Greater Is The Art Of Ending

Hey, sorry to see you go people.

But before you finally disappear, I'm looking for one in particular piece. Could you please check the database before you take it offline?

The article was a piece describing what the world would look like if you could stand in one spot and speed up time, just like the various adaptation of Wells's "The Time Machine" have done, where we first see day and night blincking on and off, then watching the seasons rotate, etc.

If you have that one, please sent me a copy. It was great stuff!

I stopped reading your blog about 8 months ago when I figured out that we have nothing in common (except unbelief), so this is fine by me.

So I just heard about this over at Pharyngula. I've only recently started reading atheist blogs, and it seems sad that once I've discovered yours, it's stopped. If this is still going to be around, I'll probably read through the old entries.

...but I wish you'd stay.

Thanks guys for everything you've done over the years. Really enjoyed the reading and discussions!

Just wanted to second (or twenty-second) the well-wishing and gratitude for bringing UTI for as long as you did. From the early incarnations of Choy Lee Mu to today, you've been an invaluable presence, and I, also, hope you to see you 'round the web in some way or another.

Thanks, also, to the list of contributing writers, Mr. Downey, Mr. Fox, Darksyde, et al. Sanity's always in short supply these days.

Brent, thanks for all the work. As a past host of, and contributor to, COTG, I appreciate your work in starting it up and developing it. And, yes, I too hope to see more from you in the future.

Steve/Gadfly

Brent: Slight correction to my earlier comment, down below. I was thinking of you, just used the wrong name. Argh.

G'bye and best wishes to all the unscrewed inscrutables...

Brace yourselves, people: we're about to be overrun with all those unground puppies!

So that slot in my reader will go mute. Shoot. Thanks, Brent (and the rest of the guys), for the words and thoughts over the years.

I'll second the motions to keep the site archived, though: There's a lot of good stuff I'd hate to see become inaccessible.

It has been great to come here and read your writing these past years, and I am sorry to hear you're closing down. Still, I can understand why you would do so, and wish you the best of luck in the future.

at other places occasionally. Since I shut down Tangled Up in Blue Guy, I have actually had a little time to myself and have been happily contributing to Quiche Moraine. But it ain't the same.

in all your future endeavors.
Thank you for your words.

I hope we see you around and about. I have enjoyed your atheistical meanderings...

Nice run, Brent. At least the part that I've enjoyed over the last three or so years. You and your co-bloggers have occupied, educated, amused and diverted me more times than I can count.

Good luck, fare well. May the road rise up to meet you.

I'll be keeping an eye out for your book and your as yet unknown future presence deep in the heart of the InnerTubes.

So long, for now.

Is it necessary to redirect everything to the Facebook page? Even with people pulling out and archiving a lot of their favorite stuff, that will still break a lot of links. Also, you currently have a lot of google juice so stuff you linked to generally gets some. Taking the site down could have a large negative impact on rankings for a lot of atheist sites.

sorry to see the plywood go up.

I will miss you! I started blogging right after 9/11. UTI and SEB have helped me gain the courage to own my atheism online (which wasn't easy), and are two of just a handful of blogs from which I read every post and darn near every comment. I hope you guys will frequent SEB and please consider this an invitation to drop in at my blog too. I will miss your Evil Atheist Conspiratorial take.

Don't be strangers, OK?

Thanks for this blog. It (and you) will be missed.

Duke

Just read over at Pharyngula that you're hanging it up and thought it would be appropriate to bid you farewell and good luck (although that last bit sounds just a little superstitious!).

Damn it Brent! I ain't the smartest guy in the whole world but I do get onto my computer every day. Let someone else manage the site. What do I need to do??

Scott

... but I can totally understand the decision. I've been close to closing up shop over at Stupid Evil Bastard myself a couple of times over the years, but then I find something else to shoot my mouth off about. Things are slower than usual at SEB right now due to life and work responsibilities getting in the way, but things will pick up eventually.

Brent, and anyone else who contributed here, if you ever feel like you need to scratch the blogging itch occasionally then I'd be more than honored if you dropped by SEB.

Good luck and stay in touch!

Well ...

Like backing up to get a good run at jumping a hurdle, I feel like I need more time to get to where I can actually express what this place has meant to me.

I remember those early years too, and they were special. In the past few years I've seen a shake-out of blogs -- used to be you could start one and people would just start showing up and commenting, but now the big sites seem to get most of the traffic. (I'm happy that PZ Myers, one of us, is one of the successes -- an international star, really.)

But mostly, the rest of us came and went. In the time that UTI has been online, I think I've had THREE blogs, Goat On Fire, Earthman's Notebook and [... uh, I can't even remember the third]. Which means I know how much work it is to maintain one, and how easy it is to get bored with it and quit. But to persevere for 9 or 10 years? Wow.

I had an image come to me when my dog Ranger died -- that the bracket of time in which he existed was still real back there, frozen in a timeless past and receding from me at one second per second. Untouchable, unreachable, but still there. And of course still there in the tracks on my heart.

I feel that same way about Unscrewing the Inscrutable. Sort of lost, but fairly happy too, that I got to be a part of it, that it got to be a part of me.

UTI was always worth checking out, when I connected every day. It was a small stage in its later years, but the good side of that was that it was a place where I felt I could be heard, no matter how long one of my overlong missives might be, no matter how tweaked my sense of humor.

This was my community, my tribe.

I'm sorry I haven't gotten to meet any of you in person, my online friends. I hope you'll be well, and will go out and have fantastic new adventures both online and off.

And Jim ... again, wow. [BRENT!! Thank you, Brent! I plead brain-fade due to advanced age. But thank you too, Jim.] Thank you for doing this. I so enjoyed it.

Especially great were those nights on the island, where we released the UTI comment-trolls and then hunted them on foot with spears. The way that Dave Mabus guy eluded us for three whole days ... that was just about the most exciting time I can remember having. I was almost sorry when the dogs finally got him.

Anyway, I look forward to Our Glorious Future. I see some good things coming up in my own life; I hope you all have equally good stuff to look forward to.

Any of you who want to keep in touch, I'm reachable through the contact links at www.DesignerQuick.com and www.EditorQuick.com, as well as through my Flickr photo page, www.Flickr.com/photos/hankfox. And I expect to be doing this too, this year: www.AdventYear.com.

Cheers!

All good things must come to an end, all the bad things too but I do consider UTI one of the good things :)

Thanks for all the time, thought, and effort.

This blog was always quality over quantity, which I'll miss. I just hope you don't disappear completely into the Facebook ghetto.

Ten years in this field is quite a run. I think there is an art to ending and that it's better to leave early than late. I'm grateful to UTI for some delightful and instructive conversations, as well as for introducing me to other sources of atheist thought.

One thing I appreciated most about this group was the humor, so I'll leave with one of my favorite quotes, from The Treasure of the Sierra Madre: "Oh laugh, Curtin, old boy. It's a great joke played on us by the Lord, or fate, or nature, whatever you prefer. But whoever or whatever played it certainly had a sense of humor! Ha!"

Frank Moorman, skeptic
"what is the point of giving persons Freedom of Speech... if you then say they must not utilize same? And is not the Power of Speech the greatest Power of all? Then surely it must be exercised to the full." --Salman Rushdie