The hobby I didn’t need

We were watching the 99th version of the Milan-San Remo cycling race tonight when the announcer said something about Erik Zabel that caught my attention. As we often do, we were watching TV with a laptop within reach, so I looked up his entry in Wikipedia. Reading it, I realized that it had a few thin spots, and some of the style could use help, so I went against the voices in my head and created a Wikipedia account.

Thirty minutes later, there’s more information, one more citation, and a bit cleaner style in spots. It’s clear to me now how Nicholson Baker and others get addicted to Wikipedia. As a librarian, i.e.- someone who can research and cite at a rate much faster than the general population, it has a very strong pull for me. I could spend another ten hours working on that article and learning the minutiae of Wikipedia editing. I think I’m in trouble.