Update: Not Podfade Away

Because I’m a mole person who comes late to everything I’ve only just discovered the term “podfading.” It’s a good term. It’s punchy. It’s descriptive. I like it. But because you’re a friend of the show and you I LOVE, it occurs to me that I owe you some clarity on this: It doesn’t describe what’s going on here at HOME. Pull up a chair and let me explain.

I published the most recent episode of HOME in December, then put up a “Gone Fishin'” sign and went on hiatus. That hiatus has gone on longer than I intended. There are a number of reasons for this, and some have nothing to do with the show. For example, my wife and I have taken two extended trips out of the country since January, which will put a serious dent in your ability to wrestle with Logic Pro. (Well. Could I have wrestled with Logic Pro while on safari in South Africa? Sure. Did I want to? No.)

The bigger reasons why this hiatus has distended, though, do have to do with the show, and some thinking I needed to do about its future. I sketched some of these issues out in an update in February. Mostly I needed to think about sustainability, about how to continue to do good work as a solo operator, and how to avoid the entropic spiral the term “podfading” describes. I needed to think long and clearly about big things, like what I want this show to be, and smaller ones, like the mechanics of the process through which I bring it to you. Frankly, I also needed to reconnect to the spirit of energy and enthusiasm in which I launched the show back in the fall of 2015.

I’m glad to say I’ve done all these things, and they’ve been good for me, and — much more to the point — good for the show. As of this morning HOME HQ is reopened for business. Plans are in place to fix some of the under-the-hood issues that dogged me in seasons 1 to 4. (You don’t care, believe me; they mostly have to do with stuff like publicity and marketing, and also with getting some help in editorial research.) Meanwhile, preliminary reporting for Season 5 is underway. The show will relaunch this summer. Sometime. Do I have a date in mind? Not yet. Will I keep you posted? You bet, because you’re my favorite, {your name here}!

I sincerely appreciate the kind things listeners and friends in the podcasting community have had to say about HOME, and the patience you’ve shown while I tried to figure out the best way forward. I hope you’ll agree with me that the time off was worth it.

See you soon.