MD, thanks for the very honest and informative reply. I do, as a matter of fact, understand completely about the change in our country and its mood. Seems like everybody everywhere is fragmenting out in one way or another, and to a very dysfunctional degree. It's sad, but ... it's sure as heck real!
Didn't know about the rest, and I appreciate your candor. It's one of the reasons your articles are over half of the issues I buy on the news stands. Brian Pearce is the other. Few other authors draw enough of my attention enough to make a purchase.
And just in case anyone can get the message to the owners, I hardly ever read the product reviews any more because my experience has been that they just can't be trusted. I've read an article, then found an example on the shelf at the LGS, and found something significantly different than the evaluator in the magazines, so that'll sour a guy over time, even when he really WANTS to buy and subscribe to the magazines.
I like the 'net, obviously or I wouldn't be here, but I used to keep the magazines. Had 15 big boxes of magazines and old Outdoor Life and Field & Stream Book Club books all packed nice and neat and tightly when I left for a stint across the big pond in SE Asia, and when I got back, found my mother in law had BURNED them!!! I had some back to '46 & '48, and I cherished those old mags and books. Just thought since you were so thoughtful in your reply, I'd let you know that I DO enjoy your writing, and Pearce's, and occasionally another writer or two.
For me, at least, there'll never be a substitute for having hard copies of good info. I'll still search back through them occasionally to find some stuff I need to know, or just want to read again. Kind'a like visiting an old friend, really.
So thanks for your reply and candor, and all I can say is that I really hope everything doesn't go "digital" because we'll lose some things then that I don't really think we're going to find very pleasing in the end. With all the talk about control of the internet, it's surely coming, and the "free press" COULD be significantly LESS free when that happens, but I'm just an old, crotchety curmudgeon these days, and don't know spit, so ... I just hope I'm wrong. I have a couple of really great grandsons coming up that I'd really like to see be able to enjoy even half of what I have in my time. Hope you're one of the "old heads" that are around to keep 'em straight when I'm not around any more. Your honesty is one of the things I appreciate most about your writing. It's valued a lot these days.
