“You’re meant to be online for your own reasons not for everyone else’s.”
This was something a friend told me a few years ago. Ever since, it has been
something I have pondered from time to time. At first blush it seems a simple
enough thing and is fairly straightforward in nature and it is. But the longer
you think about it the more you have to ask yourself, What is my reason for
being online in first place?
Until about 12 years ago the internet and home computers in general were
mostly just a novelty, and a fairly pricey one at that, for most people. Now
though they are pretty much a commonplace thing in most homes. But it
still leaves that question, What are your reasons for being online? Before
the internet we managed to get information by going to a library and meet
people without viewing their “profile” or MySpace page and sent letters via
the postal service or made a phone call. Or just went to their house for a
visit.
Of course before that if we wanted to meet someone from another country
we had to travel to their country unless we met them traveling in our own.
Now, we can have friends on the other side of the planet that we may never
actually meet face to face.
When I first got online it was, for me, a way to find information. Mostly information
that wasn’t readily available to me where I live. For a very long time I merely wandered
the internet, exploring and lurking, never actively participating. Then one day I
finally took the headlong plunge and started posting on a forum and got hooked
on it. For a long time I contented myself with merely posting on other people’s
forums and sites. For some reason I still am not entirely sure of I built my first
website on Geocities. Some of my online friends may still remember that first
attempt at building a website. It wasn’t very pretty and it in retrospect, it looked
amateurish. And that is a kind description IMO. (Hey, my site, my opinion.)
After that I got the wild hair to make my own forum, the first Bastion. It looked
a little rough around the edges too as I recall it. Ok, a lot rough but not too bad
for my first “serious” attempt at building one. A year and a half later came The
Bastion’s second incarnation, this time as a .com, this site in it’s first form. It was
rushed into service before I was completely ready because things with my business
on eBay went to Hell in a a hand basket due to them jacking their fees up. I scrambled
to find alternative auctions and found one to put my stuff in while I got The Bastion’s
own store online, something that took me two months of bumbling around to do
before I finally got it to work the way I wanted it to. The rest of the was fairly
easy since the bulk of it was the old SMF forum, the old blog and the gallery. The
other parts came more slowly since I had to make them from scratch and was still
learning.
And we come back the original question, What is my reason for being online?
Dunno, I’ll get back to you on that when I figure it out myself.
Come on now, you clicked the link so you have to take the
time to read it. I know, you’d rather go back to sleep but
it’s time to open those peepers. It only happens once
a month and you like reading the site news.
This is what happens when the webmaster gets too bored and
has time on his hands. It may change from time to time depending
on what new ideas pop into my warped mind.
Bastion Special Projects is taking a bit longer than I
originally thought it would. Lots of ideas for it but
I am having a bit of trouble deciding what to focus
on the most.
And I would like to thank beast for inspiring this
idea. The Eclectic Commonwealth web ring, unlike
most webrings, is not a niche type arrangement.
It is open to almost any webs site, blog, or forum
that wants to be part of it.
OUR universe appears to be unfathomably uniform. Look across space from one edge of the visible universe to the other, and you’ll see that the microwave background radiation filling the cosmos is at the same temperature everywhere. That may not seem surprising until you consider that the two edges are nearly 28 billion light years apart and our universe is only 14 billion years old.
Nothing can travel faster than the speed of light, so there is no way heat radiation could have travelled between the two horizons to even out the hot and cold spots created in the big bang and leave the thermal equilibrium we see now.
This “horizon problem” is a big headache for cosmologists, so big that they have come up with some pretty wild solutions. “Inflation”, for example.
You can solve the horizon problem by having the universe expand ultra-fast for a time, just after the big bang, blowing up by a factor of 1050 in 10-33 seconds. But is that just wishful thinking? “Inflation would be an explanation if it occurred,” says University of Cambridge astronomer Martin Rees. The trouble is that no one knows what could have made that happen, but see Inside inflation: after the big bang.
So, in effect, inflation solves one mystery only to invoke another. A variation in the speed of light could also solve the horizon problem - but this too is impotent in the face of the question “why?” In scientific terms, the uniform temperature of the background radiation remains an anomaly.
Ummkay, who can point out the problems here?
The first thing that pops out at me is this…
“That may not seem surprising until you consider that the two edges are nearly 28 billion light years apart and our universe is only 14 billion years old.”
Didn’t we go through this a few hundred years ago? As I recall it, it was Copernicus
that stuck his neck out and suggested that the Earth was not the center of
the bloody universe!
Oh, wait, heres a lovely Wikipedia article about it…
Now it seems that allegedly modern astronomers have taken a long step
back and decided that our little spinning rock is the center of the universe.
Hmmm…
Could it be that the 14 billion light years we can see in any given direction might just
be as far as our telescopes can see? Admittedly 14 billion light years is a long damn
way to see but it also implies that logic has been put on the shelf so some jackass can
draw a paycheck for not using the gray matter between his ears! Until someone can
show me empirical data proving me wrong, the Earth is not the center of the universe!
To think otherwise implies an arrogance that is utterly mind staggering.
Next up…
”Nothing can travel faster than the speed of light, so there is no way heat radiation could have travelled between the two horizons to even out the hot and cold spots created in the big bang and leave the thermal equilibrium we see now.”
Proof? Can anyone prove beyond any doubt that nothing can travel
faster than the speed of light?
Now before you go on about this theory, that theory, and the other theory take into
account that they are theories. With all due respect to Einstein,
Hawking and all of the other brilliant minds engaged in academic pursuits, theory is
fine. Facts and proof are better. Theoretically, nothing can travel faster than light.
This does not mean that there is something we have yet to observe that could make
light look like a narcoleptic snail in comparison.
In theory I can make your piss turn blue if I focus my mind but I ain’t countin’ on it.
And finally…
“So, in effect, inflation solves one mystery only to invoke another. A variation in the speed of light could also solve the horizon problem - but this too is impotent in the face of the question “why?” In scientific terms, the uniform temperature of the background radiation remains an anomaly.”
So far the only anomaly I see is their lack of logic. I suppose Cambridge must be paying
by the hour so they have to cast all efforts at logic to the wayside to make a living.
Here is a logical theory for you to chew on Mr PhD, sir….
Some time beyond our feeble comprehension, the universe was formed and all the
matter was scattered far and wide. How far is hard for us to say as our current level
of technology limits us to a relatively small sphere of the vastness that is the universe
that is observable from our tiny planet. To assume that all we can see at this time is all
there is to see is foolish at best.
What are my credentials, you ask? My credentials are two eyes and a functional brain.
Apparently that is no longer a requirement for paid cosmologists.
Very few people are aware that in Mississippi we have some of the most
highly trained and skilled ninjas in the entire world. It’s true, We do!
Though you may be asking how can this be as the ninja is part of the
Japanese culture. Well, a long long time a small ninja clan moved from their
traditional home in Osaka, apparently the manufacturing plants made too
much noise for their liking, and transplanted themselves in my home town
and soon spread themselves far and wide around the entire state.
As an annual event they celebrate their “new” home by giving us non-ninja
a spectacular parade. i was fortunate enough to be offered the opportunity
to act a photographer and reporter at their request. (the fact they offered to
give me a wedgie with a sword if I didn’t had nothing to do with my decision…)
Here we have their famed, if hard to locate, head quarters and home. How many
ninjas live and work here? No one is entirely sure. Disguised as a vacant lot it has
ensured them a peaceful locale to practice their arts.
And they’re off on their steady march through the entire town. You can see that
they truly are masters of stealth. I’ve blown this picture up and used every filter
I have and have yet to find a single trace of them!
Here they stopped for a moment to show off the precision sword drill.
Amazing technique and superior form to any team I have ever seen!
I have noticed that all too many people seem utterly clueless when it comes to
how to use a doorbell in a proper and civil manner, having had my sleep disturbed
by more than one inconsiderate person randomly banging on the button like a
three year old banging pots in the kitchen…
As a general rule most people tend to get a little annoyed when their doorbell
rings repeatedly during the ten to twenty seconds it may take them to answer
the door. Yes, it is supposed to get our attention, No, we cannot magically
appear at the door on the first sounding of the chime. And no, pressing the
button every 0.5 seconds will not make us open the damned door any faster!
Now, onto the proper civilized way to use the doorbell…
Depress the doorbell button once and them stand back and count off thirty seconds
to yourself. If no one responds after thirty seconds you may repeat this process once. If
after the second thirty seconds has elapsed and no one has answered the door, you
may assume that: 1) No one is home. 2) Everyone is asleep or otherwise indisposed*.
* If the sun has gone down and it is after 9:00 PM, it is generally safe to say that
the home’s occupants have retired for the evening and it would be best to try again
at a later date (preferably during day time the next day).
The group walked cautiously down the dark corridor shivering
in the cold and damp. The leader of the small band held up one
hand and motioned one member of the group forward to investigate
an oddity in the left hand wall. The cunning little man studied the wall
with great care and then disaster struck, the wall crumbled and one
of the denizens of this place attacked with it’s full fury! The group
fought as well as they could given that they were unprepared for
this particular menace. A Webmaster! One of the horrors of this place
that bore ill will toward anyone intruding on it’s lair. This one
bore the most horrifying weapon…
SITE NEWS!
RUN FOR YOUR FREAKING LIVES!!!
What, it wasn’t that bad! Geeze…
I’ve been a little busier than normal in the alleged real world this
month so I haven’t really had time to add as much as I might
have liked to.
This is something that has been needed for a very long time. It
is basically an FAQ for the major areas of the site. Be sure to take
the tour, you might be surprised at some of the things here you
didn’t know about.
Yes oh, yes, I finally got the first part posted! In a way it is a
follow up to my first story “Intent”, it is set about 50 years
after that one. How long will it be? Where is it going? When
will part two be posted? Damned if I know! LMAO
I’m still getting the basic framework laid out for this stuff so
if the articles seem generic in nature that is because I am trying
to write them for a newbie rather than a seasoned webmaster.
Additionally, Bastion Special Projects is undergoing some slight
changes in it’s mission. I’ve decided to expand it’s general area
to cover bit more ground. This will include: The basics of Wordpress,
the basics of SMF and TinyPortal, The basics of XOOPS, and a number
of free hosted services such as Invisionfree forums, SMF for Free, and
a number of others that I have yet to finalize. I may also be doing
some work on Coppermine galleries, and if I am feel froggy, I may
look into PHPNuke but don’t hold me to that one just yet.
A movie review?!? Sure, why not. Will I be doing more reviews?
Dunno, I might. I may even throw in a few game reviews now
and then just for laughs. Why? Because, I can only write so many
articles on how to make things so quickly and quite honestly, I
get tired of posting news, lately the news has been about as
depressing as it can get.
On balance not a bad movie. I’d call it worth the time
if you have an hour and a half to kill and like zombie flicks.
But I have a few gripes…
What idiot decided that zombies/ghouls are supposed
to have super human speed, strength, and reflexes? They’re
supposed to be the living dead… Rigor mortise, postmortem
lividity, a distinct lack of reflexes, and a case of B.O. that Right
Guard can’t hide. Oh yes, and that shambling around looking
for someone to have for a light snack.
In all the older books and movies zombies were always fairly
slow and easy to deal with, just walk at a brisk pace and leave
them in the dust. Or if you were inclined, give their head a new
sun roof… Unless they got into a mob and then you needed
serious fire power to get them out of the way.
But oh no, not anymore, not after ‘28 Days Later’. No we get to
see zombies doing marathon sprints for the nearest walking
snack bar or in the new version of Day of the Dead we get to
see a few doing pretty good Spiderman impressions by
clinging to ceilings and walls. Maybe it’s time for a new
super hero… Zombieman, taking a bite out of crime! (LITERALLY!!!)
Of course they had to stop by the local gun shop to pick up
hardware to augment the whole two pistols that the army issued
them. Pistols, shotguns and a full auto Uzi and Mac 10. Why yes, all
local gun shops have Class 3 firearms just sitting around in case
someone has the sudden need of them. Naturally our heroes took the
time to load the magazines… and didn’t bother to grab any extra
ammo or clips. However, they did pick up a really cool machete that was
used two or maybe even three times before the person carrying it
became a zombie snack.
And next we have Bud the Zombie… In the original he
was just another lab rat that turned out to have remembered
that he had once been a solider. In the current one he is a
soldier that got nipped and turned into a zombie lusting after
his superior’s butt… Just watch the movie and try not to
laugh too hard at that.
In the old Whatever of the Living Dead movies no explanation
is ever given for exactly how or why there were undead wandering
the world. Now they have decided to make it a bio-warfare
agent gone awry. Social commentary maybe or just a weak
plot device to explain something that doesn’t really need
explaining?
One thing they used that I am uncertain of is the way the
living become the unliving. Instead of actually dropping dead
they simple sit or lie in a momentary state of paralysis and
their eyes turn cloudy and then off they dash looking to turn
their former friends and family into an all you can eat buffet.
On the bright side, at least they don’t have them literally coming
out of the grave.
It’s four in the morning, I was bored and wanted to write something
so this is what you get stuck with reading.
Your mission should you choo…. err… Not that either.
*blank stare and drooling by the Webmaster*
Give me a minute, I’ll think of something witty any minute
now.
*time passes (LOTS of it)*
Yeah… I got nothing.
So, I guess you’ll just have to read the monthly site news minus
a witty or insightful intro this month!
I’ve been tweaking things a bit around the site this month in addition
to everything else. The main gallery, game room and library have been
undergoing some “upgrades” of a sort, mostly me correcting mistakes
I made early on but either didn’t have the time or knowledge in how to
correct. Go to any of the above mentioned sections and mouse over the
in site links at the top of the pages. You’ll notice that they now have
tooltips that give more details about the links. Or if you scroll down to the
bottoms of the pages you will see some extra additions that I have been
wanting to add for quite some time now. There are other little improvements
that are not so readily apparent, like the addition of meta tags and such.
And I am in the process of (finally!) adding new wave pages! WooHoo!
In the area of writing we have a few new articles and whatnot…
We have a new poll, it’ll run until the 15th of July, so if you haven’t voted
yet, come on in and cast your vote.
And finally, I have taken the time to create an off-site archive on
Blogger. It’s still partly under construction but it does contain most
of the site’s major articles.
I imagine we have all heard the term “trade secret” at one time or another
but when you think about it, what is a “trade secret” anyway? I am of the
opinion that it is just an excuse used by those who know how to do something
to keep others ignorant of some supposedly secret or special knowledge that they
think will make or break their business.
Personally, I consider it to be a load of crap. Knowledge is worthless if only a
few hold it. Just because someone knows the how of something does not mean
that they have the skills or interest in learning the skills to take advantage of
that knowledge. So, I see no reason for “trade secrets”. When I first created this
site I had the goal of eventually sharing as much of my knowledge as possible
publicly.
So far I’ve been making some head way in sharing some of my own “trade secrets”.
Will sharing this knowledge hurt my business? I honestly doubt it. Not everyone
wants to learn the tricks of turning raw materials into finished goods. In fact I think
knowing how one of my knives or pieces of jewelry was created might actually give a
person a greater appreciation for the work that went into it’s creation.
As an aside…
In fact I think I can safely say this about the newer project I started with BSP. Some
webmasters tend to think that if surfers or even other webmasters know too much
about how their website works it will devalue it in their eyes somehow or that
someone will “steal” their ideas. I think I should say this now, There are few if any
new ideas on the internet anymore.
So the next time someone tells you something is a “trade secret”, ask yourself, Why?
Normally I try to make a blog entry that is something worth reading but Nah, not
today.
This is just a random and slightly pissed off rant today.
Someone’s probably already said this and probably far more eloquently than I
ever could but here’s my two cents worth on a few subjects…
The media drives me nuts with their blow dried hair and $10,000 + smiles
when they start yapping about how unemployment is up or down on any
given day. All they are quoting is how many people are drawing their
unemployment benefits!
Not how many people are stuck sitting around the house or at some job
center looking at some highly bored and employed person telling them that
either they are under qualified, over qualified, or that no one is hiring. Period.
How about all the people that aren’t drawing the benefits anymore?
Take a look at this from CNN (the irony is not lost on me here)…
*sarcasm by the gallon*
Gee, that doesn’t look too very bad does it? And that’s just the ones drawing
their benefits right now. Like I said, what about the poor (literally) bastards not
drawing anything now?!?
And then they (the media talking heads) go on to quote the latest figures on
“new jobs” that have been created… They don’t bother to mention that most
of these new jobs are flippin’ burgers at some fast food joint, bagging groceries,
or playing greeter at the newest Wal-Mart for just over minimum wage if they’re
lucky.
*sarcasm by the gallon*
Oh yeah, real career potential there!
You might be saying, But Shadow, they’ve got jobs at least.
HAH!
A job is something that you mostly hate but at least make enough money at not
to need to go to a food bank and ask for a handout! Or worse ask for the whole
$10 worth of food stamps they’ll allow you since that $8,999 a year you make is
$10 too much meaning you can supposedly afford food. Meanwhile you get to stand
next to a yuppie soccer mom sucking down a cup of Starbucks latte yakking on her
cell phone while you try to decide if a can of SPAM is in your budget for the month!
And that’s another thing I’m kinda pissed about…
I’ve seen at least two idjits floppin’ their gums grinning like loons on the tube
remarking that SPAM sales are on the rise. No, really? Ya think it might have
something to do with the general price of food that might make someone start
buying it now?!? or maybe it might be the next generation of head-for-the-hills
survivalists that used to be one of those soccer moms.
SPAM, everything-but-the-oink in a can. Well, I guess it’s a step above rationalizing
chowing down on a can of Alpo…
Speaking of these new survivalists, Kids, you’re taking it a step too far. I can
understand wanting to make a break from your old spend, spend, spend lifestyle
but going to the opposite extreme is no better. Going from cell phones, TV, and the
internet to a wood burning stove, and reading by candle light, and hiding in the
woods is silly in the extreme. Survival doesn’t mean living like Grizzly Adams.
And now for the political aspect of my ranting…
To all 2008 presidential candidates and their supporters, Shut up for a change, please.
Most of us are sick and tired of hearing and reading about your newest scandals
and half baked shit stirring comments. We don’t particularly care what church you go
to and we don’t really care if you go out and pretend to be like the “common” people
and drink beer and munch pizza. The only decent candidates are about 200 years in
the grave and none of you currently running can change that.
Ok, I’m done for now.
what, you think there’s more?!?
Sheesh.. Give ‘em a paragraph and they expect a book…
I’ll be adding more articles to The Eclectica and BSP soon
so keep an eye out.
I’ve also been working on a new story but it won’t be ready for
a bit longer yet. It’s writing itself and hasn’t decided to finish
itself yet. lol
In addition to writing I’ve been adding a few new goodies to
the store. With a little luck I’ll have some more items added
by the time next months news is posted.
Now to make an announcement about a major change
in site policy… (relax, no floggings for morale improvement. YET)
After adding BSP with the Paypal donation buttons I took a
long time to consider the idea of adding them to other areas
of the site. Those of you who have known me the longest know
that I have always had personal objections to accepting donations
due to experiences with other websites. Well, I finally bit the bullet
and added them to the main site and the main gallery. And you have
my every assurance that this will be the first, last, and only time that
I will ever mention that they are here. The original donation page
for charities is still up but it has been updated to reflect the change
in site policy.
And now a break from the normally serious tone into the realms of an Al Bundy-esque
rant…
There is one thing that most people in the Western world are familiar with and use
daily, or nearly so. Toilet paper.
Yes, I said toilet paper.
A far cry from the Sears and Roebuck catalog of old and far less rough than a
corn cob of even older times. (Unless you buy that cheap generic stuff.)
At any rate we had a pack sitting on the top shelf for a while that kind of got pushed
back every month as new TP was bought to replace used TP. One month I noticed
that they came out with new packaging proclaiming “New and Improved!” but I
noticed a distinct difference once the new was set near the old.
Their improvements appeared to be a change of color on the packaging and making
the text bi-lingual, English and Spanish. What, no French?!? The Canadians engaged
in a TP boycott or something?!? Did they decide that snow was a better substitute?!?
But(t) I digress…
The other improvements were to make the rolls smaller as well as shorter. Ok, since
when is less merchandise for the same price an improvement? Oh, that’s right, the
improvement is their cash flow! I guess customer satisfaction got flushed
on this particular business decision.
To the left the “New and Improved and the the right the Old and Unimproved version
And yes, I have the dimensions (as opposed to dementia) of both the old and new.
Old and Unimproved packs Dimensions:
12 Rolls, 198 2-ply sheets per roll, 297 Sq Ft, 4.5 x 4.0 inches per sheet
New and Improved packs Dimensions:
12 Rolls, 176 2-ply sheets per roll, 250.5 Sq Ft, 4.27 x 4.0 inches per sheet
Yup, I thought I’d find you there again. Sitting in front of your computer
rolling your eyes after you clicked that link. Saying to yourself, Aww geeze,
not this crap again!
Yup, I’m afraid your stuck reading the site news again!
Another busy month for me…
Added this month:
Bastion Special Projects: Donation based help for webmasters.
I’ve posted about this before in the blog so you may already know
about it.
Bastion Special Projects is an extension of The Bastion in it’s own way. It is there
to help people that want to learn about installing and using certain PHP based scripts
that I am familiar with. Right now it is based on one of the free hosts, Byethost
by name, in the future it may be moved to it’s own paid hosting account complete
with it’s own domain name.
So far I have installed three basic scripts, Wordpress, SMF, and XOOPS. I am familiar
with a few others but for now those three will be enough to start with. I bring it up
here at The Bastion because BSP is something of a divergence from what I created
here. The Bastion was intended to completely avoid accepting donations of any sort.
I always found the idea of asking people for their money for nothing in return to
be a rather repulsive idea. That’s why The Bastion has a store and the Google Ads
afterall.
BSP however does accept donations. No, I am not asking or encouraging anyone
to go over there and drop some money in the kitty. My basic idea was and is that
people that I help with installing those scripts won’t be charged as they would be
if they hired a “service provider” to do the work for them. Instead they can donate
whatever amount they feel my help was worth to them. And any such donations
are purely voluntary in nature.
The overall idea is to help people learn that they can learn to deal with these
scripts without too much trouble. So far I have written a few articles there
detailing and explaining how to install them but it is far from complete yet.
I’ve gotten the bare minimum basics for Wordpress and the ecommerce plugin
and a basic article on installing SMF posted. I’ll be adding more articles on installing
some Mods for SMF in the next few days. The XOOPS I installed there is still pretty
much stark naked, I’ll fix that soon enough though. lol
**************************************************************
This blog entry has been updated to reflect BSP’s new link here at The Bastion.
It is still rough but it is getting closer.
He sat bolt upright before his monitor as he read the words he most
dreaded seeing. He couldn’t believe it was happening again. “Not on
my watch.”, he mumbled under his breath. His fingers worked furiously
over the keyboard trying to stop the unstoppable. In the end he failed.
Nothing under the sun could prevent it from happening.
Nothing could stop the monthly site news from being posted again!
Aww, shut yer face! It wasn’t THAT bad. :P
I’ve been spread kind of thin this month with this, that, and
a goodly dose of the other but yes, there is some news this
month.
We now have 188 links in Web Links Directory. And a good
number of them are in the online shopping category.
I’ve finally added a few new items to the store. I’ll be adding
some more next month too. I’ve also been making some improvements
to the store with some help and advice from a friend. One of
which is the addition of accepting Paypal as a payment method.
There’ll be some more changes to the store as I get the time.
And I am afraid I need to make an announcment about comments
on the blog. Due to spam bots, the blogs will only be left open to
comments for ten (10) days after they are posted. It kinda sucks
but when you delete nearly 150 spam post in two days, you have to
do something to stop it.
As it is early spring, I’ll be spending more time in my shop which
means I won’t be adding quite as much to the site as I have in
the past few months. However, I will be working on a few new
articles and a few new blog entries, so keep your eyes peeled
for new stuff.
Uh huh, thought I’d forgotten about it, didn’t ya?!?
Well I’m afraid you aren’t getting out of it that easy!
You’re going to sit there and read the monthly site news
just like everybody else whether ya like it or not!
It’s been a pretty busy month for me in more ways than
one this go around. And here is the comprehensive list…
I added an experimental guest forum. It’s a Flash based
mini forum. I am hoping that the spam bots that seem to
infest all interactive sites won’t be able to “see” it in the way
search bots can’t “see” certain other flash based website
gizmos.
I’ll be a adding links in them for Winamp soon so you won’t have to be stuck
with the one window opened if you want to tune into the stream and still
surf.
And as the famed and legendary pig said on many an occasion…
I don’t know how many people are aware of the little fact that on weekends
I set up a little table in town to make a few sales and socialize a bit. Most of the
time it is more an excuse to get out of the house for a few hours than an attempt
at selling anything. Sometimes it can be just a quiet boring day and sometimes
it can be a busy profitable one. I’ll admit that there are times when dealing the
public can drive me batty, there’s always someone that thinks haggling is the
fine art of giving an insult in the attempt to get a better deal. And it also gives
me a chance to see how a lot of people see the world around them.
One Saturday morning a few weeks ago I had my table set up and was relaxing
in my beat up old camper’s chair when a pair of little boys rolled up on their bikes.
We chatted and they asked questions about the knives and other little oddities
I keep on the table. One of them asked how much for this one little knife…
The look on their faces when I told them fifteen dollars was both funny and a little
irksome. I made it so I know how much work was involved. They didn’t. That was
when it occurred to me why so many people never do understand why a hand
crafted item cost so much more than the stuff they pick up at Wal-Mart or some
other modern store.
People have gotten used to paying a much smaller price for their goods without
realizing why those goods cost so relatively little. In a manufacturing plant the
items are produced by mass production, and all of them look and feel pretty much
the same. Hand made items can only be created one at a time and while you may be
able to make two similar items they will still both be utterly unique.
The other thing is quality, there are high quality mass produced items but there
is also a lot of mass produced junk floating around the market place as well. I won’t
say that there aren’t poorly made hand made items, there are. When I first started
learning to make knives I made a few stinkers but they are things I keep to remind
myself how to not make a knife. On occasion I’ll still screw one up but
those don’t leave my shop unless it is going to end up being used to weed the garden.
But I digress…
Most hand crafted items are usually higher quality than a lot of factory made items.
Which is usually better, an apple pie fresh out of the store freezer or one that was
fresh made by a good cook?
(betcha never thought of an apple pie as hand crafted before! lol)
At any rate, my point is that with mass produced items, the people making them
don’t really care that much about an individual item on the production line, One
of humpteen thousand usually. With a hand made item, the person making it takes
greater care with each item made and more actual time in making it.
I think and I think and I think and all I can come up with is a blank stare
and a fine line drool running down my chin.
So, I guess I’ll just stick to what I do best and keep adding new crap
to the site.
Oh yeah… I forgot to mention, It’s time for the monthly site news!
It’s been a fairly busy month for me (like that’s something new!) but I
have been adding a bit of this and a bit of that.
First off, I’ve been updating and adding new link to the Weblinks.
Right now it is up to 79 links in total to a wide variety of sites.
I’ll be adding quite a few more as time goes by.
I currently have plans to add at least one new article every two weeks.
And I’ll be adding the recipes section in a couple of days. So if anyone
has any personal faves they want to add, feel free.
And I decided to hold off on adding more gifs to the main gallery
for a month or two. I keep stumbling across enough new gifs
that I might be able to add them as a full gallery rather than just
a ‘junk drawer”.
Finally, I added beast’s new Glastonbury Radio widget to the home page.
Give it a listen, they play pretty good tunes.
I’m still making a few tweaks and tunes to the site. Some of you may have noticed
that the forum’s position on the main menu has shifted a bit. Just to give you an
advance warning, I am planning to remove certain redundancies. Since I installed
the News section for the site I will be working the news section out of the forum
as time allows. I know some people do like to discuss the news and we still can. The
News section offers the option of posting comments in the same manner as posting
on the main forum.
Since the holidays are almost over I’ll have more time to hopefully add a few new
articles to The Eclectica so keep an eye out for new ones. I’m also considering adding
two sections to it, survival articles and recipes.
As of now the Gallery has: 45 wallpapers, 325 Avatars and 3500 animated gifs.
I have a few odds and ends in the way of gifs so I may add a “junk drawer” for
the left overs next month. So after this I’ll probably be adding more avatars and
hopefully new wallpapers.
I have some more items to add to the store but decided to wait until after the
holidays to add them so keep an eye on the store for the next couple of months.
Early this morning I caught a spot on the local TV news out of Memphis regarding
an ongoing problem with their “adult oriented businesses” (Read: topless bars).
Here are two links to stories on the subject, I’ll add more later as they become
available.
Now my complaint here is the hypocrisy involved in it. They claim they don’t want
the strip clubs and related crime problems. However, they do want the revenue
generated from the sales of beer in the clubs.
Excuse me?! You want money from people, mostly men, sitting around slurping beer
watching women wearing goofy outfits strip naked but you aren’t prepared to deal
with the problems their drunken behavior causes?!
WTF?
Memphis has always struck me as a city that is highly confused as to what it wants
to be when it grows up. They claim they want to keep the small town friendliness
attitude and retain their Christian morals and values. Yet at the same time they
want to be a big city on par with L.A. or New York. I’m sorry but it doesn’t work
that way. Whenever you have a big city’s benefits you are going to have it’s related
problems.
With strip clubs those problems will be, by default, prostitution, drugs, and
horny drunks. Which would rather leave you a choice to make. Refuse to allow
such clubs and look for revenue elsewhere or get your hands dirty and deal with
the problems your greed caused.
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A year and a half later came The
