Occasionally (OK, every time), I suffer a certain amount of writer's block in attempting to come up with yet another Internet column that only my grandmother will read. This is hard stuff, you know.

Usually I end up going down one of two roads:

1) I write about my wife, who is awesome in a whole lot of ways but that my editor always removes because I live in Europe and have become too morally bankrupt to remember what is acceptable for a family column in the United States.

2) I thinly veil my socialist anti-America Global Media Conspiracy agenda in a column suggesting that perhaps people should stop screaming at each other over EVERY LITTLE THING.

Now, I'll admit, after nigh on to six years of doing the same thing over and over and over it's hard to believe that I am able to consistently produce writing that is so high quality. Pretty much everything I put out is golden. My awesomeness amazes even me.

But the writer's block was particularly rough this time around. So I did what any lazy student would do in his final year of university: I turned to Google in hopes of finding someone or something that would effectively do my job for me.

"Creative writing prompts," I typed into the omniscient search engine.

Instantly I was provided with myriad Web sites promising inspiration to the uninspired. I picked one and found myself confronted with hundreds of strangely useless blurbs such as, "Write a story about irony, with a teacher as the main character and a fuse box as the key object. Set your story in a lab."

That seems a bit too specific to me. Apparently, I had actually typed the words, "terrible ideas for a short story," into my search engine. Most of them were along the same lines as above, with none so creative as the one I thought up: "Compose a sonnet about ninja monkeys who attack only the last few people in America still driving a Dodge Aries. Involve an oil baron."

It occurred to me suddenly that these prompts were a bunch of ideas to be used by people who actually should not be writing. Perhaps the need to have someone else tell you what to write is a natural indicator that you don't have anything to say, and you should therefore say nothing.

And by "you," of course, I mean "me."

After holding court in this lost little space of the Internet for more than half a decade, I have come to the surprisingly painful conclusion that it may be time for me to move on. Or, at least time to shut up for a while. Indeed, like the pro wrestler who finds himself jobbing to increasingly implausible foes, my time may have well passed. I have -- in this realm, at least -- become old and busted.

But I held on for so long because I genuinely enjoyed writing this column and occasionally hearing from those of you reading. Well, I enjoyed hearing from most of you. That guy who accused me of treason against the United States I probably could have done without. In all sincerity, I thank you for your time.

I am also thankful to the fine people running this Web site who have given me pretty much free reign to spout off on just about everything save female body parts. Almost certainly a chance this good won't come along again easily, and I may come begging at the door at some point in the future.

Now, though, I feel it's best to say farewell to this particular forum. I'll continue to be hopelessly in love with my wife -- but now fewer people will know.

Thank you again, Chris Cope

Chris Cope lives with his wife in Cardiff, Wales. His editor thanks him for many years of great service.