A new beginning

It's probably become apparent by this point that activity on Given and Taken in Ink has slowed to a crawl.  There are a lot of reasons for that.  I've mentioned on GTI's Twitter and Facebook pages that a number of personal crises all crept up at once - I found out that I'm getting laid off, we lost heat in our house for several days, I nearly died as a result of issues related to that heating problem, and both my wife's and my cars have had mechanical failures.  Normal Life stuff, for the most part (except maybe the almost-dying bit).

Anyway, all of that paled in comparison to the past week, in which my wife endured a grueling 3-day labor before delivering our first child.  That's right, I'm a dad.  It's still a bit surreal to type that.

I was going to spend the rest of this post gushing about the little guy - he was only 4 lbs, 10 ounces (or 2.1 kg for our metrically-inclined readers) - but that's probably not why you read a site like GTI.  But I wanted to explain the lack of updates and ask you to please be patient.  I still plan on posting my Best Of lists (which were mostly finished when Life Happened, beginning in November).  And I've got a bunch of new submissions to digest and eventually share with you.

So please stick around - Given and Taken in Ink isn't going anywhere.  Thanks for your continued passion and support.