September 30, 2005
Miserable Failure
Taken directly from My Little Problem:SEO wizardry or Popular opinion?
Googlebombing 'failure'
9/16/2005 12:54:00 PM
Posted by Marissa Mayer, Director of Consumer Web Products
If you do a Google search on the word [failure] or the phrase [miserable failure], the top result is currently the White House’s official biographical page for President Bush. We've received some complaints recently from users who assume that this reflects a political bias on our part. I'd like to explain how these results come up in order to allay these concerns.
Google's search results are generated by computer programs that rank web pages in large part by examining the number and relative popularity of the sites that link to them. By using a practice called googlebombing, however, determined pranksters can occasionally produce odd results. In this case, a number of webmasters use the phrases [failure] and [miserable failure] to describe and link to President Bush's website, thus pushing it to the top of searches for those phrases. We don't condone the practice of googlebombing, or any other action that seeks to affect the integrity of our search results, but we're also reluctant to alter our results by hand in order to prevent such items from showing up. Pranks like this may be distracting to some, but they don't affect the overall quality of our search service, whose objectivity, as always, remains the core of our mission.
How many "Pranksters" does it take to cause a result like that?
Cary's response: I dunno but I'm certainly game!Posted by Bastique at 9:26 PM | Comments (0)
September 29, 2005
Day 32 Nicotine Free
So, give me another 58 days and I’ll mark this one thing Accomplished. I have two more months to go, but I’m already feeling confident that I can make this permanent. Anytime now I get the craving, I wait. It goes away. The tricky part at this point is operating under the misguided belief that I am now a non-smoker, so it won’t hurt to have one.
That is simply insanity.
Posted by Bastique at 11:56 PM | Comments (2)
September 28, 2005
What's up?
I'm actually not asking my readers that question, it's just the title of the song in my head by 4 Non Blondes
My last entry was on September 22. I haven't paid my blog any attention. You know; the last thing I want to do is let this get away from me again. Bad Cary!
Especially since I can always throw together a few words in just a few minutes. I have no excuse whatsoever!
So, what's going on? I haven't had a cigarette in 31 days. This is a truly amazing accomplishment! Last time I quit was April 2004, and it was easy, but I decided at my class reunion that I could pick up just one...and then one more. Let's just say that I will never be a social smoker, and I have to remember that one cigarette for me is the same as ten thousand cigarettes, and more.
If you're on my main page, look on the left column. As of this moment, I've saved $85.11 in not smoking the 486 cigarettes I haven't smoked. At 90 days, I'm taking that money and getting tattoo number 4.
For all you Michael lovers out there... thirteen days from now I'll be driving up to the beginning of the panhandle of Florida to go pick him up from Eglin. Wednesday morning of October 12, 2005, I had better have pulled up to the west entrance of Eglin Air Force Base or else they'll take him back. Keep your fingers crossed that I have no problems.
My softball team, the Tigers, have won a game, now! Our record is now 1-2. I didn't get to play for a second week because of a second injury I sustained during practice. This time I pulled my groin muscle. Coach wouldn't let me play. I hope I get out on the field one day! They said I made an exceptional good bat boy.
Cheer me on...
Posted by Bastique at 9:36 PM | Comments (3)
September 22, 2005
Day 26
What will make it easier to stay quit once it’s official is letting go of the reasons that I smoked and talking honestly about when I want to smoke. Today the desire to light up came with heightened stress at work. I’m grateful that my desire to stay smoke-free was stronger.
What I miss about smoking is being able to use a cigarette to get away and regroup. Now I need to find a new way of doing that.
Possibilities? Just going outside and taking a walk around my building is one idea. I know there’s some yoga things that might help too. Of course I still need to learn yoga.
Anyway, quitting smoking can be done, even by a die-hard like me! I’m going to do it!
Posted by Bastique at 10:43 PM | Comments (0)
September 20, 2005
Michael's impending homecoming
In case anyone is wondering, Michael has 21 days and one night to go in his stay at Camp Snoopy, aka Eglin Federal Work Camp just outside of Fort Walton Beach Florida. On October 12, at 8 in the morning, I'll be picking him just outside the main gate, driving ten to twelve hours back and dropping him off at the halfway house in Dania Beach.
It's been a long two and a half years.
The last weeks have been pretty screwed up too, and I've been so bummed out not being able to talk to him on the phone, because the prison phone system for the entire Southern Region of the Bureau of Prisons is located where? You guessed it: New Orleans. Why doesn't the BOP let the inmates direct dial for a few weeks until it's back up? You think our government could show just the tiniest bit of humanity.
Well, I'm sure the administration's response is "What did prisoners do before the invention of the telephone? They'll survive." Those bastards.
Posted by Bastique at 10:31 PM | Comments (0)
September 18, 2005
Baby store
I don't know if this happens to anyone else, but sometimes I'll look at a word I've read fifty thousand times before and suddenly it just seems wrong. In a book I recently read, I came to a stop at the word, infantry, and if it didn't jump off the page and slap me in the face. I had to go so far as open my spell checker in MS Word to be certain it was spelled right--and certainly enough, it was!
From the looks of this Japanese ad,
blond haired, blue eyed babies are a
big seller in Tokyo!But if you didn't know what infantry meant, it would seem to mean “childish behaviour” in the same sense as gallantry is the act of being gallant. Or worse yet, like you'll find baked goods at a bakery, infantry could mean a store that sells babies (The French could have, perhaps, an Enfenterie, commes la Poissonerie). Or, heaven forbid, like hosery and finery, infantry could literally mean “infants meant to be worn.”
English is certainly a weird language.
Posted by Bastique at 5:11 PM | Comments (0)
September 15, 2005
Day 18
One thing that gets easy to remember is that the craving will pass. Cravings always pass. Usually the craving passes within five minutes. As long as I don’t give in to it, I’m home free.
Someone once told me there are three big threes to quitting smoking. The first three days are the hardest. Then the first three weeks. Finally the first three months. I’m almost at the three week mark.
I’m pretty certain I’ve done it. But time will tell. I’ll keep you all informed.
Posted by Bastique at 5:23 PM | Comments (3)
September 13, 2005
Rush Limbaugh is a filthy pig
I've long felt that Rush Limbaugh was a deplorable, cretinous monster whose only purpose is to connive tens of millions of Americans into believing the propaganda meat grinder spewed out by the con wing of the Republican Party. There is no depth that he won't sink in order to vomit up his poisonous diatribe, no matter how farcical, slanderous or venomous, and completely without regard to those people who he might hurt.
I developed a brand new hatred for Rush when I heard his latest sickening and irrelevant diatribe wherein he says that liberals are jumping for joy because of the Katrina tragedy, because it offers them an opportunity to take Bush down. His vindictiveness is appalling—nobody is using the Katrina tragedy in this manner.
But I just think Rush is projecting...forgetting the way the cons twisted the 9/11 disaster, a tragedy that initially brought Americans together. The cons actually exploited this tragedy in order to start the war in Iraq, something that has financially benefited certain corporations helping to "rebuild." Someone was cheering then, all the way to the bank!
It's the cons who have no regard for human life—because as long as they can make money—Halliburton is getting contracts out of the New Orleans disaster?
The cons are abusing us over and over again, and Rush is banking on it. Rush has the same blood on his hands that the rest of them have.
He is a filthy pig.
I Photoshop'd the picture (obviously), but the original photograph, not too different, may be found at SPQR, a rather interesting blog.
Posted by Bastique at 9:18 PM | Comments (1)
September 12, 2005
Day 15
I won’t say that my lungs have improved terribly yet, but I do feel somewhat better, and the fact that I made it this long has made a serious impact on my well being. I have a lot of faith that when all is said and done, I will ultimately be a non-smoker.
I am already seeing myself as such.
Posted by Bastique at 8:53 PM | Comments (1)
September 10, 2005
Whose failure?
Who says there's plenty of blame to pass around? What a crock of BS.
The states are not responsible for coordinating this sort of effort because hurricanes almost alwasy affect multiple states. The city and state's responsibility is to request assistance from the Federal Agency. The city and state both met that portion of their responsibility responsibility. If you heard the governor of Louisiana didn't declare an emergency, she did on the Friday before the hurricane. It's documented. However, word got out among conservative pundits and columnists that she didn't and people have kept repeating it as the gospel truth, even though it was false. This kind of thing happens.
The state did all that it could. The city of New Orleans as well as the Governor of Louisiana begged the federal government for money to repair the levees and were turned down. Homeland Security said it was "pork barrel" spending. New Orleans couldn't possibly have done more than it did.
The blame goes entirely to the Federal government because the Federal Agency is responsible for coordinating efforts.
Michael Brown was never qualified (he was last employed as an Arabian horse show judge[?], a job from which he was fired). Neither was his predecessor Bush appointee, who is now a lobbyist for Halliburton (Dick Cheney's company). The current administration has regularly handed out positions to unqualified individuals as return on favors.
My question is how come we're just now finding out about these things? Well, today's media is either gutless or a part of the machine. The only way you get to find facts is by listening to left-wing radio or talk, which has its own share of slant, by searching on the internet, or listening to BBC or other foreign sources. You won't hear it on the evening news. (A white couple in deep water with groceries found groceries, a young black man in the same water with groceries looted his.)
I know it's hard to believe that the top level administration is fraught with corruption, graft and cronyism, because--well--we're talking about the PRESIDENT and his CABINET, right? Unimaginable. Mark my words. The wall is already beginning to come apart. Republican congressional members are quickly distancing themselves from the administration. To win reelection next year? Who knows, but it's evident that this is just the tip of the iceberg.
Michael Brown is really the first to go. Let's hope that he's not the last.
Posted by Bastique at 2:31 PM | Comments (0)
September 7, 2005
Catching Up
What's been going on with me? Well, since I have trouble with short to long term memory retention, I'm afraid you're going to have to settle for the last month or so.
I had some kind of mass removed from my rectum. Surgery was interesting and I want to thank my good friend Jeff for hanging around the hospital and waiting with me while I waited to go in to surgery (which was scheduled at 3, and didn't happen until past 6).
I found out I have emphysema. I've been without cigarettes now for 10 days. My breathing has improved, although my allergies have been kicking up!
I had another roommate move out. This was not a bad thing, this one was next to useless.
Michael has another 35 days before leaving Eglin Federal Prison Camp. That's something to cross my fingers about.
UPDATE 9/11
Hey... but I've still got a damn good life, you know? I have a great house on the water with a swimming pool. I've got good friends. What else can you ask for?Posted by Bastique at 10:41 PM | Comments (4)
September 6, 2005
Day 9
One day at a time.
Posted by Bastique at 9:09 PM | Comments (0)
United sucks, Miss Thing
United Healthcare of Florida is at it again... Now they've gone and told my my company's entire account has been canceled. Which, of course, is not true.
The girl on the phone was so condescending. I said why couldn't United consider the hurricane might have messed things up. She said, "The hurricane was in New Orleans." I said (my exact words), "Miss Thing, I live in South Florida and I assure you we had a hurricane". She didn't seem to get too offended by a white man calling her "Miss Thing." I guess I must have said it in the right tone of voice.
What is wrong with insurance companies? I guess I should count my blessings.
Posted by Bastique at 7:36 PM | Comments (0)
September 5, 2005
The Hurricane's underreported victims
AOL.com had an article entitled Evacuees Distraught Over Lost Pets that I just had to click into. As if I haven't been crying enough over the human suffering wrought by Hurricane Katrina, I am now upset about the loss of companion life as well. It was saddening and distressing to find out that people were forced to euthanize their animals rather than allowing their pets to suffer in the aftermath without them.
Thank God the article provided a link to another site: petfinder.com, which offers news and information about the under-reported rescue effort for animals. You can read all about that here: at Petfinder.com Disasster/Emergency Response. It is a great relief to know that the Louisiana SPCA and Mississippi SPCA are coordinating efforts to rescue stranded pets throughout New Orleans and the affected Gulf Coast areas. They will even be posting pictures in the next few days in order that families may be reunited with their loving companions.
There are, at least, some happy notes.
Posted by Bastique at 9:01 PM | Comments (2)
September 4, 2005
Shame on the Administration
It's a good time to restart entries on the blog, and with the devistation from Katrina's wake, I've got a few commetns I feel I need to make.
If you haven't heard, people are still suffering in New Orleans, even a week later. While nobody wants to politicise the problem, there is somthing that has become clear because of the "unforseen" events.
The administration, who could not have forseen the levees breaking, shunted the money to fix the fractures to Iraq--not to the soldiers who are fighting the administration's war, but to the corporations who stand to make billions upon billions in Iraq's rebuilding.
The administration drove resources, like the National Guard of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama to Iraq, when they should have been here, ready for an emergency. Plus, the administration cut FEMA's funding, and reversed all of Clinton's changes to the organization, makign it a substandard organziation, answerable to the Homeland Security office. If Katrina occurred in 1998, FEMA would have been able to mobilize the evacuation from New Orleans of the poor and infirmed, saving countless lives, and the Guard would have been ready to build makeshift bridges within days, freeing more people from the deteriorating conditions and ongoing looting.
The administration, ever quick to respond to crises on the other side of the world, couldn't get its shit together before possibly hundreds more people died days after Katrina passed, from starvation, exposure, or violence taking place in the disorganization following Katrina's wake. The adminstration's response? "They (The Poor) should have evacuated before the storm!" In the words of another elite: Let them eat cake!
Of course, nobody could have predicted Hurricane Katrina. Nor whatever other events or disasters our nation is ill prepared for in the coming years. Removing the United States from the Kyoto Protocol in 2001 because of Corporate Greed effectively crippled the one worthwhile international effort to reverse global warming. Shame on the Administration.
The new wing of the Republican party has an "Every Man for Himself" attitude when it comes to governmental spending--i.e., spend only when it benefits the people in power. This philosophy is inevitably flawed, and as we move forward into the twenty-first century, as the difference between the haves and the have-nots becomes greater, the holes in the philosophy will continue to expand.
There is nothing good to be gained from the tragic events in New Orleans, Louisiana, Mississippi or Alabama. But if people finally open their eyes to the fraud and corruption present in the present administration, and to a lesser extent, the government, and votes in a different variety of people in 2006, we can at least have hope that this will never happen again.
Posted by Bastique at 6:49 PM | Comments (0)