The Golden Blog

Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you -- BLOG #50!

Cue the band and dancing bears.

Who woulda thunk it? 50 blogs!

It seems like just yesterday I was sitting on my couch eating a Klondike bar watching the Biggest Loser.

Ah, the good ole days.

Three months ago, I barely knew what a blog was and I certainly didn’t plan on writing one, but fortunately that all changed, thanks to Meryl Streep.

I mean Julie & Julia.

After my wife and I saw that movie around Christmas time, the idea of writing a blog on my journey through unemployment seemed like a natural fit.

It was also a perfect way to fill out my day, instead of waiting for future employers to NOT call me back.

Yada, yada, yada, I present to you, Sir Bacon -- a nickname given to me by my six-year old daughter, for no apparent reason.

From my first word to number 28,494, which is where my computer tells me I am at exactly right now, I have really enjoyed discussing my life as a stay-at-home dad.

This could EASILY be a very bitter read and who knows, some people might find that more interesting, but to be honest, that’s just not me.

Am I bitter about what happened? Yes, but a little less each day.

Does it do me any good to be bitter? Absolutely not.

People moved on so quickly, it blew me away.

The people who are still working at my former employer forgot about us before the bodies were cold.

The people who were let go and found new jobs, have their new jobs to focus on.

The people who are no longer employed and haven’t found new work, don’t want to talk about it.

Fortunately for me and my insides, I have found a fantastic outlet to talk about it.

My blog.

I can wake up happy, sad, bitter, drunk, it doesn’t matter.

I turn on the computer and 45 minutes later, we’ve got a new blog.

After writing my first few, I was actually impressed. It made me laugh, sometimes made me cry, but most of all, it made me feel good.

I felt so good about the way my blog was turning out that I started sending it to some close friends and some people I never met before.

People like Oprah, Rosie, Regis, the Wall Street Journal, NY Times, Time Magazine...

Well, all of those fine folks did not respond, but someone who did was the editor of Businessinsider.com -- a website with two million hits per month.

To be honest, I’d never heard of them before and I’m not really sure how I ended up with their email address.

Their editor, who replied immediately, said that my blog was “often moving” and he wanted to publish some of the entries.

Where do I sign?

In the first hour on their website, there were 6,000 hits. By the end of the first day, we were in the neighborhood of 15,000 hits.

You can still search “unemployed” and “tv” on their site and you will see that it’s about to pass 35,000.

35,000 hits! Did you hear that Oprah?

That high lasted for several weeks, not to mention a whole bunch of people joined my blog as followers.

A lot of the early comments from readers on the businessinsider.com site were skeptical, make that nasty, but aside from that, the feedback has absolutely uplifting.

One of the people who found me through that story was Nicolas Berube, a writer for La Presse Newspaper in Montreal.

He contacted me a couple of weeks ago, saying that he wanted to do a piece on Sir Bacon.

After Nicolas and I spoke on the phone, for about an hour, he wrote one of the most beautiful articles I have ever seen.

Of course it was beautiful, it was written in French.

French is such a gorgeous language, he could’ve said that my writing is the quality of a third grader and it would’ve still sounded beautiful.

As great as the response was from my businessinsider, the reaction to the La Presse article was even better.

We are talking dozens and dozens... and dozens... and dozens of incredible French-Canadians contacting me to offer their support and their stories.

As I stated before, Canada has always held a special place in my heart, but after the absolutely amazing reaction to the article, I know where I’m moving if the U.S. ever holds a military draft for 40+ unemployed male Jewish TV Producers.

Since that article came out, my followers have stretched over 100.

Of course, that’s not Jim Jones territory, but I’m not serving Kool Aid.

I’m serving reality.

EVERY time somebody adds me and I mean EVERY TIME somebody adds me as a follower on my blog or Twitter or Facebook, I get very excited.

I realize that may sound silly, but it’s the truth.

I was excited when there was one follower, but one zero zero, you’ve got to be kidding me.

I really don’t have any long term plans for Sir Bacon.

I did just buy the domain, www.sirbacon123.com and linked it up with my blog.

(PS -- the 123 are for my three kids.)

I am planning on printing (at least) one “I Believe in Bacon” XL long sleeve t-shirt so that I have something to work out in. If you are interested, send me an email.

I have a multi-million dollar book deal in the works -- well, not quite in the works. The only thing missing is a publisher and the multi-million dollars.

I am planning on a motion picture deal as well. I’m playing me.

Ok, enough with the dreams.

Seriously, the last two-and-a-half months have been amongst the best in my life and I have Y-O-U to thank for that.

Yes, the writing has done me a lot of good.

But when I get a note from someone I have never met before (and probably will never meet) and they say that my story is inspirational to them and to hang there, that’s all I need.

I will leave you with these beautiful words from my new cyber friend, Andre:

• ce qui ne nous tue pas nous rend plus fort’

That means, "whatever doesn't kill us makes us stronger."

Damn, that language is beautiful.

P.S. If you thought this blog was long, wait for #100.