Hi, my name is James DeRosa. I do stuff on this site. I make music lists, write articles about Oscar Wilde, and I asloooodafdkljafdsiofle...

Wow. That's a boring description. I feel asleep.

What I'm best known for is besting all you folk in a game of luck. Way to suck at being randomly selected people. Sheesh. 

One time I saw Brian Shirk at a bingo game. B37 never showed up for him. Loser.

On another occasion, I spied Alex Cronk-Young buy a lottery ticket. He came out one number away. Way to go sucker.

Another time I saw Lance Darnell play a game of Russian roulette. He lost, and it's a little know fact, but I've been ghostwriting his entries ever since then. Way to die in a game of chance, Lance.

Damn, I'm so good at doing luck.

Gloating aside, I have to say that I was both surprised and grateful to find out that I'd won the giveaway. This is probably the first thing I've ever won in my life, and I hope the contest creators know that it couldn't have been sent into better hands.

I'm in college and having this netbook is going to be great. I've already taken it to school, and it's really nice to be able to write notes in a word processor and access my e-mail whenever I need to.

Also, I don't have a girlfriend, so it's nice to have something that will fill my empty heart. Though, when I signed up for this relationship, I didn't realize making out with Minnie would leave so many smudges on her screen.

That said, it has been a trying experience.

Being a winner, and winning so much, is a hard and exhausting work. Winning at luck takes tons of effort. I had to pray, like sometimes, to every known god of at least two religions. I also had to think about going to church at least once. And, after winning, I had to listen to less than more than one death threat from my fellow Bitmobbers.

To top it off, the postman didn't leave it a my door. I had to go to the post office at 8 AM to retrieve my winnings. Clearly, Demian Linn should have flown out to Philadelphia with a big check, a big fanfare, and a big presentation event. We could have gotten local autodealers to sponsor the whole thing.

This is me, hard at work, winning at life.

Anyway, thanks so much to Bitmob, and I know it sounds dumb, but I wish everyone who posts or comments frequently on Bitmob could have won a netbook too. It's kind of weird to win something so nice in an environment like this.

There are a ton of great writers on this site, and winning something in a quasi-random lottery like this is humbling. I would hate to hear myself say this out loud (it's so cliché), but I actually think that there are people on this site who deserve it more.

Many thanks to all of the Bitmob writers and the Bitmob staff.

Also, Demian, this sleeve is totally blue in real life.

~James D., read at The Sophist, heard at, Sophist Radio