I was thinking about what I mentioned yesterday. I'm talking specifically about the the internet-ness of some people.

Like I said, my pal Nick: Checks his email every few days as opposed to every few hours. Doesn't use AIM. Probably wouldn't take the time to carve out a little niche on the web using one of these free services.

Not that he's uncreative, or boring. Quite the contrary, actually. He was my partner in the arts all throughout our childhood. He was one of the better writers in my grade school. We made movies together using my dad's video camera (classics such as 'The Glog,' and our own 8th grade version of 'Wiseguys'). We even went to summer acting camp for four years in a row. By our freshman year of highschool, we had a deal: Whoever first made it into showbizness would pull the other in. For the next fours years, all we had to do was say to each other "Remember the deal?" No other conversation on that topic was necessary. Of course we remembered the deal; of course we remembered.

Then he went to a big fancy pants school in DC and majored in math.

I haven't asked him in a while if he remembers the deal. He just got his master's in urban planning. Sometimes, I wonder if he's going to surprise me one day by hitting me up for a gig.

Sally, too, is one of those people. Never checks her email at home. She uses it to slack at work. Only sends an instant message if she can't reach someone by phone. She knows about Diaryland, and, specifically, FadeIn. I've always wanted her to start her own page, and I've made one or two designs for her (one of them was great...it was a Cosmo-esque magazine cover theme, with all the links being mock article titles a la Just Shoot Me). But she'll never keep a diary here. It just isn't her style, which is too bad, because she's a brilliant writer, and to read or hear her talk about something funny that happened to her is one of the reasons I love her. She has a take on things and a point of view that would make her a very popular and beloved writer here, but she's happy writing in her personal diary.

FadeIn is the only diaryland diary Sally reads. She also looks at my guestbook. When I ask her why she can't get into anyone else's diary, she says "Why should I read them? They're not published."

Sally's like a professor in that she likes things that are officially sanctioned. She likes sources.

I had originally thought this was going to be a minor topic in my entry today. Ha.

Anyway, I think the thing that seperates the diarists from the non-diarists is this: People who keep online diaries are people who say to themselves "I deserve groupies."

Yeah, so, briefly (maybe) the Ritz thing: It was for a market research, and if you're not familiar with the concept, let me explain it. Basically, an ad agency contracts a market research house to find normal people and pay them too much money to come and talk about their opinions on whatever their client's product may be in hopes of generating ideas for a new ad campaign. In this case, J. Walter Thompson wants to know what 20-somethings think of Ritz crackers.

We're getting paid $120 to come downtown and chat for 90 minutes. They Fed-Exed us crackers and a disposable camera, which we were to use to keep a 'photo journal' of all the ways we use Ritz. Some classic photographs were produced, the most notable among them being 'Sally Is Killed By Ritz,' in which she lays on the floor, eyes closed, covered in crackers, 'Bill and Sally's Roommate Use Ritz As Poker Chips,' and, my personal favorite, 'Sally Gives Birth To A Box Of Ritz,' in which Sally is covered with a white sheet, legs up, while I yank a box of crackers from her nether regions.

If you see some unusual cracker advertising in the future, now you know the story behind the story. Scans to come. Maybe.