November 20, 2002 | 11:39 PM

Ugh.

Most of my recent entries have been milque-toasty dull. Neat little diatribes about sandwiches I�ve made and karaoke bars I�ve been to. Inoffensive, non-descriptive hogwash. Pap. Declarations of adoration for my friends. Crap that I would skim over and dismiss if I were looking at this site for the first time.

I feel blocked. I feel like a sheep. I feel like an apologist. So much is going on in my head�swirls of narrative and social agenda and jazz interludes, muddled and incoherent. Clotting and blocking the circuitry of my mind. Unable to find its way to the tips of my fingers and onto the page.

I have become more and more emotionally unavailable to this diary. Every time I type a word I wonder, how will this sit with the Jet Set? Who will this offend? How can I dance around this issue in a way that won�t upset anyone? After all, I don�t want people to (heaven forbid) dislike me.

I had this problem for years and thought I�d conquered it. Its onset was the greatest writer�s block I'd ever known. After having written twenty pages a day for years, at the age of 19 I found myself unable to say anything. I got caught up in second guessing myself, my motives, my beliefs. Silently grilling my muse, dismissing my passions. Trying to deduce what the faceless �they� would think about my words.

Through writing this diary I believed I had slain the beast of self-doubt. Especially with the SAGA�my narcissistic (but come on folks, highly entertaining) ode to my own perceptions. But the great phoenix of childish insecurity has risen from its ashes and is now pecking out my eyes and eating my cerebral cortex and clawing at this keyboard so that I can barely decipher what buttons to press.

I�m not glib. And I�m not particularly sardonic (except when I am.) And I�m scathingly funny only in spurts. Topical anecdotes aren�t my thing. I appreciate greatly the skill with which many people pull off breezy odes to pop culture. But for the most part, that ain�t me. And lately I am finding myself at a loss as to what to say because inevitably, it may in some tangential way have to do with someone who reads this.

I realize that what I am about to say is going to come across as completely ludicrous, but I feel like I�m in a pressure cooker. Seventy-four people list this diary as a favorite. I receive 800 page views a day. Each morning in my inbox is a pantheon of esteemed praise and damning criticism both from strangers and people who know me (often the people who know me pretend they don�t, which is incredibly infuriating and fuels my tendency towards paranoia.) I feel like fucking Louella Parsons or Walter Wichell. I�ve put myself in this position perhaps, but never meant to.

This is a broad comparison, but I feel like someone who had a little indie rock band on a tiny label and suddenly becomes world famous. Everything I say is scrutinized and commented upon. Again, I know I have chosen a public forum and probably have no right to piss and moan. A great deal of the criticism and advice I have received has been of a constructive manner and most helpful. But my sense is that most other people on diaryland don�t receive that kind of constant running commentary that I get�both good and bad. It�s hard to stay true in the face of that.

I guess this will just have to be an exercise in growing a thicker skin. After all, I don�t have much sympathy for others who can�t deal with flak thrown their way. Maybe this is a good thing. If you can�t take the heat, you best get outta the kitchen.