An entirely realistic concern, Hayward. If you do as the other posters suggest, and leave out really personal details, it's highly doubtful that others will identify you here. Keep in mind that an almost infinite sea of words is launched on the internet every single day. Even if search engines can pick up posts to threads (which they can), remember that each such search picks up tens or hundreds of thousands of hits. It's kind of like being in Times Square on New Year's Eve and having someone try to identify you, there on the ground, from the top of one of the surrounding skyscrapers. However, if you do go in for personalized blogging (rather than blogging on some professional issues or a particular intellectual subject), make sure that your blog is not public. Otherwise it WILL show up loud and clear on Google or any other good search engine. Take care!