To My Regular Readers

I had a wonderful day yesterday with my cousin from Ireland and her husband. I'd love to post more about that, but I have little time for anything right now. I do apologise to all of my regular readers for the temporary shift in focus of this blog. It is not, as I stated before, my intent to maintain a journalism blog. There is a place for journalism, but I find more challenge and more satisfaction in truly creative writing.

Many of you have already seen my post of the 29th of August. This is a serious matter, and the people involved need my help. I want to do what I can for them, then get back to the writing I most enjoy. I planned on at least going on with my writing challenge; since one of the writers involved is moving this weekend, and will be offline until next week, I have decided it is best to delay the challenge until he is ready to take part.

I have decided to make it a multiple viewpoint story. I will write the first part, making sure to leave openings for additional viewpoints, then send it on to Brandon, Amin, Susan, Sara, and Lehane, in that order. Susan and Lehane, I'm not sure if I have your e-mail addresses. I'll check, but if I don't, and you'd rather not post them in the comments, my address is in the footer, a long way down the page.

The story will follow a few simple rules. 1: Each participant has 250-300 words for their segment. 2: Each segment is to be told from the viewpoint of a different character. 3: No one may alter what has already been written. 4: Individuals often notice different details, focus on different things, or interpret the same thing in different ways, so the stories may vary widely. However, the viewpoint character must be someone who is already mentioned, or who could reasonably have been overlooked, by the narrators who have gone before. Also, unless a plausible explanation is included or implied for their having done so, the previous narrators may have overlooked details or focused on different parts of the action, but no narrator is assumed to have been actually lying.

I do want to assure you my blog will return to normal shortly. I plan three more posts on the subject of the USDA employee's threat to their critics, then I will leave the work to others. One will be a clearer explanation of exactly why I take this matter so seriously. The second will be instructional, offering those opposing the USDA ideas for getting their side of the story out effectively. This may prove to be such a long post I will have to break it up into several sections. On the positive side, if any of my readers have causes they care about, my ideas could be readily adapted. The third post, which I may not get to for a while, since it is less urgent, will be an exploration of the reasons I personally support this cause.

Whatever your opinion on the issue, please understand that I would be much happier if I didn't feel this was necessary. There are things I'd much rather be writing. I don't expect everyone to agree with me, but I do believe strongly that something must be done, and I am the person in a postion to do it. I hope you will consider reading my views on this, or at least that you will return in a day or two when things begin getting back to normal.