Entry #0: Becoming Bound to Blogging
I've never been someone who personally cares about blogs. I often look at them as uninteresting posts about people who I don't care about. I don't want to read about someones family vacations while I sit at home doing homework during the tiny bit of free time I have. I do, however, sometimes enjoy when friends of mine treat their social medias like this. I very much so care about when my friends share interesting aspects about their life. For example, My friend who recently went to Germany would post a bit about the trip, and honestly if anything I was upset that they didn't post more about it than they did. (I did however stalk them on Find My through iPhone since I make all my friends share their location with me). If any of them were to write a blog, I'm sure I'd read it semi frequently. The only other instance where I find myself reading blogs is accidentally when looking for advice or recipes online. Usually I do enjoy having access to these, as they usually help a lot with whatever my current issue or food craving is, but they also sometimes kind of suck in the sense that they drag on forever in order to make them seem longer. Like, any time I look up information about a game, if the blog is published through a somewhat sizeable company, they'll include a large portion of unnecessary fluff describing basic level details about the game to the reader, as if the reader looking for help with this specific question is in need of has never actually touched the game before. Many recipe blogs do something similar, in which they explain the dish, their history with the dish, and several other aspects of fluff in order to extend the length of the blog. Both of these types of blogs always include the fluff at the beginning so the reader is more likely to stick around longer before finding what they've come in search for. I appreciate the information being out there, but I do not like how they refuse to get to the point.
The closest experience I've had to "blogging" is my private twitter account, where I often share what I'm thinking about or doing for the day. Sometimes I probably share more than I should, or more than what others would care for on there. But that's the thing, "It's for me, not for them." It has become a daily thing for me, I've become bound to it. Nobody will listen to me ramble, and that's fine, but I still need to get my thoughts in some way or another unless I want to dwell on them alone for long periods of time. So in that sense, while I may often not enjoy reading blogs, I do enjoy the aspect of writing for them.
In the two blogs I read, those being The Blonde Abroad and A Beautiful Mess, I felt the same way as previously mentioned. I do like the fact that the writers are enjoying expressing their creativity in ways that they enjoy doing. For example, in The Blonde Abroad's post about going to Cuba, she gives a lot of details about Cuba, what to expect, and how to go about planning a trip. This blog actually gets straight to the point about this information, which is wonderful! And most importantly of all, when you look at the pictures she's taken of herself here, you can tell she is really enjoying herself.
Source: The Blonde Abroad's picture on her article about going to Cuba
In the second blog, the author falls victim to the issues I previously mentioned. In an article about how to make cookies, she starts off with several other things. First she states her reason for making the post, that being that her readers wanted her to share this cookie recipe. Then she shares several links to related posts, followed by the backstory of how she got this recipe from her grandparents who would make it for her back when she was a child, with several other details sprinkled into the mix. Next, she shares tips about how to ensure that the cookies don't come out flawed, despite not yet even listing the ingredients needed in the cookies. Finally, she goes on to start sharing the recipe. And yes, she does add more fluff in the actual recipe part as well. Despite not liking this style of writing and sharing information, I can tell she is enjoying herself in doing this as well as the cooking part. The cookies looked good, too so I can give her the pass for sharing so much unnecessary information.
In the end, the most important thing I feel I have learned is that, despite my judgement of the writing styles, the authors are still having fun with their blogs and doing the best they can with being both informative and entertaining in a sense. The takeaway for me is that if I'm going to be bound to this assignment, having to write my own blogs for others to read, I might as well forgo any care of whether or not people like what I have to say, or how I intend to say it. I may have to cater to the audience, but in the end writing comes from within, so having that internal importance to what I am writing will help motivate me to do this.
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