I Thought Blogging Was Fun

I have become an almost daily commenter on the Rex Parker Does the NYT Crossword Puzzle blog, and have been enjoying this new experience, at least until yesterday.

I made the mistake of posting to the blog without reading the author's comments; or anyone else's for that matter. On top of that, I announced the fact in my comment.

Later on, a frequent poster to the site took me to task for this faux pas. The blogger, who goes by the name PuzzleGirl, really laid one on (although I can't say for sure that her comments were directed solely at me, but it certainly seemed that way). I was told that posting without reading was like walking into someone's living room where a conversation was in progress, and blurting out a comment that was potentially off topic (she also posted a link to a site where someone had written a series of blogging rules).

Like the good little blogger that I am, I followed her link and read the rules, only to find that she had violated several of them herself in chastising me (at least in my opinion (hereafter written as IMO (has anyone realized yet that I'm in love with parentheses?))). (Must be my math background). (Are you really allowed to use a parenthetical sentence as a stand alone?).

Anyway, I tried to contact her outside of the blog comments (that's one of the rules (personal comments should be made only to the person that they are aimed at)), but could not find her email address. I knew from reading a different blog that PuzzleGirl was friendly with someone who posted their email address on their blog site (pronoun/referent issues? (but that's an inside joke to followers of the Rex Parker blog)), so I wrote an email to PuzzleGirl through that third party (yeah, that's keeping it just between the two of us!), asking her to forward the email to PG. She did, and I got a very nice response today (much nicer than I deserved (OK, enough with the parentheses, already).

Upon finishing today's puzzle, I was pretty apprehensive about posting a comment, but I finally overcame my fear and did. And, lo and behold, no one has as yet jumped down my throat. So it's back to blogging heaven, knowing the rules and having fun. (:>)!

allan


jai guru deva