Back on the Dog Sled
Someone I care about expressed concern about a previous blog posting, so I immediately deleted it. In the aftermath, I have felt skittish about writing again. This is normal, a natural step forward in this experiment of blog writing. I really don't know what I'm doing here. I know I enjoy creating a post, especially when I have a satisfying photograph to play with. And I know that I claim the parts of my life that I write about, live them twice in a sense. I enjoy going back and checking the archives to see what I was doing a year ago, or three weeks ago. It feels like stepping back into the same stream, experiencing the same water flowing over different rocks in a different part of the woods. Sometimes I get a kick out of checking my Webstats4u tracker to see how many page views per day I've received, and which countries they've come from--315 so far from France since I began measuring in March, and 17 from Sweden. But mainly I am not concerned about audience.That may change next week, when I attend the Blogs n Dogs conference in Banff. The event caught my fancy because of the terrific name and the fact that a two-hour dog sled ride is included in the registration price. The workshop topics include "Blog Writing Style," "Managing Your Public Life Online" and "Blogging and the Arts," as well as technical sessions on everything from RSS to video blogging. I am going to Blogs n Dogs with an open mind, not sure what I will be looking for but grateful to have a chance to spend three full days surrounded by serious denizens of the blogosphere. The event comes at a great time, after a long experimentation with blogging on my own.
As we wind up our stay at my parents' home in Cambridge, I am finishing a tricky Mac-and-PC project of installing a Netgear wireless network in their home, complete with boosters to extend the signal to the third-floor apartment where we will be spending more time in the coming months. It's Christmas morning all the time, now that I am free of the dial-up connection for my trusty Vaio. It's good to be back.
Tuesday, November 29, 2005
