Welcome to this Researcher's Journal. If you'd like to comment on anything they have written here, just click the relevant 'Discuss this Entry' button.
Welcome back
Oct 15, 2011
I arrived on h2g2 in late 2002, shortly after the BBC took over h2g2. At that time, people spoke of the interval with wistfulness... romance, even. I can now say that I've survived a somewhat similar event, though in this case there's much more for the community to feel wistful about. It's been the better part of a year since the BBC decided to dump h2g2, and I couldn't be prouder of this community. The small role I played in the transition convinced me that this will be a successful endeavor.
Speaking of that small role... I had initially expected to serve as one of the interim Guide Editors. However, as the transition took longer than expected, I was forced to give up that hope. With several important deadlines looming, and with my girlfriend (who had been abroad with a temporary job this past summer) due to return, it seemed like I wouldn't have much time for h2g2 after August. Icy North replaced me on the team - an excellent choice - and I'm really excited to witness these Guide Editors in action. They'll be great.
However, in past few months, I've finished some major projects and my the girlfriend and I have amicably parted (still great friends, luckily). So I'll be around, hopefully 
I've already started writing my first entry for the new h2g2. Hopefully it will be the first of many.
Showcase
Jul 11, 2011
The Showcase is an idea whose time has come. A86099809
I'm excited about the panel we've convened to select entries. It includes some of h2g2's most prolific and most talented writers. We also managed to convince Robbie Stamp to help out.
So please mosey over there and nominate the very best entries on h2g2. You only have 3 votes (1 EG, 1 UG, one neither) so be careful and thoughtful. By nominating an entry, you're saying, "This is the best entry on h2g2 in this category."
Not with a whimper
Jun 21, 2011
Even though I missed the pre-BBC h2g2 by a couple of years, I still have a strong sense that with this morning's announcement, we are going home.
I'm really proud to have witnessed this process, and to have been involved in some small way. I'll save it for wiser heads to impart the story of the bid (if that's possible), but I suppose I can say that I was not as heavily involved in the bid process as several other froods, whose hard work has quite literally saved h2g2 - not just as a website, but as an idea.
However, I am excited to get to work on building the Guide, by writing, reading and editing. I've spoken with Robbie Stamp, and I'm quite convinced that he will make an excellent Chairman. He has been thinking about how to make h2g2 and the Guide a success since before I had even read the books. As you might have seen (A85803384), I've volunteered to work as an editor for the Guide until elections are possible (which I don't believe I will be able to stand for).
I've seen several false dawns in my years here, when I believed that things were finally changing for the better. This is the first time that I don't just believe, but know, that we have an opportunity to make the Guide what we always knew it could be. F21537567?thread=8244219
An Apology, an Appreciation
Jan 30, 2011
I just saved my EG entries in a Word file, just in case. Having been a few years, I was happy to see some entries I had forgotten about entirely, and unhappy to see a few (early) entries that never should have been put in the guide in the first place.
I was astonished, upon finishing, to look at the page count. 827 pages in Word. For that, I can but apologize now. Even with something in the region of 140 entries that I consider to be my work, 827 pages is bordering on ridiculous. So, to you, the h2g2 community, I apologize for my long-windedness, and to the BBC, I appreciate your hosting all of that. I've loved writing for the Edited Guide on the BBC, and I hope to write for the new h2g2, wherever it may land.
Kinks in a hose
Aug 17, 2009
It seems that my writing for h2g2 comes in spits and starts that are almost unpredictable. I really don't know why.
In April, I wrote my first EG entry in about ten months, and since then I've written eight.. eight of my favorites, incidentally. It's been a fun few months, but I can feel that this particular urge has inexplicably run its course. I've been reading a riveting book about the Mississippi flood of 1927, but I haven't been taking notes (not even mental ones) or thinking of entry ideas. In June, if I didn't set aside an hour for writing every night, I started to get restless like a werewolf at the full moon. Really. It was inconvenient and exciting.
Animals have a biological imperative to procreate, I've heard, but it eventually ends after they've made their own contribution to tomorrow's food chain. I guess, for now, I stop at eight.
I found a website yesterday that offered free audio books for download (probably one of those websites that half the internet had heard of - the other half knowing of a superior alternative), and I snapped up Wodehouse's "Three Men and a Maid". So I spent the better part of tonight laying outside in a hammock with a pint of ice cream, listening to the first few chapters. Great stuff. Even better when narrated by a British accent. I don't know that there's better accompaniment to ice cream on a hammock in twilight than Wodehouse.
The results of the MOT is supposed to be announced tomorrow.
Sometimes when I'm about to go to sleep, I think about how things are different at that moment from when I woke up that morning. As much as every day seems to blend together, there's almost always that little something about my world that is irrevocably different. A new friendship, a broken appliance or a tiny victory. In 24 hours, I wonder what my miniature account for the day will read. I'm anxious.
Click here to see more Journal Entries
Last posted: Feb 12, 2008
