I ended up here today because a loyal reader asked me recently about the pace on TOA. Wasn't it a little slow, compared to the usual? I think some casual data analysis would support this hypothesis - my last month with double-digit posts was in July, and 2021 saw a reduction of over 50% in total posts compared to 2020. Longtime readers will note some recent TOA remarks citing various factors such as fatigue, busyness, and burnout, all of which also predicted a reduced pace.
But I think there is a part of me that wants to point out a different perspective. Since TOA started in 2016, I've mostly written when I had the time, so in that sense the past few months have been no change at all - I've just had less time, so I've done less writing. What else is there to say? The reality is that the pace of TOA has almost always depended on my leisure time, and there just hasn't been much of it the past few months.
It might be helpful to reinforce the point here by returning to the beginning and noting the circumstances that left me with so much time. The pattern is fairly obvious - the time surplus, based on temporary situations, was probably never sustainable, yet somehow the way events unfolded meant the surplus sustained itself for long enough to become something like an unspoken norm.
- 2016 - no job
- Lots of TOA time
- 2017 - no job
- Lots of TOA time
- 2018 - started a job, implying I would have less time, but quickly decided to find a new job...
- Lots of TOA time
- 2019, first half - continued above
- Lots of TOA time
- 2019, second half - started a new job, implying less time, but made a token attempt to keep up the pace for a few months
- Not as much TOA time...
- 2020, first quarter - hinted that I would soon slow down the pace...
- TOA started to slow down...
- 2020, spring - PANDEMIC...
- Back to having lots of TOA time
- 2021, first half - pandemic continued
- Lots of TOA time
- 2021, second half - see opening paragraph
- Much less TOA time
I guess the open question is, what next? In the immediate future, there are some things in progress that the regular reader might be looking forward to - wrapping up the book of the year list, catching up on some reading reviews, and the annual rant about cars hitting cyclists. As usual, there will also be some otherwise unplanned nonsense that will once again clutter this space.
In the medium-term I shared a few months ago that I was going to try operating within a roughly "seasonal" framework. This still makes sense to me, so that's the plan for now. This is the second straight week (I write on January 30) where I've managed to put a post on the calendar from over a week out, so I'm sensing that we're about to return to in-season, where TOA will have some more frequent activity for a few weeks. After I run out of steam again, I'll go back to just having a post on Sunday until I recharge. This might be the appropriate pattern for the long-term, as well, but for now we are just going to see if I have the time for it.
