A word about anonymity (to be specific, mine)

Some of you might be surprised to discover that Xenius Jones is not my real name.

When I began blogging, I thought for a while about the question of anonymity.

A portion of my job entailed writing letters to college students that began with variations of "I regret to inform you that the committee has not decided to..." Experience has shown that a small percentage of students, upon receipt of such a message, will respond with some level of venom, and the addition of Google to the mix meant that I would sooner or later be faced with some rejected munchkin swearing at my blog.

So I thought for a while and picked a name. In the world of author Harry Stephen Keeler, Xenius Jones is a detective who solves crimes (such as the famed "Aeronautic Strangler-Baby Case" in which... oh just go look it up) by studying the fourth-dimensional ripples of causality that emanate from a given event. I felt it appropriate at the time.

From time to time, the identity has been a bit of a crutch. I feel a little twinge for people who are trying to navigate it, who suspect that it might be a fake but don't want to call me on it, just in case it isn't.

On the whole, it's been fine and has served me well.

Yesterday I was offered another job at another institution, and accepted. That's one enormous horrible load off of my mind, replaced by a bunch of tinier happy loads.

One of the happy loads is this blog, and how I want to deal with it in the new workplace. My old workplace was unaware that I was blogging (though I'll bet a couple of people suspected). I may decide to be more open in my new situation. In any event, if I do come out of the blogging closet, it will probably not be soon.

In the meantime, I'd like to take a moment to thank you folks who sent me messages of encouragement, advice, and good thoughts in general.

And a special shout-out to the scholar who used my Amazon link to buy science textbooks.