Glenn Reynolds 2, Crack Young Staff 0

As you may well recognize, dear reader, we, the crack young staff of “The Hatemonger’s Quarterly,” have been “weblogging” for almost two full years. This wild ride on Al Gore’s World-Wide Web has brought all kinds of beauteous bounties: Piddling recognition, vituperative chastisement, and hate mail.

But there is one thing we haven’t received—and it’s one of the “webloggers’” prize possessions. No, dear reader, we don’t mean a gift certificate for Fruit-of-the-Loom (although the much-maligned mainstream media probably think this is the summum bonum of the pajama brigades). Rather, we mean an Instalaunch.

What, you may be asking yourself, is an Instalaunch? Well, a dashingly handsome law professor named Glenn Reynolds runs a “website” called Instapundit. It’s a bit more popular than “The Hatemonger’s Quarterly”—by a magnitude of around 7,895,342 (but who’s counting?).

In the world of the “weblogs,” getting a “link” from Mr. Reynold’s “website” is the closest you’ll come to pure heroin. E-heroin, we suppose, but a powerful drug all the same. Except instead of a dangerous and addictive chemical high, you receive all sorts of e-traffic. Pick your poison, we suppose.

Anyway, try as we might, we have yet to win Mr. Reynold’s favor. We’ve sent gaggles of respectful e-missives, inviting him to take a gander at the joy that is “The Hatemonger’s Quarterly.” We’ve offered him an array of obsequious e-compliments. We’ve even resorted to voodoo—although our voodoo doll wound up looking a heck of a lot more like Andrew Sullivan. (Honestly, crafting voodoo dolls has never really been our thing.)

Still, despite all our efforts, you can count all the times Glenn Reynolds has noticed us on no fingers. We’ve not even received a strongly worded reply from him, such as “Will you dolts stop sending e-mails to me?” or “I’d rather lick battery acid than read your arrant piffle” or “You’re about as humorous as Bob Saget outtakes.” Well, you get the idea.

Quite naturally, dear reader, this has led to a spot of soul-searching on the part of the crack young staff. Why, we wonder, has Mr. Reynold’s proved so elusive? Why has he avoided us like a scorching case of herpes?

After all, we’re young, we’re crack, and we’re a staff. Isn’t that good enough for him, darn it? We mean, come on: The guy’s at the University of Tennessee, for crying out loud. The only thing you need to get in there is a pen and a randy first cousin. What have successful “webloggers” got that we don’t—other than style, humor, and basic literacy?

To be completely honest, we can’t think of a thing. Perhaps it’s because we compose feculent throwaway “posts” like this one.