Do bloggers dream of electronic journals?

Posted on January 31, 2005

I got to bed around 1:00 am last night/this morning, and fell asleep firly quickly. Around 5:30 am I found myself wide awake. I tried to go back to sleep until the alarm clock went off, but it just wasn’t happening. That isn’t too unusual, as it’s happened before. I woke up totally refreshed, too. I’m not tired. I just wonder if it will hit me during work.

I was dreaming about blogs. I don’t remember the individual sites I hit, but I distinctly remember dreaming about visiting various sites and commenting. No, I wasn’t sleep-blogging. My computer was off when I woke up this morning, so unless I have some sort of psychic broadband connection to the net (wouldn’t that be cool), I dreamt the whole thing. Strange. Maybe it’s a sign I’m blogging too much. :-)

Polishing my own apple

Posted on January 30, 2005

Here’s a nice image, if I do say so myself.

Where from?

Posted on January 26, 2005

I saw a link to this while checking out Cruizer’s blog. I checked out the one on Colorado, and it’s funny because so much of it is true. Check it out.

Photo fun

Posted on January 25, 2005

The network is a largely anonymous space. Blogs, however, are an interesting part of the net. Bloggers are probably part exhibitionist. Not all, though. Some blog are more about business or geared towards certain topics. But most bloggers use the websites to reveal their thoughts. Some of them are funny, some are poetic, some are angry, some are boring, but they are mostly personal.

This site is could be called a vanity site, or an everything/nothing site, or a host of different things. Mostly, I have it to show off my portfolio (which I am woefully behind in working on). I am like catchy graphics and I also like sites that have clean looks and aren’t “busy” looking, so I have tried to use those ideas in this site. It may not be as clean as Google’s main page, but then again, that isn’t a blog. As a result of my liking graphics, I like to work with Blender, the GIMP, and Sodipodi, which are graphics programs available for Linux. I also like photography, even though I don’t have a gallery for that – yet. Photography is an expensive hobby, so I can’t take it as far as I want, but I have some photos that are – IMHO – pretty good looking. One of these days, I will probably add another gallery and post some of them.

Getting back to blogs and vanity, I have noticed that some bloggers post photos of themselves to their sites. Part of me appreciates the anonymity of the net, but it almost seems a contradiction to appreciate the anonymity, yet have a blog, which is slightly exhibitionistic. I pondered these things for awhile and finally decided to post some pics of myself. If you go to the Profile page you will see two thumbnails at the bottom. Click on one of them to open a new page with a photo of yours truly.

Good night, Johnny

Posted on January 23, 2005

If life was fair, Elvis would still be alive and the impersonators would be dead. – Johnny Carson

Independence

Posted on January 22, 2005

I was just reading this article over at the Indy Star website about how the newly inaugurated Governor is seeking mass resignations from various state boards. I don’t think this is a very good idea.

Maybe it’s some Indiana thing I don’t know about. At the federal level, certain government positions are appointed to terms that don’t correspond to the presidential election cycle. I think the terms are usually 6 years, though for some positions like judges and justices it is for life. The Directors of the FBI, CIA, and NSA (maybe), the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Federal Reserve Board, etc. are examples. The main reason for this is so the appointees can retain a certain independence outside of politics. They are supposed to be independent and make decisions that are for the good of the country, not what’s best for the party in power.

Our new governor, Mitch Daniels is a Republican, and I am assuming most of these people were appointed by Democrats. He probably wants to appoint people he thinks he can “work with”. I think it is more important for Indiana that these positions retain their independence. The Governor might not agree with some of the positions these people take, but it is important for them to do their jobs free from political interference. Why is it important?

As an example, one of the boards he is seeking resignations from is the State Board of Education. Suppose he were to load the board with people who think we shouldn’t be teaching evolution. That would be bad, IMHO. I am fine with teaching creation and evolution as two competing theories. I respect different viewpoints and think we should allow people to air them, but I don’t want the Governor remaking the government in his own image or being a rubber-stamp for his policies.

The strength of our society is it’s diversity, and the same idea should hold for the government. Creating a government where sycophancy rules and dissent is anathema will only lead to trouble.

Small stuff

Posted on January 22, 2005

Getting off my keister, I added some new categories, fixed the downloads and forums sections, and fixed some minor stuff in WordPress. Also added Russian and Japanese language packs to the forums :-D

Still to come are some more changes to WordPress (mainly including a footer and bringing back the random quotes) and trying to get the gallery, downloads, and forums into the same “style” as the WordPress pages. Will also be adding stats/counters, but I don’t know if I’ll make that “public”.

Sleep Haiku 1

Posted on January 22, 2005

Sleep fails to take me
Toss and turn throughout the night
Morning comes again

Not great, but not incredibly bad.

Made the other night when I was trying to sleep :-)

Sleep II

Posted on January 21, 2005

My sleeping problems are continuing – as usual. I would call it a vicious cycle, except it doesn’t seem cyclical.

Two nights ago, I only had about 2 – 3 hours of sleep, so shortly after I got home from work, I laid down in my Poof chair to take a nap. I figured I fell asleep sometime before 6:00pm. I tried to keep it to just a nap by setting a digital cooking timer to an hour, but that damn Poof chair was just too comfortable, so when the alarm went off, I turned it off and fell back asleep. I woke up at about 11:00pm. five hours of sleep is pretty good, but I knew I would have problems in the morning.

I stayed up, surfing the net, checking blogs, and wasting time in general. Around 5:00am, I started feeling tired again, so I took a bath, shaved, brushed my teeth, etc. in hopes of staving off sleep. A little before 7:00am, I headed off to work. Normally, I drink decaf coffee because I would otherwise get caffeine withdrawl headaches during the weekends. However, today I needed the extra energy, so I had around 4 – 8oz cups of caffienatedcoffee (luckily, work supplies it free). At work, it was a clinic day, so I kept busy enough to keep my energy level up. After the clinic, I felt like going home early (clinic ends before it’s time for me to clock out), but I decided to finish off the paperwork so I wouldn’t have to do it on Monday.

After work, I headed downtown to get a grande Mocha from Starbucks because I had a free coupon. I got that and a Cranberry Oatmeal bar (which I had to pay for). I lounged around in one of the comfy chairs and read the paper for a while, then headed back home. If you can’t tell by now, I am a bit wired from all of the caffiene I had today.

Anyway, the point of the story is I am now in one of those strange areas where I am too tired to sleep. My body feels tired, but I have oodles of caffeine running through my body, so they are counteracting each other in a strange biochemical tug-of-war. I imagine if I laid down in the Poof chair, I would probably fall asleep fairly quickly, but the caffiene is giving me this manic energy that makes me want to post her and get my daily fix of news and humor.

In a related link, I don’t know whether to feel glad or sorry for this guy. He’s like the anti-Rip van Winkle. OTOH, if I had insomnia that bad, I would probably try to put it to good use by working another job, or something like that. Heh, he could probably open a store or resturant open 24 hours a day and never need to leave it.

Well, off to Fark and Slashdot.

In Pictures

Posted on January 21, 2005

Although I think many news sites do something similar, the BBC’s In Pictures section seems to be the best, or at least the most comprehensive. Some of the best pictures there are submitted by users and viewers from around the world. They don’t usually have anything to do with news events, but are just the part of the photographer’s view on the world.

Check it out.

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