Aaaaargh. It’s back to work and back to school for the kids. I started waking up at 5:30am again today. I’ve been waking up at 9:30am for the past several days. There’s never enough vacation days and I still have a slightly sore throat. I’m sitting in the office as I type this.
Come next month, Animetric’s World will be celebrating its 5th blogversary. I still remember my first year, the first time I came up with Animetric’s Favorite Things.
I just put together some stuff I really liked and took a risk by asking the brands/establishments if they were interested to sponsor a giveaway I was holding to celebrate my first year. Those in the photo above are among the very first brands who supported me when I was starting and I will forever be grateful. I was giving away maybe 10k worth of prizes then.
Last year, it was already Animetric’s Favorite Things Year 4. I gave away over 30k worth of prizes each to three winners, so yeah, I think the giveaway has grown tenfold since that’s maybe 100k worth of prizes total. I’m slated to have Animetric’s Favorite Things Year 5 next month and I’m now starting to put some prize packages together. I’ll try to make it better than ever. Time flies.
So anyhow, I’m not posting this just to talk about my upcoming blogversary. During the holidays last month, I spent a lot of time going back to my old posts and cleaning them up (html codes, tags, etc.). It was inevitable that I ended up re-reading and reviewing a lot of stuff. I have a few observations:
- My food posts were much funnier back then. Maybe it’s because during the earlier years I was something of a deal site addict and I kept buying vouchers. Most of my food posts were just me simply trying out restaurants on my own expense. I’ve always made it a point to be as honest as possible whenever I post about any product or establishment but of course, when I’m invited someplace I can’t help but feel that I have to soften the blow when I need to say something less than positive. Anyhow, here’s an example of a restaurant I found so-so on my own expense and here’s one I found so-so that was invitational. I posted what I really thought on both occasions but the first one seemed more unabashed. Invitational or not, I hope to bring back the livelier me when it comes to food posts.
- I’m more aware of what makes a good photo now. I’ve taken and posted some really yucky-looking photos in the past. It started to get better when Sony Philippines gave me a Sony Cybershot TX-1. I eventually bought a Sony NEX5N and took photography lessons so I’m hoping to improve more in the photos department.
- I notice that I’ve been posting more and writing less. Does that make sense? Anyhow, I plan to write more. Write. That pretty much means sharing my non-commercialized thoughts and coming up with more original content amidst all the product and establishment reviews/features. I want to keep this blog mine.
That’s pretty much the game plan where my blog is concerned.
Personally, I’m going to continue taking care of myself (i.e. continue to not look my age, lol, since this is the year I turn 40 gaaaaah!) and hopefully lose the last 10-15 lbs that are so hard to get rid of. I’m happy that I never went back to being the 160-pound nightmare that I was back in 2011 but sad to say I’m still not at my ideal weight.
Again I’d like to thank everyone for the support through the years. Really, I can never say thank you enough. Blogging has opened a lot of doors for me and I’ve experienced so many incredible things because of it.
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