Save yourself some time and don't read this

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on Posted by Rajesh J Advani
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It's interesting, isn't it, how the web keeps giving you a way to present yourself to the world, and then suddenly there's so many people out there doing the same that if you want to get in on the action, you need to be famous to get noticed in the first place?

For the past few weeks (since I bought a laptop), I've been wanting to start a blog of my own. Why? Partly for the same reason I created a website of my own - once upon a time. In fact I got so excited about it that I created 4 websites. I no longer remember the URLs, and don't even have the userids and passwords to the sites anymore. Chances are most of them have been deleted anyway.
I still get the spam though. Well, that's life.

I've been wanting to start a blog, I said. Partly because it's possible to do that on the internet, but mostly because I like writing, and continuously suffer from writer's block. Until that is, I start typing. Before starting the first word, I think "Forget, it. I'll start later. Nothing to write about right now." Just like this particular entry. I had no idea what I would write about.
Once I get started though, the words just keep flowing. It's as if I just opened the floodgates on a dam, and now they won't close.
It's not like what I write makes any sense anyway. It's just words. Combinations of words make sentences. Combinations of sentences make paragraphs. Combinations of paragraphs make, well, anything you want!

Like this blog. What is it about? I started out calling it "The wonder of the blog" . One sentence down, I changed that to "Blogging: The new killer app". A few paragraphs later, that doesn't make any sense either. So I don't know what to do with the title. And yet I just can't seem to stop writing.

It's not like I've got anything specific to say. There's probably not one sentence that has any real meaning in this whole blog. And yet, I type on.
Call me crazy.

So where was I? Yes - Why I want to blog. So I had gotten as far as "Because I like writing, and continuously suffer from writer's block." And a blog helps because I hope to keep the stream of writing up until it becomes a habit and I don't avoid completing a story for 8 months just because... well, just because!

I wrote at least 7-8 stories back in 12th standard (12th grade for the non-India- bred). In a span of seven months. Maybe lesser. Then in college I got a little busy and only wrote one poem and maybe two stories in all four years of engineering.
Then I started working, and a friend of mine told me "Why have you stopped writing? You should start again." So I decided to take her advice and wrote a one page story. Never got beyond the first draft because once it was done, I didn't feel like doing anything more with it.
I kept writing these four-ten liner poems for my female friends, though, and a couple of them seemed to like the stuff I turned out, and told me to try publishing something here on Sulekha.
One day I took their advice. Just sat down and wrote an article. And published it 2 days later. Some people liked it, so I felt encouraged, and started writing a story a week after the article was published. Lethargy struck again, though. I stopped at the third scene(it was in the format of a play), and wrote maybe two more scenes in the next 3 months. And haven't looked at it since.
Of course, one day I did start writing a story, and did complete it, so to speak. I got to the thrid draft, and called it a work-in-progress. Then I put that up for private viewing on Sulekha. Then a couple of months later, when I had all but forgotten about it, Swapna (the editor) asked me if she could publish it. That tickled my ego, so I spent a day revising it, and a day looking at it, and finally submitted that. People seemed to like that too.
That started me writing a little more often. Unfortunately, though, I only kept starting to write. Wrote the beginnings of four stories. Not one got completed. Why? The ever-present writer's block.
So this blog is supposed to be a cure for the block. To get those fingers going.
Which is why this blog is now titled "Save yourself some time and don't read this." Because I really don't have anything to say that you might find interesting. And it's under "Humour" because I think it would be funny if someone actually read the whole thing!

PS: How do you sign off on a blog?