Tuesday 6 January 2026: Hello, January!

Soooo, I’m still attending light therapy treatment 3 times a week, so that’s still dictating a lot of my working week at the moment. 

One job that will now drop by the wayside is the weekly sharing of Diane’s Gig List reminders on Facebook every Thursday. I’d already decided to stop doing this for this year, but now the lady who took it over a few years ago is only sharing the reminder once a month. 

I don’t think people realise just how much time and effort such a small job entails each week, which was one big reason I wanted to close it down. I’m grateful she’s been able to keep it going, but I’m not at all surprised that she’s reducing some of the admin work. She also books all the gigs for one of her local pubs too, so she has plenty to work with.

Another job that won’t appear any longer is the Monkey Dust admin. The poet had already told the band he was finishing at the end of 2025, so we knew this was coming too. Sadly, with the passing of their bass player in August last year, the remaining members have decided to call it a day with Monkey Dust.

They were looking around for new band members to start another band, but I think the focus at the moment is a memorial/farewell gig in June. But I don’t have to worry about any admin for that as the support band’s drummer is looking after all of that.

Time for the young-uns to take over, methinks. 

Also, the band’s guitarist and his fiancée are expecting their first child as well as organising a wedding. So they will be busy with that too. 

There’s some major life-changing stuff going on in our own world at the moment, all good we hope. I’m keeping that to just newsletter subscribers at the moment, so if you’re not already a subscriber, you know what to do!

When I successfully completed the great novella challenge last year, I was rewarded with my choice of lifetime memberships for WMG Publishing Workshops. I chose the lifetime workshop membership and that means I now have quite a programme of learning ahead of me. I also wanted to make sure I watched the workshops I already paid for too.

Alongside the new planning admin for the new year, then, this meant I also had some study admin to do too. I’m starting with a revision of the first 3 writing with depth workshops, which should only take an hour per day for 6 days per workshop. Going forward, with Workshop #4 and beyond, I’m allowing 2 hours per day, to watch the workshop and do any related work.

I don’t get guaranteed feedback on any historic assignments I might want to try, but any live workshops I fancy attending in the coming months will include assignments with feedback. For now, though, I’m doing some catch up.

I managed to identify just one open call for submission I’d have any hope of getting something written for.

And, of course, I have the paid-for Patreon posts to get ready as well as the weekly free short story, and I’ve allocated 2 slots per week for that.

Hello, January!

Here, then, is the current plan for January:

• create graphic for Hello, January
• create graphic for January wrap-up
• lots of planning admin
• lots of study admin
• newsletter
• (week) daily blog post
• 2 extra Patreon posts per week, 1 paid for, 1 free
• publish 3 books (3 short stories)
• WMG Workshop Revision: Depth in Writing
• daily dog play time
• daily household chores
• send 1 client edit for setting
• 1 x new client edit
• invoice editing client x 2
• write Story 1 for 12 STORIES IN 12 MONTHS
• write 1 short story for open call for submissions
• WMG Workshop Revision: Advanced Depth
• WMG Workshop Revision: Applied Depth
• weekly diary work
• weekly backup
• weekly finance work
• continue light treatment therapy (dermatology)
• monthly schedule planning for February
• advance finances for February
• update 40-project spreadsheet (week) daily

What does your January look like?

This post also appears on Patreon.