BBAW Friday: Wrap up and Burnout

Many thanks to the BBAW hosts for organizing this event.  It was a blast and I'm sure we all appreciate the time and effort that went into it!

A few takeaways from this week:

• Read The Sparrow, Tiny Beautiful Things, and anything by Diana Wynne Jones
• Reread Harry Potter at least ten more times, maybe backwards.
• We still miss Google Reader.  What were they thinking?
• Introverts unite!!
• There are a lot of new-to-me, high-quality book blogs out there that I'm excited to visit!

And since I didn't post yesterday, a few thoughts on connecting:

• I'm really bad at social media, but from the handful of posts I read yesterday, I'm not alone.
• And I think that's okay.  I think a lot of us book bloggers feel comfort and support from a community that shares our love/obsession for hardcore reading even if there are not a lot of concrete involvements like a comment or twitter post. 
• I love you lurkers!  It's good to know you're out there.
• Having said all of that, visiting and commenting is one of my favorite things. I think we all would like to comment more but are limited by time, darn it!
• I WILL master Twitter.  
• I have lots of warm and fuzzy feelings about bloggers that I have felt connected with over the past 9-10 years since I started my blog.  However, I find that I hold back because I know that there are going to be times when I need to step back from the book blogging community depending on what's going on in life, and I hate the idea of forging a friendship, and then backing away into my cocoon when things are stressful.  Does anyone else feel this way? Maybe this is an introvert thing.

And concerning burnout/keeping things fresh:

• I don't think I've experienced burnout.  I just stop blogging when my priorities shift and then jump in when I can again.  My longest break was very recent, for about 2-3 years because I went back to school and other things.  Yes, I lost followers, but it happens.  As long as I get one comment on a post I'm happy.  Zero is depressing I have to admit :)
• My blog is pretty unprofessional, and that works for me. My main focus is to write reviews so that I remember my experience with a book. Because of that, I don't do a lot of different types of posts.  
• Having said that, I do have GOALS this year, which is a bold step for me.  I plan to review every book I read this year (even geeky Star Wars books and 1,000 page history books) and even have it on the calendar to write a review every Monday and Thursday (have failed at this just a bit already). I also would like to include some other things that go on in my life, mostly because I love it when other people do so.
• With that in mind, here's what has been keeping me from completely immersing myself in BBAW this week.  We're redoing a room (that my adult kids used to sleep in before they left, boo-hoo).  That big thing in the middle is a treadmill.  This is going to be a guest room/fitness room.  We've had to do a lot of wall repairs and replace all the trim and frame the window.  I'll post pictures when it's done.  I plan to do a lot of reading while on that treadmill when it's all in place!