August 2007

I love poker. I play it every time we go to a casino. When we went the other day, it was the only machine I won at (one of those big electronic poker tables). I play poker on my computer, but then again I play a lot of games on my computer. A lot of people do. What makes me different is that if they had the same games for other operating systems, then I wouldn’t be using Windows. I’m not even talking about Linux, I’d even switch to a Mac if I could play some of my games on it. A lot of companies overlook the Mac though because they see it just as an media work machine, which is funny because when it came out they called it an expensive toy.

One company is listening to the woes of the Mac gamer, Mac PokerStars, will be out soon. Pokerstars already has a Windows version out, and the Mac users will soon be able to run their own native version of the program, without using other software to make it run. This is great news for Mac users, and those of us who wish to get away from Windows all together. Hopefully other companies will listen and begin to follow through with Mac versions of their games.

I was going to get on a better sleeping schedule, but I had to be up this morning at 5AM to run a script that I didn’t want to leave up to a Cron Job. Why? Because it is taking over 2000 images and making thumbnails out of them. It is a little redundant, but as is the world of programming at times. I started this script at 4:53 AM and the time now is 5:45 AM and it is still running. Judging from the test runs I did earlier in the week, this script should be done by 8:30 AM, then I will go to bed and wake up only a few hours later (I went to bed at 7:30 last night and woke up at 10:30).

My grandmother was never officially diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease, but she was showing the signs of it, so much so that when she was in the hospital they gave her Alzheimer’s medication and she became much more lucid. Krissy has been telling me about how she donates to the Alzheimer’s Association Memory Walk, every year. I don’t think it is a bad idea, and I am thinking of donating some money to it this year as well. The Alzheimer’s Association has been running the Memory Walk since 1989 and has raised over $225 million. I think everyone should donate to this cause.

If you can’t or don’t want to donate your money, then why not your time? The Memory Walk is looking for Team Captain, but you had better sign up early, the spots tend to fill up rather quickly.

Why should you donate your time and/or money? Simple. Do you want to be a 50 year old woman and not remember who you are, where you are, or how you got there? Do you want your family to take care of you in your prime of life, because it can happen to anybody. Do you remember the Golden Girls? Sophia from that show, Estelle Getty, suffers from severe dementia. Just goes to show you that nobody is immune to it.

Emz was shocked when I had posted my totals for July. Not so much with the totals per say, but with the Pay Per Post total. Now you may be saying yes you do a lot of paid posting and will post anything for money. The truth is that I will only take an opportunity if it suits my site and it is something I would normally talk about. I am dying to see Superbad and Halloween, I need a new car and we are looking into moving. All things that I’ve been paid for, but also all things that I am interested in.

I didn’t make a website to make money. I didn’t even make one for a blog, I’ve had a site way before blogs, I’ve had a site since 1998, when we first got this thing known as the internet. I have a site as a project, something to keep myself busy, beats porn right? Well this site has changed over the years, and will continue to change. Yes I have banner ads and text link ads, plus I have inline ads in some places, but does that really take away from the content of the site? I get people coming here everyday looking for stuff on the Spiderman and Matrix sections. I need to add more to them, and they will be ever changing. Does it really matter if I get some compensation for the time I put into my website?

There may be a time when I can cut down on the advertising, but right now the ads pay for the hosting each month, while the sponsored posts really just add up so I can pay off my credit cards quicker than just with my job (which has been slow lately). So yes I make money off my website, but I don’t think it takes away from the content, do you?

My car is getting old. I love the old girl, but I think it might be time to upgrade. I’m a big guy, and my car is small, so I’ve been thinking of a truck. I’ve been thinking about an Isuzu SUV. I’ve always liked driving SUV’s, so owning one wouldn’t be that far of a stretch. The Isuzu Ascender is looking really nice. It would be nice to have four wheel drive, this way I could drive on the beach in the summertime, and not have to worry about snow in the winter. It seems to get good gas mileage too, so when I go on those long trips that I seem to go on at random times, it won’t be too much of a stretch financially. Plus the extra leg room on those trips would be greatly welcomed, considering now my legs cramp up because they are crammed in the car.

Krissy and I made a list of all the video games we want across numerous systems. The only system that has nothing is the Playstation 3, not because we don’t own one, but because they don’t have any good games to it. Lair looked interesting, but after they said that it was horrible until they added normal maps, kind of let me down.

Anyway among the games on the list are Halo 3, Assassin’s Creed, Legend of Zelda: the Phantom Hourglass, Resident Evil 4, Sonic and the Secret Rings, just to name a few. I can tell that a lot of money is going into video games this holiday season.

I’d like to use my laptop more, but with these very bright days, you can barely see anything on an LCD screen. Also if I’m outside my battery dies within a couple of hours, so that is a pain. I’ve been thinking about buying a new Hewlett Packard Laptop Battery so I can be more mobile and not always on my desktop. I mean I don’t know if it would be good now, but definitely after I build the server, I’ll be able to access my files from anywhere and not have to worry about if I have everything I need on the laptop. Maybe I’ll buy two, this way I have a backup in case I am away from an outlet for a long time.

No body used the photo gallery feature of the forum, so I am going to be replacing that with an actual photo gallery script. I have it installed, but I am working out all of the design issues with it so hopefully it will be up in the next few days.

Things have been slow with work lately, so I am trying to make as much money as I can in other ventures, hopefully I can maintain the amount for the month that I’ve been making in the past.

I work online on scripts, websites, and even the occasion Windows and Linux program. I have so much stuff on my computer that I get those disk is close to full warnings all the time. When that happens I take out a DVD or a CD and take some files off that I am currently not working on. If it is just a PDF file, or any other type of image or text file, I usually just print it out. I have folders of literally hundreds of PDF’s, Word documents, and other random paperwork. My printer takes a strain and I am constantly buying HP compatible ink. I just hope I won’t need to buy a printer soon though.

We decided to go to Slots at Midway in Harrington tonite. Well I am down $60 while Krissy is down $80. So much for the commercial that says you win more there.

After the casino we decided to stop at the diner and try their breakfast. I had pancakes and Krissy had French Toast with sausage, which she really enjoyed. Krissy’s making a special dinner tonight (special to me since I like it so much), chicken fried chicken. She made it once before after coaxing since I love Crackerbarrel’s chicken fried chicken so much, so it’s gonna be a good day, Tater.

A while ago, Blizzard announced they were making starcraft 2. I never played the first one, but my friend Mike was IMing me like crazy when he had heard. Starcraft looks interesting, but I don’t think it is something that I would pick up. It’s not that I wouldn’t want to pick it up, but it only has two player multiplayer, and I have gotten accustomed to a bit more players than that. If they add more players in multiplayer in Starcraft 2 then I might pick that one up.

I’ve been to blogs that complain about people blogging and getting paid for it. Now I post sponsored blogs, and I have to say that as long as you write something that relates to your site, then why complain?

I have written about my credit card debt long before I was getting paid to write about credit cards, so why is it any different now that I am getting money for it? Every post on here is because I want to post it, I won’t take post stuff that I don’t like or I don’t think is cool. Everything I write here is me, so if you are here to get to know me, then here I am, otherwise why are you here?