IQ

Should probably update this at least once.

So. IQ. I think it's crap. Intelligence isn't strongly correlated with success, and that it is negatively correlated with happiness, and so on. And we also know that IQ is very rarely correlated with intelligence. But that isn't why I'm critical of it.

 I suppose any criticism of IQ is suspect if the writer doesn't reveal their own. Fine. Internet quizzes, those high arbiters of accuracy, generally churn out a figure between 120-125. That puts me about at the 90th percentile.

But 120 is a low number. In any internet discussion, you see IQs of 140, 160, 180 being tossed around. I once saw someone write: "I won't brag. 107. There you go." as if an IQ better than 70% of the population wasn't something to brag about.

IQ has this impressiveness built into it. The numbers are flashy, yet you almost never hear of a number below 100.

Ah hell. I can't write anymore.

Here we go again.

This blog began as I was hungry. Let me explain.

In March of 2010, I started my first blog, on this same site, under the same name.

It didn't fare well.

It was long-winded, tedious, and esoteric; basically the kind of writing one would expect from a 17-year-old with little experience writing. Few people read it, and fewer commented. Despite my best efforts at playing at a junior Stephen Fry, or amusing with a dorky fascination with minutiae, irrelevance, trivia, the absurd - the blog went un-noticed.

In June, facing my Year 12 half yearlies, I decided to quit the internet for a month to broaden my interests outside. The effort failed. After a whole month spent without blogging or writing, I had lost the interest, or the knack. The blog disappeared quickly and quietly.

The next months, between July and November, were filled with exams and stress. I convinced myself that writing could wait - I had study to do.

Now, with my HSC gone, I can start again. Things must change. The name, which I am fond of, will stay the same. Many other things will be different.

For starters, there will be a maximum word limit: 1500 words. Secondly, there will be pictures, taken by me, to break up the wall of text.

Pictures of questionable relevance.

Thirdly, if there's more than one point to make, there's more than one post to write. No more - and I mean NO more - five star partitions. People who read my last blog know what I mean.

And, of course, I'll stop ripping off my intros word for word from the Yann Martel novel "Life of Pi."

So what will the format of the blog be?

• A lot of links, perhaps with less explanation than before. From a wide range of sources. They'll cover my own interests, so things like psychology, linguistics, history, economics, science, literature, movies, pedantry, photography, politics. Everyday sorts of stuff.

• More small posts, rather than few big ones. That will improve the flow of the blog and make the extravagant waste of my time and yours a bit more palatable.

• Obviously, I'm going to spill thousands of words over opinionated rubbish. Let's not beat around the bush here, it's GOING to happen.

The problem is, of course, that the blog will become a combination of over-stretched and under explained as I force 30 word posts over 300 words, or cut essays from 3000 words to 1500.

I will constantly claim that I will write fiction - I'll swear that I'll do it, but I nearly guarantee that that will never actually happen. I'll find awkward ways to segue between topics where no segue exists, and I will try and fail to be funny.

This is not going to be pretty.