Once upon a time I did a Oneword every day. I’ve fallen out of that practice (not to mention the practice of posting in general), but I’ve replaced it with something just as cool: Twitter. If you’ve never seen Twitter, its premise is to get you to answer the question “What are you doing right now?” It accepts SMS messages, so responses must be kept to 140 characters or less.

On the surface it sounds like a time-waster, and certainly it has that potential. But there’s a lot for a writer to love about the concept. That 140-character constraint is magical. It’s challenging and fun to attempt to write something interesting about myself in such a small space — something that might catch a random reader’s eye. Follow the minutiae of my daily life at http://twitter.com/gravelpup. Sign yourself up if you’re up for the challenge.

(This post was written on my iPhone on its last 10% of battery charge. A constraint of a different sort.)

I swore I would quit writing “I’m a big slacker” posts. I haven’t posted in seven months, so I guess I’ve stuck to that pledge.

There have been a few changes around here. I have a new daughter and a new job. My already-scarce free time has vanished. Yes, I still want to write. More than I want to fly, or play Ultimate, or ski, or any of those other hobbies that come and go. I’m not going to try to make a career of it, though. I’d rather do this out of desire than obligation.

When I was a kid, I wanted a career in music. I mentioned this to a teacher, and he took me aside and told me that I could always enjoy playing or singing, without the pressure of having to make a living out of it. I’m sure that was his way of saying I didn’t have the talent, but that’s ok. I have a feeling I’d enjoy music less if it were my job.

So you won’t be reading much here about writing for profit from now on. I’d rather write because, and when, I want to — about whatever I want to write about. You might see more technology-related material. I don’t have the urge to write anything too technical, so there won’t be much code if any. I’m most motivated to write when it’s an escape from the day job. I want to make myself do more creative writing, and that may be easier if I’m not trying to build a copywriter’s portfolio.

You’ll probably catch a whiff of sour grapes in these words, but that’s ok too. I could try to edit it out, but this post has been sitting on my desktop unfinished for over a month and sticking out its tongue at me.

I think for awhile I was making this a blog about writing, which was a mistake. It shouldn’t be about writing, or Ruby, or culture, or gadgets, or my kids, or anything. From now on, it’s a blog for writing.

Thanks for reading. That is all.