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