mycalicocat

Bigindiancreek.blogspot.com

I’m going to explain that headline at the end of this column, but let me start at the beginning.
Back in October I learned that there was such a thing as a free blog, courtesy of Google Blogger, and I started one of my own which has evolved into an rambling conversation that starts up at about nine most evenings and enriches my life.
The people who turn up on my blog most often are some you may know, like Emily Johnstone, Terry Everett and Tish Mims, and some you don’t, like my daughter Susan and her husband Beau from Kentucky, and my sister-in-law, Yvonne from Atlanta. There are others who’ve popped in and out, including friends and relatives and an occasional complete stranger, but those are the regulars.
We’ve written back and forth about everything from childhood memories to what the funniest commercials are. We went on at length for several nights about the best meals we had ever eaten. We’ve differed vehemently on the subject of malls. Some people, to my astonishment, actually like malls. Some, to my delight, have the same low opinion of cell phones that I have.
We’ve told each other about technical deficiencies, our cold remedies and our remarkable children. We’ve gone off on plenty of tangents, too, starting off on one subject and winding up on something else entirely.
Without the blog I’d never have known that Emily’s grandmother used to ask her, “Who do you think you are? The Queen of Sheba?”, that Public Defenders use sideways smiley faces for punctuation, or that my own daughter once “murdered” a pot roast by forgetting it was in the crock pot and cooking it for 18 hours!
I also wouldn’t have known Tish’s definition of “Captain Crunch mouth” which is “you know, when it shreds the roof of your mouth while you're eating it and watching cartoons”
We’ve been serious, too. A discussion of what each of us would do with $13.5 million wound up not being a imaginary shopping spree but an illumination of some of our deepest concerns. We also got our heads together at one point on the subject of St. Paul’s admonition to think about “whatsoever things are lovely,” and came up with a Whatsoever List that wound through 25 comments and over 40 “whatsoevers” including Beethoven’s Ninth, giraffes, laugh lines, the tops of babies heads, Elberta peaches, pipevine swallowtails, mochas and wireless, “any story written by a first grader,” boiled peanuts, “Hey, Jude,” and apples barns in North Georgia in the fall.
If you’d like to start a blog of your own with family and friends, it’s easier than you think (and way easier than setting up a Web site, which is a matter I don’t even want to discuss!)
To prove my point, I’ve set up a blog just for those of you who are reading this column. It took me all of 15 minutes and part of that time was taken up trying to think of a blog name that nobody else was already using.
Just go to bigindiancreek.blogspot.com. You’ll find a post from “No Spring Chicken” -yours truly- when you get there, so pick yourself a blog name and let’s see what happens conversationally.
You can use your own name, of course, but choosing an blogger’s alias makes it more fun, and less self-conscious.
Then if you want to start your own blog, you’re already in the right place. You can click on “create a blog” and follow the directions.

Written for the Thursday Houston Home Journal