We’ve had some cold weather here in northeastern Kansas, although nothing like that some of you who live further north have had to deal with this fall! I have been taking advantage of warmer weather we have had over the past couple of days to get some more work done outdoors. Today, I put up some foam core panels to enclose a lean-to shed rabbitry area. I am very pleased with how well that addition stops the wind.

This week I also got fed up with Facebook, and have begun a self-imposed Facebook exile. Although I have had my Facebook account for many years, it was a very long time before I really got very interested in it. As a web developer, I learned that I needed to write some apps so that my clients could leverage Facebook for their businesses, but I was not a very enthusiastic user of Facebook for a long time. Then over the past year, I got sucked into it, against my better judgement. I knew damn well what a time suck Facebook is. As a serious rabbit breeder, I get perturbed at all the really bad information that is given to newbie rabbit owners on Facebook. As a developer and content creator, one of the reasons I don’t care for Facebook is because all you are really doing, when you use it, is generate income for Zuckerberg and company. Although I own a couple of Facebook groups, I find it exasperating how few tools are available for group owners. Finally one day last week, I was in the mood to make some changes, and so I turned ownership of my Facebook rabbit groups over to friends, and logged out.

I recommend it! Get the heck off Facebook! You will be pleased at how much more you will get accomplished in your real life, and you will be surprised at how much better you will feel about yourself.

Something else I’ve noticed is that the popularity of Facebook has brought about the death of many independent website forums. I installed forum software on this site back in 2012, and it was reasonably popular for several months, until people started creating rabbit groups on Facebook. Today, I disabled this site’s forum, due to lack of use. However, I don’t think it is Facebook alone that has killed so many website forums; I think that nowadays, because person to person communication is so easy via the web, that lots of people just get whatever support and help they want directly from their friends. For example, a couple of days ago, Kelly Flading and I chatted together for a few hours over a Google Plus video Hangout. I chatted via my phone out in the rabbitry, while grooming several rabbits.

I first got on the web back in 1994, when America Online was just becoming popular as an internet service provider, which it no longer does. In many ways, AOL was a lot like Facebook is today, except that Facebook is not also an ISP. I first learned how to do web publishing on the little hosting service that AOL offered to members back then. I published the first version of this website on AOL, and those pages can be discovered at Archive.org. I published the first NARBC website on AOL back then as well. I remember teaching Pete Chavez, whose wife Laurie Williamson won Best of Breed at Convention a couple of times, how to web publish.

There was a weekly text-based chat for ARBA members on AOL, and that was the highlight of my week. We had so much fun, and I often found myself getting a side ache from laughing. Some of the folks whom I enjoyed during those chats back then have passed away since then. I have forgotten some of the names, even if I remember the people.

There have been so many changes in our world since then. Truly, “The only constant is change.” Some changes are improvements, and other changes are only different ways of doing things.

One of the areas of not only change, but improvement, has been the development of the English Angora breed. If I could have gotten my hands on rabbits as good as the show quality English Angoras of today, back in the 90s, I would have been gobsmacked. The emergence and dominance of the “non-molting” coats has been a real boon. We rarely see rabbits that are long and flat anymore.

Sometimes, I joke about “my career as a quitter.” I will stay with an activity only for as long as it is fun. (“Fun” might be something that is a lot of work, such as caring for Angora Rabbits!) I might wake up one day and just find that I simply don’t want to do something anymore, and I will just walk away from it. I’m not going to desperately cling to something with every ounce of strength, territorially fending off all comers. It is generally considered to be virtuous to have “stick-to-itiveness.” Determination and persistence are good abilities to have. But sometimes, I can’t resist that “screw this!” urge to drop it and walk away.

As I have gotten further into official senior citizen territory, this trait has become more pronounced. I feel like I am refining and refining, and casting aside crap that is trivial, so I can focus on the things that give me real joy.

I find my rabbit breeding to be fascinating. I want to develop a superior bloodline that consistently reproduces its type, like making cookies with a cookie cutter. In the half dozen or so litters I have raised over the past 2-3 months, I have a couple of baby bucks that I think are freakishly good. They are still very young though, and so I cannot afford to be over-confident. If they continue to develop well, perhaps this time next year, they will be the sires of the baby bunnies I have then. I would love to have a whole herd of rabbits like them.

Refine, refine, refine some more. Don’t cling to clutter. Don’t cling to “stuff.” What REALLY matters to you?