My 2,000th blog entry

Back on 18th September 2008 (exactly five years ago!) I wrote my first blog entry. It was entitled SMALL BEGINNINGS and stated the following:

After much prompting ... and not a little reluctance on my part ... I have decided to take the plunge.

I have now joined the world of the self-publicising, self-centred, self-indulgent blogger.

I intend to share my thoughts on wargaming (and other related matters that crop up) with a wider audience ... probably much to the relief of my wife and wargaming colleagues. So watch this space ... and come prepared to be bored!

This is my 2,000th blog entry ... and I think that I have managed to do what I set out to achieve just five years ago.

The last five years have seen quite a few up and downs. My father and father-in-law have both died, and my wife and I are now retired from full-time work ... and hope to remain so. We have cruised around the countries of Europe – visiting almost every one that has a coastline – and even managed to travel across the Atlantic Ocean to visit the United States and Canada.

The most important things that blogging has done for me are:

• I have done much more wargaming in the last five years than I had done in the previous ten years (it is difficult to write a blog if you don't actually have anything to write about ... so I fought lots of wargames so that I did!).
• I have made a huge number of new friends and acquaintances around the world, and have even had the opportunity to meet some of them.
• I have learnt a lot about wargaming – and people – from the feedback regular readers have written in reply to my blog entries.

Thank you to everyone who has read my blog. My only hope was that it was not too boring!