Time to start YAB (Yet Another Blog)! I’ve made several half-assed efforts over the years to start a blog, and each one fizzled out very quickly after inception. Here’s why:

1. “No time to work on it” - There IS time of course, but I choose spend it on other things. Hard to fix this one, but life is one big exercise in time management, and I’m always trying to improve. Surely I can find the time somewhere.

2. “Nothing interesting to write about” - What I know is the tip of the iceberg, what I don’t know is under the surface. Plenty to write about, all around. Poor excuse!

3. “I can’t write” - I try to be funny and entertaining, am not happy with the quality of the humor, and get discouraged. Hoping that with time and practice, I whittle away the garbage, leaving a finely-tuned, prose wonderland.

4. “Nobody reads what I write” - Hard to argue with that one :), but let’s see if we can’t change that!

Here’s why I’m hoping this attempt will be different:

• I’ve recently started working at a new company, and am already learning a ton of exciting new things. The next couple of years look like they’ll bring many more educational opportunites. I’m turning the soil over in my brain - everything’s mixing up, getting exposed to air and light again for the first time in a long time, and growing wildly in many directions. Very exciting time for me career-wise!

• As part of my annual goals at the new gig, I’ve declared that I will start a blog, with at least 6 technical posts, in the next 9-ish months. While not signed in blood, I am a people pleaser, and have an internal need to make this happen. I’d honestly like to have 6 posts in the next 6 weeks - a post a week is doable, right?

So, away we go! Here’s my current plan (another list - I feel like I lean on these too heavily?):

1. I want this blog to be informative. My hope is that I cover topics well enough, with little nuggets of information, that people actually find answers to questions. Tutorials, walkthroughs, etc.

2. I want this blog to motivate me to learn new things, and investigate those new things deeply. So many technologies out there I’d like to learn, and this could be the nudge I need to learn them.

3. This will mainly start as a technical blog, but I’d love to be able to write about things beyond tech. Not going to overthink this one, but I’m hoping once the “stage-fright/writers-block” glacier starts to melt with the technical topics, the other things will come pouring out as well. Come for the technical know how, stay for the blubbering couch session about my childhood.

4. I also plan to explore “auxiliary” concerns in creating this blog, such as web design, search engine optimization, social/web-service ecosystems, etc. It’s going to look like a prison cafeteria when I begin, but over time I’d like to turn it into a cozy mountain lodge, where you marvel at the decor, and keep coming back for more.

I’ve read many times that the most important thing about writing is to do it regularly, so that’s one of my priorities - releasing posts at a regular clip. Allocating a certain amount of time per day and week to ensure I’m productive and prolific. I need to balance that with quality - if I’m not informing and learning (and hopefully entertaining), then I’m just filling space with words.

There are many other questions I have in my mind right now (am I using the “I” pronoun too much here? Which voice should I use!? Am I using enough colorful adjectives?!?!). I hope to find clues and answers to these concerns along the way. If I try to solve everything initially, before publishing anything, this blog will die before being born. Apologies in advance for awkward phrasing, boring writing, and obvious attempts at meager humor.

One final thing - I’m planning on sprinkling my doubts, questions, and side thoguhts into my writing. I think this will give a better picture of my train of thought, and hopefully provide a little comic relief. If it gets too unwieldy or distracting, then I’ll cut it out. I am a work in progress, and so is my writing.

Thanks much for reading this far, and any/all feedback appreciated!

Marty