Whatever Best of 2007
Posted on December 24, 2007 Posted by John Scalzi 14 Comments
2007 was a very messy year for the Whatever, thanks to various horrible technical difficulties that more or less wiped most of August and September off the map, in terms of entries. Be that as it may, I still managed to get off some pretty good pieces this year. Here are some of my favorites and/or most popular posts for 2007.
Incidentally, please note that if you try to comment on any entry dated before September 30, 2007, your comment will not go through. Remember those horrible technical difficulties? Right, then.
- How DRM is Like Guantanamo
- What to Know Before You Ask Me to Read Your (Unpublished) Work
- White Castle = Not Hamburgers
- The Existential Plight of Chester Chipmate
- The Scathing Review Winner, or, This May Be the Best Whatever Entry Ever
- Reader Request Week 2007 #4: The Inevitable Blackness That Will Engulf Us All
- Reader Request 2007 #5: Out of Poverty
- What Sex is Sam Berlant?
- The Dictator of Writing Announces His Decrees, Part I
- On Teens, and the Fact Their Writing Sucks
- Hey Kids! Let’s Grade Ben Myers’ Snark!
- Jesus’ Dickheads
- A Book Reading Meme
- When Stupid People Do Stupid Things, And Then Do Even Stupider Things
- How to Irritate and Annoy People in the Name of Blogging
- The Big Three
- What Authors Know About Their Characters
- Your Creation Museum Report
- The Zombie Robert Heinlein Rises From the Grave Yet Again to Annoy the Politically Correct
Not on Whatever, but worth reading anyway: Scabs and Peasants.
Have a great Christmas Eve.
There should be an asterisk by the Scathing Review entry. That thing is in a league all it’s own, and it is damn hazardous to read. I have never laughed so hard as I did reading that. It literally hurt me.
Ooops… “All its own.”
It’s been a long day… Don’t beat me. And, if you must flog me, please use something soft and wet… Like the tongue of a happy cow.
Regarding Ben Meyers,from early July (couldn’t post it there for some reason)
I was rooting for you, but he won in a rollover with “you’re sci-fi people.”
That’s like getting called “ni**er”… there’s really no comeback, other than to be the better man and walk away… or to dole out the ass-kicking, but he already called you on that, too.
You should have just ignored this guy… attack humor isn’t your specialty, and your appeal (to me, anyhow) is your niceguyedness.
Write a few more books, develop a bigger fan base, and let your pests (Hi!) deal with the haters.
Also…never bring Athena into your beefs. When you do…she’s fair game. Once he hits her, you actually have to live up to that pipe-beating threat you seemed to have made.
Props for taking on a Limey on July 3rd,though… but again, this is one you should have turned over to the French girl.
Stacey:
Re: Myers: Well, no. Being called a “sci-fi person” is in actuality not even remotely like being called a nigger — they’re both meant as insults, but calling someone the former just means you’re lame, while the latter means you’re likely a racist prick. Likewise, I’ve dealt with people who chose to insult my daughter before. It isn’t pretty for them.
Re: nice: I’m not as nice here as I am over on By The Way, where you are familiar with me, nor have I ever been. It’s one of the major tonal differences between the two. Indeed, it’s one of the reasons I have almost never pointed to this site from By the Way.
I remember Reader Request #4 with particular fondness. I want to make a copy of it for the next time the Inevitable Blackness visits me.
Jeez! I missed the whole “Racist Backtracking at its Finest” conflagration. I believe I had just started a new job and it must have cut into my “wasting time on the intertoobs” time. Crap. And sadly, the links on that post don’t work.
Mr. Scalzi,
It was, indeed, a fine year on the Whatever. Thanks for keeping us entertained and then inspiring us to entertain each other while you were too busy to stay directly involved. My favorite blog, bar none.
As to the Suggestion Box…just keep doing what you’re doing. (By which I mean, surprising us on a regular basis because Whatever really means “Whut—evar”.)
Considering the amount of time I spent here in the last year, I’m amazed at the number of posts I missed. Thanks for the wrap up, nice xmas present, Scalzi.
And as to the suggestion box, what Nathan said.
Racists have no real excuse, other than being dropped on their heads at birth.
White Castle? Started in my home town. Left my home town somewhere around the time I was born. Never came back, for which we are extremely grateful. Instead we now have Spangles, for which we are also grateful. Cheesy faux-’50s interiors and cheap commercials and all.
Johm R. Scalzi! Sweet!
You have more restraint than I. If someone went after my kid like that, I’d have them murdered.
I think you’re wrong about the nice guy part, though… but I’m pretty East Coast, and you might pass for riled in the mid-west.
Well, I think I’m a nice guy, too. I just don’t worry about it here when I’m not.
Ahhhh, good times. Good times. :)
Happy New Year to you too!
Happy Christmas, and a wonderful New Year to you and yours, most especially to your snarky daughter and your much-abused cat.
And kids are IMHO almost never fair game — they are certainly not fair game in their parents’ blogs. There is no open season on children that I’m aware of; if there is, please show us your tags.
People who go after children, OTOH, are not only fair game in my book, but abusing such people should be encouraged.