EiNY is One Today

It’s EiNY’s first anniversary.

The past year has been a lot of fun and a great learning experience in so many ways. I’ve made new friends, had new ideas, been introduced to many different points of view and discovered great writers who I would never have found in any other medium.

When I began I hardly new what a blog was and neither did most of my friends. Now some of them have launched blogs of their own. To celebrate I thought it would be fitting to round up those blogs launched by my friends from the offline world and hopefully inspired, in part, by this blog.

Simon’s Brain is the musings of a talented writer trapped inside the body of a dry, self-effacing Lancastrian.

Simon lives only a few blocks from me in Park Slope, Brooklyn. He has a great voice and an entertaining way of charting his exploits as a first-time father. He’s also passionate about music and has just started posting audio files.

If you live in or near the neighborhood, invite him out for a beer.

Lowercase L. Only William Levin could come up with the idea for a weblog based on the misuse of lowercase L’s in otherwise uppercase signage. But he did. And he’s making it work.

It’s a great idea for a weblog because it encourages people to contribute outside of the comments box. He’s already had a few submissions from people outside New York and it’s only a matter of time until submissions increase as William’s pet peeve seeps into the minds of others. (I’ve had my eye out for one for months and yet somehow failed miserably.)

Look out for lowercase L’s and send them to William.

Broke in Berlin. Dezik is a good friend of mine from university (the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University of London) who I may never have reconnected with if it wasn’t for our respective blogs.

He is one of the most talented linguists and passionate Slavophiles I know. His weblog is not only entertaining and eclectic, but it is the only one I know of that monitors Belorussian media and politics in Russian and in English. Lately, his writing has been prolific.

The Diary of Disenfranchised Booksellers. Liukchik is another friend of mine from university. I don’t think any description would do this co-authored blog much justice, so I will leave you with one of Luke’s latest posts, entitled My Top Five Things At The Moment. It sums him up perfectly:

1. Moondog: Viking of Sixth Avenue, a CD by a homeless NYC percussionist who dressed as Viking and was friends with John Coltrane
2. Dostoevskii’s Notes From The Underground – I have read this more times than I care to remember, and it never ceases to amaze me
3. The Central Line – 25 minutes from Ealing to work (and back again) and much more reliable than the Northern Line
4. The list of delightfully expressive Spanish swearing left for me by our guests last weekend (Gracias, Pablito, Susanna & Vanessa)
5. Our stained glass window, through which car lights cast the outlines of angels onto the wall behind me.

The Old Brain Pan. Launched by my friend Nick only a few weeks ago and already getting into scrapes in the blogosphere. Nick is a well-read, articulate and passionate thinker and writer. Judging by conversations we have had over the past few months there will be many more.

Of course there are new friends I have made who turned out to be bloggers like Jen of Nonsense Verse and Brendan of Quixotic Optimism. There are also bloggers from around the world who I hope to meet one day for discussions in the coffee shops and bars of New York.

My only regret is that some of you with passion and opinions are still reading this thing when you should be writing a blog of your own. You know who you are. Just go to blogger.com and give it a try. It takes less than a minute to set up a blog. It may be the best thing you do this week.