November’s End Nov2009 – ladyglutter.com

LadyGlutter is an online pseudonym I’ve used for years. Eventually, everyone asks me the origins, so I may as well tell the tale now. In college, I played AD&D (or 2nd Edition Dungeons & Dragons) with a small group of friends. My husband-to-be was my DM. (He still is, by the way, and we’re still playing in his campaign world.) My third character was a gnome illusionist named Bofala Glutterstarfinkel… In the tradition of Kuralian rock gnomes, it went on and on. That much of the name was all she bothered with when making introductions, out of courtesy to the other cultures she was encountering. Another gnome would have been fascinated.

Around that time, I also became active on irc. A unique name I really liked was hard to come by, but “Glutterstarfinkel” was never taken. Go figure. That became my handle, but many people were irked by the gender ambiguity of said name. One of my most frequented rooms was called Camelot, and the self-proclaimed King thereof insisted everyone go by Lord or Lady. Thus, I was dubbed LadyGlutter, and henceforth, whenever I’m out and about online, I have used the name. Geeked out yet? Stick around, it’ll get worse I’m sure.

This is the Genesis Stage for Ladyglutter.com. Suggestions are welcome. Right now I’m focusing on getting something out there, and learning enough basic web design ideas to put something clean and presentable out there for the world to see. As far as content, this website has the potential to go in several directions. Worrying about niche has given me an excuse not to set anything up for over a year, so I’m going to plough ahead without a clear vision of what I’m going to talk about. If I’m passionate about it, I will doubtless end up writing about it. However, I’m interested in so many things! I am filled with curiosity and an overwhelming thirst for knowledge. This broad general interest has been a stumbling block for me my entire adult life. I’m leaving behind my fears and indecision and creating the site, with the expectation that my topic matter will sort itself out as I get used to writing. I’ve read plenty of blogs that talk about a little bit of everything, and are still interesting.

While being a voracious reader of various blogs along the way, I never intended to blog. I greatly value my privacy, and didn’t want to have a typical navel gazing boring live feed into my brain out there for everyone to read. I think that many people have met with great success with those type of blogs, but I don’t want that for me. It’s too personal and open to appeal to me. I’ve been wrong before, though, and as I’ve done more and more research, I think a blog is the best format for me to start writing again. I do not want an online diary, but what I do I want is to participate in the world of self-publishing that has emerged to become a true force in the past decade. The age of the Internet has been compared many times to the cultural awakening that occurred on the heels of Johannes Gutenberg’s mechanical printing press. Suddenly, the written word was accessible to everyone. Now, as then, an explosion of information is flooding our lives. We can quickly find out whatever we need to know, immediately. Sure, we have to do some checking of our facts, but really, the internet has changed everything.

My writing is admittedly rusty and a bit rambly at the moment, but I already write every day. Emails, journal entries, scribble-scrabble on a piece of paper that I throw away, comments to other people’s blogs, posts to online role-playing games. I’m constantly writing. Still, it has been a while since I wrote for public consumption. You have been warned. I fully expect to make very public mistakes, to have awkward moments, and to write rambly posts… but I also expect to make this a great place to visit.

If you’d like to get in touch with me personally, I welcome you to visit my contact page.