Lack of posts due to vicissitudes of real life

For almost two years I have been fairly active in the Second Life(R) virtual world, writing for different magazines, working with MBC and Life On Line, and keeping a blog or two. But in June 2009, something happened that caused my to put my Second Life existence on hold: my wife was diagnosed with renal cancer following a routine colonoscopy. This sort of reality tends to realign one's perspective on the virtual world.

I told a small number of my closest SL friends about this and their support was encouraging. All of them offered their best wishes and prayers, which puts paid to the notion that virtual friends can't be "real" friends.

Three months on and the real world is now settling down to some normality. Following the removal of an entire kidney and renal gland, my wife now shows no other evidence of cancerous cells and treatment, as such, is over. No chemo and no radiation because the cancer has been removed. She now sports a battle scar of 11 inches in length and aims to be back at work in a few weeks.

Once she's back, I will have some time to slide back into some level of virtual existence, starting with articles for SLentrepreneur, Prim Perfect, and perhaps the Metaverse Tribune. Steve Cropper has been great letting me maintain my news slot on Life On Line, and if time permits, I'd love to go back to the occasional "second fiddle" part on MBC News with Dousa Dragonash.

I'll be trying to add to the blog, but my focus will initially be on the media stuff. I also have a real life blog to maintain - and a job!

Thanks for hanging on in there, dear reader.