The Effects of Getting Spanked by Google…

rmiles7721November 15, 20078Technology

Updated – Just got home from several hours of meetings this evening. What an enjoyable day off 🙂

All of my sites except for this one have been dropped to PR0 now, but it’s the same for some of the bigger guys such as Techcrunch as well, so whatever Google is doing has broken some serious shit. Hopefully whatever it is will get fixed soon.

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It’s interesting to see what’s happened with some of my visits since Google decided I am an asshole.

zextreme

This is a screenshot from one of the counters I use. Historically, compared to Sitemeter, Google Analytics and AWStats ZExtreme only seems to record about half of my actual visits, so the numbers themselves should be doubled but it should give you an idea of what I am talking about. I suppose since I have paid links links and don’t use the nofollow tag like they think I should, I have been bumped like 50 places on any and all searches that might bring people here. Joke ’em if they can’t take a fuck. The only searches they seem to let through are from images.Google.com and I am getting ready to block that shit.

I am torn about the whole thing anyway. Has the content gotten worse? No, not necessarily. I still post the same old crap except that I think maybe it’s improved slightly. I post more often and write longer. I am getting like ten times the amount of comments than I was prior to that, and THAT’s what blogging is all about for me anyway. The participation and communication between people.

The only part of the whole thing that sucks is that it DOES effect my income and I don’t like the fact that Google is basically telling us that the only relevant paid links or searches are those which IT performs and if all your base don’t belong to Google, then you are dogshit. So am I taking down my Google AdSense advertisements on the sidebar? Nope, they are still performing, although slowly. I am considering giving in though and adding nofollow back into all of the links that I can.

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Airport Screeners Missed Bomb Parts

rmiles7721November 15, 2007Site News

GAO investigators smuggle liquid explosives and detonators past airport security, exposing a dangerous hole in the nations ability to keep these forbidden items off of airplanes.

According to the TSA the investigators only got past one level of security out of eight. My questions why didn’t they try to get through the others, or what exactly are the other levels of security that would have caught them trying to sneak it in? I would be interested in hearing more details about the investigation as well as the security procedures myself.

The GAO has not detailed the weak points since it is sensitive information but says that they can be figured out from public information.

The TSA is spouting about new technologies and ways to detect more stuff. My main concern is whether it’s automated or human? Humans are certainly fallible and there are going to be mistakes. I see us heading toward the day where you have to be strip searched before you get on a plane, or maybe even given temporary disposable clothing for your trip. It’s not as far fetched as that might seem. Thank goodness I don’t have to fly often.

Reverb Syndicate…

rmiles7721November 15, 2007Entertainment

It’s funny how you can get sidetracked so easily.

By ‘YOU’ I mean ‘ME’ of course.

I was researching a keyword on Benjamin Stanford so that I could find more news stories and maybe write a bit more about him when I came across this video from the Reverb Syndicate over at Youtube. The name is ‘I Am The New Number Two’. The first thing that came to my mind was ‘The Prisoner’ with Patrick McGoohan from 1967. No, I am not that old. Actually I am, but I was still in diapers at that point in time, but back in the early seventies thanks to my mom and dad I fell in love with several different television shows. The Prisoner, The Saint, The Avengers, stuff like that. I still love them and if one is on TV I have to watch.

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“The Prisoner” is a unique piece of television. It addresses issues such as personal identity and freedom, democracy, education, scientific progress, art and technology, while still remaining an entertaining drama series. Over seventeen episodes we witness a war of attrition between the faceless forces behind ‘The Village’ (a Kafkaesque community somewhere between Butlins and Alcatraz) and its most strong willed inmate, No. 6. who struggles ceaselessly to assert his individuality while plotting to escape from his captors.

What’s all that got to do with the Reverb Syndicate? Not a god damned thing except that their music evokes that time period for me like certain smells bring back specific memories and times. Here’s the video I found at YouTube.

Damn good stuff.

So what do you do when you find something like this? You, I mean I, head your happy ass over to iTunes and see what their other stuff is like and buy the album that is there, The Jet Set!

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Even the ‘album’ cover elicits memories of the ’60s and early ’70s, Ian Fleming, Roger Moore as the Saint and all of the other Spy movies and TV shows that were out at the time. The Reverb Syndicate has a web page (who doesn’t?) that you can visit here. Apparently Operation:Jet Set is their only album that’s out now but they have another coming soon. These guys are out of Canada and are sort of a mixture of blues/surf music. All instrumental from the couple of tunes I have heard so far.

 

Thursday Thirteen #7 – The Best Call-In Excuses I’ve Heard Recently

rmiles7721November 15, 20078Site News


Thirteen Lame Excuses I’ve Heard When People Call In To Work.

  1. Last Christmas one of my cooks and his wife, a waitress, called in on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Apparently he had gotten drunk and in a fight with his neighbors, so the police came and locked him up. Needless to say he was unemployed the next day. Christmas is by far one of the busiest days of the year for us and unless you are in the hospital or someone has died, EVERYONE works Christmas. I know, it sucks, but it’s just the nature of the business and I always make sure to tell people BEFORE they take the job that they will be expected to work ALL holidays and weekends.
  2. A couple of years ago I posted about this one. A waitress called in on me because her dog had died. Perhaps I am just an insensitive bastard but I feel like when you make a commitment to something like a job you take that commitment seriously.
  3. ‘My Chicken Died’ The same lady that hung me because her dog died, a few months later a chicken died and she called in as well. NOW you see why I was so pissed off about her missing work when the dog died.
  4. ‘I ran over a snake’. Guess who called in because of this. Yep, the SAME damn crazy lady.
  5. ‘I have a dentist’s appointment and I have to go to probation’. Now these are both darn good reasons to not go to work but since my managers hang their schedules up at least a week in advance one would think that the person referred to would have let their manager know well ahead of time what was going on. Nope, he waited until 30 minutes prior to his shift starting. Got this one yesterday!
  6. ‘I fell down the steps and broke two toes and have to keep my foot elevated for a week’. This was just a couple of months ago and was one of my managers.
  7. Ran out of gas. I hear this at least once a month. They don’t call and say they are going to be LATE, they run out of gas and I suppose it’s so traumatic that they have to miss an entire day of work.
  8. ‘I’m on my period’. No offense to all of the lovely ladies out there but I’ve been married for almost twenty years and when my wife is on her period she still goes to work. As a manager I kept a supply of multiple sizes of tampons in the office and you just didn’t call in with this excuse unless you wanted to be unemployed. My managers are a bit too nice and will believe anything.
  9. ‘My Clothes are Still Wet’. This happens when you are too damned stupid to do your laundry in a timely manner. My stock answer is generally that once you get to work if you walk real fast your clothes will dry faster.
  10. Too drunk to work. At least he was honest with me. I let him keep his job because he had the guts to at least tell me the truth unlike others that just show up drunk and have to be sent home. Been there, done that (on both accounts). I even slept under my cubicle at the office with the phone next to my head after one particularly drunk episode a few years back.
  11. ‘My husband stole my car and got arrested and they impounded my car’. Oh yeah, this was recently. Now that I have three times the number of employees I did as a manager I get three times the garbage.
  12. ‘I have to clean my house before Family and Children Services get here’. WTF? Apparently there are some other issues aside from your house being f’ing nasty.
  13. ‘I have a pimple’. ??? Not even an excuse like ‘My herpes sores are oozing’ but ‘I have a PIMPLE!’ You need to find a job where you do nothing but talk on a phone or speaker apparently.

    The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

San Francisco Oil Spill Photos

rmiles7721November 15, 2007Site News

Just a group of photos put into a slideshow concerning the oil spill in San Francisco.

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Vacation Coming

rmiles7721November 15, 2007Travel

I have to sit down this evening an write out a vacation plan for 2008. I have the requests from two of my managers and that should be fun to deal with. Two of their vacation requests overlap each other. I asked one of them yesterday which none was more important to her since they are both going to have to adjust the dates on one each. She has reservations for Disney for the first one so the second one will have to be moved and the other lady is going to have to adjust hers.

Still don’t know when I am going to be taking mine. All six of their vacation dates are right smack in the middle of when I normally take mine, so I am going to have to take mine at some other time. I thought about taking the first one in February. If the wife’s friend in Hilton Head still has not moved by then we may go visit her. That would be pretty cool. She lives in a really nice area of Bluffton, SC. The neighborhood she lives in is huge. There is a pool, and horse stables and some really beautiful luxury homes right around there I enjoy driving around just to look at.

I am still considering taking my ten day vacation at the beginning of June. That would work out very well and if we can ditch the girls for a few days, maybe go down to the keys. It will be the off season and a bit cheaper at that time. I can deal with a bit of heat in order to save some money..

Too Politically Correct

rmiles7721November 14, 20071Site News

One of my employees asked me today what we were going to do about Christmas decorations this year. My response was that we would put up limited decorations just as always. She started talking about how people have been acting the last couple of years about Christmas and how it’s not PC. I don’t particularly give a shit myself. I am not a Christian yet I still enjoy Christmas. It is on of my favorite times of year and you don’t have to be a Christian to enjoy the season and decorate. It really pisses me off that people cave in to that bullshit.

Attack of the Hallucinogenic Toad Licker…

rmiles7721November 14, 20072Site News

Back in the day my nickname was ‘the drug’. I’m not necessarily proud of it, but things are what they are. I got the nickname because I was the guinea pig. The dude that would try everything and anything to see if you could get wasted. Many brain cells were wasted, that’s for darn sure. One thing I never tried was Toad-Licking but I have heard of it. Apparently a Kansas City dude has as well because he caught one and started licking it. And got high. And got busted. hehe.

It’s illegal to lick toads? What’s up with that?

Here’s the news report from Newscom…

 

So did I ever tell you that my penis was hallucinogenic? No? Come on over and give it a lick…

Alabama Teen Died From Gunshot Wound

rmiles7721November 14, 2007Site News

For the last week or so we’ve had flyers up in my restaurant for missing Alabama teen Benjamin Stanford, who was last seen in Anniston, Alabama on the 5th. His Jeep Cherokee turned up in the town where my three stores are located, just about seven miles from my house and they have been searching the area ever since.

Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday there have been choppers flying all over the area as well as a pretty hefty police presence. As a matter of fact, although it’s completely unrelated, when I arrived at my meeting Monday afternoon at one of my restaurants, there were about eight officers with weapons drawn in the parking lot of the motel that sits behind it. I went inside pretty quickly although I was torn between staying outside and shooting some photos and actually going in to the meeting. Apparently it was a drug bust in one of the rooms but with all of the cops I saw yesterday it made me think about it.

I had to go to the Home Depot yesterday shortly before lunch to get some paint (which I have spent the last two days using in my stores) and as I was leaving I went out the back way up a road alongside a car dealership. There must have been 20 or 30 police cars from several different jurisdictions as well as news crews all hanging around. I kind of figured that they must have found the boy and sure enough they did.

According to the Carroll County Coroner, Sammy Eady, he had a gunshot wound consistent with suicide, but the Sheriff’s department is investigating anyway. His body was found about a 1000 feet from where his jeep turned up a few days ago.

Lot’s of excitement for my small but growing area and certainly not the kind of excitement anybody particularly wants. I feel bad for his family, regardless of whether Stanford killed himself or if there was foul play involved. Losing a child has got to be one of the most awful things that a parent can go through.

 

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One Way To Get Rid of Cell Phones

rmiles7721November 14, 2007Technology

Although I have several (quite a few actually) old cell phones stashed in my desk drawer, some of them broken, I can’t seem to bring myself to throw them out (how’s THAT for a run on sentence by golly?!). My local Verizon dealer has a bin where I can take them and dump them but that’s 20 miles away and I just never seem to find the free time to just go get rid of them. Apparently I’m not the only one because something like 100 million cell phones are retired each year according to CellForCash, who offers us a way to recycle cell phones and actually pays cash for them. Very sweet. There is quite a bit of useful information over at their site. Here is the latest press release from CellForCash.

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This America Recycles Day CellForCash.com Wants to Pay You to Recycle Your Old Cell Phones More than 100 million cell phones are retired each year in the United States, and most are just stashed away adding to an already hazardous stockpile. CellForCash.com lets you upgrade without the guilt when you sell your old cell phone online. OCALA, FL, November 14, 2007 –- Has the latest cell phone in the TV commercials got your number? Do you want to upgrade your feature-challenged cell phone for the feature-rich model and do the right thing for the environment? CellForCash.com enables you to upgrade without the guilt by recycling your old cell phone for cash. Over the last few years the environmental hazard discarded cell phones can cause has become a growing concern. Research has found cell phones to leach hazardous levels of lead when disposed of in landfill conditions. As a result, programs banning electronic devices from regular trash pickups are becoming more common throughout the country. Some research suggests that less than 10% of cell phones are recycled. Others say only about 5% of people will recycle their old cell phones, and a few actually do throw them in the garbage. In any event, every month more and more cell phones are added to the stockpile. “America Recycles Day is a great time to remind people that the old cell phone they have stashed away shouldn’t be trashed,” said James Mosieur, CEO of RMS Communications, the company that operates CellForCash.com. “Responsibly recycling an old cell phone is free, easy, and it may even come with a payoff.” Mosieur encourages people to visit CellForCash.com before buying a new cell phone. “Consumers should be determined to recycle even before they choose a new phone,” he says. “Besides, getting $20 for your old phone could make the difference between getting the model you want and just settling for the one you can afford”. CellForCash.com pays for over 600 different models of used cell phones and then re-markets them around the world. Payouts range from just a few dollars to well over $200 for each qualifying cell phone. If your phone does not qualify for payment, CellForCash.com will recycle it for free. Printing a pre-paid mailing label from the website and handing the package to your postman is a lot more convenient than going to the local landfill. Some recycled cell phones are used in the company sponsored 911 Cell Phone Bank program, which provides no-cost emergency cell phones to the elderly and victims of abuse throughout the country. Over 1,500 cell phones are donated to law enforcement and other agencies every month. “Phone upgrades do create a dilemma for the environmentally responsible, especially since most people already have a few stockpiled,” Mosieur said. “But as more consumers learn about recycling solutions like CellForCash.com, they’ll realize there is an immediate payoff for recycling; cash today and a healthy environment in the future.” About CellForCash.com CellForCash.com pays cash for used cell phones, and makes the process simple by displaying the phones it will buy and the prices it will pay for them right on the web site. It also provides sellers with already-addressed, postage-paid mailing boxes. The site lists over 600 models from 21 manufacturers including Motorola, Nokia, LG, and Samsung. For more information visit the web site at www.CellForCash.com. ####

This Post was Sponsored by CellForCash.com