The gaps in blogging

If you are like me, you have quite a tight knit blogging circuit that you drop in on. And when someone goes quiet on the blogging front it can be a slight source of exasperation if you have had no prior warning. Or if you don't arrange cover as does the frighteningly efficient blogger Scott Pack who seems to be the only man I know who can apply womanly juggling skills to his working life. If he is going offblog, he marshals a series of guest bloggers to plug the gap.

And yet it is often what is said in passing that is often the most telling part of the blog. I was pleased to see the Fidra blog back after a gap of 6 months. But what happened to the previously feted Andrew? Why has he gone when not long ago he was painting the windows and walls with wonderful characters from books? Whilst not actually saying anything other than he had gone and how the best people to run the bookshop are the owners, it left me wondering. Perhaps under blogging etiquette this is something that shouldn't be allowed. Remember, the internet can be a very unforgiving place and one should strive not to do harm to anyone either in thought, word or deed. The yogi in me thinks that we should add 'or online'.

This seems to be the curse of the blog. One moment we are sharing a blogger's knitting skills and pictures of a blissful family life. Then it goes ominously quiet. When the blogger resurfaces several months down the line we find out in passing about the divorce and custody battle. The difference is that visitors get to share the good times (often ad nauseum) but are pretty much shut out of the darker times.

Now me, I'm just a negative bastard all of the time. Never fear, visitors, things usually can only get worse.