Thank you and goodnight

Well, it has been 12 months since I first set up my Blogger account and started my yearlong quest to keep writing and publishing.
I pretty much managed it, every week day, throughout 2008 (with a few short breaks, for my sanity) but now I must bring the journey to a close.
I wasn’t sure if I’d get through the year without admitting defeat. I’m glad I stuck it out. I also wasn’t sure if anyone would read the stories. I have been so proud, this past year, that people I’ve never met should take the time to read and comment on my writing.
I never tried to publicise the blog much, and for a while I didn’t have many readers. But that all changed when Blogger awarded me ‘Blog of Note’ status for The Daily Tale (my non-picture based story blog).
Overnight, I found myself with an audience of thousands, plus many commentators, which was exciting and a little overwhelming at once. It was difficult to hold everyone’s attention. I’m not sure which parts of the year were my creative peaks, or whether the blog’s popularity coincided with these. I often found the most popular pieces were not the ones I expected, or my favourites, but I was glad people liked them (or at least felt moved to comment) all the same.
Anyway, a nice collective of people stayed interested through the course of The Daily Tale, but I needed to freshen up the blog to keep me interested in it. So, halfway through the year, I opened up a new blog – this one – The Daily Postcard. My idea was to separate the two blogs and keep each as distinct archives of my work.
The Daily Postcard gave me a chance to publish many of the photos I’ve been taking over the last couple of years, and also use them as the basis for writing stories. Sometimes the confines of the picture were a blessing to the writing process, sometimes a hindrance. Still, it was a fine experiment, I think.
I’d particularly like to thank the crop of readers who stayed with me until the end of the project and for all your kind comments and support. It’s especially pleasing that you guys are all such fantastic bloggers and having such superb writers as yourselves reading my work, and hopefully enjoying it, is something I’ve cherished. I’ll have more time to read your blogs now so keep up the great work.
It will be strange not to write every day, but I’m looking forward to exploring other creative outlets (such as music) and then I’ll get back to writing, either some full length short stories, or perhaps a novella, or something bigger…
Rest assured, as I come up with short tales and other ideas I will post them either to the Daily Tale or Daily Postcard sites so keep an eye out for them!
Ok, well I think that’s it from me. All that’s left to say is – thanks, so much, for reading.

Paul.