Shooting into the sun, Fuji X-Pro 3, 18mm f6.3 UFO lens
Well, there's a reason why I named my blog “On Again, Off Again”: I knew that I'm not the most consistent writer. And here we are, several months after my last post, as vivid proof. 😛
I have actually made a couple changes this year — writing consistently in a journal, and reading more books. Perhaps I can also become more consistent at posting on my blog? It's too soon to tell.
For journaling, the thing that helped most was making it a plain ol' Google Doc. The format is also very simple: bulleted lists of the day's highlights, meh points, and if things got particularly bad, lowlights. On some pretty boring days I only have a couple bullet points under highlights and meh. Other days, I type a lot if I have some stuff I really want to recount. So far this year I've only missed maybe a couple days, which is encouraging. It's also very helpful that I can update the doc from my phone. I take a few minutes after climbing into bed to post my bullet points. This, of course, means it's often just text, but I've added an image a few times if it's very relevant. I wish I were this consistent at writing in a paper journal, but realistically I don't think I would be. I think I should still do something with a paper journal, but I haven't done so yet.
Late last year I started reading again, probably started during one of my holiday breaks. I picked a book about the iPod called The Perfect Thing and somehow that kicked off my habit to start reading regularly again. I also recently joined a challenge at work where we commit to reading a book a week. It ends up being more like I read a book in a weekend, since I still don't end up reading that much during the week. Regardless, I've finished 9 books this year so far (2 of which I started the year before, or longer 😬). Considering I struggled to finish even 1 book for a few years before this, I'm pretty happy to have re-established this habit. Unfortunately during this book-a-week challenge, my game playing time has been greatly affected. I used to play games on my Switch at least a little daily, or a few times a week, but now it's been temporarily retired. I'll have to figure out how to balance my reading and gaming times, but for now reading is on the front-burner. I've finally finished some William Gibson books that I've been meaning to read for forever. I ended up going backwards, having finished Agency and The Peripheral earlier this year (also out of order). Then I moved to the “Blue Ant” trilogy that was published before, and then the Bridge trilogy before that. I've taken a break from the Gibson trilogies and am in the middle of reading his book of essays, Distrust that Particular Flavor, and a book by Neal Stephenson called In the Beginning... Was the Command Line. I'll probably finish Command Line today.
I really like having gotten back into reading books, physical or otherwise. I used to be a huge reader when I was younger, but the internet and social media stole my attention span. Now I'm slowly clawing it back.
As for blogging... I will have to figure out a system that's as easy as my low-effort, Google Docs journal (I literally titled the doc, Low-Effort Journal). I'm currently using the Squarespace app to type up this draft from my Galaxy Z Fold 3, but I think I'll have to finish formatting it from the Squarespace site using my laptop. I don't know why this app doesn't have better functionality for constructing blog posts from start to finish. I can't be the only one wanting to be able to do this directly from my phone... 🤔 I used to blog from my old iPhones (like iPhone 4 era) and they were miniscule compared to my Fold 3. Plus, I tend to edit photos, whether they're from my phone or an external camera, on my phone because the VSCO app has great film emulations, but no longer has a desktop app. 🤷♀️ So I'm still going to have to figure out a good solution for Squarespace blogging.
[Author's Note] I originally posted this on my Squarespace blog before I explored a federated blogging service. I think my answer to easier blogging is blogging here on Write.as!
In the meantime, I'm “micro-blogging” on Mastodon, @jezlyn@mastodon.social. I had to leave Twitter because of all of the Musk shenanigans. I've been off the service for a few weeks now, but yesterday I started a process of sorting through my following list to unfollow the more anxiety-inducing accounts and leave the art, retro gaming, and online friends I've gathered over the years. I won't be able to weed out all politics and/or drama, but I hope to cut down a lot of it. I misguidedly started following a bunch of political accounts while I was in an almost perpetual state of righteous indignation over all the shitty political things that were and still happening at the time. But then I realized I needed to give my brain and self a rest from all of the negativity and instead focus on fun, positive stuff to help nourish my fun, happy, creative side instead of building up an anxiety, rage monster. Mastodon has been a definite balm to Twitter's algorithmic manipulations. It reminds me of the old days of Twitter when people were actually socializing, talking about their day, what's interesting, instead of competing on who can troll the hardest. So far people have been really helpful, and posting interesting, seemingly authentic stuff. Because Mastodon is only one of several “federated” services (aka “fediverse”), I've been going through the process of creating accounts on services like Pixelfed, an image sharing social site, and Bookwyrm (I'm on the bookrastinating.com instance), a federated book tracking/social site. It has been interesting to learn about these services and slow down social media consumption in general. I think it fits quite well with my shift toward reading more books.
Hopefully besides consuming more stuff besides social media, I'll also figure out how to create more — photos, writing, and hopefully some photo books (an informal goal I set for myself this year). The photo books are meant to be “official”, more like doing something with my photography beyond posting on Flickr/Pixelfed, and creating physical tokens of my work.
Well, that's it for now. Hopefully in a day or more I'll be back with some updates or other random thoughts.