Top 10 Bleakest Unpublished Blog Posts of 2009

Dec. 8, 2010
Tao Lin is a writer living in Manhattan, NY.

2. “Unseemlily Bleak” (February 24)

Seems like a desperate, ranting, tonally inconsistent blog post. Seems like I can currently relate to this blog post. I vaguely remember watching Caroline in some place. I don’t remember with who, or why. Just felt a bleakly impulsive yearning to return to that time, without knowing what that time was or why I would want to return to that time.

i’m getting mad hits, am i even real

i feel really depressed

if mad hits can’t fill the emptiness at the center of my being what can

what can

can anything

should i enter a 5-10 year phase where i ‘cultivate’ my emptiness

i think i have already been doing that but in a half-assed way the last 1-4 years, i’m really not sure

i really don’t know anything, for example i thought that i only want to think certain things about people who dislike things or say things or people are good or bad but then i thought some other things and got confused

i think ‘cultivating’ emptiness is like feeling extreme disinterest in sex and immediate gratification, having extremely low self-esteem to the point of ‘moving beyond’ self-esteem, only ever displaying a ‘neutral facial expression,’ being really clean, eating only raw vegan organic food, and containing the content of one’s internet presence within clean and modern designs featuring sans serif and non-blurry headers

just being really beautiful but not doing anything with it, like having it be an ends

maybe i should delete my myspace

is my myspace lowering the quality of the meaninglessness of my life

would a billion unique visitors do anything to me

or will i just look at statcounter sadly, and eat carbohydrates

am i worried about the future

i contemplated the future during the 3d movie ‘coraline’

i thought about responsibilities

i thought about ‘eeeee eee eeee’

i thought about studio apartments

last night i reread the fifth story in ‘bed,’ i felt very impressed, i appreciated my similes and metaphors

i stopped more than once to contemplate a particular adjective, adverb, or sentence structure

i saw many em-dashes

when my next two books come out people will realize i didn’t control my brain at all the past three years, like i didn’t plan its development, or i didn’t have people around me to make me consistent or something

i seem unfunctional, in the world, yet i keep going, things keep happening successful

hehe

i don’t know

fuckkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk

the canon is already closed to me, at 25, what kind of world is this, that i exist in

The last line seems unseemly. Not sure what I was trying to convey. Seems bleakly passive-aggressive. Not sure if I posted/unposted this blog post.

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  • mario

    sweet.

  • http://hbgwhem.tumblr.com/ hbgwhem.tumblr.com

    damn.
    i found feb 5th inspirational, then about 8 seconds after i finished reading it, before i clicked '6' i remembered this was a 'bleak' post countdown. got confused how i could be at #6 on the bleak list when i was on page 5. 7 seconds after i thought this, i received a text message that said, “Well I'm sure you won't have a 1 bedroom forever, I'm talking like future. I have 4 roommates so I have no room.”
    bleak as hell.

  • http://heheheheheheheeheheheehehe.com/ tao

    seems complexly bleak

  • elaine

    situation in #4 seemed inception-esque

  • http://twitter.com/t_baugh Travis Baugh

    seems like top 10 lists are becoming tao's gimmick. possibility of non-top 10 structured blog posts in the future seems “bleak”

  • http://popserial.tumblr.com stephen

    lol/sweet/bleak/inspirational

  • http://twitter.com/t_baugh Travis Baugh

    “nice”

  • http://popserial.tumblr.com stephen

    “are you shit-talking commenters as well”

  • http://popserial.tumblr.com stephen

    “are you shit-talking commenters as well”

  • http://twitter.com/t_baugh Travis Baugh

    damn

  • http://tomhankssuperfan.blogspot.com megan boyle

    keep looking at 'thank you for your time' and ~5 lines preceding it with something like 'awe-stricken fondness + amusement'

    remembered feeling excited re getting 'tagged' in #3

  • link

    accidentally read this as “Top 10 breakfasts unpublished blog posts of 2009……….” was actually kinda excited about that.

  • http://steveroggenbuck.com steve roggenbuck

    nice i really appreciated these
    yeah the end of #1 is wonderful

  • anon

    This is great.

    lol @ “magically bleak”

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Parker-Baldin/516709205 Parker Baldin

    feels like some blog posts are in a ‘first’ or ‘not ready for publication’ stage and they’re written for you. Like to read at a different point in time. Have a bleak voice. Feels ‘hopeless’ and ‘in a state of desperation’ and possibly ‘cruel.’ Seems interesting how you ‘converse with self.’

    Posts seemed ‘philosophical’ at times. Almost ‘beautiful’ / ‘harmony korine strange’ re blog post #8. wish more ‘weird’ blog posts existed. More non sequiturs in terms of blog ‘as a whole.’

  • http://heheheheheheheeheheheehehe.com/ tao

    sweet

  • http://heheheheheheheeheheheehehe.com/ tao

    sweet

  • http://heheheheheheheeheheheehehe.com/ tao

    sweet

  • http://heheheheheheheeheheheehehe.com/ tao

    sweet

  • http://brianmcelmurry.blogspot.com/ Brian McElmurry

    When I was a kid I pretended to be sick on the day my elementary school class went to LA to watch the play “WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE.” I found out the next day. I regret it now. When I think the word “bleak,” I think, “that's Tao Lin's word.” Enjoyed all of this. Feel bleak.

  • dalas

    “i seem unfunctional, in the world, yet i keep going, things keep happening successful”

    I feel this way a lot.

  • Jordancastroisthepresident

    feels like i 'missed' 'this era' of your blog, to some degree

    trying to remember [posts] that were 'content-based' when i got in on your blog and seem to 'only' remember [the 'fall asleep immediately one']

    seems interesting/sweet

    just thought 'feel better able to understand “where you're coming from”' while not experiencing any feeling like [aformentioned feeling]

  • http://twitter.com/waxdustcoat A.M. THOMAS

    seems bleak that i don't find many of these posts bleak.

  • http://heheheheheheheeheheheehehe.com/ tao

    sweet

    will do a 'bleakest of 2008' soon i think

    sweet ass

  • http://heheheheheheheeheheheehehe.com/ tao

    sweet

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