The celebration is today. That’s why I’m six days early.
It was exactly one decade ago today. Ten years. 120 months. And probably many more months, fortnights, days, etc. A man had an idea. To blog about the wondrous works of animated whimsy from Warner Bros. That man, was my father. He had this son, who had been watching the cartoons for at least ten years, and obsessing over them for at least five. Naturally, when someone is obsessed with something, they never shut up about it.
Either my dad was sick of hearing about things he was too busy to watch, or he wanted his kid to share his knowledge with the rest of the world for a change. Either way, he suggested the kid start a blog. That kid, was me. And how did I respond? A shrug, and a “Sure, why not?” (I don’t get excited over much. One of the “perks” of being autistic.) With his help, I set me up at a little slice of Squaespace.com, named the site after my favorite animated work, and I was ready to inform the masses of what they had been missing.
But you wouldn’t know that from those early posts. As I’ve stated before, I acted like whoever would be reading had just watched the cartoon in question and was now just on the lookout for other opinions. Even then, I managed to spit out maybe an underfed paragraph at most. (Actually, I’m kind of glad I did that. Everyone already knows the plots of those cartoons.) I was enjoying myself fine enough, but I won’t lie: I was originally just doing it to try and get some attention about something I knew. Maybe meet a cute girl, make some fans, get a job in the animation industry? I was fifteen. I could afford such ludicrous dreams.
Luckily, the more I kept at it, the more I not only improved, but started to enjoy blogging for the sake of blogging. It got to the point, where I had actually started to have some pride in what I was writing, and wanted to continue to not only improve my skills as a writer, but make the site look better. I started to add pictures, video clips, and credits. I also decided to do what many would figure obvious, offer a plot synopsis. I learned to trust my own sense of humor, and not worry too much about being like other people online. I even ditched Squarespace to come here, which has given me the opportunity to categorize my posts, and make navigation all the easier.
While nobody has ever called me out on this, I do feel the need to explain the “order” in which I talk about these pictures. Originally, I was quite blatantly just going through my DVD collection. (Though I coyly acted like it was done by my own choice.) I soon grew bored of that though. I should have just gone in chronological order, but it was harder to find everything online back in 2011, so I couldn’t do that, and it would have been odd to do it by this point, so I’ve just started picking shorts at random lately. Gives me the element of surprise, just like you.
And look at that, ten years already. This marking not only that milestone, but my 580th post as well. Not good for ten years work. Since I do other things besides blog, I’m still not all that close to being done to blogging about everything Looney. Still, I enjoy myself more and more with each week. It really has been good for me. Helping me develop my own writing style, and being good practice for working on my own books. I do tend to lean towards entertainment rather than information, but there’s plenty of other places online if you want more serious stuff. (I feel that my wackier side is pretty faithful to the cartoons I adore.)
If I’m allowed to be petty, I’ve still yet to get the attention I feel I deserve. If I’m allowed to show how I really feel: I’m very pleased with the feedback I have received. It’s pretty much been all positive. Sure, I’ve gotten a few comments telling me to correct things, but they weren’t mean about it. They just love the source material like me and want me to honor it justly. I’ve also gotten a bit of attention from the higher-ups. Tony Cervone, animation director of “Space Jam” himself found this humble blog, and he liked it. That was an honor and a half.
Really though, this blog is meant to help people rediscover old favorite cartoons, or maybe come around to being huge fans like me. As long as someone watched a Looney Tune and enjoyed it, then I’ve done what I need to. I can only wonder what the next ten years will contain. I’m nervous, excited, curious and even a little hungry. One thing for sure: It’s going to continue to be…WACKY!