How do you beemind goals that are irregular, but where you need the firepower to do them at all?
I have to do very unpleasant physical therapy for condition where I can only feel 1-2 days later whether I am at risk of reinjuring myself and have to put in a short break - and it is going to stay that way for half a year. Without Beeminder, I have not been able keep going at all. With Beeminder, I have exhausted their patience with my repeated requests for emergency breaks.
To make things worse, I am already operating at the maximum useful amount of pressure - more makes me shut down completely and lose the ability to make progress, less doesn’t get the job done. Historically, the most useful way of dealing with that has been to forgive myself if I occasionally delayed for a day without any punishment and just continue. I.e. it has been counterproductive to derail in cases where I was shut down.
One solution that I can imagine is having two goals. One for actual physical therapy, keeping at an amount of buffer where you can add the break yourself when you need it at short notice. And the second one more traditionally edge-skating, where +1 counts for “done the thing” OR “extenuating circumstances apply today”. But such a setup requires being extremely honest with oneself about whether those circumstances apply, and this is arguably a slippery slope. I imagine I would supplement this setup with a clear explanation of what counts in the small print and potentially a public log of decisions.
Re: “already operating at the maximum useful amount of pressure, so that punishment doesn’t really help but makes it worse” - I just wanted to say that this is very relatable for me, though this is at arguably at odds with the classical concept of beeminding according to which (okay, I am hyperbolizing) one can intimidate oneself into any amount of improvement. We also exist, and we also benefit from having beeminder.
One option that might work if you feel comfortable relying on social pressure for honesty would be to do the “+1 for done or extenuating circumstances” thing that @scarabaea suggested, but specifically “+1 for either doing the thing or telling a family member why you can’t do the thing today”, or something like that.