First try

I blame my friend Don. (Of course, I blame my friend Don for a LOT of things, but I digress...) See, one of the coolest things that ever happened to me was meeting my friend Don. He is pretty amazing. He is an author, a teacher, an actor, a director, a father and, if I am reading his blog correctly (found here), some sort of raccoon wrangler. And that's part of the problem. He has accomplished so much that, once I met him, I felt positively inadequate. I mean, I had always wanted to do a lot of the things that he had already DONE. And so, with no disrepect to Don, I decided that, hell, if HE could do it, why couldn't I?

This line of thinking has led me into a number of odd, and strangely satisfying, circumstances. He has directed me in no less than 3 stage productions, he cast me in a movie, he helped me get cast in a webisode of "Stranger Things", he has shared his writings with me, and he has been gracious enough to return the favour by reading some of my own scratchings. All in all, it has been a very productive friendship, on top of the genuine affection we feel for each other. For me, at least. (Honestly, I'm still not sure what Don gets out of it...)

Which is all to say that when I learned that Don had started a blog, I had to check it out. And once I did, I realized that starting my own blog (something that I had been toying with for far too long) was as simple as filling in my Gmail account info. And so here I am.

So, if you find yourself bored, annoyed, insulted or indignant by anything I may write, you may join me in blaming my friend Don. If, however, you find yourself entertained, intrigued, delighted or tickled by anything you read here, you're welcome. Glad I could help. :)

(Actually, it's not fair to blame Don ENTIRELY for this. My wife got me started on Facebook, and that kind of added fuel to my "It might be kind of cool to start a blog" fire.)

So, here I am. You may be wondering about the title (and if not, bear with me...) - I kind of liked the variety of "n" sounds, with different spellings. Plus, I figured "Notes" applied to this overall blog, "Gnats" can describe the odd annoyance I may discuss here, and "Knots" points to certin "knotty" issues that I like to chew on occasionally.

I will confess to a certain continuing ambiguity about this whole "blog" concept. It has always seemed to me that the entire idea of having a running commentary online was, well, rather arrogant. I mean, honestly, who the hell CARES what I think, about anything? And certainly, among the vast impersonal hordes of the Internet, why should anyone presume that their voice is "worthy" of broadcasting.

However, I believe I can see a certain appeal. And in fact, it's Facebook that has given me the clue. See, I felt about "social networking" sites much the same way I felt about blogging - "What kind of arrogant jerk fills a website with info about themselves?" But then I got a Facebook page. And suddenly friends were commenting on things that I had said. Regardless of my own conviction of my basic lack of importance in the overall scheme of things, people were actually reading what I had written, and even better, acknowledging what I had written.

Bingo! Suddenly the appeal of blogs, and Facebook, became crystal clear. It's not a matter of "Hey! Listen to me! It's important that you hear about what kind of breakfast cereal I ate this morning!" In fact, I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that most bloggers are convinced their writing is unimportant drivel (this blog being an excellent example!). However, because they are willing to throw their drivel up on that drive-in screen that is the Internet, they open themselves up to feedback. Good, bad, indifferent, I'm not sure it matters. What matters is the knowledge that "Hey! I'm not alone out here! Somebody noticed me and my thoughts!" Which, I suppose, reflects their (my) insecurities as much as my previous theory reflected their (my) arrogance. (And even though I am convinced insecurity and arrogance are two sides of the same coin, that's a topic for another blog...)

So, welcome! I hope you enjoy what you find here. And more importantly, I hope you'll say hi. It can get lonely out here on the Information Superhighway. :)