Why I'm starting a blog in 2025

Greetings!

My name is Casey and welcome to my blog.

I've never really had much of an online presence despite my many years of being at the forefront of technology from a development and security perspective. I was always busy with working multiple jobs to get by, school, raising a kid, or trying to constantly learn and keep my own skills up to date. It never left much time for writing online and I never really prioritized it. Over the years I've started one here and there, but soon left them languish so I'd eventually take them down.

Things have vastly changed over the years. My daughter is grown into a wonderful human being. I have a lovely partner who has brought me much needed calm and grounding to my life. My job is (fortunately) stable. And I'm not looking for a new job, because I actually (!) enjoy where I am. As I've moved into more strategic and managerial roles and now having a solid foundation in the necessary technical skills, it's much easier to stay on top of what I need to. This of course frees up some time for other things.

I've always enjoyed teaching and mentoring in all aspects of my life. I've done a handful of presentations over the years and workshops. I've even done a short video course for Plurarlsight a while ago and for a couple of years I worked on the side writing various security articles on a contractual basis. But despite this I've never felt a need to start a blog or even to have a site. I think in some ways it added pressure. Like if it was out there I had to keep it updated or the internet gods would strike me down. I disliked having a blog out there that hadn't been updated in years. So I would always pull them down.

There's been a lot of chaos in my life for a variety of reasons, but the last few years has seen a dramatic turn towards the calm. Little changes here and there, getting rid of the unnecessary distractions. Nothing is ever perfect, but I feel very much in harmony with where I am professionally, in life, in my friendships, and in love.

I think all of this has given air to creativity. Made room for the creative spark to flame.

I've been coding since I was barely eight or nine. Started on an Atari 400 I found at a garage sale. I've been coding since. However, after leaving software development full time and focusing on application security, I didn't code as much as I used to. Scripts or small projects here and there, sure. At some point I fell out of love with it. No longer enjoyed it. Not coincidental this came during a time that in retrospect later led to an extreme period of burnout and some dark years. The web has become a drastically different place technologically than it was twenty or even ten years ago. So many frameworks, languages, platforms, cloudy things. Sure there's platforms like Ghost. Static site generators like Hugo. But every time I set out to use one and find a theme that I liked I found myself just going down rabbit hole after rabbit hole. And no, I don't want to have search for the perfect pic for a header image every time I wanted to post something. And what's with all this JavaScript everywhere! Oh it's to load an ad or analytics. Or I just wanted to do something this particular theme didn't like. It was always something. Maybe it's hyberbole and I'm being a bit dramatic about the annoyances. Maybe it's just a side effect of burnout.

I've been nurturing the love I once had for technology. I'm writing this from an early 2015 MacBook Pro which has been my daily driver since purchasing it new. Over the years, I've upgraded it. I've fixed the screen and replaced the battery. I'm finally upgrading to something new and building a new desktop as I barely use my laptop as a laptop. I've also been working on upping my skills once more and dusting off my C++ skills and knowledge. I've always enjoyed low level and desktop development. I got into programming because I wanted to make my own games. I got into hacking because I wanted to modify my Eye of the Beholder save game. Even though I lived in a very rural area outside of Minneapolis at this period in my early teens, by way of one of my slightly older best friends who introduced me to the hacker culture, I was able to get to 2600 meetings in Minneapolis and got up to all sorts of trouble as we made our way through the anarchists cookbook. I of course got into the danger zone with some things here. Luckily never really crossing the line. I loved network programming and writing tools to circumvent things more than writing games.

But with all hobbies, once you start making money doing them it becomes hard to separate work and fun, which can be both fantastic and depressing. Fantastically depressing even. We all experience much of that through our careers in any industry that people get into because of their love of it. Many in the cyber security industry have a similar story and I'm no different. We're in good company.

Now that I'm a bit on the other side of this cycle of life, I want to use this creative urge to rediscover some small enjoyments. Work on a few projects that I've been meaning to get around to. Explore a few interests I haven't been able to for a while. Learn, grow, and take my skills to the next level. This is my project to accomplish that. The best way to really master a subject is to teach it. That's one of my goals with this project.

Having worked in the offensive application security space for some time now, I've seen the plethora of open-source and enterprise tools. There's some really great ones out there, but there's also a lot of tools that were written for a purpose and fulfilled that purpose. As much as things have changed in this space, it's sometimes comforting to realize how much really hasn't. Over the years I've written a variety of proof-of-concepts, experimentations, small apps for whatever reason. I want to once again turn my knowledge and skills of this space to creating tooling that work the way I want it to. That are focused on quality and the user experience.

On this journey I'll be writing a lot about many things. I'm uncertain what form some of this may take on but I'm fairly certain it'll be a mixture of long and short-form writing. Along with various application security topics around the web and APIs, I'm focused on expanding my C++ skills and learning the Qt framework. I'll for sure be sharing some projects with those technologies.

This won't entirely be a technical blog though. As I said earlier, I do a lot of mentoring. My current company has an internship program that sees hundreds of applications each session. There's usually three or four people on my team mentoring at any given time. I've mentored many people over the years both at work and privately. Often my conversations with them are less technical and more career oriented or soft-skilled focus. In most cases, the tech is the easiest to master. It is uninfluenced by emotion. Unlike soft-skills. So in a way mastering soft-skills requires self-mastery. Something I am very much still in the early stages of.

I have my opinions of course but many seem to have found my thoughts and suggestions helpful. I'd like to share them and get feedback, make new friends, have an uplifting discussion. And just maybe I can be helpful to more than just the few people I'm able to interact with on a daily basis.

Other things I enjoy is reading, writing of course, digital minimalism, privacy, the Indieweb and smolweb movements, extreme metal, and travel to name just a few. As I'm a philosophy student you may even get a dose of that here and there. In short, this project may turn into a blend of things. It is a personal site after all.

In the end, I'm writing first and foremost for myself. I'll be a better, more knowledgeable person at the end of it all. If even one person finds something I write useful, then my goal will have been accomplished.

If you've made it this far, thank you for giving me some of your time. I appreciate you and I'm glad you're here. I'm excited and looking forward to getting to work.

This is why I'm creating a blog in 2025.

Until next time.

<3