I Can Remember When All This Was…Different…

Well, I've managed to get it together to do another blog post. Yay for me.

The old twitterfeed code, which automatically tweets whenever I update this thing, still apparently works. According to the stats, precisely one person clicked the link to view that last entry, and I've a feeling that was me. I can see these things, you know. I know what's going on out there. Let's see if this one is any different.

The idea of a blog that nobody reads is certainly an interesting one. I guess I could start pimping this place for all it is worth (and that's not much, believe me) throughout the internet. But I'm deliberately not going to, just to see what that tactic does. That's what I did for version 1.0 of the blog, and it did eventually attract some readers. People used to say it was good as well. There's no accounting for taste…

And there are advantages to a blog that's under the radar as well. Groupie had no idea I was blogging in 2008–10 and I wonder whether I'd have said some of the things I've said on here if she had known, particularly during a time neither of us particularly enjoyed when we were going through a very rough patch. Writing this stuff helped me get things straight in my mind about how I felt, both about her and many other things, and doing it here allowed people whose opinion I valued to have their say about things as well. I'm glad I did it, even if I don't particularly relish reading those entries now.

Besides—this is only a trial, to see if I still have the stomach for blogging. If I decide I still like it, the entries will be on an entirely new site, so there's not much point in pimping out this URL.

Things have certainly changed in the wider world of the net since I was a regular writer here. You can see that in the sidebar—most of the blogs listed haven't been updated for a long time. Nor have the little YouTube video playlists or widgets. Not entirely sure if I want to be bothered with updating them if I'm moving on, though.

A big change is the apparent end of embedding music videos in blog entries, which I did rather a lot back in the day. In fact, which track to use for an entry took up rather a lot of my blogging time and in some cases I actually started with the track and tried to write an entry around that. Unfortunately most of the decent stuff is non-embeddable now, you have to go and watch it on YouTube itself, and sit through pre-roll adverts too. While I accept the monetary and anti-piracy reasons for this, they certainly need to work on which adverts get shown. I don't know why YouTube think I'd be interested in watching an ad for the latest JLS album before a Slade or Human League pop video, for example. That just drives me off to find the bootleg ad-free versions that still exist. They're still out there, but harder to find (and that's ruined blip.fm for me too)

Actually, don't Google own YouTube these days? Surely they of all people could work out a more appropriate pre-roll ad for the sort of music vids I like. I mean, Google must know more about almost every one of us than we do!

The internet has changed though…it's no longer as much fun as it was back in the day (and my "day" net-wise stretches back before some of my Twitter followers were even born!) It's become like the TV or the phone or electricity now. It's not "new" anymore—everyone's on it, in fact if you're not on it (like Groupie) you're now seen as the freak! And while it's great that net access is a lot more universal now, sadly that's affected the signal-to-noise ratio on many of the sites I've frequented down the years. Check out the comments section for the average YouTube video these days if you don't believe me.

Mentioning YouTube…the whole reason for bringing this entire piece up was I though it would be rather nice to end my last entry with the track that ended my very first entry—Heaven 17's "Come Live With Me", one of my all time favourite tracks. Sadly, that can't be embedded anymore. Hopefully, though, this one still can :)

…And So It Begins…Again

The alien amongst you is amongst you again.

Actually, he never really went away. I've been posting stuff I doubt anyone's been reading on Twitter all this time, nicely packaged in one hundred & forty character sized bits.

If you go back to that first entry here, I'm sure I say something about how 140 characters are not always enough to say what you want to say—and that's still true. It's actually bloody difficult to craft a good, concise tweet, just like it's bloody difficult to write a good postcard. There's just no room for fancy words in such a small space. This really shines through when someone wants to argue something on Twitter (usually something political). The platform was simply not designed with that sort of thing in mind, yet people try all the same, resulting in flooded timelines, misunderstandings and all sorts of stuff.

The single and the LP—the snack and the banquet—the tweet and the blog post. Two related things with two clearly different purposes in mind. Sometimes, 140 characters is not enough. Hence, the blog. Again.

By a strange coincidence, it was about this time—the Autumn Equinox or so—back in 2008 that I started posting regularly to Twitter (although my account actually dates from 2007) The first entry here is dated sometime in October 2008. There must be something about the beginning of Autumn that makes me want to do new stuff. Or shake things up a bit. You'd think it would be spring when I'd get those feelings, yeah? Or New Year time. But not with me, as clearly I'm far too alien for that. Perhaps it's a throwback to my schooldays, with the academic year beginning with the Autumn term. Who knows?

I still don't consider myself much of a writer. I still don't think my life's interesting enough to write about. In fact, I'm still not sure whether I even want to do this or not. So what I intend to do is have is a trial period of blogging. Give it a few weeks or so and see if the interest is still there. If it is, then maybe I'll get myself a new blog site and start doing it properly. I don't really want to write a new blog here, as I consider this place to cover a particular chapter of my life, and I think the next volume deserves a fresh new site.

Anyway, here I am again. For how long, we shall see.

What Do You Say When Words Are Not Enough?

It's been over a moon since I wrote anything here. And to be honest, I think this entry will be amongst the last here. Not the very last - I'd like to write about my trip to Oslo to witness the Eurovision Song Contest in person, which was an amazing experience - but after that, this blog may well be closed.

To tell you the truth, I just don't seem to get the same enjoyment from blogging anymore. Back in the heyday of late 2008 and early 2009, when I'd often do an entry every day, it was a lot of fun doing this. Even when you consider some of the very black things going on in my life (such as the GroupieGirl situation) it was still a great help to write things down and post them where others could read and comment on them. Now, though, it's a hassle digging out the word processor and trying to put what's on my mind into words. To think we Geminis are supposed to be the communicators of the zodiac! Well, maybe that was true of me 20 years ago, but I'm not who I was 20 years ago - something I really should take notice of once in a while, yeah? I've had to apply comment moderation due to Oriental porno link spammers who seem to be targeting the blog (arriving every few days, whether I've written anything new or not) which may be putting genuine people off commenting... and the whole thing isn't really fun any more. So why continue?

The blogger who inspired me to start the Alien Amongst You in the first place is also thinking about winding down her blog, and in her case it's because she feels she needs the energy in other areas of her life (and I think she's right). It can be quite hard work blogging, y'know. Writing a good entry can take me about an hour, and I'm not sure I can spare that amount of time anymore. It's not that I'm running a busy lifestyle - far from it, in fact, my diary is rather empty at the moment. Which is another reason not to blog, of course. And when something big does come along, such as the Oslo trip - well, I think to myself "Where do I start? How do I put this into words?"

Or maybe I just don't feel so social anymore. I even feel the same way about Twitter these days. It's rare that I follow anyone new back on the service, and I've collapsed the various lists I used to have sorting people into categories because it was too much hassle checking them all. I'm now following about 65 people and can't see that number rising any time soon. I have everyone else who's following me on a single list which I glance through from time to time. I'll list back everyone who follows me - though that doesn't seem to be enough for some people, they demand a follow back and unfollow me in a huff if they don't get it. But if you're one of these people, ask yourself - when you're already following several hundred (as these people invariably do) will you even see my tweets in your stream?

I doubt I'll give up Twitter though, as I've come to enjoy the 140-character limit posts and the fact I can update in a few seconds from anywhere via my phone. I treat it almost like a personal diary of the kind I used to keep as a teenager - indeed I make monthly PDFs of my tweets for this very purpose. So I'm not really bothered about the fact that most of it probably goes unread, because as another blogger I used to follow said at the top of her blog, "I'm not doing this for you, I'm doing this for me". If people find my daily life interesting enough that they want to read about it, that's a bonus. Tweeting is still fun, despite the recent drop in the signal-to-noise ratio on the platform. It's just blogging that isn't anymore.

Sometimes, though, 140 characters is not enough, and I dislike sending multiple tweets in a short time - so expect me, if this blog does close, to pop up again somewhere else. I probably do need a space to go on at length somewhere on the web. (And Zog, do I know how to go on at length when I'm in the mood for it!)

I mentioned Geminis earlier in this entry. Something else we're cursed with is flightyness, if that even is a word - we're forever losing interest in things and starting up something new. Perhaps that's what I'm doing here. Perhaps I've done the blogging thing and now want to move on elsewhere. As I said, I'll try to write something about the Oslo trip in the next few days, but with a new moon and the summer solstice coming up - both good days to end on - that could well be it. For version 1.0 of the Alien Amongst You, at least.

Did someone mention the Eurovision Song Contest? :)

johnny logan

hold me now

irish eurovision entry 1987

Forever Young I Cannot Stay...

...well, maybe. But listening to tracks like this at least allows me to feel like I can postpone the inevitable. Ironically I wasn't much of a fan of this track, or this band, back in 1983, but I've been playing it an awful lot recently and now, as I said when I blipped the track a few days ago, I love this song so much it hurts.

the alarm

sixty eight guns

declaration 1983

I reckon I've got a few sensible - adult - decisions to make in the very near future, mainly concerning my future. Perhaps I'll blog about them, when the time comes.