I spend a lot of my time when on the computer reading other peoples blogs. I’m often distracted by a tweet or facebook message from a friend saying a certain blog post should be checked out. Sometimes they are the usual bullet list on how to improve something or other but occasionally there is a real gem of a blog post or an entire blog that keeps me coming back and stays in my memory. I am one of those quirky people that doesn’t like rss feeds. I figure if a blog can make me remember to check it out without me needing to be reminded than it deserves my time. Otherwise I’d spend all day everyday reading blogs.

The quirky ones with no huge point:

One I’ve blogged about before and I still check out now and then is the guy who turns entire movies into strips of barcode style pictures. He’s still going strong and there are even some other ways of squishing the film that he’s tried and some ones with much shorter pieces too. I check this one probably about once a month for updates but occasionally I’ll just go through the entire load of them for kicks.

Then there is xkcd. I think most people know this cute little geeky comic strip so i’ll just link to one of my favourites here. I never hear that song in the same way anymore.

The ones that make me think:

I often enjoy the musings of Steve’s brain. Although the content from blog to blog can vary dramatically there is very often something about each post that makes me stop and think for a bit, from my own thoughts of something to simply inspiring me to think off in some random direction for a few minutes.

One blog that never fails to make me stop and think is by Chrysalis, who has occasionally guest blogged here. I especially love his reviews. He often looks much deeper into films and media than most people and although I don’t always agree with him I do always appreciate his viewpoint.

Career blogs:

By far the best blog for a writer at the moment is one I’ve already linked to several times, Joe Konrath’s blog. Joe can be a little controversial with some of his blogs but that’s one of the reasons I like him. He’s not afraid to say what he thinks and he has success and all that to help prove his point. I also found his newbie’s guide to self-publishing very useful as well as his postings of his sales figures.

Another I check reasonably often, not all the time, but I follow the guy on twitter so will check out the interesting titles, is the Vandal, otherwise known as Derek Haines. He’s very quirky and I love his tongue in cheek way of explaining some things. Similar humour to Douglas Adams at times, with a good dose of sarcasm. Does have quite a few bits of writer advice as well but I mostly love the quirky stuff there.

Odd blogs I’ve fallen in love with:

I really love Dean Wesley Smith’s blog of his chapter 9 from his book, Killing the sacred cows of publishing. A lot of it’s just maths but then he gets to talking about the Magic Pie Bakery and that’s where I totally fall in love with this blog. The maths side is quite good too and does prove very useful.

This blog called paper cuts seems to only consist of this one post with lots and lots of pictures of outlines of famous characters. I had a lot of fun guessing these. I think I figured out about two thirds of them after the second viewing. I do go back occasionally to see if I can figure out more though.

I’d love to know what blog posts have stuck in all your minds, what blogs keep you coming back for more and what made you come to this blog to read this post?