The Blogwagon

Am I a good blogger?

That depends. If you're talking about the quantity of content for my blog, then I'm so-so, especially of late. In my meager defense, in the last three weeks (more or less) alone, I've quit my old job, started a new one, started flying solo at the new one, stayed late to cover weather and crime and murders, AND...moved into a new humble abode. So time has been scarce, and now we have, at last, a new member of the Slammy's World Blog Post family. If you're talking about QUALITY, then I think I'm a dang good blogger. I provide entertainment, variety, a mix of life's various spices, and some serious stuff as well.

And this time, it's a mini-rant/self-aggrandizement.

I have observed of late that blogging has become the new scrapbooking, particularly among young LDS couples. It seems to be a decidedly more noticeable trend to use Blogger/Blogspot as the medium of choice for this growing hobby (I give props to my old mission companion Jacob and his wife for going the Wordpress route). And this is all fine, just fine.

But allow me some small modicum of pride for being one of the first to board what has become a bandwagon...or, better said, a blogwagon. First, let me give sole credit for the idea to start a blog to two people.

First, there's Jeff. In the infancy of our friendship we started bouncing movie- and sports- and other-related ideas off each other, and at one point decided we needed to cement them into the annals of virtual history through a blog. Jeff looked at various domain name and website possibilities, but the idea, or at least the realization of the idea, kind of fizzled (it would be resurrected later, but through our own individual blogs).

Second, there's Emily. Her's is the first blog I really started to see as a mode of personal expression and creativity. Of all the family members who have blogs, Emily, Sarah, Kirsti and Joe all beat me to the punch. They started their blogs before I did. But I only knew about their blogs because of links on Emily's blog. So it was really seeing what Emily did with hers that got me excited about the idea of having my own blog.

(Side Note/Honorable Mention: Sarah and Kirsti gave me the idea to use blogs as story-creating tools with their creative writing blogs).

So thank you, Jeff and Emily, for helping me get on the path of blogging. BUT!!!!! I still count myself as among the early participants in the Blog phenomena.

A second point on this topic, and that is I am glad Tamara and I have our own seperate blogs. It makes perfect sense for someone, if already married, to start a "family" blog, one that is for their whole family.

But I like the fact that Tamara and I saw no need, once married, to combine efforts into one blog. I like how it allows us to maintain our individual viewpoints without worrying about what the other person might post. By keeping seperate blogs, Tamara gets to keep hers looking cute and pretty, and I don't have to worry about a girly-looking background. I get to post all the nerd and sports stuff that I want, and she doesn't have to bother about stuff she sees as lame or unnecessary cluttering up her blog space.

So here's to blogs, to not being part of the Blogwagon, and having separate blog-dentities!