Have you ever read the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin? If you haven’t, it’s great. Not only is he a great writer, and very funny, he’s so full of s**t that you get double the laughs-per-page. Most of his baloney, though, is *very* New Sincerity.
When he was 20, he made a chart of the 13 virtues he wanted to have in his journal. Then, at the end of each day, he would check off the virtues he’d displayed that day. He kept score and tracked his progress over time, until he found that chastity was kind of a bummer, and bailed on the whole thing.
Here’s some info and a picture of the chart.
Check out our Rockets show (MP3 Link), wherein I discuss the chart with Josh Kornbluth, who (in addition to being a public TV personality) has traveled the nation performing the monologue “Ben Franklin: Unplugged,” which details his search for the “real” Franklin.