posting slackitude and SF2G

For the first time this year since I started my blog in 2008, total posts have dropped.

Here's a plot of the rate of net posts during the year since 2008, when Cara convinced me to start the blog:

I started a bit slowly this year, then rallied, catching my 2010 schedule. But then I started losing ground, finishing in a dead heat with 2009.

So what happened?

The answer is I started riding more. This is evident from the plot on my Strava page. Barely surviving through April, then my hours start to take off in May. Normal commute means I am in the train around 100 minutes with my laptop. SF2G means I leave home early, then have only my cell phone for my train ride home. More riding = less posting.

And that is a very good thing.

Here's another look at my SF2G schedule. I counted the number of Strava activities I had with SF2G in the title. Before the period of the plot I didn't have GPS so I'd need to check my old training logs. I may have been occasionally remiss in tagging my rides SF2G, so there may be a few not included here. But you can definitely see I started riding into work a lot more often.

Through September 2010, at a previous job, I was more readily able to combine both, since I was more able to squeeze in lunch rides and even the occasional post-commute morning ride. I was on flex time, and could often do actual work on the train since much of what I did didn't require an internet connection (Caltrain has none). Now I need to be on the secure network to do "work", and in any case "face time" is more important, so working on the train then blowing out to join one of the Wednesday morning groups simply doesn't work any more. Working on the train in the morning often meant I spent the evening commute on the blog, but now if I ride in both commutes are blogless.

It's all good: I try for quality, not quantity. What really runs up the numbers is when I get hooked onto a topic, as I did with the Metrigear Vector. Serial posts on a topic become more efficient to get out.

A bit more on the SF2G rate: my SF2G's peaked in August: good weather, plenty of daylight for early starts. September tailed off, in part because I needed train time to prepare for the upcoming Low-Key Hillclimbs (scoring code, web pages). Then October-November my SF2G's were suppressed by not wanting to go into Saturday's Low-Key Hillclimb fatigued. December included holidays, and was also off.

For 2012? Who knows how the blog will go? I'll try not to set any goals. At some point I will have said enough and feel it's time to move on. But I'm not quite there yet.