Hundreds of people read or visit this blog every day. Hundreds of people subscribe to it. If anyone wants to comment on something I’ve written, some comment on the blog (thank you very much!), some comment on social media (again, thank you!), some even accost me in the street or in the pub to ask about something in particular (always great when someone does that). But lots don’t give me any feedback at all. That makes it difficult to know what to write every day.
When I first started the blog, over on Blogger, back in 2005, I’d just relocated from the midlands to Yorkshire and it was a good way to keep all my friends and family back home up to date on my news. I made a lot of friends, met some of them in real life, and I’m still in touch with many today. There’s not many fallen by the wayside, I’m pleased to say.
Since then, of course, we’ve had the social media explosion and friends and family in real life tend to keep in touch that way instead. I have no idea if any of them still read the blog. (Give us a wave if you do!)
These days I use it sometimes as a stream of consciousness, sometimes to thrash out details or particulars, but mostly it helps me keep track of what I’ve done in any one day, especially when I feel as though I’ve not achieved a single thing. But is that what people want to read?
I am fairly knowledgeable about a few things.
I’ve been writing successfully since 1985, I taught creative writing right up until I left the midlands in 2004, I’ve been editing and sub-editing since 1997, and I’ve been proofreading since 2011. This, I feel, qualifies me to also write about writing.
But other than that, I don’t feel expert enough in any one topic. I know a bit about gardening. I know a bit about personal finances and debt management. I know a bit about cooking and baking. And I know a bit about dieting.
I know a bit about fundraising. I know a bit about publishing. I know a bit about the live music scene here in South Yorkshire. The local music website I started in 2007 now has thousands and thousands of active members and a friend and a muso have been managing that since we came out of lockdown.
At least one of you is an angler. I don’t know anything about fishing, but the poet is a coarse fisherman and a match angler, so sometimes I can report on that as a result of where we go and what we do together.
Some of you are campervan fans and you enjoy reading about our travels with Peggy. Even the non-campervan fans seem to enjoy reading about all of our travels, and not just with Peggy. Before the pandemic the poet and I set up the Alphabet Adventurers, and we had a lot of followers on YouTube and Facebook for that. Before the pandemic. We’re still waiting to go and do ‘L’, and of course we’ve lost one adventurer (Lord Rufus) and gained another (Sir Alf). We keep talking about reviving it and the poet has mentioned a few times in recent weeks that he’d like to dust off his gear.
So I suppose that what I’m wondering is, what do you, my hundreds and hundreds of readers, visitors and subscribers want from a blog? Or more specifically, what would you like to see on this blog or any related blogs?
Please drop your comments below, or on social media, or next time you bump into us in real life! 😉
In the meantime, what a washout Friday turned out to be. My entire day was completely scuppered by the D2D fiasco and I didn’t manage to get a stroke of work done. Oh, I did at least ‘touch’ the editing job, but I’d wanted the editing job off my desk by the end of Friday. That didn’t happen. Instead I spent the day researching alternatives as well as reading more and more about D2D, and I did make a few more acquaintances over it. I don’t seem to have lost any…yet…
We went out together on Saturday morning without the dog for the first time, leaving him at home while we went to the butcher. We were gone less than 30 minutes and he was hot and a bit fretful when we got back but happy to see us. He’s only 8 months old and he’s suffering a bit of separation anxiety since the spaniel went back to his other human. But he needs to know that if we go out, we’ll always come back. And we have to be able to leave him alone for some things.
When we got back we had something to eat, then I went out to do the main shop while the poet stayed home with the dog. When I got back, we had something else to eat, and then I came into the office with the intention of doing some of that editing. Instead I ended up delisting and republishing at least one Wordsworth Short short story.
I toyed with the idea of pulling everything and just going either direct to everyone or exclusively to only one retailer. In the end, I republished the new version but decided to go direct to Kobo and Amazon. (Yes, yes, I know…) I looked at Apple but I couldn’t even log in with my Apple credentials and I didn’t have the time, the energy or the patience for any tenacity there, and I just ticked the Apple box at D2D instead.
I’m really not happy about them only charging the little people, but I’m hoping there’s been enough fallout for them to look at it again. I’d also be interested to see if they merge with Lulu or similar or if they go out of business. If they do go out of business, I have Vellum and now I have live accounts with Kobo and Amazon as well, but it would be a crying shame.
In between, the poet had a turn in the office, recording some scratch tracks for the Monkey Dust farewell gig. The band need to have some markers to practice to and they’re having a rehearsal early next month.
On Sunday we took the dog to one of our local parks for his walk and when we got back I was in the office again, this time working on the editing job. When I’d had enough, I swapped places with the poet again and he recorded another couple of tracks. We can usually work in there together at the same time, but he was making a lot of noise and one of us has to listen out for things like the door or the dog or the phone.
Today the plan is to get back to the editing, but also to republish another Wordsworth Short short story. I want them all to re-release from the beginning of May, one every weekday until they’re all caught up.
This post appears on Words Worth Writing, Medium and Patreon.
