See You Around?

I've written this post--or something like it--at least half a dozen times in the last 18 months and then been talked out of it. But I really don't want to blog anymore. This thing has been limping along for the last two years, and it's time to put it out of it's misery.

I didn't start this blog as a place of personal expression. In fact, I gave it the name I did in a deliberate effort to not take myself seriously. Of course, Valour-IT had other plans...

But I didn't want to write "for me." Rather, with whatever shred of ego that made me believe my words mattered at all, I tried to write for them, and they are why I continued to write. Today I'm working for them, hopefully in ways that have much bigger impacts than my words. And I find that all the passion and effort that used to go into blogging is now going into work, all the words that spilled out on this blog in support of them are spilling out into other places on a regular basis. There's nothing left for here... and so you get the kind of leftovers and personal twaddle I've been writing.

It's been a wild ride, though. Because of the people I met through this blog, my life will truly never be the same, and that's a very good thing. I'm in your debt, all of you. I only wish I could repay it with better writing...

I'm supposedly a co-blogger over at the Castle, so I'll probably show up there every now and then if the Muse ever returns (Maybe I'll cross-link whatever I write at the Castle: my RSS feed, so you don't have to keep checking). But I feel guilty about this on just two small levels...

1. That little piece of ego I mentioned above is trying to convince me that whether or not I finish my story about the DV on Stennis matters. If it does to any of you, pipe up; I'll try to write a few posts to finish it off (my notes and photos are detailed enough to guide my memories).

2. I feel like I'm closing the door to friends who were kind enough to keep checking in here on a regular basis despite the recent low quality/quantity, and whom I don't encounter at the Castle--Michelle, Nose, Jimmy, and others... I don't want to close that door; I love your visits. But you have my email (and Nose, when are you swinging back this direction, huh?).

So, it's out with a whimper instead of a bang. Too much to say, no words to say it, too much left unsaid. I just wish I had it in me to devote the energy to this I did back in 2006; I rode that brief wave of attention and then unfortunately didn't follow through...

One final bit of indulgence. Many of you wanted to see the dress:

The clasp on the pearls slid around early in the evening and I never noticed it... typical Fuzzybear. ;)

See you 'round the blogosphere, my beloved friends.