Not long ago, Roberta asked me "why do you keep that blog, anyway?" It's a good question. I don't get a lot of hits here. I'm not looking to make money with advertising, and I don't wanna be a pundit: in addition to lacking the Sports Gene, I also lack the Fame Gene, or whatever it is that makes people want to get on teevee or have newspaper articles written about them. And I know a pundit. He tells me it mostly sucks.
I think my answer surprised her. I do have stuff here for 'ego' and also because I like to think that sometimes I can offer something fun or helpful -- Stuart's comment on my Constructing A Custom Fortune Cookie post seriously brightened my day.
But most of why I do this -- at least in the last year or so -- is for my kids. And their kids. And their kids. And so on down the line.
Hi y'all :)
Barring disaster, I'm pretty much certain that all this stuff I put out here on the 'net will be archived somewhere and future generations are going to data-mine all this content for information about their ancestors. As a computer geek, I find it fascinating to imagine what kind of software will be developed to do this, and how subtle it may be. Will it pull out any obtuse Skinny Puppy lyric references? Will it tell you which pundit I know, and figure out oblique references I make to other people?1 Will it put things in historical context -- for instance, you there in 2100AD reading my Hope You Die, Denny Crane post may think I'm a barbarian -- but right now we don't have any effective treatment for psycho murderers or child rapists, and they scare the hell out of us, and this is the best we can do. You may or may not have one up the road, either (but I hope you do).
Do you still have fortune cookies?
Actually, a better question might be "is there anyone out there reading this?"2 I dunno. But genealogy is more than a passing fad, and who knows, maybe part of my family tree will turn Mormon. In all seriousness, if one of my descendents reads this and manages to pull me back to life several hundred years from now -- I'll owe you one, bigtime. Really.
But I'm not blogging in hopes of resurrection someday. I'm doing this mostly because I want Miranda and Aidan to know a little bit more about me than they do. Hi kids :) I love you more than you know. I hate to admit this, but as I write this I'm going through things in life where I am not the most loving and responsive father. I'm trying to snap out of it. I hope you'll go easy on me when you remember me. At this point I only have vague notions of what kind of people you'll be when you grow up, but I'm extremely proud of both of you now, and that pride shows no signs of diminishing. I'm sometimes tougher on you than I should be, Aidan -- some people tell me this isn't uncommon, that boy kids are 'harder' than girl kids -- but I want you to know that I love you every bit as much as I love your sister.
I hope you guys both get something out of this. The first order impression you get from reading anything here is usually probably mostly correct -- but if your software sometimes hints at something else going on, it's probably right -- I'm not always as happy or funny or intellectual or honest or good as I may try to portray myself. Please remember I'm human.
The thing I'd like to ask you to do is to remember this stuff over the course of your lives (oh, and tell your children about it when they're ready for it, too. Hi there, little ones. I love you, too; right now it's sort've abstract, I know, but I hope I'm around long enough to love you in the real) and reflect upon it at different times. One of the big things you start to notice about your parents is how you understand them more and more over the years.
I don't know if I'm ever going to be this direct again about talking to you via this channel. But I'll always be aware that you're there. If the software flags something as a reference that may relate to you, then there's a good chance it does.
I love you all.
I think my answer surprised her. I do have stuff here for 'ego' and also because I like to think that sometimes I can offer something fun or helpful -- Stuart's comment on my Constructing A Custom Fortune Cookie post seriously brightened my day.
But most of why I do this -- at least in the last year or so -- is for my kids. And their kids. And their kids. And so on down the line.
Hi y'all :)
Barring disaster, I'm pretty much certain that all this stuff I put out here on the 'net will be archived somewhere and future generations are going to data-mine all this content for information about their ancestors. As a computer geek, I find it fascinating to imagine what kind of software will be developed to do this, and how subtle it may be. Will it pull out any obtuse Skinny Puppy lyric references? Will it tell you which pundit I know, and figure out oblique references I make to other people?1 Will it put things in historical context -- for instance, you there in 2100AD reading my Hope You Die, Denny Crane post may think I'm a barbarian -- but right now we don't have any effective treatment for psycho murderers or child rapists, and they scare the hell out of us, and this is the best we can do. You may or may not have one up the road, either (but I hope you do).
Do you still have fortune cookies?
Actually, a better question might be "is there anyone out there reading this?"2 I dunno. But genealogy is more than a passing fad, and who knows, maybe part of my family tree will turn Mormon. In all seriousness, if one of my descendents reads this and manages to pull me back to life several hundred years from now -- I'll owe you one, bigtime. Really.
But I'm not blogging in hopes of resurrection someday. I'm doing this mostly because I want Miranda and Aidan to know a little bit more about me than they do. Hi kids :) I love you more than you know. I hate to admit this, but as I write this I'm going through things in life where I am not the most loving and responsive father. I'm trying to snap out of it. I hope you'll go easy on me when you remember me. At this point I only have vague notions of what kind of people you'll be when you grow up, but I'm extremely proud of both of you now, and that pride shows no signs of diminishing. I'm sometimes tougher on you than I should be, Aidan -- some people tell me this isn't uncommon, that boy kids are 'harder' than girl kids -- but I want you to know that I love you every bit as much as I love your sister.
I hope you guys both get something out of this. The first order impression you get from reading anything here is usually probably mostly correct -- but if your software sometimes hints at something else going on, it's probably right -- I'm not always as happy or funny or intellectual or honest or good as I may try to portray myself. Please remember I'm human.
The thing I'd like to ask you to do is to remember this stuff over the course of your lives (oh, and tell your children about it when they're ready for it, too. Hi there, little ones. I love you, too; right now it's sort've abstract, I know, but I hope I'm around long enough to love you in the real) and reflect upon it at different times. One of the big things you start to notice about your parents is how you understand them more and more over the years.
I don't know if I'm ever going to be this direct again about talking to you via this channel. But I'll always be aware that you're there. If the software flags something as a reference that may relate to you, then there's a good chance it does.
I love you all.
[1] And God there's at least one that I'm hugely embarrassed about. Yeah, your software probably has it flagged with a huge blinking "99+%" or something like that. That's the one. *sigh*.
[2] And ya know, if you really think about the concept of eternity -- which, hey, some entity reading this might really have before them -- there is the very real possibility that they may at some point decide to crunch through every single piece of data they can get hold of. Including what they're reading right now[3].
[3] In which case -- pleased to meetcha! And, I gotta tellya, that resurrection thing is sounding more and more attractive the more I think about it, so if you've got nothing better to do for the next billion or so years . . .
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