Mark Hewitt's Blog

On Friday I ended the run of my daily comedy blog Day of X. I had honestly hoped I'd keep going much longer - I was (initially) excited about the concept, and about trying a pure humour project for the first time (there have always been bits and pieces of comedy in my writing, but I've never just set out to just be funny).

But over time I just found boredom and lethargy setting in. I think it's partly my general state of mind at the moment; I've been going through a real period of depression and demotivation, mostly due to lack of money, being unable to get out and do all the stuff I want to do. I also set myself a pretty high bar of posting seven full and good-quality posts a week, which I think is hard for any comedy writer unless you're writing in a very short form.

I'm disappointed, of course, but it's been a great learning experience and provided a lot of fun and some work that I'm really proud of - I'm glad to have tried it. I won't be going back to the comedy format right now, but it way well be something I'll play with again in the future; maybe in a less challenging form.

Now I just have to decide what to do next. I have two web projects on the go for clients - one completely new site and one a minor overhaul - and as soon as those are out of the way I'm going to look at reworking Silverknife, which I think can be a lot better. At that time I'll be looking at my next web project, and a high probability is the reinvention of my cooking blog, which (as I mentioned when I put it to bed) I want to rework into something more distinct, with a stronger and more interesting concept.

I have some other ideas flying around, and some offline projects I want to look at again. Whatever happens, you should be seeing some new - and hopefully exciting - things on Silverknife in the next month or two.

My new blog Day of X just passed the two week mark and I'm enjoying writing it more and more. I never tried an actual comedy blog before, I think because I was scared of the responsibility to be funny every post. But so far the ideas are flowing steadily and I'm really pleased with the results.

Here's a sample, if you haven't checked it out yet:
May the 12th: International Nurses Day

In Productivity: Are You Suffering From Learned Helplessness?

New article in Food: Make Your Own Chorizo.

Life barrels on, hopefully in the direction of income one of these days. I've had a really productive week, getting a lot done with a minimum of distractions and downtime. Still haven't finished the new business websites but I've been spreading my business cards around and there are several friends and friends of friends who've shown an interest in both my web design and home computer support services. I'd always expected that word of mouth would be my main marketing tool, so that's a good sign.

I've also found out that I can start building the business without having to rely on it for income immediately, as income for the business doesn't count as income for me until I start paying myself a wage and I can keep signing on until it's reached the break-even point.

I'll probably shut down at least one of my general Articles topics shortly. They've always been too broad to grip anyone but a casual reader, and although I'm pleased with pretty much everything I've posted on them I want to focus my energies on more interesting concepts. I may put the Technology blog to bed and evolve the other two into something else; a few concepts are on the drawing board right now.

On that topic, Day of X is going really well at the one week mark. Readership is still small, but the Google Dance hasn't even reached it yet. And the campaign to Support the Grand Unified Red Thing has already gathered 18 members and is growing a little faster every day. I'm still really enjoying the posts, with three of them definitely among my favourite things I've written this year.

I've got a new article up in the Productivity section - Creativity Through Slow Living

It's been a busy week. I got in an appointment with a Business Advisor at Barclays bank to find out about my options and things to think about as I put my business(es) into action, which was pretty informative. I've now ordered a pack from Business Link, who provide all kinds of advice and support to new businesses and will give me free consultations with various specialists to help me plan the thing out.

I still haven't finished the new site designs, although I'm nearly done with the Home Computer Support page. Try and get that finished tomorrow with luck, so I can push it out to the online directories and such and start to get my name out there.

The big fun is my new project, Day of X! The idea struck me yesterday just as I got out of bed - that there are now so many International Days of Whatever that almost every day of the year is dedicated to something. So I decided to try building a blog around it.

I fleshed out the idea while walking into town first thing to do some shopping, registered the domain and created the blog when I got home, designed the site through the afternoon and implemented it just after dinner, and I wrote the first post before I went to bed. It's fun to have taken something from concept to (working) completion so fast, and I think it's going to be a really enjoyable project.

I've struggled for a long time to find a niche on the web - something genuinely different from what other people are doing. There just aren't a lot of original ideas left! For example, all three of my article blogs are very broad - Technology, Food and Productivity. It makes it easy to find ideas to write about, but it's just not a model that builds readership online, as any successful website owner will tell you. This is finally an idea with a strong niche concept, and I think it could really go places. Time will tell.