest country on the globe, afflicted Alan Greenspan with nightmares, caused Andrea Mitchell to move to the couch to sleep, where she's begun fantasizing about George Soros.

I mean, how much more can a humorist ask for than that?

You can add "Noted Internet Thinker" to your resume.

Links and kudos from me.

I miss your posts, Jim.

instead of doing my usual belated birthday thing, i thought i'd do it early this year, Jim. Happy happy premature birthday!

Do it for the money. Google's AdSense program is easy to sign up for and even if it only brings in a dollar a day, at least that's something.