Steve Almond: The raunchy candyfreak blog-hater now has a blog

BLOGGER-IN-TRAINING: Another author falls victim to the lure of instant publishing

We've spent part of our late morning reading about local author Steve Almond and his offspring Josie over at his new Baby Daddy Babble blog. It's interesting and witty stuff -- seriously. But just for the sake of clarification, let's get one thing out of the way. Blogs are okay so long as they've got the seal of coolness approval from Nerve, but they're definitely not appropriate when people start one to talk shit about you and your writing.

Glad we've slapped ourselves straight. Of course, none of this has anything to do with the fact that we have read and reread the stories in My Life in Heavy Metal countless times. This half of Word Up completely adores that book -- about as much as these people loath it, not to mention Almond himself. This link will take you to an excerpt from one of our favorite stories in the collection. Prime reading for a post-NYE day of distraction. Decide for yourselves if Almond's worth his contrary bloggishness.