[Scribble] Year in Review

I wouldn’t have thought that I’d still be blogging up to this day.

2018 is the year where I did a lot of reflections and realizations on life and other things. Along with the ups and downs in RL comes the ups and downs for my feelings for this blog. On my blog anniversary this year (last March), I realized that I’ve been blogging for 9 years now. I also thought that the moment I hit my 10th year, I’ll stop blogging at all. Blogging has been dying or so they say.

I know I’ve mentioned this in one of my posts before. Back then, I wanted to close this down because I had no time. But this time, it was different. It felt like everything’s headed to the end.

Once, I used to have such lofty dreams. So in the past years, I messed around with my domain name, SEO, plugins, and whatnots. In those 9 years, I’ve seen the best and the worst stats of my blog. Then one day, it felt like everything’s a chore, that blogging was something I must do and not something I want to do. But it wasn’t because my love for writing had died down. It’s just that there’s no point in continuing to blog about games and manga when people could just watch videos on Youtube.

But then again, it made think of why I started blogging in the first place.

At the same time, I started having trouble with my Japanese studies. It seemed like no matter how much I studied, I still had trouble understanding things. The characters/words looked gibberish and all alien talk to me. It felt like I didn’t make any progress in all those years of studying. It was frustrating.

After turning things over and over in my head, I was reminded of why I started blogging back in the day. My blog was a way to chronicle my thoughts and feels for a series. I’m the type of person who tries to understand why I love a series, what made me uncomfortable about it, what made me enjoy it etc. Blogging about it was the perfect way for that.

So for my 10th year next year, I’ll stop experimenting. If you’ve noticed, I went back to using Bishie Holic (I apologize for the constant change). If I’m on your blogroll, please change the name and the URL of the blog.

I’ll still blog about otome games and other games, and manga. But as you’ve noticed, I’ve also started writing about CNovels and lately I’ve even ventured to webtoons — the two media I’ve been avoiding for the past years lol.

Speaking of games, I made a vow to myself not to buy any more games unless I’ve finished the ones I already have. 2019 will be the year I clear up my backlog. Not a single sale will lure me in! Muahaha! It is also good that the releases have been quite slow and uninspiring so it’s the best time to catch up.

As for the format of the posts, it will still be the same. Otome games will have first impressions post, individual character posts, and the final one — this is the only non-spoiler part.

I also created a recommendation page. It’s in my menu bar named as Rec List. While this would work as a way to promote my favorite series, this is also a place to compile all of my faves in one place.

Another resolution I have is to comment more on other blogs like before. I used to be so diligent about it. I’ve been thinking about this thing this year too. When a friend pointed this out on Twitter, it reminded me of the days where I dropped a comment on blogs/posts that I enjoyed. I loved talking to these bloggers. Heck, I even made friends with some of them.

Then I came up with a lot of excuses to make myself feel good like ‘I’m leaving alike that’s like leaving a comment right?’ Wrong. While likes are okay too, the bloggers, most likely, write their posts to share their thoughts with other people. They wanted to communicate their thoughts and talk to other fans. Replying on Twitter or on other SNS makes me feel overwhelmed easily. I’m afraid of cutting into the conversation like I’m interrupting when people talks in real life. But with blogs, I already have this common ground with them. Commenting on blogs make me feel like talking to another person one-on-one. Whereas on SNS, it feels like having a group discussion or shouting in a room full of people. It makes me feel queasy. I don’t know if that makes sense haha.

Besides, writing can be such a lonely hobby so dropping by a simple thanks would make their day. I know I would.

So I think that’s all. Thank you for reading up to this part.

May you and your loved ones have a blessed 2019!