I am of the opinion that no writing topic is inherently boring. Yet there seems to be a lot of boring, boring business writing. Which stockbroker has been hired where? That’s only relevant to me if I have tons of investments (hint: I don’t). Which company is launching which new products? Again, unless I’m going to buy that product or if I plan to invest in that company, this information does nothing for me.

Service writing is slightly more useful; as a self-employed writer I’m definitely interested in learning new ways to promote myself or a better way to invoice clients or be more productive or so forth. But so much of this is boring and I read it only out of necessity.

I was reading about hot sauces today. (It’s research for an article, I swear! I love getting paid to read about just about anything.) This Inc.com piece about Dave of Dave’s Insanity sauces (invented in nearby College Park, Md.–believe it or not) was a fascinating read. And then I got to the end and read the author biography:

John Grossmann is a longtime contributor to Inc. He last wrote for the magazine about an intellectual-property dispute in the model railroading industry.

Seriously? Sign me up. Any field where you cover hot sauce and model trains in the same magazine is my kind of writing.