"You read too much," I'm told by a well respected peer (whom I assume was only kidding...). Alas—It's true. My cup runneth over with things to read. I can't help it if I find things like Development Abstraction,screwing (yeah, you have to click on it for it make sense...), and building monsters in the garage immensely interesting. Make no mistake about it, reading is good for you.
The Internet leaves us with no shortage of things to read. A lot of it is crap, but there are some good things out there. What I find daunting, and often dangerous, is that one article leads to another. I keep turning the pages of the newspaper, but it never ends. It's dangerous because it can lead to information overload, but we all know our limits. I learn from the things I read, but I think there's something much bigger going on.
I'm getting better at basic things we've learned to ignore since grade school—reading and writing. Ultimately, it's practice and repetition that makes us better at these activities. People who read are often better at writing. Furthermore, people who write and write often improve their writing skills. It's my hope that this somehow reflects in my day to day ability to communicate in the work place, and who knows, maybe even improve the quality of my code. The not-so-secret path to getting better at writing code is to write code.
Blogs are some of the best ways to get your opinions and information out into the world. I'm not the first to discover this by any means, but it's a way that I've become greedy (for all of the FREE knowledge people are willing to share, as long as you're willing to read). I subscribe to many RSS feeds, and often try to read anything that pops up in it. Take the best and leave the worst.
*Disclaimer: While reading blogs, you may find yourself saying:
"I once read a blog post about ... [ blah, blah, <nerdy topic>, blah blah ]" – me
So how can I write a blog post, totally self motivated, and then make a jab at my own character flaws? Well, you're just going to have to figure that one out for yourself.