Author: Jeffro

Jeffrohttp://jeffc.meEnjoy writing about, talking about, and helping others with WordPress
Jeffro's avatar

Facebook UI Annoyance With Videos

Thanks to my girlfriend, I’ve become absorbed into the Facebook culture. One thing though that really annoys me about their user interface is the publishing of videos. When I come across a cool video on YouTube that I would like to share, my immediate instincts tell me to click on the Video icon in Facebook. However, this is only for recording a video or uploading a video, I can’t link to a video. Instead, in order to link to a YouTube video I have to take the YouTube video URL and use the Facbook URL icon to share the link. This is annoying to say the least as it confuses my natural instincts and I always catch myself clicking the video icon before I click the link icon.

Oh well, just wanted to get that off my chest.

Can I Create My Own Career?

I’ve been working at the grocery store for over 10 years now and I’m still trying to find a way out of that place. Trying to turn retail into a career is a waste but so is working hourly at the store. I’m starting to wonder if I’ll ever be able to make a career out of something. Right now, the best thing I’ve got is my WordPress enthusiast community in which I seem to be building my own career from the bottom up. The first year brought in a total of around $4,000.00 which is below poverty level. However, I’m already on my way to shattering that amount this year by introducing more affiliate reviews into the site and doing some other things.

What I worry about though is whether I can actually pull this off. That is, with a wife, a house, and bills to pay, can I work part time at the grocery store and eventually make my enthusiasm for WordPress a full time job. Since I started the project in March of 2009, every stat related to the domain has increased. I wonder if I’d be better off getting a second job somewhere other than the grocery store or finding a job that has a career path. But those jobs that have a career path are few and far between. Plus, my lack of education kills me. Also, since I’m only into my second year of the project and momentum is on my side, it would be foolish to give that up now.

Just thinking about all those people who have careers that pay $30,000 or more per year while I only made a total of $18,000 for 2009. I hope this is the year of the big payout so I can keep doing what I enjoy doing.

The Blast Dot FM

I have no idea how I first came across this online station but I’m glad I did. It’s TheBlast.FM It’s a Christian rock radio station that plays progressive and aggressive tunes 24/7. I’m a fan of hard rock and this is right up my ally. Sure, a lot of the songs have religious sounding lyrics but it doesn’t affect the quality of the music.

I listen to the station for the good tunes, not for the religious aspects of it. I’d also like to mention that listening to music where NOT every third word is an expletive has been refreshing to my ears. Through TheBlast.FM, I’ve purchased music from bands such as RED, Skillet, Falling Up, Ever Stays Red, and Anberlin. I’ve yet to donate to the station but that will change in the near future. Colin Cruz is doing an excellent job with the station and I hope he keeps playing new, rocking tunes from these awesome bands.

I work best when I’m jamming out to TheBlast.FM.

Living On A Thin Shell

bluempI was listening to an episode of Coast To Coast AM the other night when they had on Professor William Forstchen who talked about the implications of an Electromagnetic Pulse Attack. Besides going into detail on how EMP’s are produced, the interesting thing is the issue that goes far beyond EMP and that is the current infrastructure of technology across the world. While I can’t see any country launching an EMP against another especially the U.S. for fear of being turned into glass, I do worry about an EMP coming from the sun. It’s happened before (Carrington Event) and it’s only a matter of time before it happens again. If a large X class solar flare is aimed directly towards the earth, the electromagnetic pulse produced could wipe out all modern electronics as we know them. This would set the entire planet back into the stone age.

This is another situation I can put on my list of things that could affect the entire planet where there is not a damn thing anyone can do about it. We can go to war with each other, countries can disagree and fight amongst each other for reasons beyond my comprehension, but no one on this planet can do anything about a large meteor crashing into the planet or a massive EMP produced by the sun overtaking our electronics. I think it would be awesome if the entire planet lived on a line of thought where there are things that are above and beyond earth and human beings. While we are worried about one country going to war with another, we should be focusing on what is happening outside of earths atmosphere, to protect the natural wonder that so far, we have not discovered in any other part of the galaxy. I have a sense that events that could take place that come from beyond earths atmosphere are the only ones that can truly unite civilization. The day where taking over this country or that country doesn’t matter when something from beyond can turn everything into a moot point.

There is a part of me that wouldn’t mind seeing one of these EMP’s happening or a large meteor come crashing into the earth just because I think it would be a wake up call that while we live our own little lives on this blue ball, there is something bigger at work that we could all strive to understand and be part of.

Foggy Monday

Woke up today and when I looked out our cabin window, I had this strange feeling as if we were floating in the sky. As it turns out, it was just very foggy within the valleys and we could see the top of the lower cloud deck. However, the forecast for today has us under a flood watch with a 90% chance of heavy rain. We experienced a good bit of rain yesterday so with the heavy rain today, shouldn’t be hard to cause flash flooding. Here is a snapshot of what it looked like this morning.

Fog Rolling In On A Monday Morning

Fog Rolling In On A Monday Morning

I think today we’ll be doing inside stuff such as Ripleys Aquarium and some other shops.

One Interview – 25 Things

Recently, I participated in an interview with Jade Craven for JadeCraven.com. You can check out the interview here which contains juicy information as to why I quit writing for Performancing.com. Jade also did a great job putting together a post called 25 Lessons you can learn from Jeff Chandler which compiles tips, tricks, suggestions based on my previous two years of writing about blogging and related subjects.

Beach Photos With iPhone 3GS

Last Monday, the girl and I decided to hit up the beach despite it being a crisp 75 degrees outside to view the sunset. It was a relaxing time to say the least. The only camera I had on hand with me was the one inside of my iPhone 3GS and I must say, I think it takes pictures equal or slightly above the quality that is provided by my Kodak EasyShare. Both the iPhone and my stand alone digital camera have a 3 megapixel sensor in it but while the maximum size of the iPhone photos is 600X800, my digital camera takes pictures at much higher resolutions. But this photoset at the beach proves to me that while I may not have my digital camera on hand, the one provided in the iPhone does a pretty good job in its place.

Sunset 3

Check out the full photoset here.