Writing | BulgingButtons

Dear Readers,

My hope is to share with you content that you enjoy reading. I’m trying to do that in a way that is interesting and engaging. I’ve been looking at the blog stats and have come to the somewhat painful realization that my college statistics course was zero preparation for distilling the information I’m currently facing. Actually, that’s not quite it. It’s not the realization that’s painful, it was the statistics course and its accompanying MINITAB computer labs that were painful. In graduate school someone gave me the sage advice to take my statistics class pass/fail. Remembering back to my undergrad experience, I took that advice. Mercifully, I passed.

As interesting as all that may be, it’s just back story. Something I am told time and again to avoid in my writing. I guess old habits die hard. Here’s the crux of the situation: I want to know what you, the reader, want to see on BulgingButtons. From the start it’s been a cute little self-absorbed blog about my life as a fat girl. It’s branched out from there to include my life in general, including some thoughts on parenting my dear son, with bits about my teaching career, a little about my long neglected quilt projects, and a fair amount about the wonderful world of words, aka writing.

I sometimes write about health related topics, or the world of fat girl fashion. I also write about my food obsession, both positive and negative, and about my ongoing efforts to get my fat behind in gear, i.e. exercise. Some days this is more challenging than others. Oh, and challenges. I have the ongoing 47 for 47 challenge, and the NaNoWriMo and NaBloPoMo challenges for the month of November have kept me quite busy as well. I also did a series of Daily Passions Prompts, and I have regularly written to the WordPress Daily prompts.

I suppose I’m not looking for a new direction exactly, because I really like sharing my thoughts in all different directions, but I do wonder what aspects of the blog appeal to you most, and what parts are your least favorite (or just not interesting to you). I imagine the quilters have all left the building, as my poor neglected projects page hasn’t had any action (much like my poor neglected quilt projects). And anyone seeking recipes has probably moved on, because I haven’t shared any. But I know that lots of you have chosen to stick around. I’d love to know why.

I’m ready for the feedback, bring it on! What do you see as the strengths and weaknesses of BulgingButtons, and what would you like to see more and less of here?

Thanks in advance for your well thought out and detailed comments! (See what I did there? Clever, no?)

With love and orange-filled Oreos (hey, I have to get rid of them somehow!),

Between a blogging challenge, a novel-writing challenge, a professional writing group, and my weekly writing class, I feel a little bit stretched. I’m writing and writing and writing, and some of it is pretty darn good. Not all of it, mind you, but some, and sometimes that’s enough.

I’ve never attempted to write a novel before. It’s quite a challenge, and then when you put the 30 day timeframe on it, well, it’s nuts. I did set up a lot of it before I actually started writing on November 1, and that helped a great deal. I went in already having a good idea about several of my main characters, and the basic plot structure. I’ve been reading and learning about novel-writing, and I’ve come to the conclusion that I gravitate more naturally to the plot driven variety than the character driven. I find this revelation odd.

I’m generally not a big planner. My calendar often sits empty, not that I don’t have plans, but I don’t usually write them down. When I do plan ahead, say for instance I make out a grocery list, I’m just as likely to go in a different direction all together. Usually this is a result of leaving said list at home and promptly forgetting everything that was on it.

I tend to like to make things up as I go. Unless I’m putting together IKEA furniture. Then I want all the pieces laid out and I follow those directions step by step. I wish they had words. In English. I follow recipes too, at least the first several times I make something. After that I fly by the seat of my pants, and make adjustments as I see fit. I guess I’m not at that comfort level with novel-writing. Duh.

Now my only concern is having enough words to meet all of those writing commitments and challenges. I have a feeling that I’ll find them, or they will find me.