I started a business. It made me want to drink copious quantities, smoke myself into oblivion and hit my head against a brick wall. Instead I wrote a blog.
Site Launch Day: 17
User Count: 24
Going right: Someone liked this blog so much they asked me to write a column for their site.
Going wrong: Was so flattered that immediately agreed. Can't think of a way to link it back to my business since it concerns what to do in UK at Xmas.
Comment: Lesson today. Flattery may get you very far.
The objective of this blog was never to be a daily diary, but somehow once I started, I couldn't stop. I thought that I would blog on and off for the first year after launch, but it seems that nature has determined the length of time I can blog for. At some point in oh - say 8 months time - I think I might have to take a little break. So that's how long I have to make a success of my online business. A little longer than I put in the business plan but a more finite (and painful) goal than my financial forecasts.
"Are you going to blog every day?" asked my boyfriend
"Only if I have something to say" I said. "But by definition I have to chronicle the shitty downtime as well as the success, when it happens, And it will happen. Will blog for a year." This was before I knew I was pregnant.
"I know it will, I believe in you. But that means 365 blogs. How many have you written so far?"
"4" I said.
"Only 361 to go then." He said wryly.
So 8 months, give or take, 8 x 30 days x 500 words per blog = 120,000 words. Holy crap. I don't think I have that many words actually IN me. Maybe I'll take weekends off. Starting from NOW (if my calculations are correct, this is Monday's blog, he he he) ...90,000 seems more manageable.
But apart from my dubious ability to actually blog that many words, there are other issues. For sharing my life is not just about me.
"I never found you less attractive when you were recovering from pregnancy" said my boyfriend (after having read - and thankfully smirked at - the now infamous in our household at least - cheese doodle blog)
"But you felt less attractive. And that had a detrimental effect on our relationship for a while."
Actually he doesn't use words like 'detrimental', that one is mine. His exact words probably included "less" and "sex".
Privacy is an issue, I would imagine, in most author's writing. They take from their own lives - incidents, conversational snippets even whole characters. I can only tell you that whatever impression you get of my boyfriend from his words, good or bad, it's not the whole picture. It doesn't tell you how he uncomplainingly gets up every morning @ 6am when our baby wakes to give me a lie in, nor how even when he thinks I am in the wrong, he brings home flowers to try and make up an argument with me, nor even his hugely rare quality of talking out a problem, as soon as it's occurred. Yes ladies, he also talks....;-)
It also doesn't tell you how he sniffles at the very thought of having to give a speech at his daughter's wedding. The mark of a real man.
The image above is called ASCII art and this one is taken from Joan Stark's Valentine's site - you didn't think I did it myself now did you? If you hadn't realized before now, we are surrounded by experts who give out stuff for free (including Investment Impact). That's today's second lesson. Bizarrely unrelated to the rest of the text. And here's one that is. Don't ever settle for a man less than you deserve. If possible try and get a better one than you deserve ;-)