It’s a funny thing, writing a blog. Once you start writing stuff, and people start reading it, you get to feel like you owe them another piece about something or other, because if you don’t, they might starve and die or something. And so you feel obliged to keep on writing. Particularly if you feel you’re writing rubbish.
But, equally, other times you write some stuff, and you get twice as many hits as you usually do, and you don’t know why. But when that happens, you feel that the pressure is off you to write something, and so you don’t feel like you have to do much.
This week has been like this. For some reason or other I’ve had twice as many hits over the past few days than I usually do. The last time that happened was when I wrote about Cat Bin Woman, sometime last year. Everybody was interested in Cat Bin Woman.
And so I’ve thought: “No need to write anything over the next few days!” And so I haven’t written anything at all. Whether I write or not, this week will have a record hit count.
Many readers may not understand this, but I think that most bloggers will understand it. Somehow or other, once you’ve started blogging, you get to feel you owe your readers a new piece about something every day. Or maybe twice or three times a day.
If, like me (or like Leg-iron) you’re a compulsive writer anyway, and you’re always scrawling away at something, it’s not too difficult to switch your thoughts to something else for an hour or two, and write about the filthy smoking ban again.
But I’m interested in lots of other things beside smoking bans. Every morning outside my bedroom window I can see an ancient Iron Age hill fort, and I go back to wondering what life was like 2 or 3 thousand years ago when they inhabited those forts, and the little town I live in beneath it probably didn’t exist. I’ve become fascinated by hill forts over the past few years. When I lived in Devon, there was one of them on the horizon. I’ve lived in England almost all my life, but I only seem to have noticed them now. Strange.
And for the past couple of weeks I’ve been exploring Idle Theory again. It’s an idea I’ve been fooling around with for 30 or 40 years, and which is still as fascinating as the day I first thought of it. It’s something I’ve written millions of words about. And it’s something that nobody ever seems to understand. And why should they? It’s a strange idea.
Every now and then I write about Idle Theory. Just like every now and then I write about Iron Age hill forts. And rivers. And other stuff.
This week, I’ve had enough hits. And if I write something tomorrow, it will be about rivers. Or hill forts. Or something that has nothing to do with smoking bans.
Which might be a relief.
Frank Davis 
What’s so bad about writing about forts and rivers and idle theory?
Of course, I don’t have access to your visitor statistics. For me, though, your blog is a daily ritual. I usually read it just when I’m getting the feeling that it’s time to scuttle off to bed soon. Being American, if I start reading and it involves something too intrinsically British for me, I might just not bother reading on because I don’t know the names or the details of the matters being discussed. Of course, these are the very items that would likely appeal to the bulk of your readers, just not me, so I might be tuning out while most others are tuning in.
Perhaps it’s time for some perspective from dedicated readers. I’ll start.
-I don’t think it was necessarily your best, but the blog about being at your grandparents’ house while a kid and your grandfather fighting with the TV and the reverend visiting–that’s at least the most memorable blog for me. It was sincere and nostalgic and funny. Loved it. Great reading.
-Speaking of the river, the blog about the action of the river and how that led you into thoughts about Von Mises reinforced my own thoughts.
-You’ve included references to the philosopher Karl Popper in some of your blogs, and it has sparked an interest in me to read Popper. Popper is also heavily referenced in a book I partially read called “The Black Swan”. (My dilemma is that his books seem to be valued enough by some to have a high price tag, while simultaneously being a bit too heady to find circulation in my local library system.)
-Your involved blog posts on “global warming” have me leaning in close to the screen holding my chin. I find them to be a good reference in trying to further understand what the actual, involved scientific arguments are.
-I have a far, far lesser understanding of religion and of how religion affected history than you do. I usually read such blog posts in full because I’m looking for a holding-on point to start with to learn something more. Unfortunately, I just end up feeling like 90 year old who is trying to learn how to use the internet fluently. This is my failing, not yours. The point being that I read those blog posts. (I once attended a Catholic wedding and half of those attending just stood up and started walking to the front . I had to ask if I was supposed to get up or not. The minister had invited attendees to take the sacrament, so all of the Catholics rose and proceeded forward. I had no idea what was going on. I’m still not entirely sure what was going on, though I get the gist of it.)
-This is entirely selfish perhaps, because it’s a topic that interests me a great deal, but you occasionally run into Bentham’s panopticism in your blog posts. If you’re taking requests (and I know that you’re not), I, at least, would like to read your take on how socially engineered panopticism is creeping in on all of us. You touched on this very recently, actually.
Well, that’s enough. Just me, and I’m just one of many. Take it if you will, just don’t take it too seriously. ;-)
What’s so bad about writing about forts and rivers and idle theory?
Okay. Maybe I’ll write something about what I’ve been thinking about over the past couple of weeks. Which has mostly been Idle Theory. But it’s also been about rivers and ponds. And also about fortresses. And also infectious diseases. And cancer.
And since it’s the weekend, maybe I’ll devote the next few posts to the same theme.
I pop in for coffee and a chat every morning, to see what’s on your mind today.
If I have a thought on the subject or some other idea suddenly strikes me while I’m hand pollinating the sweet peppers, I can call in to tell you.
With a blog you are always “in”.
That’s an interesting way of looking at it.
Well how else could you chat over the garden fence to someone 300 miles away, or give serious thought to the proper construction of a hill fort, or on other days be one small part of a mass intelligence so vast it crosses continents and never, ever sleeps.
And some days you will be doing something else entirely as we all do, it’s expected.
As has been remarked on before, blogs are the electronic equivalent of the village pub.
All the more so, now that us smokers are no longer welcome inside the village pub.
Dear Frank,
Perhaps the most telling thing about your writting is the comments that it brings from those that read it.
You do seem to give rise to very thoughtful discussions and for that you should be proud.
Here is a thought for you.
‘Idle Time’ has given rise to the Nanny impulses of the Puritans among us.
More ‘Idle Time’ gives more time to be bored and being bored with one’s life seems to inspire some to spend more time fussing about other’s lives.
Yeah, I often think that the comments are better than the original post.
I don’t care what you write about, I read it all. Your blog has expanded my view of the world around me, and I thank you for that.
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Frank
You do not ‘owe’ your readers. They owe you a big thanks for taking the time to write all that you do.
A ‘must’ read for me and many, many others.
Brenda
I love your blog, Frank and, like the others above, it’s a daily “must read” for me. I’m so glad that your initial anger at Leg-Iron spurred you into writing it (yes, I’ve been here since the beginning!) And I’m pleased that you two are friends again now, too, because your two blogs, plus Dick P’s, really have on occasion saved me from thinking that I am alone in believing that the whole world has gone a bit barmy – whether it’s about the smoking ban, money-grubbing politicians, politicially-motivated “scientists,” heartless council officials, or the sheer hypocrisy of the faux-caring MSM. Reading it is pretty much the first thing I do when I get in from work (after making a cup of tea and lighting a ciggie, of course!), and I often check in again later (a) to see if you’ve had any late-night musings that you’ve decided to share with us and (b) to read the comments which, as another on here has already said are, almost without exception, intelligent, informative and thought-provoking.
In fact, I think you can judge a quality of a blog very accurately by the quality of its comments. When commenters take the time and trouble to truly engage with the subject of the blog and add to it, argue against it or provide extra information about it, it makes each article worth more than one visit. Whenever I visit a new blog, I always check out the comments first. If they’re full of in-jokes, swearing, inane one-liners and ongoing conversations between regular commenters which are largely meaningless to the new reader, then it’s pretty much guaranteed that the blog itself will be of a variable standard at best, and probably isn’t worth wasting time visiting regularly, and certainly isn’t worth marking as a “favourite” to be visited frequently.
Keep up the good work!!
You know, I sometimes feel obliged to comment on my favourite blogs (such as this one, and Leggy’s, and CountingCats and others). It’s not that I expect people to hang on my every comment (disclaimer – people, please don’t , unless it’s about Battlestar Galactica, Doctor Who, or how people get on my nerves when they spend too long at the cash machine, in which case my words are the Words of Wisdom!).
Seriously, I know that blogging about politics or current affairs is largely to the choir – I wouldn’t even be reading your blog if I weren’t a smoker and was already concerned about the constant erosion of our civil liberties.
However, you’re far more articulate and expressive than I am, and often I’ve read your arguments and thought – ‘he’s right – I just didn’t see things from that angle before!’.
You don’t have an obligation to any of us, Frank, but when you do post, I feel that I should comment now and then (even if I mostly lurk in the background, if I had a blog, I’d like to know whether or not one of my ‘hits’ was someone who’d immediately clicked away again, or someone who’d actually thought about what I’d said).
Thanks for your blogging Frank, and lots of thanks also to Pat, if she’s reading this.
Well, Frank, here we are…………….
I remember commenting on a blog concerned with gobal warming (Bishophill?). The people commenting there were having a nice discussion about the electromagnetic ability, within certain frequencies, of carbon dioxide to absorb these frequencies of radiation, and then re-radiate them. They were having a lovely time. And so I pushed in, and asked what happens to the absorption of these frequencies and the re-emission of these electromagnetic waves during the night-time? These guys told me to push off. But then I started to talk about the ‘base state’ on atoms – they all went quite and disappeared.
EXPERTS ARE ONLY EXPERTS IN THEIR OWN LITTLE FIELD. The fact that carbon dioxide can absorb and re-radiate a specific frequency of ‘light’ is meaningless, unless it is substantially important as regards ‘climate change’.
I would never have known about this Biphophill blog if you had not mentioned it, somewhere, sometime.
It must be difficult to keep finding something to talk about – but do not bother yourself about it. Sometimes there may be nothing to fire your imagination. Sometimes only a pithy comment may be appropriate. If there is one reason to carry on more than anything else, it the ANGER. The anger as regards the smoking ban is that the people have been conned. The smoking ban in public places WHERE PEOPLE WORK was supposed to b to protect the workers. In reality, it was TO STOP PEOPLE SMOKING AT WORK, and thus reduce the overall level of smoking. Thus, if people used to smoke for 8 hours in their leisure time, and also smoked during their 8 hours of working time and slept the other 8 hours, smoking could be reduce by a third simply by forbidding smoking during working hours!
Keep on, Frank – we appreciate your inciseful thinking. Keep on.