On moving back to the San Jose area, I started fantasizing about getting back into mountain biking. When we moved to south San Jose, close to Santa Teresa Park, the urge grew. My last mountain bike was a Specialized Stumpjumper Comp M2. I think I bought it in 1997, when I lived here before. A really nice bike when I bought, I rode the hell out of it, all over the bay area. Unfortunately, living...
We are lucky to have found an apartment complex that welcomes our greyhounds. Especially after a brief survey of the houses (that rent for more than $1200 a month more) are mostly no pets, or cats only, this is quite a find. However, I wish that all the dog owners here would just clean up after their dogs. Part of the problem I believe is that until recently, they had a 25# limit on dogs. That...
More on the trials and tribulations of living in an apartment, this time, the house across the street has stepped up their game beyond the 4 nights a week of parties. Now they are doing auto repair. Yep, auto repair. Changing oil, replacing starters, installing LOUD stereo systems, and fart cans on cheap Japanese econoboxes. It is a joy, especially since they start at about 6 PM. Nothing like...
More in the Spam files. This time, we have a jackass trying to tell me how to better do SEO (Search Engine Optimization). Of course, the best suggestion is to hire them to help me. Oh boy. I get 2-3 of these a week across my wordpress sites. I really don’t do this for money, fame or notoriety. I do a little SEO, but in general, I don’t give a damn. I write to scratch an itch. Hello...
More in the series on comment spam. Some people keep at it, against all odds. Meet “Vivienne Westwood Dragon Lady Shoes”. She seems to think that aficionados of Greyhounds (and my “GreytBros blog) would want to buy some shitty knock off shoes (that are often made with PVC instead of leather). Persistence pays off, so says everybody. Particularly if you are in the comment spam...
Spam filters like Akismet do a phenomenal job of keeping the trash at bay (if you ever want to see how bad it can get, create a web forum, make it open access, without moderation, and watch the spam fill your hard disk). However, one type of message is very likely to fill the filter. It is – The Suck Up Short, it is highly congratulatory. It praises the content (yet never anything specific...
So begins a series of the comment spam I receive on my wordpress sites. Yes, I use the Akismet plugin (and have since 2009) to keep the spam comments at bay, and it does a phenomenal job, blocking literally thousands of spammy comments. But lately, there have been a steady stream of comment spam that sneaks by. This series of posts will highlight some of the insightful verbiage to get by the...
Friday night is party night, right? (Well, if you are the asshats in the duplex across the street, Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday are party nights, but I digress …) Ah yes, the outdoor activities are up. Kids are playing Soccer out front of our door. Cool, except they keep kicking it into the wall and our door. Fortunately there are no windows to break within reach. The teenagers are...
There are plenty of symptoms and signs that you are getting old. And I am not talking about the harassment by AARP for you to join. Sign 1 – You have a pill box to organize your daily medication. Often this starts as one, but soon becomes two as you will have morning and night medications. Statins, Ace Inhibitors, Beta Blockers, aspirin, anti coagulants. Yep you are getting old when you are...
The next episode in my experience with organized religion and why I am grateful to have been a life long atheist, is from my time in College. Not well known is the fact that I worked my way through college in restaurants. There I met a mormon woman, I will call Cheryl (not her real name). Cheryl was in high school, and knowing that I was studying physics and math, she asked for some help with her...