A Tribal Supper With Seth Godin

I had supper with Seth Godin last night.  Well...OK...He was on TEDTalks and I was in my living room, but we were both there and I was eating supper.  I like Seth.  He disrupts my thinking and I'm perversely drawn to disruptive people.

We all need our thinking disrupted from time to time. Whether we're entrepreneurs embarking on a new dream project, activists working to move a mountain in our little corner of reality, stealth change agents embedded in a huge organization, or ordinary people just trying to be excellent in world bent on mediocrity, it's a sure bet we can't get the job done alone. Nor should we try.  If we want our product or idea to spread, we need to connect with people who speak a common language and share a common passion.

Ideas don't go viral because they reached the largest number of individuals possible.  They go viral because they reach the right communities.  The rest are a waste of time.  For the most part, generic idea sellers would find me to be a waste of time if they were paying attention. I screen my calls, go directly from my mailbox to the trashcan (physically and digitally), and whenever possible restrict my binge-watching to Netflix because they don't have ads.  I can't remember the last time I bought something or changed my mind because of an ad.  Or a Facebook meme.  Most Americans have become experts at the art of not listening.

We need to stop trying to "market" our ideas to the greatest number of people and really connect with the people who are as crazy as we are.  We want our audience to stop being an audience and start being collaborators.  To feel the same passion that we do.  And then engage. But information doesn't produce passion.  Passion does!  And the only way to ignite passion is to be authentic.  Then give permission to your "tribe" to catch fire!

Fool's Paradise

(excerpted from the novel in development, entitled Haggis on a Biscuit)

“The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls and tenement halls”

--Paul Simon, New York 1965

            It’s my birthday today.  April 1^st.  My family is planning to surprise me with a cake tonight.  We’ll probably play pictionary.  Then my son will destroy me at Need for Speed Six. 

            I don’t show my years, but sometimes I feel them.  To me, that’s one of the most loathsome aspects of middle age.   Whatever I am, the me that faithfully wills this body to get up and face the world every morning, is not interested in facts.  Come what may, it remains indisputably convinced that it’s still seventeen, or maybe twenty-two.  Yet little things have begun to occur.   Nothing radical.  But unsettling.  There’s no longer any distance at which I can hold a phonebook or a newspaper and read it clearly.  (I think my arms have grown shorter.)    Hair has begun to appear in discomfiting locations.  And it’s not mine; it lacks pigment.  My wives don’t yell at me anymore…as much.  Their concerted program of domestication may finally be paying some small dividends.  Last Christmas, I noticed a two year old cuddled in my lap.  She looked like one of mine, but then she called me ‘Grampa.’

            I’ll admit it.  I’m not ten feet tall and bullet-proof anymore.  I duck a lot quicker than I used to though.  And more often.

            Fifty-something probably wouldn’t be so bad if I weren’t expected to get along with fifty-some year old people.  Proctologists and portfolios and death benefits and condos in Alabama are not the stuff of polite dinner conversation.  Male or female, those who talk about aging with dignity should be promptly and summarily shown the door with a well aimed kick.  I will not go out gracefully.  When the grim reaper calls my name again, I plan to ignore the bum. Or spit in his eye.  I’m busy.  If he wants to be foolishly persistent, he’ll have to win the best two out of three falls and I’ve already won the first two.  I fight dirty.  No, when and if my time’s ever finally up, that old boy’s going to need to ambush me, with reinforcements, and drag me off kicking and screaming every centimeter of the way. 

            I am feeling better now that the stitches are out and the voices have stopped. There is nothing like sun and salt air and the sound of waves to smooth down the frangled edges of your last remaining nerve.  It’s like a return to the womb…except for the sun and the air and the absence of a womb.  I’ve been smoothing frangles for about four weeks now. Spending some of the bonus money from my last project. The Republic of Ocracoke has been a great place to do that.  Off season.  Fifty miles from the nearest anything. Great food. Layed-back locals. 

            Back in the world, too many otherwise harmless people run their mouths just to hear the noise they make and give their brains something simple to do while they’re breathing.  If they were actually thinking, would they be asking a lot of irrelevant questions about things that are none of their business?  Like “What do you do?  Who do you work for?  How do you get paid?”  Even if they really cared, how do you explain that you were issued sealed orders and when you opened them all the pages were blank?  I’ve found if I mention something about selling insurance they usually shut up.  If they won’t, I end up selling them some. I keep licenses current under two names just in case.  But I don’t want to go through the effort, so I like it here. 

            I guided The White Rabbit back into harbor about twenty minutes ago.  We left the marina at 6:30 this morning with a private charter group hoping for sea bass or mackerel or mahi mahi. The Gulf Stream was almost like glass when we got there, and I gave them a full three hours. They weren’t disappointed.  We were back in our slip by 11:45.  I just finished hosing down the decks.  Kristiaan and Jo and Jo are over at the Clipper picking up some shrimp and Carta Blanca and sodas.

            We didn’t have our last real house long enough get attached to it.  We’ll probably settle into another one sooner or later, but for now living on boat isn’t bad at all.  “The Bunny” is a 66’ Meridian Pilothouse with some very special features. 

            I love gadgets that do what they’re supposed to do.  I love them even more when they exceed my expectations.  Take this thing for example.  Proto Issue multi-platform MobileMac G7.  Proprietary onboard 1.5 tbps secure wireless e-wave satellite uplink. Planetary GPS.  NytroQuadCore sealed cryogenic processor complex with 3.3 Petabytes of photopolymeric crystal cluster multidimensional holographic data storage and 166 Terabytes of RAM.  Power source is a combination of microphotovoltaics and a crystal polyether-ionic capaci-wafer.  Don’t ask.  I have no idea.  I don’t even know how to charge it.  Haven’t needed to in seven months.  I think it involves sorcery.  The whole tamale weighs less than 1.5 kilos including the military grade titanium faraday shell.  The price tag—if I could buy it—would be several times that of my last car. (And I drove a nice car, until some Guatemalans blew it up.)  The Mac was a gift.  From Alice.  My guess is she stole it.  She’s like that.

            It’s a very handy toy though; so I don’t let my conscience bother me too much.  I just think of it as part of a severance package from one of former employers.  I’m sure they haven’t missed it.  They’ve been a little busy sifting through what’s left of their headquarters.  That’s right.  Same Guatemalans.  My car was in the parking garage when the bomb went off.  It was an annoying day.

            I have been diligently trying to avoid anything that smells of real work, but it won’t go away.  It keeps scratching at the back door and howling.  True, this field journal does need some cleaning up.  It may be of value to someone. Sometime. Besides which Budd—my current therapist—insists that my verbal debriefing was significantly less than linear and strongly recommends written reflection to facilitate detailed inner accounting and cathartic release.  I think she may be a closet kabbalist.  I quoted Dr. Richard Ames at her.  I told her that writing, once begun, almost invariably becomes an irreversible addiction and a fundamentally sociopathic undertaking. A disease.  She didn’t care.  She told my wives to humor me and expect an outbreak at any time. To leave me alone and avoid eye contact when it occurred.   Just guide me to a quiet corner and push food at me with a broom handle.

            Personally, I think there are perfectly understandable reasons why my report was “significantly less than linear.”  There just might be some things I don’t want to dig through. Why else would I pack up my family and disappear? But I’ll play along.  Maybe it will help…a little.  Then again…

            Lunch is here.  I’ll write more later.  Jo’s smiling and she’s got a broom.  I’m afraid she’ll spill my beer.                   

A Little Help

I realize that some of my readers might not consider themselves Christians in any sense. If you are among those, please feel free to politely ignore this post.

I'm working with an emerging ministry that is in the process of adjusting several aspects of it's vision and outreach strategy. I'm hoping you can take a moment to help me out by answering four quick questions..

During a recent conversation, a friend referred to himself and his family as being part of the Christian diaspora (a term that was used to describe the Jews scattered across the globe). By this, he meant that they were part of a growing group of people who have become disillusioned with participation in an institutional expression of "church". Some are still attending somewhere or other, while others have decided to take an extended break from "church". Still others have given up on the institution altogether and have opted for a house church approach, worship and pray together just as a family, or are doing nothing.

So here are the questions: 
Are you part of this Christian Diaspora? 
 Do you fit into any of these categories? 
Which one? 
Why?

I'm posting this to Facebook  as well, hoping that as many of my friends as possible will respond. In addition, I would ask that you consider posting this to your own wall or blog and direct responses back to me. Anyone who wants to answer privately can do so by email to christiansandotheraliens@gmail.com. Thank you.

One True Hero

The smell of the earth freshly turned for planting. Putting in a crop and tending it till harvest. Rebuilding engines on tractors long past their prime. Nursing calves, lambs, goats, even piglets that wouldn't make it otherwise. Taking in strays. Barn cats. A three legged dog. Milking the dairy herd of neighbor layed up for almost a year by a heart attack. Finding 20+ years of farmhand work for the developmentally disabled grandson of an old friend of his father. Raising food and giving it away to family, friends and friends of friends who were struggling. Giving tractor and wagon rides and rabbits and puppies and smiles to a gaggle of nieces and nephews and random neighbor kids. Teasing. Joking. Laughing. Gentle and kind. Patient. Quietly loving and practically caring. Courageously hopeful, and incurably curious. Always trying to understand, yet fascinated with mystery. 

     Sunday rides to anywhere, with Paul Harvey, Tommy Dorsey, Xavier Cougat, Hank Williams and Roger Miller. Reading and traveling the world with National Geographic while cuddling little kids in the big chair. Driving from Ohio to Florida so the boys could witness an Apollo launch. Camping and motelling across America, avoiding the interstates, talking with real folks and seeing as much as could be seen from what was left of old Route 66, the original Mother Road. Fishing silent for hours. Walking, sometimes talking, sometimes silent, through the fields and woods. Looking with love and wonder at new growth, old trees, rocks laid bare by the wear of centuries. Finding time whenever possible to pause and watch the sun set.

 

      I wrote out these memories over a year ago.  Shared them at that time with some friends.  But some memories are worth sharing again...and some stories should be told more than once.  Because.

Especially today.

      Thirty six years ago my Dad passed on.  Three weeks before Father's Day.  One of my only true heroes.   But I can still hear his voice. “Don’t worry, Sport. There aren’t any wrong questions…” and…“Shhhh. Come over here. Look at this.”

Dining With Escher

I've been busy.  Too much so, I'm afraid. 

             I have Escher-esque nightmares about houses with no hallways.  Rooms indiscriminately opening onto rooms without warning or logic.  Front doors opening into bathrooms which lead capriciously to a basement on one side and a kitchen on the other.  Stairways to bedrooms with doors to other bedrooms and living rooms with attic hatchways in walls and closets that deposit me onto a street corner blocks away. Admittedly interesting. But no hallways.  None.  

Therein lies the dark perversity which makes the dream a nightmare. At least for me.  I need hallways.  A well-ordered existence requires hallways.  Everyone knows that. They are indispensable elements in the very fabric of all the cogent universes.  Clearly defined neutral zones providing for smooth and gradual transition from one place or state to another.   Calming muted little havens where one can decompress and refocus briefly on the way to being thrust into a next reality.      

 

A few weeks ago, I was scheduled to be sitting in a local diner sharing evening munchables and a tall pilsner with two friends and a guy I’d never met before.  The two friends are twins.  Yes.  Female.  Identical. They think in tandem and finish each other’s sentences.   I’m told it’s a twin thing.  So far as I know,  geographic proximity isn't an operative factor.  It still works at fifty miles.  I haven’t tested anything further, though I’ve read about a theory that under certain circumstances two particles in different parts of the cosmos can be so closely related that they behave in precisely the same way at precisely the same time.  It’s called quantum entanglement.  The story was in all the papers.  The twin thing is sort of like that.

                I was running late, which in my reality actually means they had been unfashionably early. Upon arrival, I surveyed the diner from a safe vantage point just inside the door.  I spied them in their booth.  The twins were already happily entangled, busily finishing each other’s sentences and thinking in tandem at the guy and the waitress and anything else within range.  The guy’s body was smiling and nodding, but his eyes had that wild and pleading look of someone who’s just realized his assigned customer service representative only speaks Croatian.

I hovered…just beyond range…momentarily.  I was buying time.  It had been a long day.  My brain was still picking through the details and trying to smooth down the frangled edges of my last nerve.  I had successfully dodged all incoming calls from Stress, routing them through the phone tree to my assistant, which was standard operating procedure. That’s what I pay her for and it usually works out quite well.  But she had just emailed me a callously reasonable memo demanding a fat raise and a vacation.  Damn.

Now I had to be social.  Without time to pass through my sufficiently muted and calming metaphorical hallway.  My inner child was already wincing and twitching in response to that grinding noise one only hears when forced to manually shift paradigms without a clutch.  I found myself mentally scrabbling for confirmation of some next clear step along this immediate critical path. 

 Don’t get me wrong.  I really do like the twins.  Time and conversation with them is always entertaining and never boring or predictable.  Rather akin to a social exercise in chaos theory.  The only essential preparation for encounters with them arises from the fact that they are part of the rare and little understood sub-species homo sansibubblis. Intensely relational, these beings have no personal bubble and are in most instances innately devoid of any awareness that personal bubbles exist at all.   Whatever rumors they may have heard to the contrary have been summarily dismissed as backward and baseless pseudo-science on a par with belief in a flat earth or the mythical planet Nibiru.  All space, in their multiverse, is indisputably social space. Any other arrangement would be a blatant ontic profanity.  Again, it’s a twin thing.  I’ve believe it stems from having been forced to share a womb.  Clinical investigations are said to be forthcoming.

The guy seemed harmless enough at first glance, in a bemused and bewildered sort of way.  And I felt for him.  Plus I was hungry and it was time to eat and be pleasantly interpersonal.  My assistant and my schedule both said so.             

Smiling, I hung up my coat and promptly skirted the edge of the event horizon, feigning a need to visit the restroom. Once there, I checked my mental inbox.  Unfortunately, no epiphanies.  And I like epiphanies. Oh well…on to Plan B.  I hid in a stall.  Not for long, mind you.  I didn’t want to be anti-social.  Just long enough to breathe deeply and count to seventeen.  Ten doesn’t work.  Seventeen did.

When I reached the booth, there was a pilsner mercifully waiting for me.  I already knew I would order a gyro, but the twins only paused briefly mid-sentence to greet me before going back to a topic I don’t recall, so I pretended to read the menu and played with the silverware as I joined the guy in his smiling and nodding.   The tactic was remarkably effective… until the waitress asked for my order and the guy excused himself to the restroom.  About the time I was realizing that there are only so many ways one can play with dinnerware without causing bodily injury, I also realized that the twins had stopped talking.  I could feel them tandemly thinking at me as the guy returned. It broke my concentration and I narrowly avoided impaling myself with a precariously balanced dinner fork.  I returned the utensils to a socially appropriate arrangement and cautiously looked up. 

Chloe, the twin seated across from me, smiled in a not altogether disarming fashion while Candace, the one sitting next to me sighed and squeezed my arm not altogether reassuringly. 

             I lost track of which one was speaking almost before they started.  I think they take turns breathing.

“So before you arrived we were talking with Phillip (aka “the guy”—I knew he must have a name) and we were telling him a few things about you…” 

“Nothing terribly personal, mind you, and of course only the good parts…”

“but with a few details thrown in, just to add some texture to the conversation…”

“and we had to leave out any really juicy parts because you won’t tell us about those either…”

“which you must admit is heartless and patently unfair because we tell you everything…”

“even though we know there are some things you won’t understand because you’re a man…”

“but you’re our friend so we tell you anyway because that’s what friends do…”

“and when we tried to explain to Phillip what you do for a living we couldn’t…”

“because every time we ask you about it you say, ‘Let me give you an example’… and then you tell us a story…”

“but when we tried to do it every example we gave made it sound like you do something different…”

“and it seems like you must do different things at different times…”

“so we decided that either we still don’t understand what you do or you don’t…”

“and since you probably do because it’s you who does it...”

“Could you try to explain it again?”

“Please?”

“And it’s OK.  You can take your time.  You always do.”

“He always does.  He’s quite pensive.”

“And slow.”

“Well, that too.”

I glanced at “the guy”.  He made brief eye contact that said, “Hey, you’re on your own, dude.  At least they’re not thinking in tandem at me.”  Then he went back to playing with his dinnerware.  Apparently I was on my own.

“So you don’t like my stories?” I asked.

“We love your stories,” they replied. “But they don’t answer our question.”

“Are you sure?” I continued.  “Or is it that they don’t give the sort of answer you’re expecting?”

“Each story seems to give a different answer to the same question,” Chloe protested.

“Why do you think that might be?” I inquired.

There was a moment’s silence.

“She thinks you’re a spy,” Candace said in a carefully hushed tone.

The guy stopped playing with his steak knife.  His face remained impassive but his eyes darted from one twin to the other, then to me.

“I’m not a spy,” I stated flatly.

 “That’s exactly what a spy would say,” Chloe countered.

 “I drive an old Kia and live in a tiny house in a tiny town…”

“It all makes perfect sense now…”

 “…I get up every day and I take my son to school and then pick him up in the afternoon…”

“You maintain an appearance of being passably normal and blending in…”

“… and go to church and play music on the weekends…”

 “…doing all the fairly normal things associated with fairly normal people…”

“ I’m a single dad.  I’m busy…very involved with my family…”

 “all of which is very convenient and makes for a very convincing cover…”

“I have a small business.  I work out of an office in my home.  That’s not unusual.”

“I’ve seen your office… full of computers and electronics and piles and piles of notes and diagrams…”

“Some of my projects are a little more complicated than others…”

“Then there are the maps!  What’s up with the maps?  And time zone charts…”

“…and some involve clients in other states…even other countries… ”

“You work very odd and irregular hours…”

“Phone conferencing and Skype make it possible to juggle schedules and meet with people anywhere in the world. When we meet and the amount of time I spend with each depends on their needs…”

“You’re always meticulously vague about who you work for…”

“I have relationships with a wide variety of different  individuals and organizations…”

“…and you’re carefully evasive about what you do for them…”

“…sometimes researching, writing, consulting…sorting through a lot of concerns.  Specifics vary  from client to client…

“You never give any specifics…”

“…and details are kept strictly confidential.”

“The evidence all points in one direction!” she summed up.  Quivering intensity overshadowed her attempted whisper and poured like a wave all directions.  She may as well have been standing on her seat banging the table with a shoe.  All conversation had stopped in the booth behind us.  “There’s no point in denying it,” she continued, “ although I know you have to deny it otherwise you wouldn’t be a very good spy, which I’m sure you are.”  

“You’ve been working on this for a quite a while haven’t you?” I asked.

               “Weeks,” the guy offered with dispassionate casual certainty.

               “I’m convinced,” the waitress stated emphatically.  “You sound like spy to me.” 

               “Not helping!” I told her.  I wasn’t sure how long she’d been standing there, gyro in hand, listening and watching with growing cautious interest.  The thought occurred to me, “Marvelous.  She’s planning to hold my food hostage until I confess!”

                I looked at the sandwich.  With longing.  To my great relief, she surrendered it willingly.  Then proceeded to tidy up, removing any already accumulated debris from our table along with all—now evidently extraneous—knives.  This she did quickly.  As she bustled toward the kitchen, I could hear her talking, more to herself than to us, “Not a problem.  Live and let live, you know.  We get all kinds in here.  Seen pretty much everything.  Got no idea why they always sit in my section…but…”

                I took a deep breath and tried to steel myself for another attempt.

                “I know it’s hard to understand exactly what I do.  That’s because it doesn’t fit neatly into any one category.  It really depends on who I’m working with and what they want to accomplish.  I may change hats several times during any given conversation.”

“But you’re not wearing a hat,” Chloe protested.

               “It’s a metaphor,” I replied.   “Mostly…I listen.  Then I ask questions based on what I hear.  Then listen again.  I help people clarify their specific goals, some short term and some long.  We talk about challenges, obstacles, strengths and strategies for getting to where they want to go and becoming what they want to be.”

                “In its simplest form, I guess I would say I help people understand who they are, what they are, and why they do what they do.  Then I help them determine who and what they want to be and why.  If something about their life or situation isn’t working the way they want, we look at how to change it.  Effectively.  And we look at how to map out a plan that’s broken down into reasonable steps that can actually be accomplished. In the process, we also try as much as possible to account for any roadblocks or landmines they might encounter along the way.”

                “He’s being metaphorical again,” Candace stated.  “Or at least I hope he is.”

                “Have you ever had to shoot anyone?” Chloe asked in a hush.            

                I sighed and began counting to seventeen in my head.

                The guy just smiled and said, “I think we need to go.”  He then stood and began to put on his jacket.   Chloe and Candace did the same, with minimal protest.

                “It was nice meeting you,” I told him.  “I’m sorry I didn’t get to hear more about you.”

                “That’s no problem,” he replied amiably.  “I actually found the conversation entertaining.  Besides, there’s not much to tell really.  I’m semi-retired.  Still work once in a while, only when I want.  I consult on a broad range of security related issues, mostly with large multi-national corporations and small third world countries.  Confidential.  Like you.”  With that, he turned and headed for the door.

                “He’s a spy,” whispered Chloe and Candace as one.  Then they followed.

               

Further Adventures In The Life Of Pi

“You want to buy circular food?”

“Yes.”

“For a sixth grade geometry class.”

“Yes.”

“And it has to be circular?”

“So it can be measured accurately.  ”

“I see.  Will oranges work?  They’re healthy.”

“They’re not circular.  They’re spherical.”

“And that’s a problem?”

“We’ve only covered the formula for circles.  Spheres are next week.”

“I see.  Could you wait until…”

“They’re celebrating Pi Day.  Today.”

“And you couldn’t just buy a pie?”

“Too easy.”

“I see. And easy is bad.”

“I’m a man.  I accomplish nothing until it stops being a task and becomes a life quest.”
“I sort of figured that out.  I suppose cookies would be out of the question then?”

“I prefer to have one big circle rather than a lot of little circles.”

“A giant cookie.”

“Perhaps.  If you have one.”

“I'll check with the bakery.”  

She checked.

"They have two."

"I'll take them."

The woman at the bakery looked more than a bit confused as I ordered 2 twelve inch cookies decorated with the symbol for Pi. 

"I didn't know there was a symbol for pie," she said.

I drew it for her. 

 Blank stare.

 Explained that it was a letter in the Greek alphabet.  Mathematical symbol.

 Still blank.  Tentative.  Darkly suspicious.  Eyes narrowing.  As though certain I was part of some obscure cult and had just asked her to carve a Toltec sacrificial rune into the back of a live ferret. (I really should stop dressing in black.)

 Further attempts at explaining the desire to celebrate Pi Day ("We have pies in the case right over there.") and the date and 3.14 were only slightly more helpful.  But I did finally get the cookies. 

I delivered them just in time to witness the spectacle.  Exercises in precision measurement and calculation, coupled with attentive and detailed exploration into the geometric wonders and rewards of sixth grade edible math.  

  

  

Random Neurons on Espresso

     If Chaim Potok was right and all beginnings are--supposedly--difficult, I suppose I should be at least marginally stressed right about now.  Crafting a first blog post, so I've been told by all the gurus, is murder.  It ostensibly sets the tone for everything else you'll do and determines if first time visitors will ever want to darken your digital doorway again.  So, I've been advised, if I'm going to be clever or funny or endearing or profound I should do it now and do it right the first time.  This is my signature opportunity...my defining fifteen second elevator speech.
     Truth be told, I have a longstanding antipathy for gurus. I don't have authority issues per se; just a problem with incompetent people pretending to be competent while picking my pocket. I usually don't have time for stress. When it shows up unannounced I make it fill out a long form in triplicate and forward it to my virtual assistant in Bangalore. Snail mail.  She wants original ink.  And I hate elevator speeches.  It takes me longer than fifteen seconds just to find a clean pair of socks.
     So if you're a bullet list kind of person, bent on thin-slicing your way through life--sorry, had to get in the Malcolm Gladwell reference to see if the bots will throw me some free search traffic--why on earth are you still reading?  So you can flame me in the comments section?  Get a life.  It's my blog. I moderate. You want to prove me wrong?  I have an assignment for you.  You'll need a friend or colleague, two cell phones with stop watch and video capabilities, and a sense of humor.  Lack any one of these components and the exercise probably won't work. Ready?  Here's your bullet list.

• Friend takes video
• You operate stopwatch
• In fifteen seconds, define the universe.  Give three examples. 
• No fair quoting Douglas Adams or Billy Pilgrim. We want original and witty.
• All set? Go!
• Now post your results to YouTube
• Forward link to my comments section (Did I mention that I moderate?)

If I receive any legitimate responses I may let them through, or feature them in a future post.  Then again I may not.  In case it hasn't already become apparent, I'm a fan of Schroedinger's Cat.  If I don't like the odds, I don't stay in the box.
     Now back to our regular programming.  The real reason I'm writing this is to fill space and give my neurons something to do while the espresso kicks in.  I have a friend who asked me about Blogger as a platform and I hate uttering the words "I don't know." If I can't bluff, I investigate.  So I opened an account.  I wanted to look over the toys.
     As for the pivotal importance of this as my first post, I can always come back and delete it.  I don't think there are any rules governing how many first posts a person can post.  If I turn out to be wrong, I can pull a Cat and move to another box.  But I'll probably stick around.  I like writing.  It's one of my most cherished anti-social behaviours.