Yodeller

Everything that has beginning, has an end.

The time has come. I never thought this day would come - for two reasons. When I started my streak eight years ago I never imagined I could go on this long. But once I got started and formed the habit it came as unimaginable that I would ever stop.

I'm happy that I did this, both writing for so long and deciding to stop (as long as I'm actually able to do that tomorrow). I doubt there are many people out there that could say they once wrote over eight years daily. This could very well be some sort of record.

But now it's time to pass the torch. I'm sure @therealbrandonwilson will be happy to carry it, becoming the one with the longest ongoing streak in #teamstreak. I'll be still holding the all time longest streak for a while, but I'm sure my record will be broken eventually.

Thank you for all these years, and keep on writing!

Today is the day! I have successfully written daily for eight years. It's almost time to stop. After thinking about the right day to break my streak I decided the anniversary of my streak would be the day. Just feels right that way rather than stopping at exactly eight years. Besides, that leaves the right to legitimately say I wrote for over eight years.

It takes me about 10 minutes to write these posts (not to count all the time I have spent doing research for some of the topics that has sometimes been hours on top of just the writing). Over eight years that means I've spent around 480 hours writing. That's over 20 days! So if somebody would like to write as much text as I have produced over these years that would still take at least a month if doing nothing but sleeping and writing.

I have aimed for 200 words per day, but not always reaching that. Also, at the beginning I had a lower target for a few years. But I have also written longer posts at times. I could take an export of all my texts and do a proper count on the amount of words and other statistics, but assuming an average of 200 words that adds up to over half a million words. An average book is around 80000 words, so that's worth of over six books of words.

Besides the them itself I've always liked those old LEGO castle sers because of the ability to attach different sets together to build even bigger castles. Now that I have all the sets (even multiples of some sets) I have been finally able to fulfil one of my childhood dreams.

But even with all the sets there isn't enough to "complete" those huge castles. Sure additional copies help, but just attaching similar sets end to end gets a bit repetitive. With some duplicates there is also alternate original builds that adds to the variety. With some sets that don't have that I have build the extra sets as mirror images of the actual set. It's a nice extra challenge trying to follow the instructions, but turning the build around so that it mirrors the original.

I've also had a problem with some sets that I never completely liked because they are just facades, half builds where the backside is open. Of course this can be considered as feature as it helps the playability of the set when you have easier reach to the inside. But for display purposes it feels a bit hollow to me. But luckily that is often also easily solved if I have two of the sets: just build the other one as mirror and stick the halves together.

Breaking my streak at exactly 8 years isn't that simple as it sounds. Technically, this is already my 2920th post. That's 8 times 365, eight years if you take a year as 365 days. Of course that is not exactly true, you need to account for the leap days into the math. A year is 365, 25 days (a bit less than that actually as the leap years don't exactly happen every four years either). So over the span of eight years I need to add two more days.

Another thing is the way we for example celebrate our birthdays and other aniversaries. It happens on the same day every year, not the day before. So for example this year, when I celebrated my 46th birthday that was actually my 46 years + 1 days being here. So should I stop writing at eight years, or on my 8th anniversary of writing (which would already be more than eight years worth of days).

I could say today that I have been writing for 2920 days, but on the other hand at this moment that's not true yeat. I have written 2919 posts and am just now still writing the 2920th one. So before hitting the publish button that wouldn't yet be true.

Luckily I still have a couple of days to think about this.

The fateful day is getting closer. Only two days left. Today is once again one of those days when I have to think forward to ensure I don't miss my daily writing sue having some activity in the evening that might hinder my ability to write then. But at the same time this is the last time I need to worry about such things.

This is one of the several few things that led me to my decision yo break my streak. An extra mental effort I need to think about ensuring I don't accidentally break my streak. Not that it would have been a problem during the past eight years. There has only been a few occasions that I have realized it a bit too late and have been forced to write wither in a hurry or in not so sober conditions.

Of course I remember the times when this wasn't one of the problems. The times when I did write consistently in the morning. But that practice had it's own downsides. In the end it comes down to a compromise. There is no perfect solution.