A columnist no longer, for now.

It was a strange morning. After 111 straight deadlines successfully met, my Tribune column is on hiatus. While the ostensible and stated reason for the stoppage is my candidacy for a city council seat, we also all know there are times in everyone's life when multiple considerations cross. So it is in this case, too.

There's the campaign rationale, and there's the impending merger of the editions, which might turn out to alter the rotation of local columnists whether I'd like it to or not. Changes are always possible when management shifts.

There's also a good bit of fatigue, personally. It isn't as easy as it sounds to tap the creative process on demand, and for it to be that draining takes away some of the fun. Finally, there's a desire to return to beer writing, which I might be able to do with the News & Tribune in the future. Where this future takes my attempted local newspaper wordsmithing is anyone's guess. I suppose it will be clear as soon as I lose or win.

I suspect it will provide more time to practice longer-form blogging, like I used to do, at least until new challenges come along. As an example, there's the parks piece published earlier this afternoon. Some housekeeping and touch-up decorating is overdue; a plan is afoot to update the blog's appearance and perhaps add more content, and this will rollout (if at all) concurrent with a candidate's web site. Look for it soon.

As always, your patronage is appreciated.