a post about why this post is not about Don Draper

It's way past being the cool thing to do, but I can't get past the gnawing feeling that for the betterment of my site traffic and overall digital cool, I should be liveblogging Mad Men, or at least regularly reacting to it in some way.

But I just don't give a shit.

Don't get me wrong; I actually quite like the show. The writing has terrific depth, the characters and actors are very strong, and the art direction is brilliant. I watched it very intermittently for the first three seasons, but the end of season three grabbed me and I've seen most of the current season so far.

I don't care about the minutiae of it; I don't obsess about it from minute to minute, or show to show, like the best bloggers seem to. And I can't write coherently while being involved in watching something with anything like close attention. I'm not sure anyone can actually write decently in those circumstances.

Besides, the show's not about advertising, is it. Advertising is just a convenient bag o' metaphors for playing with identity, reality, sexuality, TV, alcoholism and other fun stuff. It's a glamorous and sexy environment in which to watch people being stripped of everything they have, and losing all the things that make them who they are.

Mad Men is looking more and more to me like the Book of Job. And Elihu really isn't someone I want to imitate.