Tonight was an evening with my OU colleagues, held in Inca, a bijou place in Bruntsfield in Edinburgh, where us writers in the supposed making met with our tutor, Ray, who's actually quite a star. Very droll, very dry, and impressively well read and immensely helpful. And then I got home to a message from the OU to say I'd be removed from an online forum.
Now I need to go into a bit of history here: the OU offers us students an online cafe, where we can post our scribblings, our thoughts etc etc. However, about 3 weeks ago there was a post that omitted in the subject line that the content was 'strong'. There was a complaint by one of our number and the transgressor had a virtual wrist slap by the ever vigilant moderators. So the friend of the transgressor decided to start a different cafe. One where you had to ask to go and be accepted and where there were no holds barred. I couldn't bear to be left out so duly asked, and was accepted. It is actually full of extremely erudite, very good writers, and anything goes. And I've found it a place full of online cameraderie and sometimes very funny indeed. And tonight when I got home I was barred from entering and told the guy who'd set it all up had decided that I didn't belong.
My paranoia set in and weirdly found myself feeling rather bereft. Why had I been banned? Hadn't I sworn enough? Hadn't I been rude enough? What was the problem?
It turns out that everyone has been thrown out. A computer glitch or an OU masterplan? More to come on this methinks.
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