Reboot

“How many 13 year-old girls does it take to screw in a lightbulb?”

That was the question that I used to ask one of my daughters when she was 13. I’ll let you think about the answer.

Recently a few members of my family were sitting in the backyard enjoying each others company, laughing, telling stories, roasting marshmallows. For some reason, I started asking Siri, Apple’s iPhone answer lady, questions, including this one: “How many Presbyterians does it take to screw in a lightbulb?”

“One thousand.” Siri promptly replied. “One to screw in the lightbulb and 999 to blog about it”

Perhaps we’d had too much beer; perhaps we were just drunk on the refreshment of being with each other. Whatever it might have been, we thought that was just about the funniest thing. Typing it now, it seems a bit dull. Nevertheless, it serves as a good foil for this post.

There have been a few who have wondered where I’ve gone. My last serious post to this blog was in May, 2015, and prior to that, posts have been spotty.

My answer is that I’ve been screwing in lightbulbs and leaving the blogging about it to others. At least that is what I like to think.

There are those who have though continued to encourage me to write, and to write for this blog. I’ve certainly continued to generate ideas and consider issues I’d like to write about. That what I’ve written in the past has been to some degree helpful to some people does suggest that a blog is perhaps useful work. And yet it often asks for time that I do not think I have.

But the urging is having its effect. So with quite a bit of trepidation, I am rebooting the Somber and Dull blog. My goal at the outset will be no more than one post every week or two. Several are in an active queue; several hundred sit sketched and neglected. Time has been budgeted for developing a few of those, and so we will see where this goes.

I will try to be faithful to this. You will encourage that faithfulness by your comments and by directing others to read with you. I’ll do my best to make it worth your while.

And I’ll still screw in lightbulbs, just not as easily as my then 13 year-old daughter, who could do it all by herself:

“Just one. She holds the bulb and the world revolves around her.”