Into the black

During the song "My My, Hey Hey (Out of the Blue)" Neil Young warbles the legendary line "It's better to burn out than to fade away." And he's right. Even Kurt Cobain infamously agreed. But I ask... what happens when you fade out and you burn away?

No, you're right. I guess the two things don't cancel each other out.

The fact is I burned out awhile ago on this here blog. And the past couple months have been spent fading away faster than a meth addicts' youth and good looks.

The bottom line is that it's time to pull the plug, kiddies. I'm sorry to say, but The International House of Blogcakes hereby closes the doors. For good.

It's been a helluva time, though - don't be mistaken about that. In my time I've discovered that the blogosphere is filled with good eggs, of all types of talents and personalities. I'll just be watching from the sidelines from now on. Still around, but probably not participating as much as I was back in the day.

As for the "whys" behind my exit, it's not so much Any One Thing that led to the ultimate demise of The IHoB. If you held a gun to my head, I would a.) give you my wallet, b.) cry like a girl and c.) list them individually, and it would probably end up as a list of 10 or so different reasons. But the biggie right now is the personal matter I previously mentioned.

It's been an interesting run, particularly this past year when I introduced new blogger Fernando von Bakonstein and I lived vicariously through him as he got to personally meet a lot of those bloggers I like some much. And it's because of those participants (and the people I had lined up for his future travels) that I feel like I'm not giving this whole thing the proper send-off.

There's just not an easy way to do this. I've had about 12 different drafts of this post so far, none of which did the trick.

So having said that, I thank you all for stopping by here over the past two and a half years, I take a bow and I exit stage left.

Good night, and good luck.