It’s Been a Long Time, We Shouldn’t’ve Left You, Without a Dope Beat to Step to

Good morning, starshine! That hiatus sure lasted longer than we thought it would.  In the interim, the Mels and I have become professional blogging girls for real live companies.  Weird, right? Anyway, you can throw out your Save a Blog of Two Cities tshirts, delete that #RIPablogoftwocities tweet, and just generally stop your blubbering, because it looks like we’re back for Season 2. And booooy do we have a lot to catch up on!

Maru = The Best Cat In The World

So I should apologize to my brother and sister-in-law’s cats for that statement, but it’s true.  I’m sorry Lilly and Ender–you are adorable but you guys are not nearly as funny and palyful as Maru.  You’re probably asking, “Who is Maru?”  Well, Maru is a cat whose videos have been online for a while and they are freaking.hysterical.  He’s this chubby, overweight Scottish Fold residing in Japan who, “has a thing for putting himself into things.”  Anytime I’m feeling the teeniest bit sad, I just watch this chubbster dive into an empty soda can box or roll around in a garbage can.  Who knew that something so simple could be so amusing?  Even if you don’t like cats, this guy is an anomoly.  He’s playful and silly like a dog, but tries to maintain the dignity of a cat, which makes it even cuter.  Even if you don’t like cats, you will like this guy.  Trust me.

The clip above is my favorite, especially around the 1:50 mark, but if you want more, you should check out Maru’s blog.  Yes, a cat has a blog, but this one is funny so it’s worth checking out.  I promise you won’t be disappointed.

Based on a True Email

Subject: i didn’t read this article

but i like the picture.

BLOG HARDER!

Sent to you by Melanie via Google Reader:

Exploiting the Blog-to-Book Bubble: A Guide [Struggling Writers]

via Gawker by Alexia Tsotsis on 6/30/09

Two blogs, Texts From Last Night and Look at this Fucking Hipster, scored contracts at Penguin’s Gotham Books imprint in the past week, the latest in an endless series of such deals. Shouldn’t you get a piece of the action?

It’s not like there’s any shame in aiming for a book deal right when you start your blog. As the New York Observer puts it:

These days it seems more and more like people start goofy Web sites practically counting on seeing their stuff between two covers.

If someone’s going pay $20 for a bound collection of stale weblog posts, they might as well be yours. Here are some tips for living what seems like the new American Dream:

1. Focus on a hot technology like Twitter or iPhone apps – nothing scares the publishing industry more than a platform that basically makes it irrelevant.

2. Intimidate this shit out of people with your sheer Internet randomness. This worked well for “I Can Has Cheeseburger” and “Chuck Norris Facts,” two websites old people do not understand at all.

3. Racial commentary. (Well, it worked for that site about white people — Park Slope’s Blognigger still seems to be waiting on his book deal.)

4. Be this guy. (You’re next, Bonerparty. The world is watching.)

5. Three words: Stalk Patrick Mulligan: The editor who acquired “Texts” for Gotham, Patrick Mulligan, is like the Ari Gold of Tumblr-to-book deals, responsible for more of these deals than almost anyone else out there: Chuck Norris Facts, I Can Haz Cheezburger, Barack Obama Is Your New Bicycle and GraphJam.com the novels are all his doing.

Words of Wisdom from Patrick:

“Not all websites make great books,” Mr. Mulligan said in an email. “You have to be confident that you can curate the material in such a way that it still hits its audience while also taking advantage of the book medium. For the books that I’ve worked on… my aim is that the person in the bookstore who picks up a copy will fall in love with the material the same way as someone who stumbles onto the website.”

See you in hell Mulligan.

[Ed note: I would never buy these books.]