"Lock the doors and close the blinds -- we're going for a ride..."

(I have checked the 'Submit to "News."" check box above on this. Which is funny because there no longer is a functioning news box. Isn't life grand?)

Hi there. My name is shiny. I started my Mindsay blog several years ago -- some would say 2004, but I prefer to say that I began 29 years ago. It had been a wonderful experience for me -- I was able to form a community full of truly awesome people -- some of whom I've had the honor to meet in person, and many I'm happy to call my friends to this very day.  Blogging was able to give me an outlet to write about what was going on in my life, my head and my funny bone.  It was a really great feeling to have people "follow" me on Mindsay, interested in reading what I decided to write.

In the midst of my happy times at Mindsay, I became interested in a new project started by some online friends of mine who called themselves chilly and nomad.  They had decided to form a weekly, live internet radio show which eventually was called wtf.  I would listen every week, writing in with my answers to their "Questions of the Week," and submitting my own audio material just to see if they would find it witty enough to play on the air. They did -- and ultimately invited me onto their show to be a guest and eventually a co-host.  I was able to bring my wife arrrgylesocKs into the mix as well. We had a lot of fun times.

I really liked the notion of Internet radio quite a lot. It was then that I decided to start my own show on the BlogTalkRadio platform called "Shiny Talks Too Much."  It only lasted for a short time, but I had a blast with it. I had met many others beyond Mindsay through BTR, many of whom had blogs hosted independently by them and not through Mindsay (or Blogger or Typepad). I was wondering to myself: could I do this? Could I break out into the proverbial big leagues?

And so I did: I registered a domain name and started "Shiny's Takeout."  At first things were rather slow. I was the new kid in a much larger pond. But I started to get readership. And with my own independent site, I could count the stats of people visiting my site. I went to a blogging event in Philadelphia called TequilaCon -- where I met all sorts of fascinating people.  Before I knew it -- my new blog was thriving! I was getting hundreds of hits per day!  I was even at the point where advertisers  were coming to me with porducts to review online. (I politely turned them down). Life was good.

Fast forward to June of this year -- when I came to a realization that my life online was starting to get in the way of other things that really deserved more of my attention: my life at home with my family, for starters.  As much as I felt that blogging had been a wonderful experience for me, it had been, in some ways, a crutch.  An escape from certain issues that I simply didn't want to deal with in the real world.  It became apparent that I was spending too much time online and not enough time focusing on the things that counted -- or needed to count more.  An example: my weight. It had been in pretty dangerous territory, and I realized I needed to lose a hell of a lot of it. I decided to take the time I had spent blogging and focus it on eating better and exercising.  Since then I've lost about 30-some pounds, and I'm still going at it towards a goal further down the weight line. I'm also concentrating more time on my family. On finding things that will make me happy. Even volunteering regularly (which I'll write about later this week).

There are some who say that I quit blogging regulalry at the top of my game. Perhaps this is true. Perhaps I'll go back to blogging the way I did several months ago. I'm still not sure. I suppose, for me, the important part of all of this was finding a good balance in my life. I think blogging may have a place in it, but I'm not certain exactly where that is right now. In the meantime -- I've got this week. And I've got Mindsay -- a place which has a lot of happy memories for me.

Welcome back, everyone! Looking forward to spending this reunion week with you...

-- S