Happy New Year readers! It’s good to be back! The inaugural post of the New Year is always an exciting one to write. Apologies if you recently received a strange email from me with some gibberish. These were some notes I wrote on writing better posts that I accidentally published. They’ve been removed now, so only finished articles from now on!
Firstly, some news. UK Tights now has a Twitter page! I’d never “tweeted” before now, but I’ve discovered that Twitter isn’t just for any normal human being. You either have to be so remarkably interesting and witty, that you can manage a tweet every few minutes about something, or you’re a terminally busy person, with only nano-seconds to spare for human communication. If you’re either, you might want to invest some time in the whole Twitter thing, especially now that we’re on it!
Enough banter. Today I’m writing a slightly cliched post. It’s a New Year’s resolution post. I wanted to reserve the first piece of writing of 2011 for mapping out my hopes, goals and ambitions. For this Blog, my goals are simple, but should make your reading more enjoyable.
I’ll just jump into it, with a list of a few new things I want to try out for the coming year.
I’m Here To Help
One thing I’ve always tried to do, and something you have to do if you want to make your Blog successful, is help people. Dispatch helpful advice and you always get a fantastic response. My last post, on Christmas suggestions, had people sharing it on their Facebook pages. My article about what makes women really stand out and respected was shared, tweeted about and passed from one Inbox to another.
Looking back, it’s the articles with the helping hand that people like to read the most. And oddly enough, they’re the ones I like writing the most, too.
Why Use One Word, When A Thousand Will Do?
I took a quick glance over my WordPress Dashboard the other day, and I realised that I’m doing something that’s totally unhealthy for my writing. My posts are too big.
Some Blogs I read only ever publish short posts. These are always the ones I enjoy the most. I enjoy them because they’re short, sweet and if it’s a funny Blog, they’re often more witty.
People tend to think that if your posts are funny, then it must be good for a subscriber to get huge essays sent to their inbox. But really, no one likes ploughing through all that reading material, no matter how humorous you make it.
From now on, I’ll be writing with more brevity! This should free up more of your time to do what ever it is you want to do, and with lots of little entries, I’ll have more time to look over my drafts. That’ll means fewer spelling mistakes and a lot more wit!
I told you I’m helpful!
And The Most Erotic Words in the English Language Are…
Over Christmas, I was reading one of Christopher Hitchens’ books and I remembered a talk I saw him give once. He said “When asked what I think are the most erotic words in the language… Slowly… Captive… Audience”.
When I was searching for ways to make my writing better, I realised the power, and the need, of story-telling! The best writing is the kind written from one person to another. The kind that entertains first, delivers the point second. Telling an interesting story with real characters is very important. How many times have you fallen back on an anecdote when someone doesn’t get where you’re coming from?
And besides, what good is it, reading something that doesn’t entertain you? Tolkein used to say that good tales are essential to enjoying life, and that the teller’s job is to “unfold the leaf of a story”. As the sole writer of this Blog, I’m making it my mission to do just that. Entertain, delight and keep you captivated!
Yes, But What’s It All Mean?!
The UK Tights Blog is still going have everything that made you subscribe in the first place. The humorous, sometimes silly, always charming series I do, like Captain’s Log, will still be there to warm your heart!
They’ll be a healthy mix of practical advice, tear-jerking tales and drunken revelry!
But most importantly, it means you’re going to get a lot more out of this Blog than before. They’ll be more pages you’ll want to save and bookmark and more posts you’ll want to send on to other people.
I said it best myself in the wee hours of January 1st. “Let old acquaintance be forgot” and let us make an even better Blog for 2011!
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Hey this is one of the best UK tights blogs so far!
Like the pace and tone of it.
So now you’ve gone the extra mile – less is more, mix in image and intrigue to give the extra bonus yipeeeee more time for you. I think NOT. Fact is, writing less is a fine tuned skill and knowing your audience takes longer than you think.
Have fun x
Nicola,
You’re definitely right about that! Writing less is very difficult and often consumes more time in editing than anything else.
I hope I didn’t come across like I was trying to cut down work loads or be lazy. You’re right though, all my work is still ahead of me, it seams!
Thanks for the honest reply.
Kyle
Course I don’t think you’re trying to cut down on your work load Kyle – chance would be a fine thing. Ha ha!
We see first hand how hard you guys work at UK tights its just phenomenal the out put of top quality products.
Keep up the good work.
Nic
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