Category Archives: blogging

Renewed…

Posted on by

Based on the email that arrived overnight from my domain registrar, it looks like http://www.jeffreytharp.com will be sticking around for at least another year. I suppose that could be good or bad depending on your point of view.

Taken wholly out of context, the email left me thinking about the issue of renewal in more general terms. It strikes me that this is a chance to evaluate where this blog has been and where it’s going, what’s worked well enough, and where I’d like to nudge it in slightly different directions. None of that is the work of a single day and certainly not of a single post.

Lately I’ve been kicking around the idea that I need to tighten up the focus of my writing a little bit. As you’ve no doubt seen, what shows up here tends to be sort of wide ranging, off the cuff ideas and commentary. That’s one of the aspects of this blog that I’ve always enjoyed. It has occurred to me, though, that in order to make it more than just whatever happens to be on my mind at any given point in the day (and to broaden its appeal beyond people who know me and want to see what I happen to be ranting about), there needs to be some kind of method overlain onto my particular brand of madness.

When it gets right down to where the fingers meet the keys, I don’t know exactly what I want this space to say about me and what I’m trying to do with my small slice of the internet. I have a hard time imagining that I’d be able to stay focused on just one or two main themes after I’ve spent the last seven years blogging about whatever notion captured my interest. With all that said, I want to believe it can be more than what it is currently. You might say I have a passion for this kind of writing. The commitment I’ve made to keeping this page current – now racing towards it’s eighth anniversary – is the longest commitment I’ve ever willingly made to anything in my life. If that doesn’t speak to passion for an activity, I’m not sure what would.

Now if I could just gin up a way to make this work a little less pro bono and a little more income earning, we might be on to something here. Then again that one time when I tried to make my living from history, my first passion in life, it quickly turned into work and a situation other than fun. Maybe I’d be best served by not trying to make a buck off of this one and just keep doing it because it’s what I love.

All of that because Go Daddy sent me an email. Sometimes I really do wonder just how the hell my brain works.

Culling the herd…

Posted on by

This morning, I did something that should have been done a long time ago – I culled the list of blogs I follow as well as the ones I link to here. It was painful.

As an active blogger since 2006, no one knows better than I do the challenge of keeping a blog alive week after week, month after month, and year after year. Writing, even when you don’t want to is work. Keeping content fresh and topical is a killer. I tend to think most people who start blogging just have a few things they want to get off their collective chests, or think that writing is something they want to do, or just get busy doing other things. I get that.

I’ve written before about bloggers that just disappear. As a reader, you learn not to take it personally when one of your favorites just stops posting. Still it’s a decidedly unfulfilling way for things to end. That being said, you can’t hang out forever expecting that someone is going to realize they haven’t posted in months or years and suddenly get back to the grind.

While I had some time this morning, I ruthlessly slashed the blogs I had bookmarked, followed, and linked to over the last decade. I can’t tell you how many there were to begin with, but right now there are less than 10 still on the list. To put that in perspective, well under 10% of the blogs I started following over the years are still active. That’s more than a little disappointing, especially because even a few of those are on the cusp, having not posted in the last month or two.

So there you go. Life happens. Bloggers move on. Not me of course, because I refuse to be one of those who just fades away quietly. I like to think my last post will catch me in full rant and provide the internet with the full list of reasons I’m giving it up for good. I’m fairly sure that when the time comes to fold my tent here at jeffreytharp.com, it will be for a far better reason than I just ran out of stuff to say.

The forgotten blog…

Posted on by

I could probably create some grand story about why this is the first post in three days, but the fact is I mostly forgot about posting this weekend. Not spending a great deal of time annoyed, aggravated, or otherwise pissed off radically diminishes the number of ideas worth writing about. That might be the only unfortunate side effect of spending a weekend successfully hiding from the world. The lower blood pressure resulting from the lack of human interaction is probably worth the lack of words.

Conveniently, Sunday night making its inevitable appearance has reminded me that there is, in fact, still a world out there just waiting to cause offense. That’s probably what reminded me that I needed to get back to the blog. I’m doing my best to remind myself that this weekend is leading into a short week that’s leading in to a long weekend, that’s leading into an even shorter week, that’s leading into an even longer weekend, that’s leading into yet another short week. As long as I get over the hump of the next four days, at least the first half of July is scheduled to look pretty damned good. I’ll just keep my fingers crossed that I don’t find some way to jack it all up between now and then. In fact even admitting that I’m looking forward to it has probably been enough to irretrievably jinx myself.

Tomorrow’s Monday, which if nothing else means that there will in all likelihood be plenty of fodder for new posts. I just hope the blogging gods will let me off the hook for skipping out on them for the last few days. Otherwise, it’s could be a very long week indeed.

What Annoys Jeff this Week?

Posted on by

1. Landlording. It’s one of those things that seems like a much better idea before you actually do it. There are those occasional times when everything is good – the rent is paid on time, nothing breaks, and for at least one month you can show a positive cash flow. Then there are all the other times – when you’re replacing a stove, having the whole place painted, fixing problems that people cause because they don’t give a damn since it’s not really “theirs.” Worse, you’ll catch those months when you’re between tenants and every nickel being spend is being taken out of hide. You’re doing all that in the hopes of making it livable as quickly as possible so the cycle can start over and there can be more repairs, more late rent, and more trouble all over again. Let the record show that I’m throughly looking forward to the day I can get out of the landlording business almost as much as I’m looking forward to the day I can get out of the being a tenant business.

2. Permission to speak freely. Jeffreytharp.com has been, is now, and will always be a place that reveres the basic principles of freedom of speech. Since turning the switch on this site, I’ve never had to drop the ban hammer on anyone. I hope that I’m never given cause to do so. With that being said, I’m starting to hear the barest rumble of a rumor that has the potential to curtail what I am at liberty to post and discuss here with you. Whatever comes, you have my personal promise that I will continue to use this site to advocate those issues about which I feel strongly, to discuss the day to day stupidity of life, and yes, even to provide commentary on those things that others wish would just be left alone. I don’t come here looking for a fight, but if one finds me here I suppose I’ll have no choice but to close with, engage, and decisively defeat the threat. Easier said than done, I’d imagine, but still worth doing.

3. Always needing a third thing. It’s not OCD, but having a third annoyance for the week always feels like it round out the post. Sometimes, though, I don’t have a third thing so much as I have a dozen small things that individually wouldn’t rate a mention. That doesn’t make for great reading and it makes for even worse writing, so I’m making an executive decision to skip the third thing tonight. So there.

Topics, ideas, and factoids…

Posted on by

I keep a running list of topics, random ideas, and factoids I think might be useful when faced with a moment of indecision over what to blog about on any given night. Looking at the list it’s a pretty well rounded selection of stuff from work, news items, and the just plain ridiculous things you see on a day-to-day basis when you’re paying attention to your surroundings. After looking at this list tonight, all I can tell you is there was nothing there that moved me to type. After 15 minutes of looking at the list, that’s precisely all I accomplished.

So what’s coming to you tonight is once again, just a blog about how damned hard it is to blog on a regular basis. Most of the time if you sit down and go at it, the words will flow eventually. Occasionally, though, all you end up doing is sitting there wondering where the words are that should theoretically be on the page already. It happens. I’ve been blogging for six years and writing for a lot longer than that in one form or another, but I’m just starting to come to terms with the idea that sometimes the words just aren’t going to be there when you summon them. It’s apparently an occupational hazard.

The worst part, of course, is that it’s an occupational hazard I then get to inflict on you by way of rambling 248 word posts that don’t really say anything at all. You’re Welcome.

Aspirational additions…

Posted on by

While I was waiting for Retribution to work its way through the byzantine self-publishing apparatus of the big retailers, I took some time this weekend to make a few changes to jeffreytharp.com.

You may not notice anything at first – I haven’t changed the format or layout and just about everything is right where it was the last time you visited. Still, there are a few small changes, both visible and invisible that should make the site a little friendlier to use (and hopefully more efficient to maintain over the long haul).

The one change that’s most noticeable is that I’ve added two tabs to the header – one for Fiction and the other for Non-fiction. I like to think this little change is aspirational since those new options are replacing the single “buy the book” tab that use to live there. Adding these two simple collections of bits and bytes to the interwebs is my personal nod towards throwing my cap over the wall and making this whole writing things a permanent state of affairs for me. I’m a smart enough guy to be wracked with self-doubt most of the time, but this is one of those rare moments when something feels fairly right.

I have no idea…

Posted on by

Most days I muddle through with one eye on the news, social media, and a few choice blogs just to keep a grip on what’s going on in the world. The news makes me crazy, but the only thing worse is not having a clue what’s happening in the world. On days like today, though, I emerge at the close of business like a mole – eyes squinted, vaguely confused look on my face, and a general confusion about the world that everyone else has been inhabiting. The days when I’m tethered to PowerPoint, email, and God help me, to meetings are really the bane of life in Cube City. I’m not saying I expect vast swaths of free time in the middle of the day, but a few minutes now and then to come up for air might be nice.

Worst of all, of course, is that blogging on near-daily basis means I burn through a lot of ideas in a very small amount of time. I rely on the news of the day and unfortunate dealings with other people as a primary source. When neither of those two things happens, it means the well runs dry pretty damned quick. That’s how you end up getting a post about not having any idea what’s going on in the world instead of one about what is actually happening. It’s a small matter of semantics, but it makes a big difference.

So there you have it. The Russians could have overrun all of Ukraine and we could have made first contact with an alien species all at the same time and I’d not have a single clue any of it was happening. In some ways I’m probably better off for it… but posts complaining about not having anything to post about will only cary me so far. Eventually, I suspect someone is going to want some actual fresh commentary and content around here. Or maybe not. The interwebs are a fickle place.

Six P’s…

Posted on by

Ninety-nine times out of a hundred when you see me, I have a plan. It may not always be a good one, but it’s there informing the decisions I make throughout the course of the day. Even if I know the plan is going to be blown to hell and back by 9AM, I feel better starting the day with a semblance of an idea about where I want to be when the day ends.

That’s true except in the one part of my life where it feels like a plan is currently most needed – the writing part. You know, the part I really, really like. More days than not I find myself sitting at the keyboard after dinner flailing around hoping to strike on a decent topic for the night’s post. That stroke of good luck feels like it’s getting harder to come by lately. That’s pretty much how I know it’s probably time to sit down and look at this thing like an actual professional – planning out posts in advance, working to deadline, and generally not waiting for the good idea fairy to drop ideas in my lap at the last possible minute.

I think I’ve always worried that having posts pre-planned might take away some of the ebb and flow around here. It could make me less responsive to the breaking news of the day that’s just crying out for a heavy dollop of cynicism. It’s getting to the point, though, that I’m feeling like that’s an acceptable level of risk to take so I can try to get the most out of the limited keyboard time I have available. So from here on out, I’m going to do my best to see if the Six P’s are still true. I’ve I’m lucky, I’ll find all these years later it’s still a stone cold fact that proper planning prevents piss poor performance.

Bitching about…

Posted on by

As a certain Facebook friend of mine is fond of pointing out, I have a bit of a tendency to “bitch about everything.” Guilty as charged. I can’t deny it. I might as well deny the rise and fall of the tide. I like to think my bitching and complaining is the last line of defense; the thing that keeps my blood pressure from spiking to the point of literally blasting off the top of my head. Sure, it never actually changes anything, but it makes me feel better. As I wrote in closing last night, blogging is my safety valve, letting me vent the day’s anger, hostility, and frustration into something like an appropriate channel, or if not strictly appropriate, maybe at least shunting it off into a space where it doesn’t do any lasting damage.

I’ve lived in my head a long time now and if there’s anything I’ve come to know about how I work, it’s that the ranting and raving aren’t the trouble. The real problems come in sullen silence on the days when I don’t say anything all. Those are my worst days – the ones where everything is roiling below the surface. Those days are the hard ones to get through with some semblance of sanity intact.

Today, the sun is up again, the week has careened past its zenith, and mercifully the weekend is coming on a day early. That’s a far cry from saying all is right with the world, but for the time being at least my particular black dog is back on its leash. Don’t worry though, there are still plenty of things that have annoyed me this week, so we’re well on track for tomorrow’s post… because it wouldn’t be Thursday if I didn’t bitch about at least three things.