I tried to work in a Ray Stevens joke, but I think most of my readers are too young for it. And even if you aren’t too young, do you really want to get that song stuck in your head? (oh, I did that already? Whoops.)
For most of the life of this blog, I’ve struggled to get 4-6 posts up a week. The goal was always 6, but sometimes I’d have to settle for two. Sure, I’d occasionally get 8 or 9 days in a row, but that was about it.
Then in 2021, I got a notification that I’d posted something here for like 50 days in a row—without trying or noticing. That seemed pretty cool, so I thought I’d see if I could go for 100 days in a row. And then I’d take a couple of days off. But then I got the 100-day notification and decided to go for 200, I was liking this challenge.
Once I hit 200, I didn’t even bother shooting for 300—I had to go for a year. And then once I got there (actually, it was a couple of days afterward—I don’t think I saw the year mark), I figured it could be fun to go for two years—or 730 days. Yesterday’s repost about Hard Rain was enough for me to achieve that personal record. I’d hoped to get 2 other posts up yesterday (maybe 3), just to make the day more of an event, but things happen (I do have 1.2 of them written, I want to note).
Sure, not every one of those days resulted in something I’m proud to have posted—once it became a goal and not something I stumbled into, I’d stress about getting something up and would have to settle for a repost of something just to qualify. But I did work on something every day, whether I got it in decent shape to post or not. I’m enjoying the discipline
I haven’t decided if I’m going to try for three straight years (1,095 days) or if I’ll let myself have a day or two off. For now, I’m just going to enjoy the accomplishment. We’ll see what happens next.
Gina
Congrats on the accomplishment! I once made it a year, but the pressure got to me. So I let the streak die.
HCNewton
There’s a lot of wisdom in thst. Thought about deliberately skipping a day just to give myself some wiggle room.
Bob Germaux
Congrats on the streak, H.C. Very impressive. I was turning 28 when Stevens released that song. Haven’t heard it in many years, but thanks to you, it’s now going to be an earworm for me for a while:)And c’mon, you know you have to go for at least a thousand, boogity boogity.
HCNewton
I was…um, I’ll be nice and say considerably younger when it was released, and since I typed the word “streak” in the title filed I’ve had it as an earworm. Just sharing the pleasure. (went through a period in the mid-80s when I couldn’t get enough of Stevens).
1,000 does have a certain appeal. It’s a nice, round number that’d look pretty…
Allyson Johnson
Remember this is your hobby, not your job There is no penalty for absenteeism.
HCNewton
Only self-imposed penalties 🙂
But yeah, I do need to remember it. Would help me greatly.
Bookstooge
Congrats. I have decided that if I feel like writing, I will. And if I don’t, I won’t 😀
That way, there’s no pressure.
Seems like you’ve gotten to that point too. How far out do you schedule stuff? Could you schedule stuff for an off day to keep it going?
HCNewton
I’m not at that point, yet. But I’m thinking of forcing myself to adopt it. But I also have to work against my inclination to tweak and twist things to exhaustion before I post–deadlines (even self-imposed ones) really help me with that. Eh…like Allyson said above, it’s just a hobby and I need to remember that (both to work against perfectionism and being uptight about schedule).
I sometimes schedule stuff a week or so out, but most things are scheduled 1-8 hours out 🙂 Tonight, I should be getting 3-4 posts ready for next week. Emphasis on should.
HCNewton
Heavy emphasis on “should.” Turns out thst it was more like 0