The whole medium of blogs seems to have largely died, certainly when compared with the heyday of dozens of my friends having LiveJournal- or Blogger-hosted sites. This page has also lost some of its drama since the Oxford and even the Ottawa days ended. The late years of a PhD tend to be a time of loneliness and isolation. Many of your day-to-day obligations like coursework have fallen away and you’re meant to be devoting yourself to a project that almost by definition has appeal to only a narrow range of people.
It’s not terribly clear who, if anyone, is still reading this site, as comments seem to have gone out of favour as well.
If anyone’s still around other than the long-reading family members who I know about, you have my thanks and another invitation to comment. Anonymous commenting is recommended for those who prefer it.
Blogs that have caught my attention since this post:
Vorofuzzy: On the threatening nature of catching up
I’ve read your blog for 11 years and have enjoyed the content, no matter how infrequent.
I appreciate it, and I value any kind of comment. All told there are over 7,000 posts and 40,000 comments, which site a site established in 2005 seems respectable.
It’s weird but one part of my brain still thinks of dates beyond 2000 as “in the future” or “part of science fiction”. It’s a cliché, but I think if I saw a 2018 newspaper in 2000 I would think it was a joke of questionable taste.