My, how time files

Somewhat over a year ago I posted post number 300 and said I probably wouldn't make much of a production until I hit a more significant milestone.

This is post 500 and, having mulled this whole "blog" thing over, I've come to a few small conclusions:

• After 500 posts and nearly three years I'm pretty well convinced I can write a blog.
• The last couple of months have seen a mad scramble at month-end to make my self-imposed and arbitrary ten-post-a-month quota
• I still enjoy writing Field Notes, but there are also other things I'd like to write and my time is limited.
• Somewhat to my surprise, I still enjoy reading this blog, despite feeling that I must have beaten most of the major themes to death by now.

So ... I'm not sure exactly what to do next, but one decision did jump out: Drop the ten-post-a-month thing. It's good to have a goad to encourage putting something down, but at this point in the game just producing posts doesn't seem like a very meaningful end in itself.

That doesn't necessarily mean I'll be posting less. I might, I might not. The next post might be tomorrow (not unlikely) or in a year (much less likely), but there will definitely be a next post, and one after that ... Will there be a post 1000? I have no idea.

One thing I probably will do is go back and re-read the whole blog from start back to real time and do a bit of gardening along the way. That will almost certainly produce a few "where are they now?" followups -- maybe a year or two is a long time on the web after all.

As always, I thank anyone reading this and in particular anyone following the blog regularly for your time and attention, and hope that you enjoy it at least as much as I.

[Hmm ... re-reading the blog ... now there's an idea.  Five years later I still hadn't done it, but I'm doing it now, slowly, in reverse chronological order, like you see it on the web.  Which is why my heart sank a little when I realized that I've only made it through 148 posts and still have 499 to go (fewer until I get to wherever I ended up when I tried to read the blog through from the other end).

As to the pace of posting, well, that did drop off a bit, didn't it?  Posts from 23 Aug 2007 to 21 Jul 2010: 500, or about one every two days.  Posts from 22 Jul 2010 to 14 Dec 2015: 147, or about one every 13 days.  So basically once every two days vs. once every two weeks.  Ah, well. I still enjoy it.  I just don't do it as much. 

I still have no idea whether there will be a post 1,000 --D.H Dec 2015]