Two years of blogging

Nearly two years ago, I published my first blog post (in my first blog called Malkanthapuragudi, hosted at blogspot):

I like to read books – A rainy afternoon during the monsoon season (on the pyol with smoke rising on the tiled roofs of houses) with a novel on one hand is my idea of heaven: that a cup of coffee on the other hand is my idea of nectar goes without saying. I like to listen to music – To wake up at around 5:30 on a cool summer morning listening to Bhavayami of MS is also my idea of heaven: that a cup of coffee appears in this heaven also to perform the duty of nectar should not surprise you. In fact, I know of a short story of Kalki Ra. Krishnamoorthy, where, one of his character longs for a cup of coffee in the heaven, and is pretty disgusted with himself for mistakenly comparing the wonderful coffee that his daughter-in-law used to serve with nectar. But I am rambling. I read lots of articles and books on science and technology: that is part of my job. I watch plenty of movies: I prefer to think that that is my job too. And, I love to talk about all these things. As any number of my friends would tell you – I am a compulsive talker: I watched a good movie – I read a good novel – I read about some new discovery – I found a nice book in the library – Then, I just can’t keep quiet – I keep talking about them everywhere – In the coffee house, in the tea kiosk, while having lunch/dinner, on the way to and from the eating place, and just about anywhere. Recently, I found that two of my friends carried these conversations over to the internet using blogs. Now, that was tempting, and, as you can see, I can resist anything but temptation!

I have named my blog Malkanthapuragudi – After the Kanthapura of Raja Rao and Malgudi of RK Narayan. Like Kanthapura and Malgudi, this is an imaginary landscape. Also, like Kanthapura and Malgudi, I hope, it will stand for much more – It could be the microcosm of the universe in which we live in. It could be the backdrop against which greater events can take place, and greater truths be understood, and greater questions be raised and probably answered. So, welcome to Malkanthapuragudi!

As you can see, I have come a long way since then; today, I would not have written that post without peppering it with at least five or six links, even if they be to only wiki pages.

However, I did anticipate my blogging style correctly; till now, this blog is mostly about links to other blogs and articles (with paranthetical remarks); the original posts form a very small fraction of what I wrote. However, writing original stuff is a very time consuming affair for me; so, though I would like to increase the fraction of original posts in future, it still might not be a large fraction.

I have always enjoyed the comments that I received in this blog; they have been informative, and kept the conversation going. More importantly, I would not have known about other interesting blogs and people but for this blog and their leaving comments here. Having said that, I think there are more readers of this blog who never left a comment here; why not take this opportunity and give a birthday gift to this blog with a comment? I would really appreciate it.

I also received more links to my blogposts than I ever imagined. I got my first link thanks to Grrlscientist; when she hosted Tangled Bank 38, she was kind enough to link to a parody of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner that I wrote. This happens to be my only inclusion in a blog carnival of any kind.

These days, I also find that this blog is the place I often come to look for links to articles and posts which I know I have read, but forgotten where; in that sense it is a personal reference document for me.

On the whole, it is a wonderful two years; I am looking forward to more posts and more comments/conversations here. And, a big thank you to all of you, my dear readers/commentors/linkers!