Less Dana’s First Anniversary

One year.  One whole stinkin’ year.  Everyday, not one day missed, I posted a blog for the last year about my journey to live healthier, lose weight, raise money for the Food Bank of CENC, tell some stories, make some people laugh and inspire others.

For the last 365 days I have posted a blog everyday without fail.  Actually I post 370 blogs and I am not quite sure how that happened.  I started the blog as my way of being accountable for loosing weight and raising money, but somewhere along the way it morphed into my story telling, recipe site.

I know that if you follow the blog even semi-closely you have learned More Dana than Less Dana, so I apologize now for anything you found unsavory or disturbing.  Mostly I hope you got a few laughs, discovered some new foods, and if you needed it found some strategies to help you live a healthier life.

A few blogs get read over and over again almost everyday because they obviously have hit on a universal issue, like “Dana’s Bra Strap Shortening Station.”  Based on how many random people are searching for this and reading it leads me to believe that there is a real business opportunity there.

“The Burst into Tears Gift” I wrote on Christmas day is one of the most read and reread blogs having been viewed over a thousand times.  Clearly, “heartfelt” sells in blog land.

But anytime I wrote about clothes falling off like in “Will It Zip Roulette”, “Epic Zipper Failure Follow-up”, “No Boobs for Yoga” or “Advice for Dieting Travelers” I got more readers.  People must find it extremely funny to read about other people’s mistaken nakedness.

Thanks to all the generous readers, over $53,000 has been donated to the Less Dana campaign at the Food Bank of CENC and awareness has been raised.  I have readers from 183 countries due to the miracle of search engines and no one from the State Department had sent me a letter accusing me of causing an international incident.

I lost 70 pounds over this past year, but I know of at least a dozen blog followers who lost well over 500 pounds in total.  I love when people tell me they have been able to do better with their eating after reading the blog.  Even after one year of doing this I have not reached my goal.  I want to lose 18 more pounds so I am going to keep the blog going.  I am less concerned with doing it quickly and more interested in living a balanced life.  As long as I am on the going-down-side of the scale and I am making a few of you laugh I am happy.