So, you may have noticed a little downtime here at tossr; no updates for, ooh, about 4 months and some proper off-the-map downtime too, due to my previous host slapping up a big “this domain has been suspended” notice rather than, I dunno, actually letting me know that my account was due for renewal. I subscribe to British science fiction mag SFX and they start telling you your sub is due for renewal months in advance, so why can’t a webhost at least have the courtesy to inform you that it’s time to cough up more money before pulling the plug on your site? I’m not going to name names as I was fairly happy with them otherwise and it may just have been a one-off; however as a form of protest I’ve taken my business elsewhere.

What’s with this post then? Well, I’m determined to get back to blogging (mainly so that I can stuff the site full of ads and rake in that sweet Adsense cash) but, as always, the hardest bit is getting started; inertia can be pretty difficult to overcome. It doesn’t help that on more than one occasion I’ve made announcements along the lines of “Yay, tossr is back! And this time I’m going to keep posting!” only for it to come stumbling to a halt after a post or two. How is this time going to be different? Well, I can’t guarantee it will be; I’ve just landed some potentially-lucrative web design work so that has to take priority but I’ll certainly do my darnedest to keep this place running.

As always, the question of what to write about rears its ugly head; tossr was initially intended to be a tech-related blog (hence the name, with its suggestion of a dismissive attitude towards the hype surround the whole Web2.0 scene) but it somehow got sidetracked into interminable anecdotes about coffee and tipping. Having said that, I like writing anecdotes about coffee and tipping; you may consider them dull, self-absorbed ramblings but I prefer to think of them as witty snapshots of modern British living. Maybe, if I can keep it up, I can get a job as a Guardian columnist, churning out 600-word missives so that the likes of me can skim over them every Saturday over a coffee and ciabatta.

That reminds me, did I tell you the latest on my coffee addiction? But no, that can wait until another day; I don’t want to go giving away all my best anecdotes just yet, as you never know when a passing editor is ready to pounce, chequebook at the ready, with the promise of my own weekly column headed with a vaguely-flattering photo of myself looking happy, sleepy or grumpy (or indeed, some other dwarf-related emotion). I’ll save that one for another time then; when I’m a bit stuck for material, perhaps.

So, um, coffee stories tomorrow, then?