This Is This

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Oh Baby Give Me One More Chance
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How To Cream Off Legitimate Google Searches By Peppering Your Posts With Song Lyrics

Right, OK, well the last two weeks have been a test to see how you respond to burnt-out bloggers deprived of daylight and I’m pleased to say the majority of you passed. Well done. Excellent job everyone.

Seriously, thanks for the patience. Regular readers here (chorus of “guilty”s) were understanding and don’t worry - all the pressure was coming from me. I can thank you gliblessly because you’re back reading here now, aren’t you, so understanding is what it was. Also, it wouldn’t sit right with either me or you if I didn’t explain the lessons learned during and changes brought about by my blogdown.

I learned that this is not just this, but you as much as me and that it’s nice to know we’re connected by more than wires.

I feel much better now. It felt bad not to write, but it’s good that it did. I honestly thought I might be gone a month or two, but found not writing every day just what I needed. But writing generally is what I also need, so I wrote every couple of days to because that is what I do (see “a thought for my rolling before”). And after a week and a bit, I found just writing every day or so to be what I would call relaxing. Any more and I would have gone back to the pressure, any less and I’d start to get itchy pencils. Not a pretty thought.

As soon as I realised it was going to be a break rather than a case of “goodbye cruel web”, I came back to post, which is the one you may have read after the video.

I also learned something else I already knew, which is that I’m fairly productive. I like results, I like the focus it gives me and how it keeps away the guilt of lethargy and depression. It’s playing fetch with the black dog.

Example: on Saturday, 5 January when I would normally have been publishing the weekend song - which would have been Canary by Liz Phair (I learn my name/ I write with a Number 2 pencil/ I work up to my potenial, I earn my name/ I come when called) - I woke up thinking: “Hmm… today’s the day I’m going to finish my book and make bagels.”

And I did and I did. Results, see?

And not like the obsessive stuff or alpha-type nutsoid drive, just - doing a thing and feeling all right about it. And it’s the same with writing this here. How many people in the world get to write whatever they want and feel good about it and get the same reaction from other people? Not many, not comparatively. It’s a humbling thing more than anything.

So no, it’s not a duty, it’s a privilege and feel I do get paid to do this, and the money is pretty good.*

There’s a lot coming up. You’ve got animal facts, some politics (but interesting! With animal facts!), a meme about all the reading/listening/surfing I’ve been doing, a couple of video posts in the pipeline, even a cooking spot.

Also, Ed offered to send me legal pads, pencils and an electric sharpener at the weekend. Thanks for the offer, mate, but I’m doing OK.

*I’m speaking metaphorically here, but if anyone wants to actually pay me to write then let’s talk. I can churn out 300-500 words a day no sweat, and with the right offer, I’d ditch this place in a second.

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This entry was posted on Monday, January 14th, 2008 at 7:00 am. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed, or you can skip to the end and leave a comment yourself.