Regarding small text

Since I first became interested in lucid dreaming, I've used small text as a mainstay of my reality checks. I've read several places that small text will either be impossible to read, appear as hieroglyphics, or change every time you look at it in a dream. Last night, however, I had a dream wherein I could very clearly read the text of an email I had received from my school's writing competition judges, telling me that one of my submissions had won an honorable mention and also including several comments on the submission itself. I looked away from it and looked back, and both times I comprehended the text saying "your writing style has a very distinct voice!"
I am an avid reader and writer, so is it possible that constantly viewing text could allow my dreaming self to comprehend small text as well? Also, if I can no longer use small text as a dream indicator, what other methods would my fellow oneironauts suggest?

I sometimes can read small text perfectly fine in my dreams, too. I think this is because I read and write a lot, so it is fairly simple for my dreaming mind to replicate it.

Personally I like the memory RC, the nose pinch RC, and the lip bite RC. To do the memory RC think back about how you got to where you are, what you are doing, etc. Obviously this won't work for FAs (false awakenings). Because I usually have decent logic ability in dreams if I stop for a moment, the memory RC works perfectly for me almost every time. The nose pinch RC is my other favorite. I usually do it in conjunction with the memory RC. To do it you just close your mouth and pinch your nose. Wait. Can you breathe? You have to do it for longer than you can comfortably hold your breath. If you feel air moving in and out of your lungs then you are alseep. The lip bite RC is fun. To do it just gently bite down on your bottom lip. Gently increase the pressure. If you are dreaming you often can easily and fairly painlessly bite all the way through your lip!

I often dream about using my computer and chatrooms/IMs/forums, and text seems perfectly normal. So it definitely varies from person to person.

Yep, its different for everyone. I think a lot of the reason people have trouble reading in dreams is because they've been told you'll have trouble. Now that isn't necessarily a bad thing, as it may result in more lucids for them, but I get frustrated when I'm unable to read in dreams! Now, most of the time, I can read alright. I'll understand the main point, even if it may be poorly written at any rate (I can never recall exact dialogue or text from dreams, just "what" they said if you know what I mean).

But anyway, suggestions to get lucid. You probably know about reality checks, and if not just hunt around for more info, but basically it is something you do to check if you are dreaming. My personal favorite is the nose reality check; just plug your nose and try to breath through it. I've had only a couple instances where I couldn't breath through my plugged nose in dreams. Do a reality check when you notice something weird, or perhaps even if you just 'feel' a little weird. You know, like everything looks a little bit too clear, or something happened just a little too perfectly. My dreams are often insane so I just get lucid off of the normal "oh I can fly" types of things though. Really though, just hunt around Dream Views in the tutorials and the Attaining Lucidity forum and you'll get a ton of detail.

Good luck.