Wow. Hello blog.

I’m pretty busy. It even seems sort of cliche to complain about such things on ones blog, but I think being busy has coincided with a somewhat larger reevaluation of nearly everything.

Wait, no. I’m not quitting blogging.

I’m actually really proud of the Knowing Mars launch, and it feels really good to have that project “done,” even if I think it needs a major revision, and I have a lot more fiction on my plate that I don’t want to just “let go” like that.

I’m also somewhat displeased with the kind of blog posts that I’ve been writing recently. It seems that I’ve been writing about some basic ideas: my disdain for the way the web functions as a user interface, some general work flow topics, some basic cyber-culture topics, and half way through most of these blog posts I mostly loose interest, and I suspect you have as well.

I’ve had a post in my “write this soon list,” about digging in deeper and striving for a more rich engagement with the topics I try and cover here, and I’ve pretty much failed with that. In any case, this post was supposed to be more about the things that are on my schedule:

I’ve been doing a lot offline these past few weeks. It’s May and that means it’s Morris Dancing season. I seem to have joined an interesting phenomena called “Maple Morris,” (more reflection on that when I’ve processed a bit more,) the usual Mayday festivities, Midwest Morris Ale. And then there are a bunch of singing conventions, which are a great deal of fun and fulfilling, and then there are contra dancing things, but none of these things transmit to quiet weekends alone writing. Or even quiet evening around writing. At least very often. Some highlights of the recent past and near future:

  • Maple Morris; A my-generation Morris dancing event, last weekend in Boston. A bunch of Morris dancers in my general age rage got together to dance some really challenging dances and to sing great songs. I was totally overwhelmed.
  • The Midwest Morris Ale; My regular annual Morris dancing ale. This is my 9th consecutive ale (and my 10th anniversary of dancing Morris.)
  • Since last September, I’ve gone to an all- or mulit- day Sacred Harp singing convention most months, since last September, and there’s one on my calender every month between now and this September.
  • I’m going to “Youth Dance Weekend” in Vermont in September, which I’ve never been to, but I think it’ll be a a great deal of fun, and I’m very much looking forward to it. I’ve not been contra dancing as much, but that’s not a huge problem for me.
  • I’m moving to Philadelphia in the summer, which means a drastically longer commute, but an easier to orchestrate social life, and a better work/life balance. This means apartment hunting and all that jazz.

While this means less writing time and time for taking care of my own projects, it doesn’t mean that I don’t have any writing time. Sure writing takes time, but the largest challenge as a writer is in using the time I/we already have effectively, and getting the most out of those opportunities.

It also, I think, means finding a way to develop a writing (and blogging) habit that:

  • Doesn’t revolve around a fixed daily publication schedule. I still want to write essays, but I need to write essays when I have a compelling argument for an essay, rather than around the same core of ideas that I’ve been running around for the last year.
  • I need to be able to put the blog on the back burner while I focus on things like writing fiction, or hacking projects, or Cyborg Institute stuff. The blog is great, and I love writing the blog, but It’s far to easy for me to fall into a pattern where the blog becomes the project, rather than the journal in support of the project.
  • I need to organize my projects and tasks into clumps of work that are easier to manage in shorter periods of time. This is probably a reorganization problem that needs to mostly occur within my head.

So where does that leave us? I have a few posts piled up that I’ll parcel out over the next few weeks, though on the whole there will probably be less posting by me around here. I’m probably going to do more posts along the lines of “here’s what I’ve been up to, go read my work elsewhere.” There will be some guest posts and I’ve already begun working with some writers for that. Beyond that, I guess we’ll both be able to be surprised.