The First Post

Hello, and welcome to my blog.

I have decided to start this blog for a few reasons.

First, my job requires a lot of writing.  That's fine, but I feel I need to be able to do it faster.  So, just like my typing speed only really started progressing during college when I was suddenly sending email to everyone (I went to college before instant messenger services became popular, and still detest them), I figure the best way to increase my writing speed is to start writing more.

Second, if I'm going to be writing more I should write about something I love.  Personal finance fits the bill.  It's a strange (but cheap) hobby, and there's not much I can do with it at this point.  I do read other personal finance blogs, but no one really seems to be that similar to me, so I figured I might as well start filling in that niche.

So, what are my goals for this project?

Mostly to get me writing.  My target audience is people like me, which I am guessing is a pretty small percentage of the population.  I don't expect to have more than 300 people ever following the blog.  This means I'll try to never do cheap things that bother me to drive up the audience levels.  As of today I will not monetize the site, mostly because I'm lazy and setting up the blog was enough for one day, but I do plan to at some point, out of curiosity.  When that happens I'll keep a running total.  I do not expect to ever make enough money off blogging to cover even my food, nor do I particularly care to.  I have a career I enjoy.

Having a small audience also means I can be pretty brutally honest about things.  I've decided to obscure facts about me personally, but not about my money.  Markz is not my last name, but it is a convenient identifier.

Since the main purpose is to write, I'm going to try to do a post a day.  That won't always happen, but seems doable right now.  Also, since this is a hobby it should be a fun hobby.