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Lector: And you are…?

Auctor: Kevin Michael Grace, currently employed at a Canadian media organization.

Lector: Never heard of you.

Auctor: I get that a lot. It’s a condition that’s begun to grate.

Lector: So you really think the world needs another one of these "blogs" (dread word!), do you?

Auctor: Well, everybody else is doing it, so why not me?

Lector: You’ll have to do better than that, I’m afraid.

Auctor: OK. A few months ago I was talking to a journalist and author far more successful than I. He explained that a website was a professional necessity for me. I’d been thinking the same for some months. Plus, I didn’t want to become one of those guys.

Lector: What?

Auctor: I'll explain. I didn’t buy a CD player until the end of 1988. I finally did so because it was either that or become one of those guys boring on about the "superiority" of vinyl. It’s a binary thing: analog/digital. In 2002 I faced a similar dilemma—either blog now or polish up my old codger routine: "Back in the old days we didn’t need your fancy ‘World Wide Web’ when we wanted to publish something; we had something called Quark XPress, and we were glad to have it, dadgummit…"

Lector: So this "blog" is going to make you famous, is it? Perhaps you are deservedly obscure. Ever think of that?

Auctor: I’ve considered it. And rejected it. I’m not interested in fame, and I don’t think I’m vain or jealous. "I’m tired of Love: I’m still more tired of Rhyme./But Money gives me pleasure all the time." In other words, this blog is a showcase and an advertisement. Thomas Sowell says, "The people I feel sorry for are those who do 90% of what it takes to succeed." I’m not content to be a 90-percenter anymore. I hope that editors reading my blog will say, "See if we can’t get this interesting fellow Kevin Michael Grace to write something for us." I’m available for work, for publications in Canada, America, Britain, wherever English is spoken. What’s the point of this wonderful "Anglosphere" if there’s no pecuniary benefit in it for me?

Lector: A Google search reveals you get paid for about 100,000 words a year and have done so for some time. Why do you suppose adding thousands more for free will make any difference?

Auctor: My blog will be more personal. [In the event, I no longer write 100,000 words a year.]

Lector: Yes, we’ve noticed a surfeit of personal pronouns already. Is this going to be one of those "I went to the grocery store to buy a litre of milk, and I couldn’t wait to tell you all about it" kind of deals?

Auctor: Not exactly. I write about politics mostly, but there is so much more to me than that. "I am large, I contain multitudes."

Lector: In the habit of quoting Walt Whitman?

Auctor: Sorry. Won’t happen again. But my blog will be a Song of Myself: a combination of comment, diary and memoir. I’ve been around, had an interesting life, have intelligent, well-informed opinions on all manner of subjects: politics, of course, but also music, literature, movies, television, sports, celebrity, the media—all aspects of culture, high, low and middle. Why should I hide my light under a bushel? I shall write as I please--unmediated by editorial guidelines, unconstrained by considerations of space—on anything I like. Hell, I might even write about cats. (No, I’ll leave that to my friend Colby Cosh.) [No, I won't. I've broken this promise twice.] I want people to know the man behind the curious moniker. Kevin Michael Grace: Mordant sophisticate or troubled loner? You be the judge!

Lector: How often will you "post"?

Auctor: Every day. Posts might be as short as a few words; occasionally, they will be as interminable as this one. [This promise has been broken several times.]

Lector: Any other promises?

Auctor: This sentence contains my first and last use of the word "blogosphere." [I've kept this promise.]

Lector: Why is your "blog" called The Ambler?

Auctor: Several reasons, many of them negative. KevinGrace.com was taken. KevinMichaelGrace.com was too long. Every other descriptive URL (and every conceivable variant) I could think of was already taken. The Ambler refers to a personal attribute (I don’t own a car) and sums up my character rather nicely (I’ve done a great deal to no great end). It also describes a way of seeing: from ground level at a human pace. (I had thought of The Pedestrian, but there was the obvious comeback, "Pedestrian in name, pedestrian in nature.")

Lector: Who designed your "website"?

Auctor: I did, using Microsoft FrontPage 2000. (The banner, however, was designed by my friend Dave Stevens.) I didn’t use a blogging template because a 5-point Verdana font on a scalding white background is not my idea of "reader-friendly." Sometime in the future the readers and I shall look back and share a laugh about those days before I mastered borders and the arcane concepts "cell padding" and "cell spacing." In the meantime, this suits my needs. [The Ambler has since been redesigned extensively by Dave Stevens.]

Lector: Is The Ambler suitable for children?

Auctor: I don’t "work blue"--What, never? Well, hardly ever--but The Ambler is for adults—in every sense of the word. When quoting others, I will not bowdlerize. An MPAA rating of PG-13 is suggested.

Lector: Do you have a political philosophy? Are you, perhaps, an "ideologue"?

Auctor: I’m suspicious of ideologies. Anyway, after the fall of Communism, most ideological labels are of little utility. If pressed, I would call myself (after Erik von Kühnelt-Leddihn) a right-wing anarchist—or a "paleoconservative." (Actually, I may have invented the latter label, circa 1986.) So-called "paleolibertarians" will find much to their liking here, but libertarians of the Virginia Postrel ilk ("Every day, in every way, humans are getting better and better") will find little to their taste. "The first Whig was the Devil," as Dr. Johnson said. I believe in Original Sin, the Four Last Things and the Tragic Sense of Life.

Lector: There are no further questions.

Auctor: On with the show, this is it!