Maintenance underway at munky.org
Well, it was time to find munky.org a new home. After being with hostmonster for nearly two years, it was time to renew, and unfortunately, being unemployed, I was unable to afford their renewal rates. So I’ve moved to a new server. Although my other sites have so far transferred over fine, munky.org was not so fortunate. Wordpress, claiming how *easy* it was to move to a new server, blew up during the transition. Thankfully all of my posts and images made it safely over. Unfortunately, my plugins didn’t move over so nicely. Nor did my theme. Guess it was time for a change anyways.
So munky.org will be getting spruced up over the next week, and hopefully I will begin to start adding new posts on a more regular basis since school is out for the summer.
New post coming
I’ve been sooooooo slack on this site lately, I need to kick myself in the ass. Somehow I lose my job and now I have no freetime?! I don’t know. I’ve been busy trying to get caught up on that to do list that I started back in 2006! And it is 2009 now!
Anyways, I just wanted to post to say that I’m going to have a damned good post for you tomorrow. I better, at least.
New Section: Poetry
See what Thoreau found on Walden Pond?
For those who remember this site < 3.0, you would probably remember my poetry collection. Although most of it is not the most reflective of a more mature me – I informally refer to the old collection as a Collection of Adolescence – however it is still of interest. Right now I have only a few on, but I will be adding more as time goes on. I have 106 old poems to restore, dating back since 2000. These weren’t on any system that easily migrates to Wordpress (a home made perl script, it served me well for many years), and each poem has 2 pages each to get the data from, so as you can tell, it will take some time.
Either way, take a glance when you get a chance. I will also be adding photography, something desperately missing from before. Eventually it will be all original photography, but for now, I’ll do what I can.
Also of interest, the disclaimer has been updated to include specific information regarding the poems. So if you would like to use them, please read it first.
If you have any poems you would like to share, just post em as a comment and I’ll put it up.
New Feature: Reading List
If you notice up top, there is a new page listed as Reading List. This is a currently small list of the books I have read and enjoyed over the last couple of years. They are in no particular order for now, though that may change. I will be adding links to Amazon over the next few days.
Some of these books may be advanced reading, and wouldn’t be recommended for everyone. However, beyond my taste for business and science books, I thoroughly enjoy fictional novels. I’m not too selective on a genre as you can see, as long as it is well written with a sustainable plot (although one or two may be questionable at that, but has other positive attributes).
If you happen to think of any, feel free to post it as a comment. Please note that all comments are moderated for spam or highly offensive material.
More pictures added
I just added more than 100 pictures to the trip section, including images from Portland, OR and Minneapolis, MN. Check them out here.
Reading that USPS $1.2 MM blunder
They did what?! Spent how much?! My curlers are about to pop out!
I came online today, to check the site and the news, and about fell out of my chair. In 1 post I matched nearly 2-3 weeks worth of visitors. I was floored.
Which article was it? Post Office Buys $1.2 Million Dollar Home - sourced from CNN. That tells me right off the back at how much people are outraged over this blatant excess. Further than that, people are outraged and blatant excess period.
You can see it all around. People complain about banks buying jets and stadium naming rights (even though naming rights are really and advertising move, and companies need to advertise). The lashing auto execs got for flying into Washington in private jets with their pockets hanging out and shaking their cup. The people who still have that coveted disposable income either not spending it or doing it in stealth.
We have a right to be upset though. Over 12 million Americans are unemployed, and millions of others are underemployed. Millions of people are struggling to make it through this time, while others are still living the life. It can drive a person mad. Why should we starve while they are jet-setting, making it with billions of taxpayer bailout funds? Can’t we get a break? Heck, whatever happened to philanthropy? When we need the charitable help the most, it all dries up.
It’s a sickening cycle, but we can’t let it get us down. We are defined not by our strength in the good times, but for our strength in the bad. I can attest to far too many sleepless nights worrying about what happens next. Everytime my manager tells me to meet him when I get in, I get the jitters and thoughts start racing through my head of what am I going to do if I get laid off. What scares me is I don’t really know, and I’ve always got a plan. I’d get through it I guess, which is the attitude I need to get by. Thankfully it is always him asking me to pick up some extra work. But my nerves can only stretch so thin.
Remember that we are only guaranteed 2 things in life: death and taxes. Everything else we have to work for, to fight for. And if it isn’t worth fighting for, it isn’t worth it.
Notice to spammers
I will make this blunt. Any IP that is responsible for spamming will be blocked. Continued spamming from similar IP’s will result in an entire block being banned from this site. I have already blocked several. The most recent is actually from a server on a social content website.
I will not tolerate spamming of any sort. You can feel free to post a comment that includes your site or blog, but anything with multiple links, advertises products, or has any form of message that anyone can easily conclude was not hand written, this will be flagged, removed, and your IP blocked.
I may eventually set up an address to allow someone to address your concerns if you are unrightfully blocked, but for now, it is final. No warning.
More upgrades on the way for munky.org
I’ve currently been working on the back end of munky.org to improve it’s functionality in this web 2.0 world. All posts are now finding their way to my Twitter feed (here), along with new sharing and subscribing tools.
The theme is also going to get massaged out. I like it’s current lay out, but unfortunately there are some kinks in the css that I can’t tolerate (such as not allowing images to align with the text, not boxing in captions, etc.). I may take the time to convert this theme to the Carrington framework, but with Calculus 2 and Physics homework piling up, that may take some time.
It’s also taken some time for me to really find the direction I want this blog to go into. I’m more inclined to push it towards the finance, business world. Banking and the economy are major parts in my life, a byproduct of living in the 2nd largest financial center in the U.S. (Charlotte, NC), and working at the largest financial institution in the U.S. (Bank of America). I’ll still include other topics that I find of interest, but those issues will be the bulk of thing.
At least I’m honest enough to admit I’m not an expert. But as Philip Tetlock, a professor of organizational behavior at the Haas Business School at UC-Berkeley points out, experts are only slightly better than random generated forecasts. You can read the full article at CNNMoney here. So odds are, I might be even more reliable than these guys.
Thinking about adding more authors
Well, let’s face it, my life is fairly dull. I get up, go to school, go to work, go to school, come home, hopefully spend time with my daughter, work on homework, go to sleep, start the whole thing over again. In the meantime I find a bit of time to wrangle up this existance I call my online life. It sucks, lemme tell ya. Except for when I travel for work, life is a bunch of routine.
So right now I’m mulling over the idea of adding a few personalities here. I dunno if it’ll be a good fit or not, who knows. This may get interesting.
Pardon the mess
After searching all over the freakin internet to find a theme, I find one I really like: but it’s in German. It was also written before widgets were alive. So yea. You’re just going to have to learn a little of the German language till I get this cleared up.
Blogroll
News Sites
Political
Where are we from?
Times Business & Tech- Mark Hurd: Who Will Hire the Ousted Hewlett-Packard CEO? September 4, 2010
- Lights, Camera, Groceries!: Tesco Supermarket Turns Film Producer September 4, 2010
- Toyota: New Car-Safety Issue Hits Company After Recalls September 4, 2010
- Study: Young, Single, Childless Women Earn More Than Men September 4, 2010
- Seeking Alpha Financial News
- The Cost of Bernanke's Failure-Aversion September 4, 2010
- Hurricane Earl, And Other Threats to Insurers September 3, 2010
- Will the FCIC Report Be a Whitewash? September 3, 2010
- Friday FX Interest Rate Monitor September 3, 2010
