DOWSWORLD

DOW with a blog? Never! Yes folks; me - a fully signed-up member of the Luddite club tiptoeing into the 21st century. Yes, yes, I know; I turned up my nose at computer technology and once was a member of the saloon bar brigade of bigots who boasted of his ignorance of IT. Putting pen to paper and sticking a stamp on an envelope was good enough for me. Mobile phones? Pretentious nonsense for ostententatious starlets and the flash nouveaux riches. Broadband and the information superhighway? What's wrong with the the local library and a decent encyclopedia?

I take it all back. Why? Firstly, it was a real pleasure to follow my son's world travels (with photos) on his blog. Secondly, a cancer diagnosis made me aware of how precious life is and how little time we have to record our thoughts. There were other motivating factors, not least my irrepressible compulsion to vent my spleen in the letters pages of the Press. Also our impending move to Spain will diminish my interest in British politics and the move itself will conjure up many impressions and experiences that could well merit recording for posterity.

The clincher was an article in - of all magazines - The Oldie (issue 210), the house magazine of all those with one foot in the grave. The Oldie was launched by seriously old Richard Ingrams (ex-ed of Private Eye) back in 1992. The Oldie article advocated the use of a blog for writers, thinkers, pholosophers and even grumpy old gits who just want to sound off into the ether.

Well now, sez I, if The Oldie embraces the idea so enthusiastically, why not I. So here, dear reader, is the world of DOW. (I use reader in the singular- just in case). What shape this blog will take, who knows. Hopefully it will be profane, irreverent, often angry and more often than not mischevious and witty.

I express my gratitude to The Oldie for explaining to me what blog meant. It is a contraction of WEB LOG. As an ex-sailor I am fully familiar with what a log is and I now know what the web is so the word is no longer nerdy - it makes sense.