Milestones and Such

No lunch poetry today, its my one day off before heading back to the grindstone. Just wanted to do a quick post about hitting 200+ followers this last week. Happened and I almost missed it. Maybe next time this year I will be at 500 followers. Although I wonder if I can convince 500 people to like my random poems. In any case, its only thanks to everyone that visits. Thank you all for your support and reading, it helps me a lot to keep me going and writing. Have a good week this next week.

Dissapointing

So I’m a pretty curious guy with too much time on his hands. All the likes I get I visit the persons page and check things out. Sometimes I find things I like, sometimes I don’t. I can usually tell if the person was just liking me for a re-like/re-follow or if they were generally interested. On my last couple of posts I noticed something even more annoying. Pyramid scheme-ish spam likes. Its a business called the Empower Network. They sell blogs to people so they can sell blogs to people who can sell blogs to people. Everyone up top is making bank, and the majority are barely paying the monthly fee. For details on this business check here, he sums it up pretty well. Two of the likes I got are most likely the same person, with another two possibly being a duplicate as well. It’s disappoints me to know I’m entertaining robotic pyramid scheme spam with my blog. Is there some kind of way to block certain users? I’d rather not have likes based on commissions for someone else.

Edit: So now several of the pyramid scheme guys have liked this post too. The post describing their operation as a scam. I wonder if anything I tag Empower Network would get likes from them. Dave Hunter, thomasmaxwell12, Jordon Latour, and Dominik Mikula, all part of that nonsense. If you’re going to be a fake blogger  selling fake things, be good at it. Don’t just click randomly like these guys.

Ugh.

So I’m just now getting over a bout of food poisoning or some kind of bug. Ate something that just tore me up Saturday night/Sunday. My resolution to write sadly meant nothing compared to my angry stomach. And now of course, I have to go to work. I got a little bit done on my short story last night. Working on turning this one into an actual short story. Has a lot of good potential there I think so it should be fun. I’ve also got a couple poems almost ready, so I’ll see if I can post some throughout the week while I’m working on my short story. Hoping you all have a good week, I gotta go get ready for work now.

On Writing

Image found at http://www.npr.org.

I just finished Stephen King’s book On Writing and I’m currently kicking myself for not reading it sooner. I even had it sitting on my bookshelf for probably close to a year now, along with other books on writing.  On top of all that I only read the book because I ran out of things on my kindle and spotted it on my bookshelf.

But wow, just wow. The blunt way he puts things and cuts right to the chase is just amazing. Read it over the course of a few days this week at work and home and it had me chomping at the bit. Now that I’ve read it all I want to digest it, to really let it sink in. It also made me aware of something. I’ve been treating writing like a hobby, not as a career or what I truly wanted to do.

Sure I’d come home and bang out a quick post, a poem or a bit of fiction, but it was really just a half effort. If I want to really pursue it, I believe I need to make it among my top priorities. I also need to work on stories over a thousand words and not just take the easy route. The book has been quite an eye opener to me. My pursuit of writing needs to be a 100% effort, not 25%.

I know some of this drive is just that freshly-completed-book rush. But  I don’t want it to fade, I want to keep my conviction. Part of my problem as to where I’m at now is a lack of time and privacy in writing. Hard to focus, hard to stay uninterrupted. But I do have some time in the morning, some time after work, and occasionally other bits of time.

It will be in these times I will have to really focus and get into the habit of just writing. Not checking my e-mail, playing LoL, or whatever else. I have co commit to this. I also need to watch myself, I find myself trying to build a blog at times rather than be a writer. I realize the two aren’t mutually exclusive, but I don’t want to lose my way.

So, that has been my epiphany this week. Sorry if it seemed disjointed and rambling. I wrote it to understand it myself as much as to relate it to all of you.

Thanks!

Image found at http://www.romeomodels.com.

Centurions, arise!

I just wanted to thank everyone who supports and follows this blog. I know I don’t always stick to my 1-a-day post schedule, but I really appreciate the likes and feedback. Its a lot of what keeps me going. Just wanted to give a slight blog update. ITFD is now at 100 followers, over 700 views, 70 comments, and the top three countries for views are: United States, Hong Kong, and Canada. So thanks again to everyone and I’ll have another post or two up later, just wanted to share that. As always feel free to lurk, like, and comment.

Becalmed!

Image found at http://www.theepochtimes.com.

The wind has left my sails and the ocean does not move.

My patchwork craft of love and tears sits captive to the sea.

I drift in place alone, unknown and unaware by all.

Rescue is a fool’s errand, hope the dying mans opiate.

Here I shall remain, consumed by the ocean’s silence.

by Nicholas Byrley

–

When is a post not a post? When no one reads it! Ha-ha-ha.

But seriously, I think I am a little shallow. When I don’t see those likes popping in my ego starts complaining and my motivation starts to stray. I know my ultimate goals have nothing to do with whether anyone likes my random posts, but I still like the attention all the same. So, I wrote a poem about it. Like a ship at sea, so goes my blog. I suppose eventually we’ll drift into a friendly port and my troubles will be gone, but out here there be monsters. To all that care to visit this lonely sea, what are you interested in seeing in this blog? More poetry, short stories, flash fiction, posts about parenthood or geekiness? Let me know, as of right now I have no idea what my audience of 84 really likes.

State of the Blog

Photo found at http://www.photo-dictionary.com.

In Summation

 

So I actually hit that magical goal of thirty days of writing. It has been a busy day though, so I don’t have the theme update I was hoping for. I’m also still debating upgrading to pro, but I can’t bother with that until I get paid again anyway. In the meanwhile, I’d like to list off the numbers.

_

208 Likes

60 Follows

429 Views (Not sure how many unique viewers, can’t find that.)

37 Comments (About half are my replies.)

13,194 Words

34 Posts

–

 

This is all thanks you readers out there, I hope you stick around for the next thirty days as well. I’m going to be doing my best to keep it entertaining. My goal is to move into more effort on flash fiction and writing some actual stories. I also have been enjoying my poetry a lot, its more fun to write than I thought it would be. As for my random rants and idle thoughts, I’m not sure. I seem to be hit or miss with my topics and I’m not sure anyone finds it interesting. I suppose even if there is no large demand for it my ranting is still practice writing.

 

I guess I will continue to blog about the obscure notions of my mind and the happenings of my life. I’m sticking to a post-a-day from now on, with the next goal being thirty years. I figure if after thirty years of writing every day I’m not a writer still, I can probably call it quits. Thanking you all again and wishing you all a good night. Stay tuned for more randomness.

Blog Etiquette

When To Like, When To Follow?

 

Being the somewhat socially inept person that I am, I wonder a lot about the etiquette and rules for things. I have stumbled into awkward social situations in the past usually due to a lack of knowledge. So, with my mind set to avoiding such problems I’ve been pondering blog etiquette lately. Specifically, WordPress blog etiquette. The main questions I have involve liking and following.

When someone likes a post of mine here I get an e-mail in which WordPress suggests that maybe I’ll like their blog as much as they liked mine. I see an implied nudge towards liking the other bloggers posts in return. The e-mail will even list off several posts for you to click on just from the e-mail. The etiquette in this case seems to be a like begets a like. But what if the blog is about a subject I hold no interest in? Maybe a curling blog loves one of my poems, but I doubt I could see myself loving curling anytime soon.

I mean I’m sure I could find something on a blog of that type worth liking, but it would be a forced thing. (Side note, I hold no ill towards any curling blogs out there. Stay the course.) Is there a polite way to bow out in such an instance? I’d much rather be genuine and like only things I really enjoy. Otherwise, whats the purpose of liking a post? It just becomes a ping pong paddle linking bloggers for no reason. But if I don’t return a like, am I committing a break in etiquette? Is there an older refined lady somewhere making a ‘tsk’ sound when she notices my failure to reciprocate?

Things like that are always in my head when I visit this site and check my latest likes. I have a similar problem with follows. WordPress once again implies a need to visit the other blogger and follow them in the e-mail. The results of a bad follow however are even more distressing. Not only would I fail to be genuine but I would be submitting myself to  a slew of curling posts whenever I visited my reader. Sifting through pages of curling stats and player lineups just to find the poetry and writing buried within.

I of course don’t think everyone who likes me or follows me expects the return. I just wonder if there is a set of unspoken rules I may be breaking by not giving these things more consideration. I don’t want to alienate those who actually enjoy my ramblings or vice versa by failing to observe proper etiquette. Sadly, it seems like an unknowable thing. Short of asking every time I get a like or follow, I’m unlikely to be able to nail down an appropriate response. So in that case I’ll just continue to try be as honest as possible in my use of those features

Perhaps there is a well defined consensus here I’m missing, I’d love to hear about if that’s the case.