In general, I prefer blogging when I have something to say about something, as opposed to when I have to find something to say about something. * That's because the former is more sincere, and less driven by a sense of "blogligation" than the latter, which in my case often takes the form of saying something about something that others are blogging about, lest I appear to be neglecting or not interested in the subject. For example, if fifty students were suddenly shot by some damned nutcase in another classroom, I'd have to say something -- even though I'd resent the hell out of that sense of having to.

It's like, whose life is this? Why should the stuff we call news get to dictate my blogging agenda to me? It's as if other people -- even random events -- are telling me what I have to do, and I don't like it.

However (and here's the catch), I have learned that the blessed people who actually read my stuff don't really care whether what I have to say is something I had to say, or found to say. Some seem to prefer the latter to the former. Perhaps this is because I care more about the former than the latter, and the less I care, the less I tend to be emotional, and the less I find myself struggling over, say, pointless nuances involving endless internal contradictions in my thinking.

Philosophically none of this matters, because once I put whatever I put here, I then have it, and whether I was originally driven by having to say it -- or by the process of finding something to say something about -- becomes irrelevant. Likewise, whether I hate or love what I wrote (or hated or loved the process of writing it) has no relationship to what readers seem to like.

That's because my tastes are not yours, and there is no accounting for taste.

Anyway, I'm sure I am neglecting a lot of important issues right now, but whatever they are, you can be sure that someone, somewhere isn't!

* It should go without saying that if the goal is blogging, having nothing to say is not an option. So if you have nothing to say, never say it!