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I’ve decided to take a few months off from regular blogging in order to rest, collect my thoughts, and take stock of the situation. I also have some study I need to undertake, and I want to give it my undivided attention.
So my plan is to put the blog into partial hibernation until sometime this spring. I may still post from time to time over the winter, but there’s no regular schedule for it. I intend to return to full-scale posting in spring.
I want to say thanks to my readers and commenters, and I hope you won’t forget me while I’m gone.
Let me know in comments if people would still like to have open threads at this blog. I’ll still put up short posts to allow for that, and participate in the threads.
Come back even stronger my friend! We’ll be here when you return. Thanks so much for all the hard work you do, Russ! Hope you and Rany work on a collaboration. Sincerely, tawal
Comment by tawal — November 18, 2011 @ 6:50 am
Darn, I just joined and now you’r hibernating
That’s okay, I know you’ll be even more brilliant than ever when you come back:)Have an inspiring winter! I’ll be awaiting your return with eagerness.
Comment by DualPersonality — November 18, 2011 @ 7:14 am
Russ, thanks for all your efforts. Always an intellectual challenge here.
Love your strong spirit and take no prisoners attitude. May your spirit always find the light!
Comment by i on the ball patriot — November 18, 2011 @ 7:31 am
Russ,
Thanks for all of your work on this blog, as well as your comments at NC, I’ve learned a lot by reading you. Have a great winter, I’ll check back here from time to time in case there are open threads, and I’ll look for your return in the spring.
“Hibernation is a covert preparation for a more overt action.” – Ralph Ellison
Comment by Frank Lavarre — November 18, 2011 @ 8:56 am
Enjoy your sabbatical and looking forward to your next post.
Comment by atomiota — November 18, 2011 @ 12:55 pm
Thanks everyone.
Comment by Russ — November 18, 2011 @ 1:21 pm
Yes, enjoy, recharge. I imagine things will look a bit different come spring (if NYC yesterday was any indication)!
Comment by Pete — November 18, 2011 @ 1:33 pm
Have a good break, Russ! An open thread here and there probably wouldn’t go amiss. Take care and see you in the spring!
Comment by paper mac — November 18, 2011 @ 1:50 pm
Winter’s a good time to hibernate. Enjoy your retreat.
Don’t get lost wandering on the printed page though.
There are many many OTHER PLACES to be learning what interests you than in a book, or even with the Internet.
Good luck.
Comment by Debra — November 18, 2011 @ 2:40 pm
Hope you will be experimenting putting your ideas to work in the real world.
Comment by Ellen Anderson — November 18, 2011 @ 3:33 pm
To paraphrase Le Guin: “When blogging grows unprofitable, gather information; when information grows unprofitable, sleep.” Winter is a good time to sleep. Remember that the value of the writing you’ve done here and elsewhere doesn’t rest in the frequency with which you update it. Your blog is a body of work that has value in itself. It may be useful to go back over it with an eye to collecting something in book form. The act of doing this, whatever its ultimate outcome, would create new insights and linkages between ideas you currently hold, and this would have value whether or not you complete the effort or ever distribute it. (It might be good to share the results with a few other people. Wouldn’t want to end up one of those narrow-minded cranks we see all over the blogs hawking xeroxes of ideas that never change.) The aspects of your writing that have impressed me the most are its clarity and directness, and the ease with which you draw a straight line from an individual act to its larger context.
To quote Le Guin again, “The truth is that as a man’s real power grows and his knowledge widens, ever the way he can follow grows narrower: until at last he chooses nothing, but does only and wholly what he must do.” You’ll remain in my thoughts; I wish you the best. Even if you don’t return to blogging soon, or at all, I feel certain you will do what you must.
Comment by reslez — November 18, 2011 @ 5:40 pm
Love that second Le Guin quote. It is perfect. Where is it taken from, please ?
Comment by Debra — November 19, 2011 @ 9:51 am
A Wizard of Earthsea.
Comment by Archie — November 19, 2011 @ 3:30 pm
Your blog is a body of work that has value in itself. It may be useful to go back over it with an eye to collecting something in book form. The act of doing this, whatever its ultimate outcome, would create new insights and linkages between ideas you currently hold
Thanks for this suggestion. That’s actually part of what I intend to do, take everything and organize it into a coherent book, which I’ll then sequentially post on the blog, at least.
Comment by Russ — November 20, 2011 @ 1:53 am
Have a good winter. Stay warm.
Comment by Ross — November 19, 2011 @ 11:56 am
We love you, Russ.
Comment by Reed — November 19, 2011 @ 7:11 pm
Thanks!
Comment by Russ — November 20, 2011 @ 1:51 am
Happy Thanksgiving to each and every one of you. I am thankful for all you thinkers and rebels against the system (even you, Tao
) So glad to have found you guys 
Comment by DualPersonality — November 24, 2011 @ 1:01 am
Thanks DP!
Comment by Russ — November 24, 2011 @ 2:24 am