Early morning thoughts

 At some point yesterday, Cliff made this comment:  "You should write a book.  You could tell about all the stuff we've done... the fun we had with our motorcycles, you and your horse, our tractors..."

"It's being written now," I answered.  "It's my blog.  I've been blogging since 2004 and I'm still at it.  That's the reason I keep at it, so my story will still be here when I'm gone, for better or worse."

I first began blogging on AOL Journals.  Theirs was a simple blogging platform for a beginner.  John Scalzi would suggest easy photo projects to the AOL bloggers about once a week, if I remember correctly; I was babysitting my granddaughters after school at the time; the girls and I had fun with those projects.  I was working at Kohl's Distribution Center.  Unfortunately, AOL was losing its popularity during that period and warned those of us who were using Journals that they were closing it down.  At the same time, they were going to do away with AOL photos, which was where I stored all the pictures I'd put in my journal.  They came up with a way for us, the AOL Journal bloggers, to move our writings to Blogspot (or Blogger), which is now run by Google.  Unfortunately, the pictures I had included in my AOL entries didn't make the trip to Blogger.  "My Country Life" is still online, you can find it HERE.  Once I had it transferred, I decided it best to make a new beginning, but I kept the old one for the memories:  it was during that AOL time that I visited my friend Joanna and toured Washington, DC, with her. 

This year is a difficult time in my blogging life; actually, in EVERY facet of my life.  The pandemic has limited our activities significantly, and the political scene is depressing.  I'm practically off Facebook now, and would make it official except for the connection with my family.  This past week I realized I was finally bored with Words with Friends. I removed the app from my phone; that was bound to happen sometime.  In the past I was addicted to Farmville, but eventually it just wasn't fun any more.  I won't ever get rid of Facebook, I suppose, but I don't see myself making Facebook my first stop every time I open up the laptop any more, which is what I've done for years.  

Cliff asked me to find him another library book to read.  I have to say, I'm learning what sort of book he enjoys.  While he'll read one of my favorite who-done-it books, if that's what I offer him, he really likes biographies and other true stories.  When I go to the virtual library, there are books suggested on the site, so I'll see what those look like, then go to Amazon to see what sort of reviews they've gotten.  This time I chose a book called "Born a Crime" for him.  The author is Trevor Noah, who grew up bi-racial during apartheid.  I read a little of the first chapter and decided I'd check it out for myself too, since there were other copies available.  My husband and I can have our own little book club.  We're learning about a part of the world we haven't paid much attention to, and the author has a great sense of humor.  I've laughed out loud a couple of times.  

Now, this "other copies" thing seems crazy to me.  It's a virtual book, something you can't actually feel or see.  I would think there could be unlimited numbers of books; how hard is it to make copies of a virtual book?  I suppose it helps authors make money with their creations:  some people want to be the first one to read a popular book, and they aren't going to wait until fifty others read it first.  I'm still amazed that people will buy physical books (clutter in the house) or pay Amazon to let you read some of their books every month (but not the current best-sellers) when you can own a whole public library full of books on a device you carry in your hand wherever you go.  What a waste of money!  Yeah, I should talk.  Like I never wasted any money on something that didn't make sense?  Ha!  

Have a wonderful day.