So I've had my blog up and running again for six weeks, and I think I have posted something every weekday. I'm pretty proud of that, even if some days I just posted a funny picture or Youtube video.
About a month ago I signed up at StatCounter.com to keep track of page loads and visitors. The graph above is of the past 30 days. It's interesting to see how the traffic fluctuates during the week. There is little traffic on the weekends because people are too busy living life to read my silly blog, and it picks up later on in the week (Thursdays have seen the most total traffic) as people become less and less motivated to do work at their job. I figure it usually slows down on Friday because people realize they have a lot of shit to do before the weekend.
In total I have had 878 page loads, 482 visitors, and 58 returning visitors these past thirty days. And before anyone suggests it StatCounter.com does not count me in those numbers.
I hope that some of those returning visitors are real-life friends of mine, but I figure most of them are coming in from the Atheist Blogroll. I need to spend more time reading the blogs that are often listed as *NEW* along with mine on the list. I have already spent time reading some of them, and I am thinking about reviewing some of my favorites.
DO ME A FAVOR - If you are one of my returning visitors, or if this is your first time here, let me know who you are in the comments.
In my local paper, The Long Island Advance, there is a weekly (as is the paper) segment titled From the Archives of the Long Island Advance, in which they present some news clips from 100, 75, and 50 years ago. A lot of the news is so mundane that I find it to be very funny. I hope that you do too.
From 100 years ago:
Ira Rogers’s bull dog Jumbo was run over and killed by
an auto.
About a dozen Tungsten lights on Main Street, between
the village limits and Swan River, were turned on by the
Patchogue Electric Light Co. They are the first to be placed
in the recently organized lighting district.
At the Unique the contest to decide the most popular
young lady in town stood as follows: Esther Smith, 175;
Edith Nugent, 239; Eunice Foster, 189; Fanny Smith, 49; Sadie
Ginocchio, 61; Nellie Gibbons, 169; Hilda Webber, 32;
Lottie Link, 100; Mayme Vanderpool, 51; Clare Marran, 54;
Fanny Budd, 97; Lillian Davis, 2; Nellie Ackerly, 8; Roselle
Daly, 5; Edna Webb, 4; and Virginia Ullman, 10.
Thomas B. Camidge has purchased a power vacuum
cleaner on wheels, run by a gasoline engine. He will take
orders for cleaning houses. This is an innovation that will
be welcomed by the ladies.Mr. and Mrs. John Romanski left for a trip to Germany
and expect to be gone three months.
In this chapter Abraham pulls a stunt we’ve seen him pull before, but it is still mind boggling. Abraham and Sarah settle in Gerar and Abraham tells the king, Abimelech, that Sarah is his sister. Abimelech sends for Sarah, even though she is at least 90 years old at this point. In a dream that night God tells Abimelech that he is in deep shit because Sarah is actually a married woman and demands he return Sarah to Abraham.
Abimelech is confused and angry. He calls Abraham and says to him, “What have you done to us? How have I sinned against you, that you have brought such great guilt on me and my kingdom. You have done things to me that ought not to be done.”
Abraham tells Abimelech, “I did it because I thought, There is no fear of God in this place, and they will kill me because of my wife. Besides, she is indeed my sister, the daughter of my father but not the daughter of my mother; and she became my wife.”
Well that’s the first we’ve heard of that. So Abraham wasn’t technically lying, but he was still being dishonest.
Abimelech pays Abraham in sheep, oxen, and slaves and tells him to settle anywhere he pleases.
Oh, and we find out at the end of the chapter that God had “closed fast all the wombs of the house of Abimelech” but Abraham prays to God and God “heals” them.
Here’s a similar situation:
You see a speed limit sign that says 65 mph, so you drive that fast, but soon a cop pulls you over. He tells you that the speed limit is actually 30 mph, and revokes your license. It turns out that it was the cop who put the 65 mph speed limit sign up. You tell the judge about the misleading sign, but the judge already knows about it, and he demands you pay a hefty fine to have your license reinstated.
Sunday and Monday night saw the series finale of two shows that I've been following for a long time - LOST and 24. These are two television programs that really changed the way we perceive the medium.
I think LOST should have ended a couple years ago. That being said, I was satisfied with the finale and the last few episodes. All of our questions weren't answered, but I didn't expect that and I wouldn't want that anyway. If all the questions were answered we would close the book on LOST and move on, never to think too much about the show again. Now, even after the show is ended, we can speculate and theorize about the unknown. LOST was about mystery and now it will be forever.
For me, the finale of 24 didn't seem like a series finale, it seemed more like a season finale. With plans to make a 24 movie (or movies, more likely) the writers didn't have the freedom to provide the audience with a sense of closure. If you followed this season, especially the last 4 hours or so, you have to agree that Jack should have assassinated the Russian president and been taken out afterward by CTU. If the writers and producers of 24 wanted to make an even more lasting mark on television history, the final minutes of the series would have been Jack being taken out by CTU in a crazy firefight with Chloe crying on the sidelines, followed by a silent clock.
Most bears will kill you with teeth and claws. Some will kill you with kindness (see: Pooh, Winnie the). This bear will kill you with mad kung fu skills.
My grandma died on July 10, 2008.It was a Thursday and I was planning on spending a long weekend in Maine with some friends from college.My dad told me I should still take my trip because it would take a few days to make the arrangements and for his brothers to fly in from Arizona anyway.
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We weren’t surprised that she died.I had resigned myself to that fact months earlier.I was heading home from an exam and saw an ambulance in front of me heading in the same direction. Somehow I just knew it was going to my house.
My grandma was a stubborn old lady.Even at 81 she didn’t ask for help putting something on the top shelf in her closet, but instead decided to stand on a chair and do it herself.She fell off the chair onto the hardwood floor and broke her hip.
I entered the house to her screaming in agony.I tried to see if there was anything I could do to help, but I just couldn’t listen to her cries.I went downstairs to my room and started throwing shit around, which is what I am prone to do when I’m upset.My grandma had survived multiple open-heart surgeries, but I knew she wouldn’t make it through this.
When I was just a baby, my parents were having a house built and decided that my dad’s parents would move in with us, I think for financial reasons.My grandpa died when I was seven and my parents were divorced when I was eleven, and after that it was just myself, my sister, my dad, and my grandma in the house.My dad always worked two or three jobs so we spent a lot of time in my grandma’s care.She was one of my greatest influences in life.
Atheist Peace
Bad Religion
The Empire Strikes First
Maybe it's too late for intellectual debate
But a residue of confusion remains
Changing with the times and amphetamine tortured minds
Are the average citizen's sources of pain
Tell me what we're fighting for
I don't remember anymore, only temporary reprieve
And the world might cease if we fail to tame the beast
From the faith that you release comes an atheist peace
Political forces ran critical winds of discontent
And the modern age emerged triumphantly
But now it seems we've stalled and it's time to de-evolve
And relive the dark chapters of history
Tell me what we're fighting for
No progress ever came from war, only a false sense of increase
And the world won't wait for the truth upon a plate
But we're ready now to feast on an atheist peace
There are two levels of “atheist peace”: peace within oneself and peace in the world.
