In the summer of 2011 I was gearing up for a return to university at age 36, armed with a supportive wife, two kids and a quartet of inspiring bulldogs. That’s when I decided to complicate my life with a massive writing project.
The task seemed simple. For 1000 consecutive days I would make use of Wikipedia’s “Random Article” button to find a new topic every day, then write 1000 words on that topic. This would (hopefully) serve to make me a better writer, a more informed human, and give me something to put on my resume to warn future bosses that I’m a bit stupid.
Day 1 was posted on January 1, 2012. Day 1000 was posted on September 26, 2014, the day before my 40th birthday. The fates wanted me to do this. The timing was perfect.
The site was originally hosted at 1000words1000days.com. It was a success, in that I actually saw the project through to completion. Along the way my articles caught the attention of Roger Christian, Oscar-winning designer of the lightsaber, filmmaker Kevin Smith (who himself was an inadvertent inspiration for this project), a few members of the 60s band the Bobby Fuller Four, and others. A couple posts went semi-viral, and it led to me being hired to write copy for Big Rock beer for a while. It was a thrilling ride, and I loved every minute of it. Even those articles I had to write on Christmas or during road trips.
Then, because I wasn’t the hands-on owner of the site, the upkeep lapsed and the page was taken down. Oh well, it’s just history, right? Except that I still love reading these articles, and I still want to be able to point to this accomplishment as my most epic achievement of questionable real-world merit. So, because there was no way to revive the site (and because some schmuck in Colorado had already tried to steal its contents), the summer of 2019 has led me to attempt a re-build. From scratch. I still have the articles on my hard drive, so I’m re-posting them one at a time, trying to re-source the pictures and links. It’s a process that will take months.
But it’s important to have out there, both for my own ego and for the fact that 2020 is bringing with it a new project, larger in scope and intensity, and certainly larger in whatthefuckery.
So if you’re reading this page and Day 1000 is not at the top of the page, please be patient and know that I’m working to restore this joint as quickly as I can. Thanks to all who stop by.
- Marty Schwartz, July 2019
AUGUST UPDATE: Just a heads-up to anyone tempted to follow, I’m going to be hammering my articles up here in bursts, and I apologize in advance for the notification blitz. The pretty pictures will still need to be sourced, but it’s important to get the content up here, if only to clear my mind. Thanks.
1000 Albums, 1000 Dates 