The short of it:
Dabble Babble is a place to read generally about a variety of topics. I’ll write about things that fascinate, amuse, or excite me. Think of it like a ‘zine written by a bit of a babbler as he dabbles in a little of this and a little of that. Playlists, thoughts on books that are cool, maybe some interviews. You never know! And neither do I! So, welcome. I do hope you’ll enjoy reading Dabble Babble.
Director’s cut:
Rewind back to the pre-internet days. Sure there was dial-up and bulletin board systems and all of that. But there were also ‘zines with their very generalist approach to topics of interest. One of my favorite zines ‘You’re Toast!’ was a collection of musings about, you guessed it, toast! Except it was also a collection of reviews of recent records listened to, books read, ghost sites visited and an advice column about training unruly dogs. There were guest articles by local cranks about potholes and occasionally a “think piece” from a local student at the university in town.
It was primarily a one-person effort—I never knew if the Toastmaster General was male or female, no one cared. And while the local cool record store often put an ad on the back page and you could subscribe by sending cash in an envelope to a P.O. Box, there were no sale pitches, no influencing, no product placement and oddly—from the POV of 2024—no dissertation on eating toast as a political act.
Fast forward to 2024 and pause. The conventional wisdom of the internet is that blogs are product placement or expert platforms to influence consumers. Didn’t that last sentence make you want to vomit?
Now, press play. This isn’t a blog about how to get rich quick, have million dollar abs (whatever the hell those are), or succeed at your McJob (here’s a little generational wisdom on that one: show up, shut up, and fly under the radar). This is a blog that dips into the many fascinating things in our world that have somehow become crowded out of discussion by the tedium of politics and “the hustle.”