Eight Year Blogging Anniversary!

When I started this blog, the UK was still in the European Union, David Cameron was Prime Minister, and Obama was the US president.

...It's kind of terrifying to realise that that was only eight years ago, but here we are.

And I feel so very old and tired 😅

Nerd Church - Writing A Full Blogpost In 32 Minutes

 

Turns out, I can write a whole-a** blogpost in 32 minutes.

...I know - I was surprised too!

OK, so I was kinda brain-foggy this week, and ended up writing both this week's Comics Wrap-Up (CWU) and Friday Fics Fix (F3) posts the day before they were due to go live on the blog.

One day, I will be a blogger that can schedule content well ahead of time, but that day is a long way off 😅

Life/Blogging Update - Covid Recovery

(Yes, this post discusses Covid)

No, this is not my cat - it's a stock photo from Pixabay. Yes, I wish I could pet this kitty 😅

Covid really sucks, by the way.

Like, it really sucks.

So, I obviously want to get back to blogging straight away. But even walking up the stairs is still an exhausting activity, so I'm going to have to try easing myself into things.

(...which, is not easy for me. I really want to spend circa 25 hours a day, 8 days a week, being productive right now, and I can't. Argh!)

My regular posts won't be back in June - it's just not practical *sigh* - but I do have dates in July when you can expect my series-posts back on your screens:

Life/Blogging Update - Covid

(Warning: this post obviously discusses Coronavirus/Covid 19)

Hi everyone,

I tested positive.

I went to an outside concert for the first time in 2 years, was really careful, am triple vaxxed, and still got Covid.

So, my brain is currently smoosh, and I really hope this missive contains a modicum of sense (...I turn into a Victorian dictionary when I'm tired - sorry.)

My usual posts will be suspended for the time being, until I can think clearly enough to figure out a strategum for said missives.

(...I honestly have no clue where that came from, sorry again.)

Once I know what in the name of your great-aunt Doris (...seriously, I have no clue,) I'm doing, I will let everyone know - I promise.

See you soon.

Month in Review(s) - April 2022

 

April was rough, mental health-wise.

I'm OK - just having to adapt and take care.

...It's kind of worse when there's no real reason or trigger because there's nothing you can blame, y'know?

...and it really doesn't help that the pollen this year is exceptionally, brutally, high, so my hayfever is extra-present this year.

Kind of hard to focus on your mental health when the pollen is making you feel like a zombie, lol.

(Oh, and hayfever is linked to climate change. #TrueStory.)

Nerd Church - The Writer Diaries: Write Your Obvious

You're the only one of you.

( *Starts mentally singing ME! by Taylor Swift and Brendon Urie: 'I'm the only one of me! Baby, that's the fun of me!...'* Lol.)

Hooman-bean-brains are one of the most complex things in the known universe (I know, right? We're special!) and yours is just that: yours.

No-one else's brain will ever work in exactly the same way as yours does.

We may come to the same conclusions or think along the same lines as someone else - but at the end of the day our brains are ours alone: entirely unique.

Month In Review(s) - March 2022

Warning: this post briefly discusses various aspects of the world's clusterf**k, including but not limited to: Ukraine, systemic Transphobia, and Covid 19. 

It also breifly discusses poor mental health, and chronic illness (migraines.)

March was... turbulent.

Which I know isn't exactly unusual atm, but still...

Month In Review(s) - November 2021

 

OK, this post is a bit later than I intended, but December's hectic at the best of times, so... let's just do this -

November's over, and here I am standing in December wondering how we got to the end of 2021, when it feels like it never really got started in the first place.

This year's felt like the hangover after 2020, and never really moved past that. 

Or is that just me? How has your 2021 been, dearest nerdlets?

Seven Years of Blogging! (aka My Blog Anniversary Post)

(Warning: this post references: the affects of Depression, grief and bereavement, 2020 in general, Nazis and internet trolls)

Seven years ago, in a decision I can’t remember making, using reasoning I don’t remember at all, I started this book blog.

(Yes, this is technically a book blog! I’m just very good at stirring the bookish content into the non-bookish content. 

Like sneaking veggies into your food or something... I don't know where that analogy is going, tbh 😅)

I named it Diary of a Reading Addict. I don’t remember why.

Later, I changed it to Dora Reads – which I felt was better for a bunch of reasons. (I never have just one reason for anything!)

Nerd Church - Embracing the Minimum And Learning To NOT Go The Extra Mile

I don’t half-a** things.

It’s not in my make-up. When I do something – work, writing, whatever – I put my everything into everything.

And that’s good. I like to think it shows in what I do.

But as part of my on-going attempts to learn that over-working is an unhealthy coping mechanism...

...and that I need to, y’know, not work myself to exhaustion, I’ve been trying to figure out what it means to put my all into things without all the negatives.

And I’ve realised something – I can do the minimum (or, at least, not the maximum,) without half-a**ing it.

Month in Review(s) - August 2021

 

August was a month where I had multiple migraines, so that sucks.

But it also was NOT meltingly hot (unlike the first days of September...) so I'll take that! 😅

I know some people were complaining that the skies were dull and not as sunshiney as August normally is, but honestly, if the temperature stays down then I don't care!

(Me + Heat = Angry Bear! Lol.)

Nerd Church - Reasons I Didn't Review Your Book

 

Yes, I'm a book blogger. Yes, I write reviews.

And yes, somehow I lucked out and reviews are some of my highest-traffic content, despite the fact that I write way fewer of them than I intend to.

But I don't review everything I read. Far from it.

There are people who do that - and that's amazing, I admire you so much.

But I can't.

I just can't.

I don't have the energy or the time. And I'm trying not to do the work-myself-into-an-early-grave thing. With varied results.

And whether or not I'll be reviewing your book (metaphorical author who may or may not exist,) will be based on a bunch of factors - because you know that I don't have just one reason for absolutely anything.

(Warning: this post references the affects of Depression/Anxiety)

Nerd Church - The Writer Diaries: Musings On Medium (and Blogging in General)

 

In March I started – tentatively – sticking some of my blog archive onto Medium.

Medium is kind of a weird-a** combo of blogging, freelance journalism, and social networking. And it pays.

Don’t ask me the ins-and-outs of how it pays – it uses some form of occult ceremony to distribute the tithes paid by the ardent congregation (only they call it Medium membership, but meh.)

But anywho, it pays.

And since I lost my Amazon UK Associateship (which is a long story which you can read on Dora Reads here, or on Medium here,) I need to work on other modes of monetisation.

Because one of these days I would like to hit an income bracket above ‘Starving Artist™’ – but that’s enough about that.

Month in Review(s) - June 2021

 

June was awful.

I lost my grandmother, and everything is just that little bit harder, y'know?

I know a lot of people have been through some sh** in the last year and a half - but that doesn't make it any easier.

Nerd Church - Random Life/Blogging Update (It's Been A Rough Week)

 

It's been an extremely rough week.

And I'm emotionally exhausted, at this point.

My grandmother passed away last weekend. 

And even though we'd known, for a while, that it was coming - even though we'd almost lost her twice this year already - it still hurts like hell.

Month in Review(s) - April 2021

(Warning: this post briefly discusses Covid 19/Coronavirus and Lockdowns, and mental health problems)

April was a mixed month.

Not only did we have snow, hail, rain, and blazing warm sunshine on the same day, but the uncertain opening-up after Lockdown etc. still meant that things felt hecka odd.

We're in that odd position where we're (hopefully) beyond the worst of it, but it's also uber-important not to move too fast, y'know?

Month in Review(s) - March 2021

(Warning: this post briefly discusses family ill health, mental health problems, and Covid 19)

So, dearest nerdlets: March!

March was better for me personally as Nan's health, although still exceptionally fragile, has been a little better and more stable. Hopefully it'll stay that way and/or keep improving.

Nerd Church - How Bloggers Always Have Ideas ...Sort Of

(Warning: this post briefly discusses the day-to-day affects of Depression/Anxiety)

Some of you might think this blogpost topic (i.e., blogging ideas) is a bit of a cheat – which, honestly? It kind of is.

But… that’s kind of the point? I guess?

No matter how long you’ve been blogging, you’ll have moments when you just don’t know what to blog about.

Either because your brain is producing nothing but white noise in answer to your increasingly frantic requests for blogging material...

...or because you can’t seem to string your ethereal ideas together into something readable, or at the very least coherent.

What Happened Between Me and the UK Amazon Associates Programme: The Entire Story

(Warning: this post briefly references and details mental health problems (Depression/Anxiety))

Last December, I got kicked off the UK Amazon Associates Programme. 

I am so not happy.

I've tried pretty much everything to sort this out - but Amazon UK don't seem to care.

So I will do what I do in situations like this - I will put it all out there on the table, in it's full stalling-tactics, arbitrary, frustrating glory.

(This is a long one - feel free to bookmark it and come back, but I would really, really, appreciate you reading this. 💖)

My darling dearest nerdlets, you don't get rid of me that easy. 

I don't just 'leave it,' not when I know I did nothing wrong. 

I will keep going, again and again.

And so here we are...

6 Years of Blogging At Dora Reads!

 

It's Halloween, which means that it's my blog anniversary!

- Which in turn means it's time for my annual ramble about this blog, and blogging in general, and all that stuff, while trying not to repeat the stuff from previous blog anniversary posts too heavily!

Woo!