This is the absolute worst time to start a travel blog. That’s why I’m doing it.

Have you ever heard the maxim, “What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail?” Well, I’ve come up with a twist: What would you do if you knew you couldn’t succeed?

My answer? Whatever the heck you want.

If you have a website that depends on Google for its traffic, you already know what I mean. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, the TL:DR is that over the last year Google has systematically decimated the pageviews of many sites that depend on ads or affiliate income in favor of AI, its own ads, and Reddit. In short, there’s much less money to be made in blogging unless you have a consistent source of traffic outside of Google search. Too many of my friends have had to pivot to new careers after losing 90% of their income.

So starting a new travel blog right now with the idea of making money is a terrible idea. Fortunately that’s not why I’m doing it. I’ve had many people ask me how to get into writing as a career since I’ve been doing this so long, and I always have the same answer: Don’t write because you want to. Write because you HAVE to. Write because you have something you want to say so badly that it will explode out of your head if you don’t get it down. And that’s where I find myself: It’s why I started The Deal Mommy in 2011, and that’s why I’m starting a new blog at TheDiaAdams.com.

In some ways it will be same as the old blog. My daughter mentioned to me that The Deal Mommy documented much of her and her brother’s childhood and she had a point. Buried under about 90% of posts about daily deals and companies that don’t exist anymore (RIP Luxury Link, US Airways, and Deal Chicken, a real site I wrote about) were stories that brought a smile to my face and advice that was surprisingly solid.

So I’m bringing over the ones that made sense to save in the TDM Archives. They’ll be easy to spot with my old logo as the featured photo and the original publication date listed on the bottom. I’m also going to revisit some content that is still relevant along with publishing my random musings about family travel and real life. Well, as a soon-to-be empty nester “family” travel will likely be supplemented by a fair amount of solo travel stories as well. And because it’s me, you can expect an occasional rant.

What I won’t be doing is covering daily promotions or providing deep credit card content (that’s what I do at my day job). I also will be paying absolutely no attention to search rankings or SEO. I started The Deal Mommy expecting no one to read it and I’m starting The Dia Adams with the same expectation.

I’d love for you to tag along and am happy to have conversations on social media (@TheDiaAdams). For those of you who have stuck with me for 13 years now I say thanks. You have enriched my life in ways I couldn’t have imagined when I first started at the keyboard. I can’t wait to see where the next chapter of life takes us.

Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose—Janis Joplin