smokerblog

The Fretful Porpentine

Okay, so if you haven't already noticed the new link at the top of the list over there to the right, here's the official directing-of-your-attention thitherward. Also, this will serve as the announcement that effective sometime soon, smokerblog will go into retirement, to be replaced by the fretful porpentine.

Do Not Fear: all of the existing smokerblog posts (including the Story of Ben) will remain in their current archived location, but comments and other interactive gadgetry will be disabled. This is just a change in title and design (which will likely be evolving), plus also some much-needed behind-the-scenes retooling of the machinery that manages the organization of all this self-indulgent blather. There's a new version of the blogging software running at the FP, and if I've got it right, this should provide a better defense against the hordes of comment spammers I'm having to deal with today.

So but why the name change? No reason really, except that I've had the domain name kicking around for a while now and I thought it was high time to put it to good use. The source text for the name comes from Shakespeare, (Hamlet, Act 1 Scene 5):

I could a tale unfold whose lightest word
Would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood,
Make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their spheres,
Thy knotted and combined locks to part
And each particular hair to stand on end,
Like quills upon the fretful porpentine

I really should give some poetic explanation for why I chose this name, like maybe my I'll be saying things in my blog that may be shocking or some such, but the reality is just that I find the snippet above to be highly hilarious, especially when taken out of context. But maybe that's just me.