I suppose it would be responsible of me to at least say something to explain the nearly seven month gap between the notice of the death of that wonderful human being who was Tommy Wonder, and this 2007 inaugural post. And I would if I were a responsible-type adult.

Okay, I was serving time. (Just kidding — the conviction was overturned.)

I’ll borrow from one of my previous posts’ quotes:

I’ve got something to say, boys,
I’ve got something to say.
Just as soon as I can find a way, boys,
I’ve got something to say.

That was David Allan Coe. And I agreed with him then, and still do now: you have to have something to say. And I’d run into a patch where I thought I’d said most of what I had to say.

The reasons I started this blog a couple of years ago are somewhat different from the reasons I continue it today. Back then, there weren’t many magic-related blogs at all. And a painfully high percentage of those that were around then were dedicated to skewering the keptin of the green ship. I avoided direct participation (and even indirect participation, most of the time) in that endeavor and focused on other things.

Due to the shear numbers of blogs started with the singular goal of harpooning one fellow only served to light a fuse that virtually guaranteed the majority would quickly run their course and fall off the edge of the great flat earth. There are only so many non-clever ways to call someone stupid or fat before you, yourself begin to look…. Well, you know.

As a result, there are many, many magic-related blogs that now litter the digital highway with their dead carcasses. Escamoteurettes did not die; it simply took a nap, but not a dirt nap. And that’s the distinction.

So. What’s changed in the last seven months?

Offering up audio on a blog is far more popular today than it was when I stuck a toe or two into the waters. I don’t feel all that much different about it today than I did when I put the kibosh on it here. It takes time to listen to audio — attentive time. Podcasts aren’t like listening to music in the background.

Some blogs are gone; some new ones have popped up. Even Richard Kaufman blogs (and I’m glad to see it. Someone light a fire under Stan’s chair, please.)

So what have I really been doing? In part, I spent the last seven months putting into action some of the concepts I’ve pointed to, suggested, preached about, and admonished in these digital pages, the results of which I will share with you this year. I may not have been blogging, but I have been writing. This will be a year of education as well as a healthy helping of the sort of silliness you’ve come to love and expect from Casa Escamoteurettes.

Oh, in case you haven’t noticed, I changed the old design when I upgraded WordPress from 1.2 (the writing on cave walls version) to 2.1 (the brand spanking new, days-old version.) It was a new design, or spend another seven months shoe-horning the old design into the new template structure. And I didn’t have the stomach for that sort of excitement. (Expect a few broken links here and there. Sorry, Charlie, can’t help it.)

I’ll temporarily close by appropriating the essence of a well-known movie quote:

“You smell that? Do you smell that? Literacy, son. Nothing else in the world smells like that. I love the smell of literacy in the morning.”

Cry ‘Havoc.’ It’s begun again.