If you’re reading this, then odds are that you found the link via Twitter or you saw me mention it in my Instagram or Facebook story. If you found it some other way, um… congrats?

In 2003 I started blogging my thoughts on LiveJournal. From there, the tools for sharing our lives online continued to evolve. In the summer of 2007 I bought the domain of my name (Tom Croom) and decided to migrate from LJ to my own website. The thing is, I was the one coding the site myself so it never was (and probably never will be) anything spectacular to look at.

Today microblogging and short form online storytelling is the main style of communication. See something interesting? Instagram it. Want to yell something in the universe? Tweet it. Need to get into an awkward argument with that racist relative outside of holiday get togethers? Reply on Facebook.

Now we’re in February of 2020, and I’m still trying to catch up from 2019. I got on a plane (somewhere and back) over twenty times last year. Twenty. Times. One of the side effects from traversing the planet so much was twenty extra pounds. For those of you who have followed my online adventures in the past: I like to eat local foods in local cities. Thus, the de-healthing of myself really wasn’t much of a surprise.

I’ve spent the last month getting my blog migrated and cleaned up enough to launch again. This post is an update post doubling as a test post, so I’m going to claim that any mistakes are intentional. That said, my blog as a whole has been locked as I slowly begin the process of adding back years of content.

The narrative of my life is full of random thoughts, and I’ll be spending time going forward telling new stories, finding and revisiting/reposting old ones, and telling ones I forgot along the way. The plan is to blog about the things that keep my life interesting (at least to me) and go from there. The obvious key topics are now the links on the menu. Highlights:

• Conventions: Each year I do an annual post on my blog outlining the history of pop culture conventions in Florida. I have the 2020 one drafted. It’ll get posted soon.
• Man v. Food: I love this TV show, and I eat at a lot of locations (SEE: “gained 20 lbs.”) since I travel so much. My last blog update of a location is from February of 2017. I’ve been to a bunch of locations since then, and I have a slew of old posts to unlock/repost.
• Concerts: This is more for my “old man” memory. I’ve been lucky to see some great performances in my life, and I like keeping track of that for some reason. As technology has gotten better, photos and videos have started coming along with these posts.
• Best Picture Winners: I like getting into watching entire series of films from time to time. Usually these involve franchises (like the Jame Bond series) but a while ago I decided to try and watch all the movies that have won the Academy Award for Best Picture. The last update I could find for this dates back to 2014. I’m pretty sure I’ve seen more since then.

There’s more, too, thanks to my geek-loving convention travels. I just have to start writing again somewhere that’s not social media in order to keep my brain sharp. Age is creeping up on me, and the nineties are farther away than many of us care to admit…

Stay tune, folks.