My Seventieth Post

So once upon a time, I was a freshman. I was really bored, so I was going through some random blogs of people I barely knew through facebook. I ran across a post someone had written about the 100 Hour Board, and how awesome it was. So I checked it out. I became hooked. I read for months and months until I finally got up the courage to ask the Board a question. My first few questions were pretty random, and I signed them with whatever pseudonym came to mind. At some point, I asked a question about Heritage Halls, and signed it as Heretical in Heritage. I thought this was quite a clever ‘nym, so I stuck with it in many of my future questions to the Board.

Eventually, I moved out of Heritage Halls, and I decided it was time to change my handle. I knew no one on the Board would know who I was if I changed my signature, so I asked quite a few questions in a short period of time to get my new name out there. I signed all of these as Baked Alaska.

At about this time, I decided I would really like to be even more involved with the Board than I already was, so I applied to be a writer. I was accepted (possibly just to keep me from asking so many questions), and I began my writing career the summer after my sophomore year. I had never intended to use Baked Alaska as my writer ‘nym, but it just seemed to work out that way. So I wrote for the Board for several months and got to know the other writers at numerous Board parties and other writer-type activities. Unfortunately, school started, and I started finding myself struggling to keep up with the current questions on the Board. I was in the middle of a semester that would determine my future at BYU (if I didn’t do well in my classes, I would most likely not be able to return). So after a bit of stalling, I resigned from the Board. This was probably a very good move, since I was able to get a 3.0 GPA that semester (for the first time since high school) and remain in school.

But I missed the Board. It had been a big part of my daily routine for over two years, and I now had many friends affiliated with the Board, especially my roommate krebscout (whom I had convinced to apply). So I continued reading daily, and eventually I started asking questions again as Rejected in Regency, a throw back to my days as Heretical in Heritage.

This whole time, I had been involved with various blogs of family and friends, always using the title of “ahem.” (which basically started as an inside joke with my sisters). At first, I really never intended to make my personal blog public, so I didn’t care what name I was using. But I did start making comments on others’ blogs, and a few people started to know me by “ahem.” as well. So when I started telling people about my blog, I didn’t really want to distance myself from those comments or blog-relationships I had established. So I stayed as ahem., and for the most part, I tried not to write anything that would specifically link my blog to any of the ‘nyms I had used over the years (with a few exceptions). But I have finally decided that since any of you now reading this most likely know who I am anyway, it doesn’t make sense to keep up the façade of secrecy. I don’t really care anymore. So there you are.