Wow...

Hi All,

My mailbox exploded in the past few weeks with notifications that people were signing up for this website. My initial reaction was a bit of confusion about how this happened. Then I realized Adam Tooze was engaging with me. Tooze's Wages of Destruction is why I decided to do what I do, so I am really, really touched he is my friend and interlocutor. I am also writing a big paper on his work, so stay tuned...

However, now I am embarrassed because this website was never meant to be more than a personal hobby. I lose money on this because I prefer Ghost to other similar services for various reasons. The little posts I write here are mainly to keep my brain active and to have a place to write about things I am interested in when I don't have the time or place to do it more formally, or it doesn't fit into my academic publishing or my day job. So the stuff is not really that clean... The other thing is I don't write on here that often. I have to write a lot for my day job, so this is a very back burner. I post when I have something to say that I can't keep in and need a text box to jot some things done.

All this throat-clearing is to say that I am flattered by all this attention but embarrassed that I will probably not be able to give all of you a lot of new content, and the content I will be putting up here won't be very neat or well written. This is especially true since I will be a father soon, so I will have many other priorities. In the next few months, I am putting the final touches on my long-suffering book manuscript, which, again, for various reasons, I don't want to get into in a public setting, got significantly delayed.

That said, I will start thinking about what I can do soon as a series or some more structured thing to make this a proper "newsletter." I am unsure if I will ever make it a paid service. However, with all this attention and on the suggestion of a few friends, I am adding a tip jar page which I will use for beer money and probably to pay my Ghost fees.  

Anyway, stay tuned, and it is very nice to have you join me here. Meanwhile, enjoy some cute pictures of my cats.

-Yakov