Sunday, February 12, 2006

Musing About Blogging

Blogging is my newest and most extensive form of procrastination. It's been a smashing success in that regard.

I started my first blog because I thought it might help me lose weight. Accountability and all that. Needless to say, I am not inclined to be accountable to anyone or anything. A blog least of all. But I did enjoy the writing so I just blogged on, oblivious to the reality that blogging is not the same as cutting back on the ice cream or getting out there and running a few miles. Blogging about weight is pretty much in the same category as purchasing a weight loss magazine and presuming that you will morph into the cover model by virtue of having plunked your cash down.

So I decided that blogging was a useful venue for practicing writing skills. I do think I've become a better writer as I've, uh, written. But I haven't translated that improvement into any effort to get myself published. I just keep blogging away, seldom noticed and definitely not paid.

Then I started meeting people. There are some bloggers whose work I really enjoy. There are some whose humor I enjoy just as much. There are some I wish lived next door. So now I blog, I read blogs, I search for new blogs, and I hope with some degree of obsessiveness for comments, because a lot of the time I like those best of all -- and not just the ones left for me.

My husband has just recovered from not one but two kidney stones. My cat is not going to recover from renal disease, and I have just yesterday learned to give her sub-cu fluids. One son is sick and the other is flunking econ. The lovely daughter is very much in a quandry over whether to switch colleges. I am healthy, but I'm the one who worries about all the rest. Tylenol is making a fortune off me.

I'm thinking I might continue blogging for a new reason -- I need a rather extensive fantasy life. One where urine output, college tuitions, and the imminent unemployment of three adult children are not factors.

Oops. I was going to toss in a new title, but I think self-restraint might be in order.

16 comments:

Vicky said...

Oh, my dear, procrastination and fantasy worlds...do I ever hear you! I, too, as I mentioned in a recent entry, spend altogether too much time in front of the computer (ok ok some of it is playing spider solitaire, a secret vice) and find it therapeutic, or so I tell myself. One thing it has done for me is to open up a whole world of wonderful people, such as you.

As for the kidney stuff, imminently unemployed and swithering offspring - you have my sympathy. My suggestion - keep on bloggin'. You happen to do a very fine job, and I, for one, very much appreciate it.

Love, Vicky

Abadiebitch said...

You are singing to the choir sister!

Last night I saw a CNN special "Fat Chance" that has made me think all day. Actually I have been in a pissy mood thinking about it. Because I know everything, yes I do. But doing something about it is different. But incase you did not see it let me recap. Supposedly there is a fat registry. A person can only get in this registry if they have lost over 30 pounds and have kept it off for at least five years. Because the guy said as a whole if the goal is weight lost, Americans have achieved that goal. However Americans have not kept the goal of keeping the weight off. He claims our overeating comes from the caveman days. Where we always thought the meal we were having at the moment would be the last so we ate as much as we could. Now that food is not the last, we still eat like it is. Anyway, of all the people that kept the weight off there was seven common factors that kept coming up with all of them. Let me see if I can remember them (not exact order)

1. Weigh yourself often
2. Do not deprive yourself
3. One hour of physical activity a day.
4. Incorporate more physical things in your daily routine, like parking far away or taking the stairs.
5. Low fat and high Carb diet, 60% carb, 20% fat, 20% protein (same as Jenny Craig).
6. If you fail, try again, over and over.
7. At least five meals a day.

What else did you talk about? Oh yeah, the cat. I'm so sorry. I love my cat, even though he will not let me touch him, he is feral. But he has been hanging around since his mom had him in my garage almost six years ago. Again I am sorry.

I am sure your daughter will make the right decision.

Kidney stones, my husband's doctor thinks he has a few. I think they are mean stones.

I make myself leave the computer, if not, the whole day goes away.

Anonymous said...

Sick kitties are such a sad thing. They just don't understand and there's no way of making them understand....
hope things get better for you.

Lisa :-] said...

Poor kitty! Unfortunately, that's what happens with kitties when they get old. I have three geriatrics among the horde, and it's almost a race to see which one is going to succomb first. :(

Sorry about the sons... But, they're (kinda) grown-ups, so I guess they have to start making their own mistakes (which is not to say that it will not continue to bother you. Big help there, wasn't I?) Is daughter thinking about retutning to Willamette?

Anonymous said...

So many troublesome issues that you're dealing with right now. Who wouldn't turn to escapism and fantasy? I hope that your son and husband both feel better soon, that the econ grade turns itself around soon, that your daughter gives herself a chance to enjoy her time in New Orleans, even if it ends up being only 1 semester, that you and your kitty adjust to the new daily routines, and that you continue to treat yourself to a little "me" time each day. It's essential to any kind of healthy existence. As for the unemployment, you've got at least a couple of years before that happens; stop and smell the roses now.

Theresa Williams said...

Blogging is a curious mixture of things, and I hadn't thought about it, but fantasy is definitely involved. I do spend a lot of time imagining what various people's lives are like and spinning their realities around in my head. It all makes for a very strange soup.

emmapeelDallas said...

I agree with Carol, the "me" time involved in blogging is essential, especially when you're taking care of others. But I have purely selfish reasons to encourage you to keep on blogging: I love reading your posts.

:)

p.s. - hang in there and good luck with all the family and feline stuff.

Judi

beths front porch said...

I have struggled with "why blog," especially if I don't want to want the blog to be "Beth Confidential." So I wondered if it could just be for me, and see what mysteries came out within the parameters I set for myself? Funny, but haven't told anyone at work or most of my family that I blog. They'd think it was "weird" or that I need to "get a life." Maybe I thought those things at one time, too. So it's my "secret community." I like it. ~ Beth

DesLily said...

the more life throws out at us.. the more we need some sort of escape in order to cope with it all.

blogging seems to be a good outlet.. depending on your own personal need you can read/ or write everyday.. more then once a day, once a week, once a month.. how you dish out your own medicine is according to how much you need.. everything helps.

Anonymous said...

I for one certainly enjoy your blogging and hope you keep it up. It can be a place to escape from all the worries of sick husbands, sick cats, and the constant and seemingly endless worry of parenting.

Paula J. Lambert said...

Two kidney stones? TWO? Holy cow! I don't suppose you saw the first few episodes of Season 2 Deadwood? Imagine the excruciating pain coupled with antique medical equipment on a western frontier--holy cow!

I'm still new to your blog, but have become a regular reader. (You're my first, post-BlogBreak, "legal" comment!)I'm so glad you kept with it. As to being mindful of weight--everything has to be done with balance in mind, and not the kind that shows up on a bathroom scale. What it primary is overall health--physical, emotional, pyschological, spiritual. Seems to me you're doing fine.

And the kids? This whole life is about growth. They're growing, figuratively and literally, and that's never a bad thing. I say this from the college instructor's point of view (I'm not a parent)--when they figure out their focus and make up their minds, there'll be no stopping them.

Hope your "house" continues to be in order--remember the wings in the attic, my darling!

Anonymous said...

There are times in life that we all need to take that deep breath, blogging is a way of exhaling.

Globetrotter said...

Robin,

You have absolutely no idea how much I needed to read your blog today! God...you have made me feel like I am not the biggest fuck-off guilt-ridden parent in the world, as well as helping me realize that I am not the only intelligent middle-aged mother and wife with problems. I am laughing gleefully because blogging is a wonderful way to encounter people who are as totally deep in shit with the same kind of problems that I have. (Well maybe not, your excrement seems more along the lines of urine than shit.)

I am sorry for the expletives here, but as the mother of 3 sons in their twenties who were afforded the very best private school educations, followed by college tuitions so exorbitant that I was forced me to realize I had to either sell my lovely dream home in order to keep them in college or ultimately declare bankruptcy... I really had thought they'd be totally independent of us (financially) by now.

Wrong. The Magna Cum Laude/Phi Beta Kappa philosopher just lost his cushy job in Boston that included college housing and food, the architect is framing roofs without health insurance, and the political science major is standing on corners trying to gather 1000 signatures to land a job with a democratic councilman guaranteed to lose the election against a popular Gop incumbent.

Me. I'm the one with failing renals thanx to all the alcohol I have been consuming for the last 10 years.

Thanks for the laugh. Keep blogging.

Paul said...

Well, I wondered if I fit into any of those blogger categories you made up, but I'm sure I'm not in the "wished some lived next door" group.

Cynthia said...

You've obviously hit some common ground here. Like Beth, almost no one in my day to day life knows that I blog, and the people I've come to know through blogging are such a draw, my virtual friends and neighborhood. I blog for the writing development. I blog for the private time. I blog for the escape it provides. With three kids at crossroads, a sick cat and a pain filled husband right now, I think you need all of the above. Blog away. I'll always read.

Anonymous said...

I'm behind but I read and am very glad you are blogging.