Bienvenue

Well. Here it is. The Beginning.

The idea for this blog has been germinating in my head for months. I've had blogs before, but I wanted to try something a little different. I wanted to write something that might be a little more publicly appealing, rather than just a less invasive version of mass e-mailing friends with updates on my life. This is still a personal blog, but I hope it will make for more generally interesting reading than my past efforts.

Why has it taken so long for this blog to make it's way out of my head and onto the page (or screen, I suppose); to break through the soil? Well, first there was the title. Choosing a good title seemed so important, and if you know me, you're probably aware of my distinct aversion to making decisions, to committing to a choice. Of course, there are guides to blog-naming on the internet. However, they usually ask you to start by thinking about the theme of your blog. As I said, this is a personal blog. I don't really plan on sticking to one topic - at least not to start with. There are so many things I want to write about. Perhaps, after a while, a theme will emerge, but trying to pin it down now would be like trying to start the process of writing an essay by writing the introduction.

I thought that once I had come up with a title, things would go smoothly from there. But then I encountered the hurdle of The First Post. My intimidation on that front, combined with the constant thought of, "well, I could tackle the blog, but I really should be working," yielded only more procrastination. But here's the thing: I think writing this blog will make me happy, and that in turn will make me more productive in my work. So here we are: it's Sunday; I haven't done any work yet, but I'm sitting down to write this anyway.

Despite the fact that I refuse to choose a "theme" for this blog, there are some topics I'm pretty sure you'll encounter if you stick around: food (producing it, and acquiring it from people who are talented at producing it), Paris (suggestions for visitors and cultural observations, among other things), feminism, photos, and possibly some philosophy. Oh, and I've seen a trend among other bloggers: a weekly feature called "Friday link love," where they share all the funny or interesting tidbits they've come across on the internet that week. I am somewhat embarassed by my level of "facebook activity" - which I think consists mostly of sharing links - so I'm hoping to consolidate it into a weekly blog post, and become a little bit more invisible on facebook.

So, there you are. This is my blog. And to show you just how excited I am, I'll do a little song and dance for you:

Willkommen, bienvenue, welcome!
Fremde, étranger, stranger.
Gluklich zu sehen; je suis enchantée;
Happy to see you,
Bleibe, reste, stay!

(Sorry - I couldn't help myself. And please excuse any mistakes in the German spelling - I don't actually speak German. Yet.)