Friday, May 13, 2022

1000th Blog Post!!!!

 1000 eh?  I still remember over 12 years ago reading the day Stephane of Teamasters posted his 1000th Blog post.  I remember thinking that was a crazy amount of posts about tea!  So I guess that makes me crazy then too?  Hahaha….  Stephane was one of the earliest tea bloggers that indirectly motivated me to start blogging. He was posting fast and fantastically furious about puerh and oolong from his background in Taiwan and it took him only a handful of years to hit 1000!

A year or so ago I remember reading Char of Oolong Owl posting her 1000th post.  That was unbelievable for me as well because she just started in 2013 and I have only been reading her for a few years at that point.  She is a real workhorse and I always end up reading her puerh posts.  Her post had me, for the first time , checking how far I was from my 1000th post.  It also had me thinking of Shah8 and his Sheng of the Day posts at Badger and Blade.  He must have the most puerh posts in English of all time maybe even 2000??? Anyways he’s my favourite one to read in the last few years here.  Don’t think anyone else has hit 1000?  Have I missed anyone???

It also got me thinking what it takes to get to 1000 posts… it think it’s a combination of resilience, a bit of obessive compulsiveness, a bit of inflexibility and a true love of the tea.

This blog has evolved lots over the years but I think it always stays authentic to where I am in life at the time.  Lately, my articles about broader topics have been less.  This is not because I’m out of thoughts or ideas or things to say but mainly because I don’t have the time or energy to write them out or to put my thoughts into writing.  Instead it is mainly my detailed tasting notes and comparisons and rankings.  

What you see on the blog is my evaluative writings.  For some people writing everything down as meticulously as me takes away from their focus and enjoyment but for me it actually keeps me present, engaged, and in the moment with the tea that I’m evaluating.  I find an extreme focused evaluation of tea is in some ways similar to a meditative experience for me.  It sharpens the use of my senses and everyday judgments and evaluations in all aspects of life.  Because I’m already writing this stuff down it’s pretty easy to share it with you wonderful readers!

A few years ago I wondered if there was a resurgence of puerh blogging but now I’m pretty sure it’s an old person’s thing… but I’m old anyways … hahaha

Thanks readers as well you also give me the motivation to continue to post because I can feel your energy and I really do put that into this blog.  Thank you for this!

Peace

8 comments:

Max said...

Keep on blogging Matt! I only started reading your blog maybe 2 years ago, but it has become a big pleasure to read and an important source of information.. some buying decisions have been made based on your evaluations! And the oldschool blogroll is also really useful to quickly see whats new in the rest of the tea blogging world. Thanks for writing 1000 posts!

Anonymous said...

Matt,
raising a cup to you. Here's to a thousand more!

~ Paolo

Ignoramous said...

Congratulations Matt!

One thing I appreciate about your blog is your consistent referencing of others in the community. You do this in your posts and also link relevant comparisons sometimes at the end and also have a sidebar that shows when most recent other bloggers (except Darius & TeaDB) post, which is a big reason I check your blog so often.


Also wanna commend you for giving James a run for his money on stirring up drama [and helpful discussions too] amongst the big community egos. Now that he's only youtubing for the kiddos, I think you're the new champion.

Appreciate you!

Nicole Wilson said...

Congrats on reaching the 1,000 post milestone! I've learned a tremendous amount about puerh from your posts.

Anonymous said...

Matt, thank you for taking the time to blog. Always look forward to an update and enjoy your even handed and insightful posts. Wishing you many more excellent tea moments.

Alex said...

Congratulations Matt, keep on the good work!

Curigane said...

Your post reminded me of a wonderful quote from the Dao de Jing. "The Dao created One, One created Two, Two created Three. Three created the 10.000 things." Congratulations Matt. Amazing.

CarlosHopontopofus said...

And more exposing fraudulent vendors selling fake tea!