No doubt many of you read various blogs during the day and night and wonder. How do they do it? How can so many different people come up with so many different things to say? Daily. Except weekends. To answer this I present "A day in the life of a blogger", a semi-non-autobiographical description of the tortured creative process involved in pumping out yet more cr@p onto the internet.

Eyes open. Quickly scan the bedroom. Alive? Check. In same bed as went to sleep in? Check. Same person next to me as expected? Check. So far so good. Another scan of the bedroom. Anything worthy of memorising for the blog today? Negative. D'oh! Wait by the front door for the thud of the South China Morning Post. Nothing. Oh my God, what am I going to do? The SCMP is the best source of daily Hong Kong blogging. There's always something that can be spun into some kind of witty aside on life in the city. Right, I know, go over to the window. Stare. Wait for blinding inspiration, then realise I'd better start getting ready for work. Was that the thud I've been waiting for? Furtively open the door, only to see red welcome mat and nothing else. Make some cereal. Could I blog about my cereal today? That would be an all time low. Maybe how the blog has taken over my life? Hmmm, file that in the rainy day ideas pile.

Sit scooping my special breakfast mix into my mouth. Finally the SCMP arrives. Eagerly open it and read each story. Is this the one? Will this be my blogging fodder today? Will Phil or Conrad beat me to the punch? Or worse, post the same story with something funnier/smarter/more incisive to say? Probably. Try and remember the story AND my insightful take on it while putting in videos to keep JC occupied and from waking PB. Realise I can't remember what day it is, let alone an article on Chinese manufacturing.

Check my emails. Any comments? Any links or trackbacks? Anything? A few, good, I'm not alone. But still a blank on the blog topic. Hopefully I can scum off the back of some other blogger's postings today. Or use the Munu list as there's always something good in there.

Get on the bus down the hill to work. Eye on the passing landscape of Hong Kong, wondering what can I say about this that hasn't already been said? Damn my uncreative mind. The walk to work is full of the usual faces and scenes, nothing there. Sh!t. Get into work. Plough through the usual barrage of emails and spam. Better put something on the flippin' blog quick. My 3 readers might desert me. They expect regular postings. They also expect good postings, but they'll have to make do. Right. There, I've told them how JC enjoyed her ballet class yesterday. That'll hold 'em for a while. Check back to the blog: oh my God, the formatting is all wrong. Fix it up. Tweak the blog some more. Notice I use a lot of contractions and break many grammar rules. That's bad English. Probably shouldn't point that out.

What next? It's half way through the day and still just a bit of blog filler. I need something. Maybe I'll make something up? No, I know, I'll go into faux-philosophy so I look deep and add to the blog's gravitas. Go through the blogroll again. Check on my stats and Ecosystem standing. Need to keep pretending hits don't matter. No, I don't suffer from blogger insecurity syndrome (BIS); I don't need to have lots of hits and links to re-affirm the worth of this whole thing. No I don't. No I don't. Keep repeating this mantra until I almost believe it.

Notice the whole day has gone and it's time to go home. Write down the hits for the day. Make notes of things to blog about tomorrow. They always seem rather pathetic the next day, but nevertheless I've got to try. Get home and realise I've spent the day looking at everything with one eye on it's blogging potential. Decide it's time to relax. Realise this might be something worth blogging about: how blogging forces me to observe. That's not such a bad thing. It doesn't take up much time. I seem to have found a niche. I get good comments and obviously have some of the best readers on the web. Start to feel good about the whole thing.

But what will I blog about tomorrow?