March 19, 2021

I am tired! Yesterday, I put part one of Sarah Someone on The Host pod feed. I wonder how many people (if any) listened to The Host that are not currently following me on Instagram. I spent some time and money working on advertising it, so it's possible. I had a vague notion, before I started releasing The Host, that people might just come across it. I put it out into the "world" after all. But the internet is not like a regular place. People won't just wander by your stuff and maybe decide to check it out. If they're not directed there, they won't ever see it. I'm getting distracted. 

I'm wondering if anyone will ever search down the rabbit trails I'm leaving. Follow this project to this other one. No one is reading this blog, I know, and I think that means no one is looking for me online. That's good, maybe. 

Something else -- I'm following Celeste Barber on Instagram (me and 7.2 million other people). She recreates posts by hot women on IG, usually "influencers." But she, Celeste, an average-sized woman - not a dancer or a gymnast - hams it up for comedy. It shines a light on how silly the things the influencers are doing. It reminds me of discussions on how often photographs and film are performed for the male gaze. Our assumed audience tends to be a straight guy who is, presumably, licking his lips. When you replace a man with the woman in the image, have him hold her same pose, it becomes ridiculous. The thing that looked totally normal is revealed to be slightly insane. 

It's interesting to me that Celeste can accomplish the same thing. She's still a woman and not unattractive, but something about her costumes and performances defangs whatever sexy gyrations the influencer had used to perform her hotness in dead sincerity. Celeste makes the swimsuits with holes cut in weird places, the domestic mockups of grand opulence, and the butt wiggling for the gaze of everyone, not just powerful horny men. And it's gotten to the point where she often has more followers than the women she's parodying. It's something!