ZD Hits Accountability (Maybe) and Goes Environmental

We formally started ZD on January 4, 2006, which means that today is our eighth birthday. I’m not sure what it means for a blog to reach the age of accountability, but here we are. Whether or not this will make us better behaved is anyone’s guess. And if eight years is only the average, rather than some absolute age of responsibility, we might actually have a few years to go.

We’ve added a number of bloggers over the last few years, and one of them observed a little while ago that since she’d come on board relatively recently, she hadn’t read a lot of our archives. This led to a discussion about recycling some of our earlier posts, and we’ve decided to become environmentally correct and add that as a regular feature. Watch for it starting next week.

Also, in the fine tradition of bloggernacle navel-gazing, I went back and looked at some of my email from December of 2005. In the middle of our usual Christmas present discussion (“don’t buy this gazillionth baseball statistics book for Ziff because I already did”), I found some interesting conversations between me and Eve.

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Lynnette to Eve, 15 December

I actually posted a couple of things on FMH under my middle name (on Luther, though I think that might have been a little too weird for anyone to respond to), and on the ultralong “readership down” thread, about why I don’t think “no children” automatically equates to “selfishness” (that discussion might not be your favorite).  It was very random.  I haven’t really read the blog in a few days, though, and it looks like it’s all about polygamy at the moment.

Eve to Lynnette, 15 December

I found you. Wow! . . .  I want to jump on there.

Lynnette to Eve, 15 December

I’m glad you found me!  Dang, I do think it could be entertaining if you and I and Kiskilili were all there blogging.  Maybe not so good for our PhD programs, though. 😉

Lynnette to Eve, 16 December

Help!  I went back to catch up, and ended up posting three more comments. The Bloggernacle is going to suck me in if I don’t exercise a bit of willpower and turn off my computer . . .

Eve to Lynnette, 16 December

It’s dangerous, that Bloggernacle. If you and Kiskilili started posting, there’s no way I could resist!

Eve to Lynnette, 17 December

Check FMH. I’m getting sucked in! I’m getting sucked in!

Lynnette to Eve, 17 December

Hooray! We’re going to be a family of feminist bloggers!

I looked at the names of the recent commenters, and immediately deduced which one was you.  😉  (Of course, I already knew that you liked the name “Eve.”)

I’ve gotten sucked into the polygamy threads, but I’m not sure if it’s worth arguing with someone who can’t see that polygyny is sexist.  To me, it’s so obvious that it’s difficult to explain.

Eve to Lynnette, 17 December

Yeah, I find polygamy a very hard topic to discuss, although I have to admire them for taking it on.

I really love your middle name . . . I don’t see any Eves around, so that seemed a good choice . . .  I guess I like the connection to a woman who took the initiative. :>

Lynnette to Eve, 17 December

Eve is a good choice, I think.

I’ve added two more cents to one of the polygamy threads; you’ll have to read it and tell me if I sound too antagonistic!  There are some issues that I really can’t discuss rationally.

Eve to Lynnette, 17 December

OK, now I’m going to jump into the fray too. Might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb, right?

Lynnette to Eve, 17 December

You know, I keep thinking that it would be fun to start a blog for Mormon women in academia—obviously I like FMH, but a lot of it is about childraising, and the rest of the academic discussion on the bloggernacle seems to be male-dominated.  But I’m worried that a) it would be too hard to keep up with it or b) it would be too easy to keep up with it, to the detriment of other areas of my life.

Eve to Lynnette, 18 December

I agree that it would be a blast, but as you said, it might lead to me dropping out of school to become a fulltime Mormon feminist commenter :>

Eve to Lynnette, 19 December

OK, now it’s really getting out of control . . . I’m going to have to swear this off once the semester starts. (Although it would be pretty funny to sit at Mom and Dad’s and quietly post back and forth!)

Lynnette to Eve, 19 December

Ha!  A fine Christmas activity, blogging.

Have you thought of a name for our blog yet? 😉

Eve to Lynnette, 19 December

Unfortunately, I can’t think of a good name for our blog. Maybe it will come to one of us in a flash while we’re dragging our luggage to the plane . . . I love “When Charity Faileth” but I think that’s a blog for other purposes!

Lynnette to Eve, 19 December

Okay, what are the ethics of this?  Now I’m neglecting my other online group in favor of the bloggernacle . . .

Eve to Lynnette, 19 December

You’re taking the truth that you already have and letting the Bloggernacle add to it! ;>

Lynnette to Eve, 19 December

So what’s the OT story about the tribe in which there are only daughters, so they go to Moses and ask to inherit?  I can’t remember where to find it, but maybe we could name ourselves after them.

Eve to Lynnette, 19 December

That sounds good—it’s the daughters of someone or other. Kiskilili would know!

Lynnette to Eve, 20 December

zelophehadsdaughters.blogspot.com

Too weird?  I kind of like it, especially because the story is about women managing to claim rights for themselves in a heavily patriarchal culture. (Though it doesn’t really have any obvious connections to feminist Mormon academics.)

Eve to Lynnette, 21 December

I think it looks great! I’m just having a bit of a moral crisis about how much time I’ve managed to spend blogging. :< Let’s talk and think about this more soon!

Lynnette to Eve, 21 December

Yeah, I seem to go through phases of internet use, and lately I’ve been on a bit of a roll.  I don’t know how serious I am about this, but it’s been fun to play with!  (Though I may have other distractions now that I’m back in Utah.)

Eve to Lynnette, 21 December

I don’t know what to think about blogging. My biggest concern is that it’s such a time-sucker, and my second-biggest concern is that it makes me so mad ;>. But by all means keep the site up. At least we can play around with it, as you said.

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It’s entertaining to read back through this. What strikes me is how fast it all was—we started a discussion about having our own blog only a few days after beginning to comment on FMH, I set up an early version of our site only a few days after that, and after discussing it over the holidays, we got it going in early January. If you’d told me we’d still be around eight years later, let alone how much impact it would have had on my life, I’m not sure I would have believed it.

Happy New Year, everyone!