State of the Backlog
Feb. 6th, 2017 03:35 amAmong the tasks I have completed:
* Tallying donations for January.
* Posting fishbowl reports and unsold poetry lists for January events.
* Going over January poems to make sure I sent everything to![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
callibr8 for listing online.
* Going over Sample Page entries for recently listed poems.
* Sending comp copies of later-written poems to their prompters.
* Doubling back to check November and December, tallying donations for those.
* Listing poems sold in the Holiday Poetry Sale.
Yay. Yay. Progress.
Stuff I still need to do:
* Put November and December poems into collections. Some of this may be started, but not finished.
* Put January poems into collections.
* Proofread the collections thatcallibr8 has assembled.
* Count up the collections currently available as year-end perks for 2016.
* Remind Doug to assemble the 2016 collection, which may be partly done, but I only just got around to listing all the poems in the Holiday Poetry Sale.
* Contact 2016 k-fans to ask what perk collection they want.
* Print and mail the k-fan collections.
* Make the 2016 donor bookmarks and mail those.
* Reconfigure the perk structure to account for changes in the Poetry Fishbowl project.
* Write the Sixth Poem of the Fall in which a dragon destroys the Eofor stronghold.
Things I have learned:
* I oopsed some more books. The Polychrome Heroics threads are waaaaayyyyyy bigger than I realized. Like big enough to break the previous perk structure, so I have to make some half-step adjustments for 2016 perks before recalculating 2017 perk options. I do not want to bait-and-switch my fans, so I'm unwilling to ditch the whole structure for 2016 just because it went a bit pear-shaped.
* The Holiday Poetry Sale sold 27 poems in 2015 and 39 poems in 2016, an increase of 44.4%. Also people didn't stop buying poems after the sale ended. Some problems are nice to have! But this meant I didn't have the second half of December to make the year-end goodies because I was posting poetry. Like, until right before the January fishbowl.
* Also the hugely successful November mid-month sale in Polychrome Heroics kept me busy enough that I didn't have time for any advance prep of year-end tasks.
* General trends in the fishbowl have meant more and longer epics, which take more time to write. You may have noticed that the fishbowl is rarely a single day now, but sprawls over a week or so. I wrote 20 sub-epics in a day for the February bonus fishbowl; that used to be typical. Now it's more like 8-10 on Tuesday and more later. What this means is a sea-change in distribution of my production. I do not want to meddle with things in ways that could undercut the very generous donations, and I want to make it easier for folks to enjoy the series material as has been repeatedly requested, so I'm mulling over ideas.
At least I have reduced the amount of behind that I am, and while I am about to fall more behind while working on the February fishbowl, the 2016 portion of the backlog should not grow, and will eventually get whittled down. I hope.
Thank you for your patience. People telling me that it's okay to take my time makes me feel less like I have completely dropped the professional ball. I'm working at the fringe of my organizational ability here, which is exciting but sometime also daunting. I keep repeating, "If you're not making any mistakes, you're not learning, you're coasting."
* Tallying donations for January.
* Posting fishbowl reports and unsold poetry lists for January events.
* Going over January poems to make sure I sent everything to
callibr8 for listing online.* Going over Sample Page entries for recently listed poems.
* Sending comp copies of later-written poems to their prompters.
* Doubling back to check November and December, tallying donations for those.
* Listing poems sold in the Holiday Poetry Sale.
Yay. Yay. Progress.
Stuff I still need to do:
* Put November and December poems into collections. Some of this may be started, but not finished.
* Put January poems into collections.
* Proofread the collections that
callibr8 has assembled.* Count up the collections currently available as year-end perks for 2016.
* Remind Doug to assemble the 2016 collection, which may be partly done, but I only just got around to listing all the poems in the Holiday Poetry Sale.
* Contact 2016 k-fans to ask what perk collection they want.
* Print and mail the k-fan collections.
* Make the 2016 donor bookmarks and mail those.
* Reconfigure the perk structure to account for changes in the Poetry Fishbowl project.
* Write the Sixth Poem of the Fall in which a dragon destroys the Eofor stronghold.
Things I have learned:
* I oopsed some more books. The Polychrome Heroics threads are waaaaayyyyyy bigger than I realized. Like big enough to break the previous perk structure, so I have to make some half-step adjustments for 2016 perks before recalculating 2017 perk options. I do not want to bait-and-switch my fans, so I'm unwilling to ditch the whole structure for 2016 just because it went a bit pear-shaped.
* The Holiday Poetry Sale sold 27 poems in 2015 and 39 poems in 2016, an increase of 44.4%. Also people didn't stop buying poems after the sale ended. Some problems are nice to have! But this meant I didn't have the second half of December to make the year-end goodies because I was posting poetry. Like, until right before the January fishbowl.
* Also the hugely successful November mid-month sale in Polychrome Heroics kept me busy enough that I didn't have time for any advance prep of year-end tasks.
* General trends in the fishbowl have meant more and longer epics, which take more time to write. You may have noticed that the fishbowl is rarely a single day now, but sprawls over a week or so. I wrote 20 sub-epics in a day for the February bonus fishbowl; that used to be typical. Now it's more like 8-10 on Tuesday and more later. What this means is a sea-change in distribution of my production. I do not want to meddle with things in ways that could undercut the very generous donations, and I want to make it easier for folks to enjoy the series material as has been repeatedly requested, so I'm mulling over ideas.
At least I have reduced the amount of behind that I am, and while I am about to fall more behind while working on the February fishbowl, the 2016 portion of the backlog should not grow, and will eventually get whittled down. I hope.
Thank you for your patience. People telling me that it's okay to take my time makes me feel less like I have completely dropped the professional ball. I'm working at the fringe of my organizational ability here, which is exciting but sometime also daunting. I keep repeating, "If you're not making any mistakes, you're not learning, you're coasting."
