It is a year to the day since I started the 100DaysToOffload challenge.
The idea of the challenge is to publish one hundred blog posts in a year. For those that have been keeping track I managed just over half the requirement, publishing entry number fifty-five on the 26th December.
From the very start I knew that publishing one hundred entries would be a lot of work but I was motivated and prepared to give it a shot. I made a list of as many ideas as I could and with my creative juices flowing started writing everyday. Most of my writing has been on my phone, a lot of the early ones were written while holding my sleeping infant daughter.
Let us take a look at the distribution of entries over the last year
ls -1 entry/2022* | cut -c 11-12 | uniq -c
12 01
12 02
5 03
4 04
3 05
1 06
1 07
3 08
1 09
4 10
5 11
4 12As you can see I started off the year strong. Twenty four entries in the first two months. That is almost half my final number published already.
March was a bad month. I caught Covid-19 and was ill for about two weeks. For a couple of months after I also felt exhausted all the time, although having a one year old to look after did not help. Due to this I stopped writing every day, which in turn stalled my motivation and even my creativity.
The summer was a blur of work and parenting, barely getting a single entry published for a few of the months. Around this time I started to develop some rules on my writing. I had been drafting posts when I thought of what to write, but if a draft remained untouched for a few weeks, or I couldn’t find the words, then it was forgotten. A number of the ideas I had on my list were either started as a draft or ignored if I couldn’t think of how to expand on the premise.
My entries are also quite short on average. I have been told by some readers that they like this. Even my most lengthy entries can be read in 10 to 15 minutes. I try to develop my drafts in one or two sittings. If I can write a whole entry in half an hour then it will most likely get published.
Using that mindset has helped me to pick up the publishing a bit more near the end of the year to a comfortable rate.
A lot of the shorter entries were written at the beginning of the year but I quickly used up that backlog attempting to stick to publishing every two to three days. By the end of the year I was writing as and when the ideas came along. Either something new I was working on, or I had fleshed out an idea enough to start writing.
Considering between 2016 and 2021 I had only managed sixteen entries, I would say fifty-five in 2022 was a success. It has certainly got me into the habit of writing more and not only trying to write about technology. My forged in metal entry was one of the most enjoyable to write.
Looking forward I won’t be attempting the 100DaysToOffload challenge again (for now) but will continue writing when I can. A few entries a month seems to be a sustainable rate for me at the moment.
There are no analytics on this site (by design) so I have no idea how many people visit and read, but if you are one of them then Thank You. I hope you have enjoyed some of my ramblings.
As always, if you would like to get in touch my contact details can be found on my home page. Comments and suggestions are always welcome.