Year: 2007

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I had a panic attack at 2am

Somehow in this 4 day weekend I failed to complete what should have been a simple task. The problem is I assumed it to be a simple task and, having not truly relaxed in forever, I decided this weekend I could play it by ear. That is, I procrastinated. It would be okay because I only needed a few hours to get the work done and Saturday evening was mine, well, except that Saturday evening started awfully later after a long and fulfilling day. It would be okay because I only needed a few hours to get the work done and Sunday afternoon was mine, well, except for the parade in Lenoir City. Tommy needed that and it fit the "must relax this weekend." It would be okay because I only needed a few hours to get the work done and Sunday evening was mine, well, except that Cathy and Evan had come down with a migraine and fever respectively. I pulled the evening shift of getting the children into bed and getting school stuff out for the next day all while hearing Cathy’s voice in my head lamenting the horrid condition of the house. Could I possibly get the children ready, clean, and get the work done. It would be okay because I only needed a few hours to get the work done and I don’t really need sleep, well, except that it is difficult to type with your forehead and I presume that is what I was trying to do considering the number of times my head bounced off the keyboard with a series of ZZZZzzzs across the screen.

I attempted sleep but kept dreaming of my obligations so I woke with my head dully throbbing, my arms rubbery and weak as if I’d done hours of weight training, and my body aching sore. No, I do not have Evan and Cathy’s sickness. This is simply what it feels like to not allow yourself a good night’s sleep. Of course, I can sleep when I am dead. I thoroughly enjoyed my weekend but I cannot allow myself too many of those.

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What are you doing with your phones?!

Narration (with additions): [audio:http://realityme.net/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/whatareyoudoingwithyourphones.mp3]

During the Bearden Bulldogs versus Farragut Admirals high school football game, Cathy and I were busy tapping messages into our phones as quickly as our frozen fingers would allow. I was Twittering the game. My father-in-law, a true die hard football fan, did not understand how we could be looking away from the game to play with our phones, "what are you doing with your phones?!" Cathy explains, "Doug is putting game highlights on Internet for people to read. See (shows her phone to her father), the Knoxville News-Sentinel editor is encouraging Doug." He doesn’t believe her. Something significant happens on the field, he suggests, "Tell your ‘editor guy’ about that play."

So how does one explain this fascinating world of instant communication and self-publishing to people who have not experienced it or perhaps to those who have not even become comfortable with computers yet? Some people feel that if you are over 25 years old, you cannot understand things like Twitter. Jon Swanson suggests 8 ways to explain 2.0 friends to 0.0 parents. My favorites are:

2. You know how you like to shout at the television? With 2.0, @newmediajim can hear you.

…

4. Remember how you used to walk down the street and say hi to people along the street? That’s what i do when I turn on my computer.

[Source, Levite Chronicles, 8 ways to explain 2.0 friends to 0.0 parents]

Web 2.0 tools have such undiscovered potential. The Red Cross is using Twitter to help reunite families during disasters and to forewarn of impending doom and the request resources for help. Presidential candidates are using Twitter for publicity and to have closer contact with the voters. People blog for different reasons; I have published why I blog. This list could go on for pages. The possibilities are endless. The changes that will come in the next 5-10 years will blow people away! Of course, faster broadband in the United States is crucial.

Update: Random Mumblings talks about breaking news. See also Group Twittering instructions for events. Music City Bloggers talks about Instant Communication Changing the Rules. Michael Silence warns of Big Brother watching during Liveblogging of sports events. Read Ryan Sholin regarding Notes on breaking news. Les Jones chimes in.

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My penis is a mountain

Last night at the Bearden Bulldogs vs Farragut Admirals football game, as the crowd stood respectfully as color guard brought in the American flag (and 3 others), Rocky Top blared from the speakers instead of the national anthem. Whoops! The crowd chuckled through the beginning of the actual national anthem. Why did they use a recording instead of having the two high school bands play? I wonder if they could have done it in sync.

Of course, the playing of the national anthem is not unique to sports events in the United States. Countries all around the world play their national anthem, and often a singer belts out the words. Croatia invited UK opera singer Tony Henry to perform their national anthem at the beginning of the Euro 2008 soccer tournament with Croatia vs England. He mispronounced a Croatian word (see the video) when trying to sing "we love your mountains" and instead announced to the crowd "my penis is a mountain." The Croatians believe the mistake relaxed the team enough to knock England out of the tournament with a 3-2 win for Croatia. They have since adopted Tony Henry, and his mountainous member, as their mascot.

(This post should pull in some interesting spam… )

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Thinking about hosting your own blog?

I am a huge advocate of getting your blog away from 3rd party solutions like blogger.com. If you have blogspot in your blog’s address then you need to consider getting some hosting and using a solution like WordPress.org (note: wordpress.com is a 3rd party solution just like blogger.com and while I advocate every wordpress user having an account at wordpress.com for statistics and askimet key, you really need to use the open source software found at http://wordpress.org) WordPress is not the only content management system out there which is great for blogging. You have a ton of choices! If you have trouble setting up a WordPress blog, just contact me and I will help.

One negative in hosting your own blog is that you have to pay a host for server space. That is akin to renting a building to run your business. In the Internet business, like so many businesses, you get what you pay for. Free hosting will likely have problems but it is available. I have personally found 1&1 hosting to be very reliable with great customer service despite its low cost. I highly recommend 1&1!

The postive of paying for hosting is that you get full control over your content. If Blogger’s robots determined that your blog suddenly appeared like a spam blog, they could take you offline instantly and lock you out of your account. You could find yourself unable to access your posts and drafts. If Blogger suddenly went out of business or just quit, you’d be out of luck. Does this happen? Ask anyone that hosted their photos at Yahoo. Yahoo bought Flickr and did away with their photo hosting. Anyone that failed to move their photos by the deadline lost their pictures. All links to those pictures are now 404 pages. We personally came within minutes of failing to get our pictures moved. By paying for hosting, you get backups of your data, control of your site, and the ability to handle exceptions (like 404s) in a way that can benefit your audience rather than drive them away. Plus with your own domain name, you can virally market your blog by using the address in your emails. You can’t send an email from blogmaster@someblogname.blogspot.com but you can send an email from blogmaster@myowndomain.com and everyone who gets that email has the chance to say, "I wonder what myowndomain.com is?" Each email sent becomes a subtle advertisement for your site.

Banner1&1 has a great deal right now! Since Uncle Danny is testing the limits of my webspace and monthly transfer volume, I thought I should review the limits on my account. When I did, I discovered that 1&1 is offering their Business shared hosting at only $5.82 per month! (normally $9.99) This is for the first year only with a 1 year commitment. It’s worth it! Their standard packages are still month-to-month (no contracts; no commitments) if I am not mistaken. They are $3.99, $4.99, $9.99, and $19.99 for shared hosting with increasing benefit respective to price.

Full disclosure: The 1&1 links in this post are associated with an affiliate id. If you purchase hosting from them by using one of those links I do get a payment but the affiliate link does not influence my decision to recommend 1&1. I genuinely like their service! This is also not pay-to-post. I just did this of my own inspiration.

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Color commentary in 140 characters? Impossible!

Follow the bearden vs farragut game at http://twitter.com/djuggler

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The updates: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21

Update:: Knoxnews coverage. And Jack Lail’s coverage of my coverage.

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I love me some Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving TurkeyI thought yesterday was very special. I was tickled that our inlaws chose to join us at our house. The official family Thanksgiving is Saturday at their house when some other relatives will be in town. Between yesterday and Saturday we should have enough Turkey to last until Christmas. For half a decade or so, I have put off (ie. procrastinated) getting a meat thermometer. Yesterday, while the turkey cooked, I went to Walmart to get a meat thermometer, some ice cream, and a few essential non-essentials only to find that I wasn’t alone. I thought I would get to park right by the door but still had to park a distance before trekking around Wally World. Who needs a gym when you shop at Walmart! I did find a few things at the store for which to be thankful even if I don’t understand it. I felt sorry for the poor guy in line in front of me who had to produce his birth certificate, social security card, photo id, bring in three unrelated people to vouch for him, and give a blood sample before he could pay with a check. I sure hope there was a valid reason for the hassles. In America we should not have present papers simply because you look Hispanic. Do our schools teach any history anymore? Can people not draw the parallels between WWII Japanese and how we locked away American citizens because of their Japanese ancestry and today how we hassle American Hispanic citizens because of immigration politicism. Do people not see the risk of another race war hidden behind the word "immigrant?" Have we forgotten our Schoolhouse Rock Great American Melting Pot lyrics?

Whoops. How do these soap boxes keep getting under my feet? Yesterday was a thankful day. I brought a long standing project to a close. I was able to relax instead of spend the day in uncertainty and panic. I was with family and they laughed and played. I am thankful to have found countless friends on the Internet (I dare not make a list of links for fear of leaving someone out or having this post extend endlessly) who share such fascinating stories. I am thankful to those who have helped us in so many ways during the extremely hard times. I am thankful that I am not out shopping today. I am thankful for my children; they make me smile! And everyone knows, I am extra thankful for my wife! She is my sun which I gravitate around; she warms my soul; provides me energy; and shines on me to make my darkness go. I can think of so many things for which to be thankful that I believe I could type this post until next Thanksgiving! I hope you are thankful too.

wrestlinggrandaddyfor the little peopledessert highpirate grubhe who eats with fingers

Update: Illegal immigrant saves 9 year old boy’s life.

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Don’t put off until tomorrow…

So a couple of years ago I noticed my water bill doubled. Years? I hope not. Sure I meant to type "several months ago." It doubled because the washers on the spigots needed replacing but mostly because the flapper in the downstairs toilet needed replacing. Someone would flush the toilet and it could run all night before someone realized it needed fixing. A $3 part and a few minutes of my time would fix the problem but I had more important things to do like figure out how to pay the extra $30 or so per month the leaks were causing.

Yesterday I put a new flapper on the commode. It was $3.45 and took about 2 minutes. Assuming this has been going on a year and that toilet was the total cause of a $30 increase in water costs, then I spent $360 waiting for my round tuit! I may never learn. In 1998, I left for a month of work in South Carolina to return to a very molded bathroom because I could not find the time to replace a 25 cent washer. Failing to change that 25 cent washer resulted in a bathroom remodel! Don’t mess around with water! Don’t put off until tomorrow that which you can do today!

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I predict a major social change because of the war

How do you pay for an expensive overseas war and bring value back to a falling dollar? Simple. You reduce your countries infrastructures costs, add workers to the populace to increase gross national product, create a livable wage for those same workers for taxable income, and create a high demand product to encourage the citizenry to purchase taxable goods. Personally I would add impeach a president to the list.

These things are coming! (well…maybe not the impeachment) And your politicians have already begun the game of wag the dog to get you to accept the reduced infrastructure costs, new workers, different tax structure, and focus on purchasing a highly taxable product. The spin war is on because it is going to be a vicious one and a very hard sell because the government has been selling you a different bill of goods for almost 50 years. See, the reduced infrastructures cost will come by releasing roughly 800,000 inmates from prison.

…would save taxpayers an estimated $20 billion per year…[Source, Unlocking America: Why and How to Reduce America’s Prison Population, page 7]

It is these same 800,000 inmates who will be the new workers adding to the GNP which means these 800,000 people would be producing taxable income.

What of the product? The product must be inexpensive to produce otherwise the savings from releasing the prisoners is negated. Ideally the product should already exist and be high demand with the general populace. The United States has just such a product. It is a product that no one uses yet you cannot swing a stick in a crowd without hitting someone who does use it. The product is marijuana. No one admits to using it yet it seems like everyone around you uses it socially or medicinally from time to time. Even our presidents use it! They just don’t inhale.

My prediction is that in the next decade we will see significant pressure by politicians to encourage legalization of marijuana for all the reasons stated above plus more. By encouraging the use of hemp for cloth, paper, ropes, and so many other uses, we will make better use of the land with higgher quality products (see 200 year old hemp nightgown looks like new). Watch the news. California will lead followed by Colorado and Nevada. Tennessee will follow closely since TN produces quite a lot of crops. Mark my word. As soon as the government can deprogram society from the believe that marijuana is bad (remember, marijuana was lobbied into illegality by the paper companies – apparently it is supposed to do less harm to the body than drinking alcohol), you will see marijuana sold either over the drug store counters or beside the cigarettes in the grocery stores.

See also: Decriminalizing Pot Will Reduce Prison Population, Have No Adverse Impact On Public Safety, Study Says

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That Feeling of Disbelief

Sometimes you get a project that goes wrong. This happens more frequently if your specification is loosely defined or non-existent. I have just finished a project that threatened to drive me from consulting back to the corporate world. It is a wonderful project! A real showcase piece! (that coincidentally I cannot show anyone) One feature was very technically challenging and at one point I, the believer that anything is possible, was thinking that maybe this could not be done. Well it is done! I anticipate some cleanup but I’m through the rough waters. Time to regroup and do damage control. Now where is my desk? Anyone got a shovel?

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Coder Motivation

One method for programmers to stay focused, keep it simple, and get the job done is to set micro-goals or micro-milestones. "When I get this query returning the correct results, I can take 10 minutes to read/write blogs." These rewards may come in the form of snacks, naps, leisure time, or anything that the coder made find rewarding and a rest from the project. I have found one reward that absolutely does not work! Never set your reward as "when I get ____ finished, I may go to the bathroom." One way or another, you are going to fail!