By far, this is the most aptly titled blog I’ve ever read. At first glance Someone Called James seems like it would be a short read, being only two months old, but James has done a lot of writing in the last two months, pretty enjoyable writing at that.
James, an 18 year old living in the United Kingdom describes why he started his blog in his first entry as; “I just want somewhere to ramble on about my life, my thoughts, my feelings – infact just me in general.” Which is pretty much why we all started our weblogs. The differance between most weblogs and James’s, is that his is pretty interesting and at times, even though the author probably doesn’t realize it, is pretty gosh darn funny. In his January 2nd entry James writes about the breakup with his longtime girlfriend and how he has still remained good friends with her; “But i suppose in a way we never split up. We just stopped having sex – perhaps we got married when I wasn’t looking.” That comment is just hilarious!
Although this blog is only two months old, James is quite a prolific writer, I spent just as much time reading this weblog as I did reading weblogs that have been around for five or six months. There is no “About” section or “FAQ”, but by just reading this weblog’s entries for the last two months I felt I kind of knew who the author was. I think I found out more about him than an FAQ or “About” section could provide by just reading the blog. How rare is that?
The author doesn’t just talk about his own personal issues though, in his January 17th entry he takes the British media to task: “Maybe if they stopped moaning and looked at themselves, they would realise that the problem with Britain today isn’t asylum seakers, or rising crime, or the imaginary persecution of the ‘middle classes’, but the bigoted attitudes they encourage daily.”
The site design is user friendly, easy to read, I had no trouble navigating it, and had no trouble getting to the archives. There were no broken links.
I’m giving Someone Called James at 3.5, even though its only a couple months old, because this blog seems like a “true” journal. The author writes candidly about his personal life, its entertaining, and I enjoyed his dry humor. In a few months when there is more content this weblog will probably be a “five”. This journal has a pretty gosh darn good start. Three and a half stars, check it out.