You can't post from Espana? Por que?

Andrew Campbell took a break from blogging for a week or so and used the time to qualify for the Olympics. Bonnie disappeared from the blogosphere for a while and has apparently been kayaking in my back yard. And when I signed off before heading to the Masters Worlds, Peconic Puffin asked, "You can't post from Espana? Por que?".

Why don't we post on our blogs when we are most active in our sports?

Are there practical difficulties? Perhaps Bonnie was camping out on some Rhode Island beach? Or in Andrew's case was it just that he needed to focus 100% on his performance in the Olympic Trials and blogging would have been a distraction?

I'm not sure why I don't make the effort to blog about my sailing every night when I'm competing in a major regatta. It might make more interesting reading than some of the drivel I write here. Then again it might not.

There are some practical issues. My current laptop is more of a desktop replacement than a true portable. And with all the other sailing gear I had to carry to Spain for the Worlds I didn't feel like lugging a heavy laptop too. But if I really wanted to, I could always buy a smaller computer to use for writing and blogging when I am traveling. Plenty of bloggers obviously do.

There is always the Internet cafe solution. Who needs a laptop? Find some establishment offering computers and Internet access at a price, and blog from there. Every harbor town in the Caribbean has those places. Cabarete had plenty. Actually I didn't see any in Roses but I expect they were there somewhere. Could do I suppose but it's not quite the same as blogging from your hotel bedroom with your feet up in your PJs after a hot shower.

Actually in Roses, there was some kind of wireless Internet access service set up in a tent near the regatta site. Many of the sailors rushed down there with their laptops every morning. Some of them, of course, were keeping in touch with the home office, running their businesses, or whatever, before setting out for an afternoon of yotting around the buoys.

It wasn't good enough for everyone. We met one sailor we knew on the second morning we were there. He was in the hotel lobby, checking out. He mournfully confessed that he had discovered that he suffered from Internet addiction and that he couldn't possibly spend another night in a hotel that didn't have wireless Internet access in the bedrooms. If he couldn't log in to check his email and other stuff every morning as soon as he woke up he couldn't survive. He was heading off to another hotel with the facilities he needed.

So the practical issues are solvable. I think there are basically three reasons I don't blog when I am away at a regatta.

1. I really don't want to deal with it. I want to concentrate on the regatta and having a good time socially in the evenings. I just don't want to be bothered with thinking of an interesting topic to blog about and composing a readable post. Oh sure, I could write one of those, "I went right, the fleet went left, left was right," kind of accounts of the day's racing. But I don't find that kind of writing very compelling and that's not been my style on this blog. But perhaps you really would like to read a blow-by-blow account of my mediocre racing performance each day?

2. I do like to be able to prove that I can survive for a couple of weeks without daily Internet access. Some times I feel like I might be an addict. From time to time I need to prove I'm not.

3. A regatta is a vacation from everyday life, even if I am retired. And not touching a computer while I am on vacation makes it seem like more of a break. Is that weird, or what?

Do you blog when you are traveling? Or take a break like me? Should I become a traveling blogger? Comments please.