Today marks the one year anniversary of this Pots and Pans blog. I must tell you that it feels like a lot longer, because I have a hard time now remembering when I didn’t write a blog every day. My new routine is to get up early, make some tea, feed the cats, walk the dog and write a blog entry.

As the year has gone on I have slowly and steadily picked up readers, and I thank you all. I have 114 people who get the blog every day by email and roughly fifty other people read the blog on an average day. I know that writing about telecom is only of interest to the few and I am pleased with those numbers. Many of the people who read this are my friends and colleagues and these blogs have led to some lively discussions.

I find that my brain has gotten good at thinking about the world in the format of the 500-word essay. My brain fought against this format when I first got started because I am an explainer. I want to tell you everything I know about a topic and that is impossible to do in a short essay. But the blog has taught me to get pithy and to get straight to the heart of a matter quickly. I have written enough blogs now that my brain composes my thoughts easily into the blog format, which is interesting all by itself.

That discipline of trying to write every day has been very good for me, both personally and professionally. Personally it has made me a better writer. The blog has also let me express myself. My first blogs were very factual, but over time I have allowed my opinions to come into the blog. I am certain that I am not always right, but I have strong opinions about many telecom topics, be they right or wrong.

Professionally writing this blog has forced me to read a lot more to keep up with what is going on in the industry. And in my job as a telecom strategic consultant, the more I know the better my advice. In the last year I have done a much better job of keeping up with the industry, but I also have expanded outward in my reading to learn more about all sorts of technology that tangentially affects our industry. For example, I find myself fascinated by the Internet of Things. I feel lucky to be alive at a time when human knowledge is literally doubling every few years. The stuff that scientists and engineers are working on is fascinating.

I try to write s blog every business day, but I don’t always succeed. I skip major holidays just because. And there have been a few days where I had the flu and my brain had a hard time remembering my name. I can only imagine what would have hit the page had I been dumb enough to write on those days. And once in a great while I just run out of time, particularly on days when I am traveling. But I somehow managed to get 241 of them done this year and I am proud of that.

When I started doing this I thought I would be out of ideas in a month. I see many other bloggers who only write a few blogs per month and suspect that lack of ideas is a problem. Early on it was a struggle every day figuring out what to write about. But now I have more ideas than I have days, because we work in an industry that is changing quickly. Almost every single aspect of telecom is different today or soon will be different than what we all grew up with.

I have no idea how long I can keep this up. But for now I love the daily discipline of writing this blog and I love the way this mental exercise is making me think. As long as I keep getting such positive waves from the experience I guess I’ll keep writing for a while.