The Count

College Green, Dublin

Remember that thing? That thing called chronology? You know, that organizing principle on which this humble blog was built, a simple-to-grasp numerical structure that created a pleasant slog of a journey, number by number, through an entire year? Yeah, I remember it too. And while it pains my Helvetica postcard-making heart to go public with this confession, I must: I've been missing it.

There's something nice about chronology. Call me a lapsed Catholic, but over the course of &7's first year, I'd grown to think of the daily numbers here as a typographical Stations of the Cross, a place to pause and think for a few minutes and look more closely at things normally overlooked in day-to-day life. Some days I zipped past in a hurry and others I rambled on about Clearview, complicated drinks in tiki bars, and the joys of dressing up as W.B. Yeats. But I liked that there was the challenge of posting one number every single day. I found some excellent company along the way in my readers and commenters, and if you've been following in any sort of way over the past two years, I thank you. And I do hope you'll stay on board for the next stage of the journey.

While I make no apologies for the mish-mash of the past year's posts (after all, I'd have conked out if I didn't take a breather, and I really was dying to give that rotting Newmarket Potatoes sign a happy online home), I'm ready to move on. Or go back. Or a sort of "move on in a somewhat backward way." Which is why, on January 1st, I've decided to start the number line all over again. Starting from 365 and counting down to 1. A number a day, every day. That's how &7 was conceived, and it feels right to be going back to the original format. You see, blogs are kind of like Coca-Cola. If you've got a winning recipe, no need to go getting all "New Coke" on everyone's ass.

There will be ever-so-slight changes, mind. I'll be counting down this coming year instead of up. (A curious choice as I have a deathly, if irrational, fear of countdowns. We'll see how that particular psychodrama plays out.) I'll be collecting an entirely new batch of numbers for the new year. And I may throw in a few more entries with multiple photos if they go along with the day's number. But in 2011, there'll be one thing you can count on: the number line.