Two Years of Things You Otter Know
What even is time?!
This is Ottavia Paluch, and for the final time in 2023, you’re reading Things You Otter Know.
Is it just me, or did this year feel kinda long? Like two years put together?
I hope you’ve had a good year, Otters. As promised, I wanted to send one more post out before 2023 was up. For all I know you could be at an NYE party right now reading this instead of talking to drunk people. Good for you! I’d do the same frickin thing.
Last year’s recap, if you’re curious, can be found here. I’ll try to keep this one shorter.
Some stats!
Aka the one time a year I do math.
I’ve crunched some numbers on word and view counts for the sake of transparency and also reflection. This Substack is not a big deal and neither am I. Sometimes you and I lose sight of that. I don’t write this thing to get famous, though. This thing has and always will be for ME.
Anyways, the numbers:
As you might’ve guessed, I really did not write that much this year for Things You Otter Know.
21 posts for a total of 38,443 words, or an average of 1,831 words per post. That’s excluding the post you’re reading right now (obviously).
Of my regular posts, the Speak Now thinkpiece (if one would call it that) was the longest, at almost 4,000. Overall, though, Significant Otters: MJ Gomez was the longest, at 4,622 words. (MJ is a good talker.)
These numbers are down significantly from last year (82,000 words over 29 posts, or an average of 2,745 words per post.) Now, why is that?
As I mentioned, I essentially took 4 months off this thing.
Over the course of the year I made a decision to considerably shorten the length of my posts to around 1,000 (for the sake of my time, but also yours)
I swear to god I wrote three times as many words this year just for school. Holy hell, essay after essay after final paper. It’s been bruuutal. I clearly picked the wrong major.
5,016 views total for the year, or an average of 238 views. Significant Otters: Saturn Browne was the most viewed post! Congrats to Saturn for being popular. (Not that she wasn’t already, but still.)
I actually don’t have the exact totals from last year but I know this year surely brought better numbers. Like, I’m not gonna complain about any of this. I get as many emails as you do. I am terrible at responding, and my unreads are in the tens of thousands. No joke. I totally understand where y’all are coming from when it comes to your reluctance to click yet another email.
And there’s close to 200 of you here, goddamnit, so the fact that most of you are still bothering to read these (read them twice, even—like, dude, get a life!) means a lot.
Some faves!
Obviously we have to start by shouting out every 2023 Significant Otter: Carina Solis, Saturn Browne, Tejashree Murugan, and MJ Gomez! Only four this year, but wow what a group. Honoured to have gotten to speak with each of them. It’s like the Avengers of teen writing. My goodness.
So much Taylor on the blog this year. Speak Now! 1989! The movie! Some of the funnest posts I wrote all year, and also the ones that will probably age the worst. Love you, Tay.
Lots of music this year, too. Maybe this is recency bias but the song and album lists feel particularly strong to me. Throwing in a passion piece on Elliott Smith for good measure.
Some goals!
I think for the sake of brevity I’m going to tell you what my new years resolutions are once the new year actually hits. But I do want to tell you about what my goals are for this Substack in 2024.
Of course I want to grow this thing and increase the size of our…dam…but on a less grand scale, I really just want to send at least one post a week for 52 consecutive weeks.
It’s something I’ve talked about a good deal over the last two years—just that desire to write consistently, and consistently well week-in and week-out. The way all good writers and Substack whackos do.
Take those first four months of the year of the equation, and I would argue I was relatively consistent post-wise, but I’m still not 100% at the point where I can tell you oh yeah, I’m sending something out next week, and not be lying. So hopefully next year is the year I change that.
It’s for this reason that I’m still not launching paid subscriptions next year, at least not for the first quarter of 2024. Y’all work hard for your cash. I don’t want to ask you to spend any of it on me when I’m not worth the pay just yet.
I mentioned not too long ago as well that I wanted Significant Otters to become a monthly thing, but there’s a bunch of logistical things that have kept it from becoming that since its inception. Again: always open to suggestions of writers to feature! Just hit me up.
I’d like to engage with y’all more as well. Get your takes and ideas for things. Stuff like that. No idea how that will be done, but I will find a way.
Some thank yous
This was supposed to be where I summarize my year in general, but 1) we’re nearing my intended word count, and 2) it’s late and my brain is mush. Maybe next week.
It was always going to be hard to top 2022 anyway. 2022 had everything, good and bad. It was such a rollercoaster that I’m honestly sorta glad that 2023 was normal and borderline mid. People have suffered so much worse. I am incredibly privileged and lucky.
Thanks for being here, Otters, and for being a part of my year. Hopefully I’ve made yours a little better. You and I otter know that 2024 will kick ass.