Continued from the previous post ...

Doing this for very long ... ten months, let's say ... can result in a blogger getting the idea that they're the smartest person in any given room. After all, we postulate regularly (Can you take something for that?) in a huge forum, people read what we say and sometimes pat us on the back in the comments sections of our blogs. When it comes to our categories, we know our stuff ... enough.

Sometimes, we get grief for what we've written. People take issue, think we're dead wrong, know more than we do, slap us upside the head. Some bloggers may feel picked on or wounded or wonder if it's worth it.

Hey, this isn't rocket science, it's blogging. We're not writing for the NY Times, rules of journalism only loosely apply, and, heck!, we're supposed to do a lot of these every month, so how much research can we realistically be expected to do? The pay is far from lavish. There's no Pulitzer for blogs. There won't be a Nobel awarded. And there are three more due tomorrow.

For some of us, our blogging is an off-shoot of what we do the rest of the time. I write and I work on adoption issues (and I'm a mom and a wife and a friend and a boss and ... ), so my blogs often feed off those other bits of my life, and vice versa. Being a professional blogger for Adoption.Com lends a certain cachet to my other work ... well, the adoption-related work ... and gives my opinions a gravitas I would not be able to muster in some quarters without the gig.

I like that. I like having a soapbox right here ready for me every morning as I digest the news and react to world events. I like posting photos of my beautiful children and sharing events in their lives with people all over the world. I like paying public tribute to my husband and my mother and my friends. I like hearing that something I've written has helped someone do something important to them somewhere. I like knowing that my passion inflamed someone else enough to write a letter or take on an issue or fight for a cause.

I take my blogging here seriously. I am dedicated to providing as much information as accurately and as often as possible to people with varied interests. I have topics I write about because they're important to me (Cambodia, Emma Nicholson, etc.), and others I investigate because I know there are people reading who have are curious or care.

Some things amuse me, others have me scratching my head in wonder. No matter, it's all fodder.