In case you haven’t noticed, I have decided to retire Abdiel Blog. I may post from time to time, but I’m not publishing anything regularly.

There are a few reasons for this. One is that I got tired of posting and just let the habit die. Another is that I use Facebook as my online social outlet now. A more important reason is that, while I still try to develop ideas and figure out the world, the things I have been trying to figure out recently have been too personal to blog about. Last of all, I created the Abdiel website when I was into the culture wars idea, as platform for certain topics that I am not really interested in anymore, or that I am interested in on a different level.

If anyone is reading this, thanks so much for your readership! Abdiel was an immensely fun project, and I intend to keep it online for some time yet.

Many writers seem to take it for granted that a good tool ought to disappear. The best notebook is supposedly the one that gets out of the way, the best jigsaw is the one that works right so you don’t have to think about it, and the best computer is the one that you don’t have to fiddle around with.

I disagree.

I think that that a good tool does indeed get out of the way. But an excellent tool gets back in the way, and becomes aesthetically noticeable. The perfect tool is not the one that you don’t notice as you do your job, but the one that is so beautiful, so practical, so stylistic that you don’t just notice it but enjoy using it, and want to use it.

The perfect notebook is the one that makes you feel like writing, the perfect jigsaw is the one that makes you feel like cutting, and the perfect computer is the one that makes you feel like customizing and playing with just for its own sake. Why be contented with the merely useful when you can have the beautiful?

I should have decided this several weeks ago when my schedule got busier and my inspiration started to dry up, but since things don’t seem like they’ll be changing for a while, I’ll go ahead and announce it now: Abdiel Blog sill be on summer vacation until September. I may post during that interval, but I won’t commit to it. See you in the fall!

This little poem is meant to express by its metrical form as well as by its words how unnerving and painful the process of learning can be. It is, of course, based on Plato’s cave metaphor.

I sat upon a slab of unhewn stone,
Imbibing all the chill solidity
That oozed in clammy moisture from its pores
and petrified my every weary bone.

I watched the sleepy shadows on the wall—
The dancing forms of sprightly, clever things
That soothed my soul and lent my spirit wings
As fire warmed my back. And that was all.

Until one day a stranger came and asked
If that was truly all—if stone was hard,
If warmth was warm, if shadows were. He asked
A thousand questions, and each inquiry shed light—

New light, and light, and light—effulgent, streaming,
Beaming, burning, stinging,
Blinding—

Until I longed for the dark security,
The shadowy cave
Where I could see and know.
Was I enlightened, or
Belighted?

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Or should I change something else, like the colors or layout?

As you can probably tell, I am working on this website’s colors and some parts of it look weird.

Does it have an awesome logo? Yes, it does! Does it feature huge lists of the best free icons, fonts, and css templates on the internet? Yes it does! Does it offer awesome free wallpapers with calendars on them every month? Why yes it does!

Is it now on my blogroll? Just guess.

I subscribed to Smashing Magazine a few weeks ago, and it is already one of my favorite blogs. If you haven’t seen it yet, you’ve missed out.

Yes she does, and here it is. So go and comment on it.

A month or so ago, I stopped at a vending machine at my college to get a snack. I was irritated to find that there was a large paper posted over the front of the machine, blocking my view. Nut then I noticed what was written on the paper.

It was an advertisement for CollegeDegreeFund.com. I visited the site and found that by registering a username, I would receive a funding account. Corporations would then be free to select all the profiles of some category I was in, or even my profile alone, and pour money into my account. When I got more then $20, I could withdraw cash.

I am writing now to tell you of my success. Just a month ago, I was a starving student, scrounging and saving just to afford book money and a Bambino Burger once in a while. But no more. I signed up for a CollegeDegreeFund.com account, and I am happy to announce that I received my first dollar of corporate sponsorship today.

My generous donor is Monkey See Monkey Do, a merchant specializing in vinyl animal toys (see the picture). To get their money, I had to slog through a strenuous questionnaire that included taxing inquiries such as whether I’d heard of cool vinyl toys (I hadn’t), whether I would go to their store if I ever was in their vicinity of Texas (I might), and whether I would buy their toys (again, I said I might, preferring prevarication to offensiveness, especially considering the munificence of my benefactors).

So why am I saying all this? Because I am not selfish. I wish to share my secret and my bounty. With one dollar in my account, it can’t be long before I’m rolling in wealth. Visit CollegeDegreeFund.com, and you could be too!

“It only takes time for a man to grow older, but how many of them grow up?”
~Gloria Naylor, Mama Day