Compadre Padre, or How I Wish Individuality Was Not The New Conformity

I am afraid to say it, but individuality really is the new conformity (I didn't make this up, it's a book that I am reading). Over the last few days I have been doing lots of blog browsing, and only recently realised that if you view someone's profile you can click on anything they have entered and a list of all other blogs with the same entry will come up. It's nice to know that 1000 people like my favourite book, and 2,500 like my other favourite. But I realised that it's all about trying to be an individual within a morass of same-same when I noticed that 12 people have listed "maintaining my sanity" as an interest, and 54 "watching the world go by"*. I think that a level of comfort comes from knowing that you exist among a likeminded (virtual) community, yet there is something unique about you. For instance, although my literary tastes are not terribly individual, I am so far the only blogger with an interest in pear flavoured vodka. I am sure this is only a matter of time though; it's a new flavour.

Anyhoon (I just invented that word - trying to be an individual by increasing my idiolect) on to the first part of my title. Compadre Padre (never studied Spanish - no idea if I have spelt that right) is what I have dubbed Pastor John Wiuff from Oregon - he and I are the only two bloggers with an interst in "real tea". I am sure he is a lovely, Goddish man but a glance at his blog was enough to scare me into doing some work on my thesis, and to contemplate giving up my fondness for real tea.... well I suppose I could just call it "leaf tea", then our blogs would no longer be linked.

He has called his blog "Crossview" and no, it is not the vista of an irritable person a al Grumpy Old Men, it is indeed the view from a cross. Let's not forget that there is more than one person who has been crucified. Are we supposed to assume he thinks he is Jesus - surely a problem for the hardcore Christian community to swallow - or that he thinks he was one of the robbers(?) who was crucified next to Jesus? In a way, this choice of blog title reminds me of Trinny and Susannah. Just like some people on their show who follow the letter of the rules but entirely miss the spirit ("but it's got a nipped in waist" "yes, but it's ugly!") he has chosen some element of Christian paraphenalia to use, but not really thought through the consequences. Anyway, oops I mean Anyhoon - I'll stop my ranting now to go away and contemplate some alternative blog titles for the Padre.

*including a dog blog, written by her She Boss.

PS a little pimp for my site (and I mean pimp in the promotion sense, not in the MTV "make glitzy" sense, which someone used in an essay I marked last semester): down the bottom of the page are some links to more time wasting opportunities