Four Years and Counting!

Four years ago I bit the bullet, registered with Blogger and posted this. The whole motivation for doing so was a kind of New Years resolution type thing where I had decided that a Blog would serve the purpose of keeping me in practice, writing-wise, possibly keep me in touch with the world wide web (which I had sort of unplugged from), and act as an online journal (something that I've never been able to successfully accomplish with pen and paper).

I never really had a solid plan or theme to operate under so the blog has wandered, often aimlessly, between journal, linkblog, pop culture commentary and the like. It tends to follow the ebb and flow of my own haphazard approach to my interests, so at least I can be happy that, if nothing else, the blog accurately reflects me and my personality.

Still, I'm trying to figure out what, if any, defining quality it may have and what I want to continue doing with it into the new year. I think its overall lack of focus is part of the reason why I have never really had a group of regular readers who visit the site and comment on the posts like other blogs. I mean, it's not like I'm a review or news or gossip blog that people make a point to visit. A destination site, like a digital big box store. The stuff I have been doing for the last four years has usually been pretty random, and often irregular, musings that do not serve the goal of community building very well. Not that that is the only reason I continue to post on the site, but there has always been an attraction to having more interactivity with Meanwhile... and that might be a motivation for tightening things up a bit this year. We'll see how it goes.

Community building aside, I would also like to do more reviews, so I may make a resolution this year to take that on. If you are a regular reader be sure to take me to task if I don't stick to that particular resolution. I've also toyed with and tried, in the past, to launch a new interview blog, which would get me back to doing something that I love. I spent so many years doing it that I feel a little strange now that I'm no longer in the loop. I've posted about it before and it is something that I am still interested in so it may be one of the things I try to tackle in 2009.

I think I would be remiss if I didn't acknowledge that, despite the 'problems' I list above, the biggest accomplishment I have made so far is the fact that I'm four years in and not completely balls-up bored of sitting down from time to time and posting something. It's a long time to keep coming back and doing this, especially without some format or umbrella to hide under when desperately seeking inspirado.

And, with that, I take my leave. Thanks to everyone who has visited in the past and, as I said in my first post, I hope it hasn't been a total snorefest. I raise a glass to four down and many more to come!

Cheers.

mike