Image: Cliché courtesy of Mayr

We have come to a fork in the road; a road that has been exciting and tortuous to travel, yet a road worthy of travelling. A fork that we had to come to; a fork that will decide the future of this blog.

Was the Crazy Colombian on some illicit substance when he started writing? What on earth is he talking about?

No, my loyal readers; I have not lost the plot; abused illicit substances; or gone gaga on alcohol. I am simply at a point in our writing journey where I am at a loss to explain some things; things that are important to me and my writing, and in consequence, important to you, my readers.

In this article I will share with you some of the things that have me perplexed; relate a few of our ups & downs since the early days of this blog; and ask for help. GASP! HORROR! The crazy Colombian used the ‘H’ word! Yes my loyal readers, the time has come for you to do some work. Yet it is a favour that I ask with the utmost humility. I value your time (please don’t let my average post length make you feel otherwise), and appreciate the fact that time is your only truly non-renewable resource. And so, I will try again to use it wisely. So without further ado, let’s get started.

Paradoxes and insanely confusing questions

When I started this post, I was going into a lot of detail about the things that baffle me. And then I remembered I promised to keep it short. These are the top 5 questions that perplex me:

1. What article length do you prefer? My top 5 articles have 52, 2000, 1000, 500 and 400 words respectively; kind of confusing, isn’t it? Do you prefer short, medium or long articles? I just don’t get it…
2. Why won’t you talk to us? I am curious about the absence of more comments to the articles, especially when I actively ask for questions. Are my articles too bland to be worth of a comment?
3. When is the best day to post? Lately I have started posting on a regular schedule: Mondays at 10 PM, Sydney time. Is this working better, or do I go back to my irregular post-when-you-feel-like-it schedule?
4. How many articles do you expect per week? Lately I have moved to just one, as I prefer quality over quantity. What are your thoughts?
5. What topics are of interest to you? I have been puzzled by the diversity of topics that appear on my top 10 articles. Are there specific topics you’d prefer me to focus on, or should I continue writing on a wide range of topics? I am also interested in your thoughts about the Peaceful Warrior Series : What do you think of it?

Ups & downs on the way to wisdom

I’ve been at the summit of ecstasy, and gone down the stairs of despair to the lowest dungeons of my soul. The launch of the Peaceful Warrior Series was a time I truly enjoyed, as was the day I found out in Skelliewag.org an article on finding and using incredible flickr images. The lowest moments happened during our transition from Wordpress.com to our own self-hosted domain; there were a number of technical issues we were barely equipped to deal with.

Have you had moments of disappointment and wisdom while reading this blog? Have you ever felt we’ve lost the plot, or that we have been particularly insightful? Let us know!

The moment of truth: will you invest a little time to help us make this blog better?

This is where I humbly ask for your help. As you read the previous sections, did any answers or comments pop into your mind? If the answer is Yes, then please quickly move down to the comments section and jot them down. Don’t worry about editing for politeness or grammatical reasons; we are happy to take it raw.

The second thing you can do is vote for a very simple change. As I have mentioned, I recently moved to a weekly posting schedule (every Monday at 10 PM). I am considering introducing a second post every Thursday at 10 PM, and make Thursday posts somewhat shorter, say 200-400 words. They will likely be short reviews of books I’ve read, movies I’ve seen, moments I’ve lived, or articles I’ve read.

If you want to share your preferences with us, please go up and to the top and answer the short survey. But before you do that, remember to take a minute to leave some comments; when you complete the survey, it will take you away from our web site to a page with the survey results.

Thanks for your continuing readership and support,

The Crazy Colombian