We’re into the third week proper of the summer holidays, and I have been off work for that entire time.

“You could have fooled me!” I hear you cry. You haven’t been very active on this blog.

Well, obviously I don’t hear you cry…

I’ve made that joke multiple times on this blog.

Not recently, but still.

And also, I have been reasonably active on this blog, but not as active as I intended to be.

So your accusations of inactivity are actually quite unjust.

And, as the poem I wrote on Friday would attest, I have been a bit ill.

Because that poem really was art reflecting life.

Which isn’t always the case on my blog, but it was on Friday.

Also, it was Little Proclaims’ birthday last week, which went well, but that was quite tiring.

And I’ve been doing lots of other stuff, as will become clear.

So stop having a go at me.

I don’t deserve it.

Anyway, I can’t keep on recycling my old material.

Although I frequently do do this, but usually across different mediums.

For example, some very early posts on here were simply rehashes of some of my stand-up material from back when I did stand-up comedy.

Which I did do at one point, but not in any meaningful way since 2012, and even then at a very amateur level.

But I wasn’t terrible at it.

Just so you know.

I have also recycled material from this blog on the podcast that I do with my friend Ben.

And tomorrow, I’ll be recycling some of that material on the very first episode of James Proclaims: The Podcast.

That’s right. I’ve taken my newly acquired podcasting skills and combined them with my long-established blogging skills to make a version of the blog that is a podcast.

And not just a podcast, but a vodcast, as I filmed myself doing it.

Why I chose to film myself sitting at a table talking is anyone’s guess.

It doesn’t make for particularly compelling footage, really.

But I did do it.

So I have effectively made a video version of this blog.

Which, I think, is technically a vlog.

But I’m also releasing it as a podcast, for people who would prefer to listen to me and not look at me.

Which would be a reasonable position to adopt, in truth.

Which brings us back to it being a vodcast, seeing as it’s a video version of a podcast.

But also a vlog, as it’s a video version of this blog.

Anyway, it is definitely something.

And it’ll be available on YouTube and Spotify tomorrow.

I’ll also post it on this blog.

And, as soon as I’ve got a better understanding of how RSS feeds work, it’ll probably be available on all the other platforms as well.

So that’s quite exciting, isn’t it?

Whether it’s a vlog, or vodcast, or podcast, or something else entirely, I can’t imagine too many people will listen to and/or watch it.

It is fundamentally just a middle-aged man talking about nothing.

A bit like my blog posts, but spoken out loud.

But, and this is a key point, it won’t just be me reading my blog posts.

It’ll be all new material.

Although, as discussed, I do sometimes plagiarise myself.

So it might not all be new material.

Certainly the main joke in Episode 1 is something that I stole from my podcast with Ben.

But the bit I stole is a bit I wrote, so it’s fine.

Anyway, if you’ve read this and you’re wondering what this would be like if a man said it instead of writing it, then pop back tomorrow for the inaugural episode of James Proclaims: The Podcast.

And if that sounds like the kind of thing you absolutely wouldn’t want to engage with on any level, I completely understand.

If it wasn’t me doing it, and someone told me about it, I’d smile politely and immediately forget about it.

It sounds rubbish, doesn’t it?

But, in the unlikely event that a middle-aged man talking about nothing for around 40 minutes sounds like your idea of entertainment (yes, honestly, I managed to keep talking for 40 minutes, and that’s after the edit), then you’re in for a treat.

And don’t worry, if you’re one of those people that likes reading the ramblings of a man who has nothing to say, but doesn’t want to hear the ramblings of a man who has nothing to say, then rest assured, the new vlogcast is not meant to replace the blog, merely to augment it.

Or take it to unprecedented lows.

So I’ll still be here, writing bad poetry and banal prose, but I’ll also be there, on the YouTube and the Spotify, doing something similar but audibly.

I’m also still doing the podcast with Ben, and we’ve started videoing that too.

I’m going to be everywhere!

And simultaneously nowhere…