386. Since you asked...

... here's the my-trip-to-Madison backstory.

Jocelyn asked me a very good question recently. (I love questions!) In a recent comment she asked how I met my internet Madison friends. My trip is a curiosity to many people over here, too. Those many have asked me who found whose blog first, and (the real meaty question) what on-god's-green-earth prompted me to go all the way to the Midwest to meet a bunch of "strangers."

I have other things I wanted to write about before tackling this one (like Chicago, my Frank Lloyd Wright tours, funny-or-sweet-to-me interactions with locals, more pictures, etc...), but today on Tonya's blog, The Tonya Show (don't tell me you don't read this cool blog!), she posed some very good questions about meeting people in real life versus the virtual life we bloggers enjoy, and I feel inspired to tell my Madison story.

I started my blog in January 2005. Moral Turpitude, from Madison, was the third person to comment on my blog in February or March. (Her blog from that time can be found here.) Moral found me on my old employee's blog. (He never commented on my blog.) Her comment led me to her blog. I was flattered that someone so funny and witty liked my blog. It was love at first blog. (Okay, that sounds weird! But it's true.) Then Moral's law school classmate Freakin' Rican became a regular commenter, and I in turn, started reading his blog.

A little while later, much to my happy surprise, Oscar Madison awarded me the B.O.W. (Blog of the Week) award. (The links on his site are broken. I've since changed my url and the spelling of my name.) It's been almost a year, and I don't recall whether he posted any comments to my blog, or me to his, prior to the award. I asked him, and he doesn't remember either. (By the way, I'm not saying that Oscar is from Madison, but his name is, and that's close enough for me.)

I thought of Moral and Rican as my blog-posse. We all just clicked. They would occasionally ask me, "When are you coming to Madison for visit?" I'd always say "soon," thinking that they were just being nice. As the months rolled on, I started to get the feeling that they wanted to meet me as much as I wanted to meet them.

While the "soon" was still in the consideration phase, albeit serious consideration, I really started getting into Oscar's blog, too. I loved his travel stories and existential Friday posts. His comments on my blog were witty and always thoughtful.

I used to joke to R (and still do) that I should move to Madison. I "got" the people there and they seemed to "get" me. (Let's just say in my real life I'm usually the only person laughing at things I consider blog-worthy. My friends are funny, but our sense of humor doesn't always mesh.) It was also interesting to me that not only were these cool people from Madison, but they were also in law. (I thoroughly enjoy working in my friend's law office when I have the time.)

A cute little goblin often left quirky funny comments on Moral's blog. One day she graced my blog with her cricket and cute goblin self. Sleep Goblin lives... Any guesses? That's right: Madison. She's another cute and lovable blog personality who didn't disappoint in person.

Tom Bozzo (Madison) started leaving comments on my blog during the latter part of last year, if I remember correctly. His comment said he found me via Oscar's site. I blame (or more accurately, credit) my car posts though! Tom has great taste in cars as well as a wealth of knowledge about them. I was a lurker on Tom's blog for a little while prior to his comment. I think I might have even left a comment on one of his political posts, although my memory is sketchy...

Sara (from Madison) and I share a funny story, thanks to Mike (San Francisco, and we haven't met yet) and his blog I Am Prepared to Give Up at Any Time. Sara and I both tagged Mike, independently, with one of those silly blog memes. Mike made-up and wrote a funny little story about Sara and I before further humoring us and answering the darn thing. You can read it here. The post is good fun and even talks about a tickle fight. (Oh la la!) When I was in Madison, at Tom's house where we all met for dinner--Sara, Suzanne, Tom, and I--Sara shared that "tickle" is also a computer programmer thing. (Don't ask me to elaborate. We're all lucky I even remembered it had to do with computers.)

After Mike's post, Sara left a comment on my blog. I think my reply was something like, "Hey! It's Sara from Mike's blog!" I was so excited that she popped over to my place.

Admittedly, I was a lurker on Tom's and Sara's blogs long before comments were left either by them on my blog, or by me on theirs.

I probably lurked on Tonya's blog the longest before leaving a comment. I finally left a comment, because at that point I knew I was visiting Madison, and I really wanted to meet Tonya. I thought she was a very cool person, and knew I would regret it if I didn't make my move, stop being a stranger, and comment. I'm so glad I did!

(You guys do know that I'm kind of shy and a little insecure, right? If you haven't noticed yet, most of my blog friends left comments on my blog first.)

Since the summer of last year, I knew that I would be visiting Madison. Moral Turpitude and Freakin' Rican were good enough reasons last year for me to do so, but I wasn't ready. My insecurities and paranoia held me back. What if people think I'm weird flying to Madison to meet internet friends? What if Moral and Rican are disappointed? I'm really not as funny and witty as I may seem in my blog. What if they are completely different in person?

It so happened that Oscar Madison and B were going to take a trip to California this past March. I was excited to get an e-mail letting me know that he'd like to meet me. Unfortunately, they both were too sick to travel when the time came. I was disappointed when they cancelled their trip. This only added to my travel-to-meet-bloggers bug!

All my other "what ifs" started to sound pretty lame. Although I've got a stubborn insecurity streak, I'm pretty brave, and willing to take risks. I left a cushy job at the age of 23, after all, to start a company with R. There have been many other risks that I've taken, and although some of them didn't pan out, I never once regretted taking them. The risks I didn't take are the only ones I regret.

Compared to big life risks I've taken, traveling to Madison hardly seemed like a risk at all. First, I read these blogs for a reason: I liked the writers. Normally, I'm drawn to smart, nice, and witty people. It seemed highly unlikely that the blogs and bloggers would result in me having to suffer stupid, rude, and non-good-humored people. Second, if I ended up not liking the people I met... so what? I'd still be in a city I've never visited before, and if it was really bad, I could just fly back home. If they didn't like me, well, what's the worse that could happen, and couldn't I take care of myself? As R and other friends say, "Who wouldn't like you?" Whatever that means... :) It means I have nice friends here, too.

There you have it. Even though my trip to New York got postponed (business-related stuff), my heart was still set to go to Madison and meet wonderful "strangers."