Strange title, but there’s a madness to my method (or so I’m lead led to believe). There’s a silent letter in there somewhere, another reason English is so frustrating.

I spent a couple of days a couple of weeks ago reading EVERYTHING in this blog. Sort of a self-imposed penance for the nearly two year absence of effort. I wanted to remind myself what was out here, and why I thought it was a good idea (at least at the time) to put it out on a line for the world. An effort that was only partially successful, I suspect. There’s at least a few nuggets of value strewn throughout the waistland wasteland that is the debris of my mind. Some of it seems pointless in hindsight, but there must have been some kind of reason (maybe the pressure of the 3xweek quasi-commitment) at the time. To the extent that the author is lost in the content, my sincerest apologies have to go out to the random victims that were the collateral damage in these shots…though I doubt there was/is much serious long-term injury resulting.

I’m not generally one to do a great deal of post-posting editing, so apart from making two corrections (one spelling missed by the checker, and one that was a homonym with a completely incorrect meaning), the content stands and will continue as such. But I anticipate a few changes to the site overall that might mitigate the future damages somewhat.

Over the next n [approprite plural time unit], I intend to build and label all postings with a set of tags to help bring some clarity to site. This should help alert a potential reader of what content has some possible chunk of value and which are mostly (entirely) stream-of-consciousness babbeling. I’ll add a page with a discription of the tags and (possibly, unclear exactly how it will play out at this time) links to search for desired ones. At the very least, there will be a [favorites] tag to mark out the ones that I feel are at the top of the list.

Back to the title… There are letters in there that you just don’t hear. It doesn’t mean they’re not there, or not important, but are in the background, molding the shape of the idea hiding in the author’s mind. If you are not careful, the receiver’s picture will not match, and you will have failed to communicate (since mental image transplants is the soul/sole purpose of all communication). And in review, there’s a couple of gaps in the frequency of posts, the longest almost a full year. Silent letters…but not absent ones.

A confession. My name is Phred, and I’m a writer. [GROUP RESPONSE: Hello, Phred] In a tangible way, this really IS therapy (of a sort) and you, gentle reader, are my therapist (except you are not getting paid, sorry). Full disclosure is that I spend time upon awakening almost every morning, mentally writing on the ceiling of my bedroom. This morning it was almost an hour (trying pointlessly to go back to sleep). I (finally) decided to get up and commit the ramblings to paper…er, online storage.

The phrase “older but wiser” is always (at least half) true. I’m perched at the edge of another completed lap around the sun, but (as far as this work is concerned) with little to show for it. I have no way of expressing my regret at the wisdom lost to you from my slacking off (and just as much relief at the pain averted from the pointless-drivel parts, but it doesn’t necessarily balance in quantity or quality). To prevent the need for endlessly repainting the bedroom, I “intend” to continue posting works here in the future.

I have to…I’m not skilled enough to knit gnat guards.

Phred

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