I’m working on a couple regular posts, but for now, here’s a fun, off-topic post about my blogging/writing habits …
It’s funny how every blogger has their preferred blogging time and place. Some like it before work, some after; some like to write into the late hours of the night and some like to get up before the sun to write.
My blogging habits have changed over the past of couple of years. Early on, I would only write after work, but I rarely type posts after work anymore. Sometimes I do, but I find that it starts the gears turning in my mind and usually sets me up for a restless night of sleep. (Such a sensitive one, that mind of mine.)
Now, I find that writing is on my mind much more regularly. I’m usually jotting down thoughts in one of several mini-notebooks that I’ve started carrying around with me. Currently, my favorite notebook is the red one that’s covered in pink flowers – totally me – there in that picture to the right.
Almost every post that you see on this blog is drafted during my lunch hour at work. I like to scout out an empty conference room (sure would be nice to have an office!) and spend 30 to 60 minutes at one end of a long meeting 
table, clicking away on my miniature netbook keyboard (that cute little white thing to the left there).
Even though I spend most of the day slaving away on spreadsheets and financial systems, I feel that when I write over lunch, I am able to carve a little slice of time out of my day for me and that I get more out of my day (I also used to feel this way when I made time to work out over lunch – but, as I already mentioned, I’m now trying to work out in the morning).
Sometimes, I can’t make time to write. During the beginning and end of the month, I’m usually annoyingly busy (such is the life of an Accountant) and often don’t have time to break for lunch. Other times, even when I’m not really busy at work, I just waste my lunch break with:
- mindless Internet surfing
- telling my co-workers long, boring stories about my wedding (he he)
- going on a walk
- making personal calls
- running errands
- staring blankly out the window … whatevs – you know you’ve had days like that, too
These are all good ways to spend the lunch hour, but don’t leave me quite as happy as my lunchtime writing sessions do (well, the walk usually does … gets those endorphins pumping and all that jazz).
I usually always plan time to write during the weekends, too.
I always daydream about these marathon Saturday morning writing sessions where I have my coffee cup in hand, I’m deep in thought and staring out the window at the stormy weather, while a narrator tells the audience everything I’m thinking … but that hardly ever happens. In fact, I’m one of those writers that desperately wants to write, but hardly ever gets around to it. Funny how that works. 
What are your blogging/writing habits like? How do you make time in your day to do the things you love?
About B&B
I write in the evening most of the time, but there are times when I can work from home and I’ll try to get a whole post done before the work day is over. If I’m at the office, sometimes I’ll see an article that I want to write about, so I’ll just email a link to my home computer. I don’t usually write on weekends unless I’m really excited about something.
I usually do several posts on Sunday and schedule them throughout the week. If I don’t get that done, I blog in the morning. However, my favorite time to blog is when I have a topic that I’m just dying to write about. I try to post on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but sometimes there’s just something that I want to get out there, so I write more. I honestly wish I could blog all of the time. That would be my favorite
When I’m on a roll, it’s Sunday afternoon with coffee and I write all the posts for the week and set them to auto post. When I’m struggling, it’s during a lunch hour at work or after work at home, racking my brain for topics.
I love the netbook concept.
Married with two kids (12 and 8), the time from when I get home from work to when they go to bed is usually reserved for family. Once everyone else goes to bed, I get my writing on. Altough during the week, I usually do the “prep” work for blogs. Every blog starts out as a one sentence idea in a “future blogs” document. The first step for me is what I call “story boarding” where I just start throwing ideas in a document that may or may not make the actual final blog post. On Saturday/Sunday AMs before the rest of the family wakes up (I stay up later, and get up earlier than anyone else in my house) the phrases/ideas are developed into paragraph form. Then, I let it “rest” for a few days. Then I go into the “edit” phase where I start making minor changes to the post. I read the post every morning, and each evening until I can’t come up with anything else I want to change. Then, whalla, it’s done. I normally have 2-4 blogs “in flight” in any of those various phases at any time.
Probably more detail than anybody cares about, but hey, that’s how I roll.
I do most of my blogging during the evening and on the weekend. However, I like the idea of writing during lunch at work. I think I have done enough mindless internet surfing on reddit and youtube that I can give it up some days.
I write a lot in the evenings, but I usually feel burned out and would rather relax. I write a lot on the weekends, but I can’t count on that time being avalable, This weekend we are going camping. Other weekends, I have to work on the house, work on the car, fix computers or attend social events.
I have the weirdest writing habits. Probably because of my schedule, I always begin writing around 3 am and I finish by 6 am. I don’t like to write during the day, night time is more for me. And I never write anything in advance, kind of what I feel like at the moment, is what you get.
I still haven’t made it a habit. When I first started blogging, I had a job where I pretty much could blog right at my cube and no one would say anything. My next job made it a bit tougher, but I started to post at night. Now, I work out in the morning, work all day and have class at night, so I try to blog whenever. I find that I kind of prefer reading during my break instead of writing, so I never end up updating as much as I would like to. My next attempt will be to try to find some time during the weekends to write up blog posts and post them from time to time.
I’m relatively new at blogging and don’t have a routine just yet. I find that I write several posts on the weekend and during my lunch. I’m self-employed but try to stick to a routine.
I find that blog ideas come to me in the strangest places (grocery store, bank, subway) and since I don’t have a red notebook
I use the memo application in my blackberry and have created a ‘Blog Ideas’ memo where I quickly write a one-liner for a new blog idea.
Writing for a newspaper (my ex-job) gave me the best writing habit that I ever developed — it required me to write, everyday, whether I felt like it or not, and whether I had anything to say or not. That practice is invaluable to me now as a blogger.