How Long Does It Take To Write A Blog Post?

I have spent three hours editing photos and writing two travel blog posts. What takes so long?

Photo editing
Loading or rather downloading the photos from mobile phone to laptop. Deleting out of focus photos. Removing accidental photos of my feet, ceilings, and total blanks.

Putting a black heart to mark favourite on the best of three photos.

Adding names of people. Checking correct titles (such as worshipful mayor, mayor or mayoress).

Adding and correctly spelling names of places. Adding addresses and checking the numbers of the address and phone are correct.

Cutting parts of photos showing too much empty road in street scenes. Cutting blurred moving hands waving across corners of crowd scenes. Adding light so you can read names on bottles and shop fronts. Adding light so you can see people's faces in dark rooms.

Editing Layout of Photos
Inserting a photo at the right section of the text. Going to view to check it looks ok. Finding long areas of text and moving a photo or adding a photo to break up the long text.

Editing Page Layout of Text
Inserting side heading to break up the text.

Where I now have two identical sub-headings, cutting and pasting to move the paragraphs together and deleting the second sub-heading.

Labels
Adding labels. When I have too many and the post won't load and tells me I have more than twenty words, counting and deleting a couple of words.

Addresses and Websites
Adding an address and website so the reader can find more facts. Adding websites I have used in case I want to go back to them later and add more facts or pictures.

Checking the restaurant website address if valid. Finding out what it covers such as a menu, to tell the reader and add more facts to my blog post.

Adding a photo from Wikipedia. Checking whether I need to add the attribution of the photographer's name.

Signature
Adding my signature at the end. Remembering a call to action. Directing readers to other posts or blogs or websites.

Saving
Checking number of readers today, compared with yesterday. If numbers of readers are dipping, checking the nationalities of readers and which posts are favourites. If I have extra facts and photos, writing a second post.

Sharing
Sharing the post.

Break
At the tend of every hour setting a buzzer for an hour. Standing up, folding my arms behind my back to straighten my shoulders and prevent myself developing a hunchback. Focusing my eyes on a distance.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.