And that's pretty much how my entire day yesterday went.
But one thing that I DO remember is reading a post by Alison @ Mama Wants This, which was interviewing the Babe Ruth of the blogging community Alexandra from Good Day Regular People. She was giving advice to people who, like me, have no clue what they're doing when it comes to the blogging gig. And one of her tidbits of advice was, "blog ahead of time, because otherwise your blog is crap, and come on, people - if you have any sense of dedication to your hobby, you can at least get that straight".
Or something like that. Probably less abrasive, but I don't remember, cause I was essentially stoned all day yesterday.
And I know I've heard this advice about infinity times, but for some reason, it stuck yesterday.
So - whereas this was my blogging process before:
oh, wait, what? it's 9am. I guess I should stop working and figure out what I'm going to blog about. How about puppies? No, I don't have a puppy, so it would really be kind of a stretch. How about my shoes? they're kind of stinky, maybe that's worth putting in the blog. No, that's kind of dumb, no one wants to read about my smelly feet (right people? if you would, let me know, and I'll hook you up). How about a list of all the things I THOUGHT I was going to blog about, but finally decided against? Brilliant! Entire time from idea formation to hitting the "publish" button: 15 minutes.
This will now be my process:
I have enough posts sitting and waiting to be published that I could die a horrible death likely from falling out of a window from a very tall building and people wouldn't know about it until three years from now. Well, besides those people who would be walking by that building. They would know pretty much instantaneously. Unless they were looking away at that exact moment, but once they turned their heads back, yeah, they would know then.
So I told my boss that I'm not working on his crap today, I'm spending my entire day today building up my library of posts. Then I apologized profusely and played it off as a joke. It'll just be our secret, ok?
I'm going to give you a tip to regain your sanity. Not only should you write blog posts beforehand, but I don't know if you know this, but this isn't actually Vicki. She outsourced all of her blogging and commenting to our company in rural Sri Lanka, thus letting her sleep in and providing meaningful work to a whole community of beleaguered Lankans, two of whom write her posts and comments and six of whom take turns running in a large hamster wheel to generate enough electricity and internet bandwidth to load all of the pictures on mommyblogs.
ReplyDeleteIn fact, before Bhagiya gets tired and the electricity runs out for the day, I'd like to introduce myself and offer my company's services to you. My name is Rajesh and you can reach me at
Well I'm so glad you remembered you read my post and the Empress' interview, because she certainly shelled out good advice.
ReplyDeleteI won't tell your boss you're taking the rest of the week off to plan your blog posts for the next 2 weeks. *ahem*
I'm trying to do that too, although there is some merit in blogging something that pops into your head and you just have to get it out. I actually have more posts than I know what to do with right now, especially since I have certain posts for certain days! You can do it. And for the record? I really loved your post last night :)
ReplyDeleteYou're hilarious! Hey, I don't think you really planned this post ahead of time (did you?), but it was a good read. I agree with Amanda up there, sometimes spontaneity does wonders to blog content (among other things) ;D
ReplyDeleteFunny post. I can barely keep up with my own thoughts long enough to write a shopping list ahead of the trip to grocery store. Who am I kidding, I always forget the list at home...
ReplyDeleteAs for Vicki, Rajesh you are so fired. Love Sirinathra
I have a horrible habit of getting some writing inspiration, starting to write the ideas down in a text document, and then filing the text document. I know, if I write when I'm not-focused, that I'll write horribly, so I just don't let myself do it.
ReplyDeleteThe problem with my approach is that sometimes I have a great idea, but barely have any time, so I'll write something cryptic to be developed later, only I don't remember what I was talking about. Whoops.
At any time, though, I have 10-15 blog posts in the works . . . and two that, if I've really felt that I've gone 'too long' without posting, I can just hit the button to remind people that I'm out there.
I wish I had more time. Seriously.
Great idea! Could someone give my kids the memo to go fend for themselves for a week so I could build up my post library? lol
ReplyDeleteI know, I know, I'm lucky to be a SAHM. But try telling my husband or kids that I can take time to work entirely on my blog for 15 minutes uninterrupted. Argh. Maybe I can bride my krasnolutki to go babysit them for me?