and tonight i was faced with why

even though i have a website with my name in it, and even though i fake it reasonably well, (not so) deep down i am ridiculously shy

and i know myself well enough to realize that if i have my mouth open the odds significantly increase that i will say something embarrassing to either myself or my employer.

but people invite me to these things, and i battle the fear of being boring with the fear of making a fool outta myself and a lil demon whispers in my ear something along these lines:

you are tony pierce OF COURSE you are going to say something stupid, so just dont Also be boring. and ps you cant hide who you are.

those voices make their way to my stomach. which is the magic 8 ball of my soul. so for lunch i ate a sensible salad. and when i left a little early to change clothes at home i went to Vons and got a nice spicy tuna roll

because what could be better for a soon-to-be-upset stomach than supermarket sushi?

but relaxed at home for a few minutes. snacked. ished, showerd, and shaved. got into some traffic. made it to the santa monica with 4 minutes to spare.

and when the time came for we, the panel to be introduced, thank God, the host of the show took the floor (pictured above) for 10 minutes because suddenly it got really hot in the room and i ran to the mens room to powder my nose cuz i was fixin to die.

got back just in time as the panel had introduced themselves, it was my turn and we were off.

all went (seemingly) well – other than the sustained hiss i got from one member of the audience after i told the crowd of attractive young women that if they all dont have a photo of themselves as their Twitter icon then they’re missing a great opportunity if attaining followers was one of their goals.

i even got a few laughs.

but right at the end someone asked what my favorite blogs were. and i said, well it might seem like pandering but i have often said my faves have almost exclusively been women and most of them happened to reside in Canada.

i explained that two in particular was one raymi the minx and one keira-anne. and, because time is of the essence, especially near the end of a two-hour discussion, i described one as “sweet” and the other as “saucy”.

somehow all i was projecting was that i liked them because they were both easy on the eyes.

and i got called out.

a followup question came from the back along the lines of “other than being hot what ELSE do you enjoy from these female bloggers?”

and your hero thought, this is exactly why your stomach did not want to be here. this is precisely why i should just stay in my pajamas and hide behind the glow of the macbook. this is specifically why i attempt to remain comfortably numb in public – because when i drop my guard the unedjumacated politically-incorrect sexist pig leaks out and everyone can see.

but luckily i was able to explain that yes people like raymi and keira and so many others may lure you in with their beautiful photos but once you get beyond the image and get to the actual content you get to see not just who these fine women are but you learn a little about the cities and country that they live in. you get to learn about their struggles, insecurities, hopes, loves, dramas, families, and stories.

after the show the young lady who had put me on the spot was super sweet and apologized for what was probably seen as an awkward moment, but i told her not to sweat it, that it was honest and great because all we had been talking about was to be honest in our blogging and tweeting and there she was actually living it.

anyways if we hadnt been rudely interrupted by one of the only other dudes in the place i wanted to tell her that right now my favorite summer blog is also written by a young lady, but an AMERICAN

yes, Alecia’s asian vacation is the type of travel writing that can only be seen in blogs for its honest, not trying to be anything other than what it is, educational, funny, weird, filled with pictures, and so so many interesting tales.

more female bloggers i am inspired by and hope to one day be as good as (lets try to keep it to 10): leah, lindsay, erin, gage, zulieka, krista, danielle, katfran, xiaxue, and last but not least the so nsfw xtx

ok now im going to drink that beer i promised myself.