I decided to start off this blog, which I intend to be mostly technical observations, with an explanation of the title and a bit of background on the writer (awkwardly enough, that’s me). Maybe if you understand where I’m coming from, you’ll be able to appreciate my writings a little better. If you don’t care about all that human nonsense, feel free to head over to MSDN for a nice steamy cup of documentation.
Why “Awkward Coder?” Partly because a lot of really cool names had already been taken. Partly because that’s who I am most of the time. Raise your hand if you’re with me! Most developers I know are grown-up forms of the same kids who, in Jr High, got stuffed into lockers or got made fun of because their nose was too big (okay, that last one was me). We made it through the fire and now we’re poised to take over the world with a keyboard and mouse. Well, maybe we are just poised to make more money than the cool kids… who knows?
I’ve been programming for most of my life. When we were 9 years old, my best friend and I used to write text-based RPG’s on my Commodore 64 at my house. When we went to my friend’s house, we would re-write our games on his Apple 2. When I got my hands on a 8088 (XT) DOS-based PC, we started writing games in GW-Basic. It was pair programming before there was pair programming. We didn’t know anything about Agile, user stories, or IOC containers. But somehow, we managed to learn how to make a computer do what we told it to do.
Over the years, I’ve learned a lot about patterns, principles, and practices. Even after all the books I’ve read, videos I’ve watched, blogs I’ve subscribed to, podcasts I’ve listened to, and programs I’ve written, the most important piece of knowledge I’ve found is this:
The more you know, the more you realize you don’t know.
I suppose that’s what this blog is all about. Finding out what I don’t know, learning something from it, rinse and repeat. The process will be good for me. I hope it’s something you can use as well.
True story: The other day at work, a lady who I had not yet met said, “Good morning.” I must have been thinking about something else because, as I passed by, I said, “Nice to meet you.” I’m so awkward.
