I admire Lloyd and Chris for being able to add to their weblogs on (more or less) a daily basis. I have tried over the years to emulate their practice. I find it difficult to do so without spending way more time each day than I think is desirable. Recently, I have found really simple things to fill my daily writing quota. Even though I've not blogged every day, I have taken at least one picture a day since early January and posted my pictures to Flickr. It's only natural for me to use a picture or set of pictures as a writing prompt for my blog. Two birds with one stone: I add commentary to my pictures in Flickr while also fulfilling my daily blogging goal.

Even though I get something up on my blog, I remain unsatisfied. I long to write more sustantive pieces than what I can just crank out on the spur of the moment. The solution that I've been pursuing is to work on larger scale pieces in the background while sustaining the daily writing habit. Easier said than done. I have been trying to make all the little pieces contribute to the writing of the larger pieces, instead of merely competing for time and attention.

To the end of writing articles akin to Chris Ashley's essays, I have been accumulating a list of possible topics for blogging, looking for jigsaw pieces that start to fall together into larger patterns. I will resist the temptation to list those topics so I can give myself space to reconsider half-baked ideas.

Tomorrow, our local group of "Berkeley bloggers" meets for lunch. I'm looking forward to the fellowship and conversation that flow from being in the very same physical space as each other. Times like this remind me how I've not used my weblogs recently to participate in conversations. Conversing is difficult though, require patient listening/reading over time. I also find weblogging-as-conversation challenging because the way I write and read blogs are driven by speed, a need to get through the overwhelming torrent of materials.