I Run Like A Girl

I have a different topic for this post in addition to my usual weekly recap below. I’ve been blogging once a week for almost 5 years, and I thought it would fun to share how I think through and write my blog posts for those who are curious. 🙂

How I write a blog post

1. Brainstorm and plan the week ahead: Around 90% of my weekly blog posts are centered around events/activities that happen throughout the week (most of the time, it’s a weekend recap because let’s face it, my life isn’t that glamorous on weekdays). I usually start thinking of blog content in the middle of the week based on what events have happened and what my plans are for the weekend.
2. Take photos: The biggest task is making sure I’m taking pictures throughout the week. I never found this difficult since I LOVE photos. Ever since I got a digital camera in high school I’ve been obsessive with documenting my life through pictures. I try to take as many pictures as possible because I think it’s so powerful to have visuals to support any writing topic. When I forget to take photos at an event sometimes I don’t even write about it 😛
3. Sort, edit and resize photos: By the end of the week, I usually have plenty of pictures to choose from and I start sorting them and deciding how to tell the story. I lightly edit each photo on my iPhone, and just recently I’ve started reducing the image size to save space on my blog (I also read somewhere it helps with SEO stuff). All of this is pretty manual and takes some time, but I usually have tv on in the background and can turn my brain off.
4. Write! I usually write on Mondays, recapping the previous week. I used to write on Sundays but I found I like to live out the entire week before documenting it :). The writing process itself only takes 30-60 minutes for these weekly recap posts. I’m more of a stream-of-conscious writer which makes writing go quickly. I’ve always tried to not be so picky with my words because I want this to stay authentic and read like the way I talk (friends/family say they read my blog in my voice, ha).
5. Publish: After writing, I proofread once and then publish!

Posts on random topics: So that’s how I write the “standard” 90% posts, but what about other 10%? Some weeks I might not have any life event interesting enough to warrant a blog post. Then I think about other random topics – fitness, life reflection, world topics…I usually have 10+ drafts of these kinds of posts saved on my computer at a time (this one included). These posts usually take longer to write and so I like to marinate longer before publishing…sometimes for months. Often times they just die a slow death and no one ever sees it. Here, here, here and here are some of my most popular random posts!

Travel posts: If you’ve seen my travel posts, you’ll know I love to document every detail and recap everything day-by-day. That said, I typically don’t let more than 3-4 days to go by without posting. After that the pictures/stories really start to pile up and I feel like the post will be too long or I’ll forget things.

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Now onto the weekly shenanigans!

The highlight of my week was spending time with some of my closest girlfriends from work. I went over to Carmina’s new studio in the Richmond for some wine and Hawaiian food on Tuesday. We’ve been hanging out more now that she moved back to the city after spending a year at her parent’s during COVID, and I’m very happy about that. 🙂

Later in the week, I met up with Lily and Christen who are also girlfriends from work. We had a wine night in Nob Hill and then headed over to Lily’s new apartment afterwards. We had so much fun gossiping about work and non-work stuff, and before I knew it we had been hanging out for 5 hours! I feel very grateful to have some good friends at work who understand the daily grind and who share that bond.

The weekend was a pretty quiet one as Joe and I stayed local in SF. We went out for lunch on Saturday to West of Pecos, our favorite Tex-Mex spot in the Mission. The sun was out after a rainy week and so we treated ourselves while soaking up some vitamin D.

For dinner, I heated up some frozen dim sum and made my mom’s secret sauce recipe. Lily introduced me to a fantastic food app that specializes in Asian food deliveries. It’s about time there was something like this in the Bay! There are so many yummy treats on the app and it’s definitely made my meals easier (and tastier).

On Sunday, Joe and I were originally going to go hiking, but last minute we traded those plans to stay in the city. It ended up being the best decision as we really needed the time to relax. We spent the morning in Joe’s garden: Joe planted some new seedlings while I relaxed on the side with one of Joe’s cats. We’ve been bringing out this cat on-and-off over the last year, and he has gotten so comfortable with the outdoors and even whines when too much time passes since his last outdoor visit. We keep him on a leash since he can be unpredictable and we don’t want him to run away. We just had the funnest time sitting in our chairs side by side hanging out – he was in heaven soaking up the sun and smelling the homegrown cat nip. 🙂

Joe trained the cat to hop on his shoulder so now he does it anytime Joe is squatted down 🙂

After our relaxing morning, Joe kept gardening while I went for a hike in the Presidio while catching up with my mom on the phone. The Presidio never gets old and I’m grateful Joe lives so close to this huge network of trails.

Joe joined me afterwards for some ice cream at Salt & Straw. We usually pick up ice cream and sit on the steps of Alta Plaza park to eat it – we call it our “ice cream spot.”

I’ve learned so much about plants from Joe and often times I find us doing creepy things like staring at a neighbor’s yard and assessing their garden design. Joe is growing lots of alyssums which smell SO good (like honey). We passed a neighbor with alyssums and had to smell them too 🙂 we’re not creepy at all…

The rest of the weekend looked like this. After more than a year, Joe’s cats have reached a new level of bonding with me and I’m not mad about it.

If you haven’t read my latest post reflecting on racism against Asians in America, here it is.