How to raise your blog portfolio: Funny article from popfactor.com on how to get your blog noticed so you can make it into the big-leagues. Blogger provides an assortment of intro paragraphs for different types of stories (genre fiction, New Yorker fodder, etc.). Which one would lead to a story that gets published? Here's one which combines the detective novel with the mid-twentieth century Jewish immigrant genre:

Izzy Goldman was about one hundred and fifty pounds of loose kugel in an ill-fitting suit ("Off the rack!" he said proudly. "Below wholesale!") His eyes were golden brown potato latkes, and his weak chin was roughly the same color. He sat on top of an overturned milk crate and he was smoking a cigar the size of a shofar. He said: "I need a mohel."