In Which Maggie Becomes Her Own Mark Zuckerberg

“GET ZUCCED!” — Me, to me, upon realizing how much work I have to do to update this blog.

I’m digging into blog updates today and just reading the current/old version of the “About” page got me giggling. What the hell was I thinking with those insane writing goals?

I think one major thing I got wrong was that an MFA “packet” is usually not due in 30 days or less. (I gave myself 27 days for April 2021?? Maggie, what the hell??) A “packet” usually stretches across at LEAST six weeks, sometimes longer, depending on the semester. I know the program I got accepted into only does 4-6 packets per year. I was planning on a packet every month???

I also way overdid it on each packet’s requirements. After all, my middle name is “I don’t know how to set reasonable expectations.” So let’s start there.

Step one: Slashing my book-reading quota.

Whose idea was it to read 15+ books in a single month? I’m a fast reader, but I’m not THAT fast. Maybe if this blog was my full-time job I could do something like that, but with as insane and unpredictable as my life has been in the last few years, that goal is just laughably intense.

Solution: Cut the book list down to five books per month. That includes four “general” books and one “craft” book. I can read the craft book in small chunks if it’s a dense one like Twyla Tharp’s or The Artist’s Way. (Blog idea: Redo TAW and write about it! Loved that experience!) And I won’t assign myself an 800+ page book without making equal adjustments to the rest of my reading list for the month. (I loved A Little Life, but it destroyed me, both spiritually and work-load-ily.)

Step two: Evaluating the word-count quotas.

Academic writing, whomst? I set a very silly (and arbitrary) goal for “academic writing” based on a vague listing in the example packet descriptions. I think in an actual MFA program, I’d be writing real essays about the books I’m reading, but at this point in the project that seems a little silly. So instead of setting a specific word-count quota for “academic” writing, I’m calling it Gucci so long as I write a blog for every book I read.

Plus, now that I’m adding in all the #vanlife stuff, any non-personal writing quotas will surely be eaten up. So long as I’m blogging, I’m happy with my “professional” writing.

Step two and a half: Creative writing quotas.

I’m actually still happy with the system I had planned for version 1.0. Scaling word count quotas, starting at 10K words for the first month and jumping by 5K up to a total of 40K in the sixth/final month of the project. That sounds extremely doable, even with my gnarly personal/professional schedule and total inability to stop spending money on travel.

So, I think I’ll stick with what I have: 10,000 words in the first official month of the project, plus whatever I write on this here bloggy-blog. Right now, my plan is to officially reboot the project on September 1st (since I’m moving and whatnot), and I’ll start with 10,000 words.

Step three: Adding in my #vanlife plans and general life updates.

Emphasis on “highway”!!! I want to make this blog a place where I talk about anything and everything, so I’m not limiting myself to specific writing projects. My goal for the next two years is to buy and convert a camper van, with the intention of living in it for a year, starting sometime around March or April of 2024. (Or maybe spring of 2025, depending on when I actually get my hands on a van and start converting it.)

All that means I have a ton of planning to do, from daydreaming to genuine strategy to budgeting to DIY projects and contractor research. I want to do most of the work myself, but I know I’ll end up consulting (or just paying) professionals when I take on the scary stuff, like electrical wiring and plumbing.

The fun part is that I get to do all my scheming in writing, and I plan on word-vomiting it here on the blog. It’ll be fun to watch my plans meander from crazy hackneyed ideas to actual action, and then have the progress photos to show that I actually put my money where my mouth is. (First step: Acquire money.)

Once I start actually blogging about my van plans, I intend to make a separate section of the site (or maybe just a separate section of the blog?) dedicated to Van McCann. (Still workshopping, but I think that’s what I’ll probably end up naming my van. LOL.)

Step four: Starting my plan for world domination monetizing this site.

Ugh, I signed up as an Amazon affiliate. So, let this disclaimer stand as my first disclaimer for all the disclaiming needed about affiliate disclaimers.

Disclaimer: This site contains affiliate links. If you use these links to buy something I may earn a commission. Thanks for your support!

Note the shiny use of that word “may”. I’ve got 180 days to start earning commission via Amazon affiliate links or my account gets deactivated anyway, so there’s a good chance I have to redo this whole process down the line. But hey, might as well get things started while I can, right? And who knows, maybe I’ll earn, like, a dollar, and have something fun to tell my parents.

I’ve got to get good about adding that disclaimer to any posts where I include affiliate links. I mainly see myself doing this on my book reports (i.e. linking to the Amazon page for whatever I’m reading), but I’ve also started an Amazon wish list of potential Van Life purchases, like a totally impractical mini ice maker, a neat sectioned frying pan and some cool-dude hanging ceiling net / roof rack thingies. (BUY ‘EM!!! FUEL MY ADDICTIONS!!!)

I also went ahead and added the disclaimer to the footer, so it’ll show up on every page. Look at me, FTC! I’m following the rules!

Step five: Blog categories.

The blog is so cute as it is. I don’t feel like I need to change much, beyond adding categories and tags to my posts. I’m famous for forgetting to do that. It doesn’t really matter right now, since all the posts so far have been about book reports and THMFA v 1.0. But once I start adding in life updates (like the “rebooting” post) and site updates (like this post) and van life updates (coming soon!), I want it to be easy to get around.

I’m undecided whether those categories will live in the nav bar as their own pages or just be a filter-able section of the blog. It’ll probably depend on my readership, once that starts growing.

Stares intently at Google Analytics. Remembers I haven't set that up. Stresses.

I already have categories for “Book Report”, “Lesson Plans” (whatever that is), and “Personal Letter”. I never made any tags, but that’s fixable. For now, I’m adding in the new categories “Van Life” and “Finances” (or at least, I will when I blog about those things because Squarespace won’t let me add them from the general blog settings page). Same for tags. Do I want tags or categories? Both? Who knows. I’m bad at SEO.

I also want to add something like “Health”, because my general wellness is going to be a facet of this blog. Goals all over the place, yo!

Categories: Book report, lesson plans, personal letter, van life, finances, health and wellness

Tags: Craft book, fiction, nonfiction, memoir, BIPOC authors, women authors, classics, progress report, Maggie’s favorites, YA, LGBTQ+, short story, struggles, wins, planning

I was going to be lazy and write a note about updating the categories and tags later, but I updated all the categories and tags! Take that, accountability demons!

Plus, I tweaked the blog header copy a little to make more sense for the new lean of the project. And the bloggy-blog is ready to go!

Step six: Summarizing everything that I’ve changed so far.

Alrighty, time to update that shiny “About” page!

When last we spoke, our intrepid adventurer was broke and depressed in Utah, raising two dogs, struggling under $31K in debt, and sitting in the middle of an existential crisis that, let’s be honest, continues to this day. Among the many updates are that I’m down to one dog (more on that later), I’m DEBT FUCKEN FREE (more on that later, too), I’m in the process of moving back to Baltimore from Salt Lake City, which currently places me in Jacksonville, Florida (two guesses as to when I’ll talk about that — later), and I’m still buried in existential doubt and rickety, pandemic-influenced mental health.

But hey, that’s what blogs are for, right?

I want to try and be honest on this blog and talk about my struggles as well as my wins. If the fact of the matter is that I’m too overwhelmed and bummed out to function, I at least want to have a place to talk about that. (All while being mental health positive and sharing helpful resources and the like — this is a safe space, for you as well as for me!)

That being said, I’ve updated the “About” page to reflect the new version of this project. (And I’m still laughing at myself for everything I said I’d do in the old version. C’mon, kiddo, you’ve got a life.)

Step seven: Do I still want to do an Annotated Bibliography?

And why do I keep typing “annotated” as “annoted”? That’s not even a word, Maggie.

The books that I currently have listed look nice and shiny in that annotated bibliography section. The only issue is that I found writing those out to be extremely annoying and busy work-y. In a traditional MFA program, I’d need to keep up with this practice, but I don’t really want to.

I’m thinking I’ll convert this to a general “Resources” page, where I’ll list all the books I’ve read, link to their associated blogs, and include Amazon affiliate links (and my rootin’ tootin’ affiliate commission disclaimer). If I feel fancy, mayhaps I’ll include a little blurb about the book and why I liked/disliked it. I’ve got a meeting in half an hour, so I don’t have time to do that now, but I’m adding it to the list!

Step eight: The step that’s not really a step

The Contact page looks good as-is, so I’m not gonna reinvent the wheel. Social media needs an uplift, given I stopped updating my Instagram in April 2021 and haven’t updated my LinkedIn since I graduated from college (whoops). But that is a Tomorrow Maggie project, because — if I haven’t said this before, strap in, because I’m going to be saying it a lot — I fucken hate social media.

There. I said what I said. Deal with it.

But hey, now that I’ve identified areas for improvement and souped up the site a bit, I can start thinking about my intended next steps: Fixing up the annotated bibliography/resources page, adding Amazon affiliate links to everything (DISCLAIMER DISCLAIMER DISCLAIMER, wow y’all are gonna get tired of me saying that), updating social media (ugh), reading Walden (double ugh), and setting a specific schedule and goals for the official actual for real this time no really reboot of The Highway MFA.

I’ve got my eye on September 1st, which gives me plenty of time for planning. Only problem: Not getting so gung-ho on this in the next two weeks that I burn out and give up.

Again.

(Hey, it happens to the best of us.)

Til next time,
Mags