Major Climate Change Occurred 5,200 Years Ago: Evidence Suggests That History Could Repeat Itself

Major Climate Change Occurred 5,200 Years Ago: Evidence Suggests That History Could Repeat Itself

Hmmm. Am I the only one wondering if this might have anything to do with a global flood?

From honeypot to bot in minutes

From honeypot to bot in minutes
Here's a scary story about how quickly a non-protected machine got whacked & 0wned. It was hacked within 4 minutes of just being connected to the Internet & was being attacked 340 times an hour...

Get patched. Get clean. Get firewalled. Get clean. Stay current. (hopefully the Anti-Virus part goes without saying...)

Pointless Sites Dot Com

Well, just in case I've failed to tell you about it in person, there's a fun site for when you are bored (I'm in class right now... but NOT bored - just a bit of downtime). There's a page full of fun links (not all are appropriate for all ages). It is Pointless Sites Dot Com. Have fun!

Turn off that Blasted TV!

I just read this Great Article at CNN about a new keychain remote that allows you to turn off TVs AND it's only $15. To quote the article:

The key chain fob works like a universal remote control -- but one that only turns TVs on or off. With a zap of a button, the gizmo goes through a string of about 200 infrared codes that controls the power of about 1,000 television models. Altman said the majority of TVs should react within 17 seconds, though it takes a little more than a minute for the gizmo to emit all the trigger codes.

Update

Well, it's been about three weeks since I've posted. I recognize that this is completely shameful. What's been up in the last three weeks?

• Well, right now I'm sick - sinus congestion, sore throat, etc.
  
• Last weekend was the first time our church had a retreat! It was very good - based off the book 'now discover your strengths'.
  
• Two weeks ago we took all three of our turtles/tortoise to the vet for a pre-hibernation checkup & found out that Fred, or tortoise, has worms. He was given a dewormer & I have to take him back today for a followup dose.
  
• I've been making pages for my web/dev class. One can be found here. Another proof of concept page can be found here though this one displays best in Internet Explorer.
  
• I will be updating the Interactive Worship Station blog page soon.
  
• Guys group is going through 'Desiring God' and it is very good reading!
  

Study: Few corporations use anti-spyware tools | CNET News.com

Study: Few corporations use anti-spyware tools | CNET News.com
Man! This is just dangerous stuff. I imagine that companies will start to pay attention to it. I think it is a matter of the peons getting themselves whacked while the IT folks are careful enough not to get compromised, so they fail to realize that it is an epidemic outside the server room...

Most users unaware of PC infections

Plague carriers: Most users unaware of PC infections | CNET News.com


Somehow, I'm not suprised...

What File Extension Are You?

Which File Extension are You?

SO, I was pretty happy with the results of this... What did you get? Try it out and post your results...

Microsoft Linux only $249.99!

If you're wondering you can get a copy of Microsoft Linux here's a blurb from the website!

We are now offering the MS Linux Introductory CD at a special introductory price of only $249.99 (plus shipping and handling), if you order before it ships.

MS Linux is released under the provisions of the Gates Private License, which means you can freely use this Software on a single machine without warranty after having paid the purchase price and annual renewal fees.

TV & Movie

Having a great night! Terri & I caught the season premier of Joan Of Arcadia. Now we're watching Pretty In Pink on DVD. - picked it up for $10 at Fry's Electronics!

Well, I caught Fred eating the green leaf lettuce we'd put out for him. I tried Collard greens, but he didn't seem too interested. I know he loves Romaine lettuce, but I wanted to provide some variety. It didn't seem like he'd eaten any green leaf yesterday, but I caught him snacking while I was checking out the webcam...

Zombies for rent...

Zombies for Rent
Problem growing at astounding rate
According to Technology Review, a compromised network of PC's - infected with trojans for use as spam relays or DDoS participants - has a going rental rate of $100 per hour. According to the article, some 30,000 machines per day are infected and incorporated into zombie armies (up from 2,000 per day this time last year). While an unprotected machine will typically be attacked within 20 minutes of being put on the Internet, one Symantec analyst notes that "the fastest we’ve seen was a machine taken over six seconds after it was connected to the Web."

From http://www.broadbandreports.com/shownews/54746

Internet Deprivation Study

According to a new "Internet deprivation study" from Yahoo, 28 participants who were forced to go without connectivity for two weeks "suffered withdrawal symptoms and feelings of loss" (BizJournals). Users increased their consumption of more traditional media like newspapers and television, with one couple claiming their cell phone bill tripled (USAToday). According to the USAToday article, one user forgot how to boil an egg and was stymied when he couldn't look it up on the internet.

http://www.broadbandreports.com/shownews/54689

Now Reading...

So, I've got The Celtic way of Evangelism over on the side as 'now reading'. That's true. I'm reading that for the guy's group for The Bridge. However, I'm also reading The Story We Find Ourselves In, so I can be more prepared in creating Interactive Worship Stations for our current series of talks at church. In addition, I'm reading Now Discover Your Strengths in preparation for a retreat coming up. Also, I just finished The Street Lawyer (good read) and Terri and I are co-reading The Slippery Slope (book #10 in the Series Of Unfortunate Events). And, I've ordered four more books from Buy.com & am anxious to begin them... Sorry no links as I've run out of time - started this at work & now it's time to go home - I don't want to stick around to create links.

I've been gone too long

Sorry it's been so long since a post... I've started two classes this fall - A help desk business skills course and a 2nd semester Web Development course. This, along with a weekend trip to Boston and a book study on the Celtic Way Of Evangelism, has kept me busier than I would have imagined...
There is so much to talk about! The trip to Boston was incredible - let me just drop a few words & phrases: Historical sites, rain, prop plane, little Italy, water taxi, great food, lotsa coffee, expensive meals, zagat, cool bookstore, trolley tour, and friendly people.
I'll update more as I get time...

Join The Resistance!

Turtle Caught On Web-Cam!

For all you doubters out there *cough*Joshua*cough* here is proof that every now & then you can actually see a turtle in the turtle cam! I didn't even have to Photoshop this one...

YouSendIt | Email large files quickly, securely, and easily!

YouSendIt | Email large files quickly, securely, and easily!

Here's a cool site - it lets you upload files to the site & send an email link to someone. Then the file stays up there for 5 days for the person to download it... How big can the file be? Try up to one GIG! You heard that right folks, 1,000 MB. 1,000,000 KB. That's about 695 floppies worth of data... WoW! Here are a few clips from their policy page:

We collect the e-mail addresses of YouSendIt Delivery recipients solely for the purpose of logging and measuring usage. Personal user information we collect is not shared with other organizations for any reason.
We use MaxOnline and other third-party advertising companies to serve ads when you visit our Web site. These companies may use information (not including your name, address, email address or telephone number) about your visits to this and other Web sites in order to provide advertisements on this site and other sites about goods and services that may be of interest to you.
In the course of serving advertisements to this site, our third-party advertiser may place or recognize a unique ?cookie? on your browser.

flash effects

flash effects

This site has some really cool Flash Media stuff! check it out - you can spend some quality time playing here...

How Many Words-Per-Minute Do You Read?

How Many Words-Per-Minute Do You Read?

This is what I got: "You read between 550 - 600 words per minute. Highly efficient reading level. (The average rate is between 200 - 250 words per minute.) It is assumed that you did not skim the words nor fail to understand the meaning of what was read." Check it out! I was a bit slower than normal due to the fact that it was a speech - I kind of wanted to hear it in my head & that takes longer... Non-fiction would be about this speed too, but definitely slower if I was underlining as I go. It is a bit off as you must also scroll the page during the test & I would go faster for fiction, but pretty interesting!

The Effect - online radio

So, I went to the web site for The Effect.
It has been re-made and looks great! If you've never listened to The Effect, or don't get it in well wherever you are, they have a feature where you can listen online! I'm doing that right now.

Freddy Cam

Well, it's official! We've adopted a two year old Russian named Freddy. A friend of Terri's from work had this adorable tortoise for a couple years and then got a dog... We all know how much dogs like to play & carry things in their mouths... Needless to say, poor Freddy spent most of his time trying to hide from the dog. So, she asked if we would give Freddy a good home & we were happy to welcome him as one of our own. Check out the FreddyCam/TurtleCam and see if you catch any of them in action... I captured these snaps of him walking, eating, stretching this morning :)

I Need Coffee!

Need I say more?

Beg! Good Turtle!

OK, so I saw this really cool animated picture of turtle on a banner ad in Yahoo today & I liked it so much I decided to see if it would post correctly… We’ll see...

Generational Tyranny

As I was driving into work today, I heard a blurb on our NPR station about corporations. One individual was describing the environmental legacy we are leaving for our grandchildren's grandchildren - We are making a big mess of the world & he was describing it as a form of generational tyranny - taxation without representation.

It really made me think. I think I'm pretty conscientious about recycling. I pick up trash that blows into my yard. I don’t ask for a bag from a store unless I really need it. I use re-usable razors, I use a reusable coffee filter, I use rechargeable batteries… What else should I do as a responsible steward (see Genesis 1:27-28) ?

Starbucks in the morning

Terri & I had a special date at Starbucks this morning! What a great way to spend time together. I decided to recharge my card for another $20, but you know I'm going to use it...

Bug Me Not!

As I was wandering around several news outlets I found a few wanting me to "register" so they could deliver news to me... Why do they need to know anything about me? I don't have to give personal info at the newsstand to get a newspaper. I don't have to answer a questionnaire to turn on the TV... It just doesn’t seem right! < /rant >

Apparently a number of other folks agree and a website exists to provide folks with dummy credentials to use at sites that are too nosy for your taste… SO, instead of telling them about yourself, you now use the credentials of a 95 year old student who buys beer and tofu and uses windows 95… BugMeNot.com was created as a mechanism to quickly bypass the login of web sites that require compulsory registration and/or the collection of personal/demographic information (such as the New York Times). Check them out the next time you visit a site that asks too many questions…

Fewer people reading...

I just read an article about the rate of reading in the US declining. This is just outright depressing... It can be found here. Read the article, let me know what you think. Post a comment and let us all know what your are currently reading!

Spiderman 2

Just saw Spiderman 2 the other night! I really liked it - a lot to think about. Doc Oc & how a person can be controlled by something he thought he was in control of... Peter & his realization that you may have to surrender your dreams for the good of others around you... The conflict between best friends, the legacy of evil in a family, it was all there...

etherfarm: whither whatever

OK, check out this hilarious blog about the Californian's map of the United States. It is very funny :) I must admit that geography is not my strongest point but come on...

TurtleCam

Hooray! I saw slowpoke getting a drink of water this morning.
Just in case you missed it, here's a screen capture.

I saw this online & it just looked cool... It would go well with some tunes :)

What are you listening to right now?

Has anyone seen SAVED?

Check out this Forum Thread on the movie SAVED. I'm thinking about planning our next Epedition to be to see the movie. We're still waiting to get some info regarding Broom Hockey, so this might be just right for a July 10th trip???

Cell Phone Etiquette

I just saw a great article on cell phone etiquette at Relevant Magazine. It wasn’t exactly groundbreaking, but it was a timely reminder…

PS. I've been playing with embedding links into a picture - you can click on the picture & it will take you to the article :)

Right-click BlogThis for Mozilla

I just installed Mozilla's new browser, Firefox, and am experimenting with tabbed browsing, multiple home pages being opened automatically at startup, and built in pop-up and banner ad blocking. BUT, what it didn't support was the IE google toolbar which had the "Blog This" button on it. Well, I just found a Right-click BlogThis for Mozilla plugin and what do ya know - It worked!

I think I'll be using Firefox for a little while & see how it goes...

New Jersey?

Well, I dropped off Terri at the airport this morning & she is currently on her way to New Jersey for a few days for work. I already miss ya! Call me all the time, OK?

Father's Day

Well, Father's day is upon us! Yesterday I took my dad out to Solid Rock Gym out by the 101 & I-17. After several hours, we were pretty sore. We went out for lunch & came back to my folks place & moved a bit of furniture. Then it was a quick trip home and We had Terri's folks over for the night to celebrate Father's day. A full plate of some salad & pasta later & I was pretty full. BUT, we had recieved an ice cream maker for an anniversary present & Terri decided she would try her hand at home-made ice cream. I decided this would go very well with some Icing On The Cake decaf coffee, and it did! We had gotten him a DVD for Father's Day that we had really enjoyed, but by the time we got around to opening gifts, it was too late in the evening to start watching a movie...

Andy.Hunter - Free online stream

If you go to Andy Hunter's website and launch the audio player, you can hear the whole CD streamed to your desktop. Very Nice !

Yahoo Free Mail Acct now 100 MB

Notice: Change of service to your Yahoo! Mail account
Hooray! Check out what I just got in my Yahoo mailbox...


Dear Yahoo! Mail User,

Thanks for using Yahoo! Mail. It's our goal to offer you an email experience that makes it easy and enjoyable to stay in touch. Periodically, we make service changes to enhance that experience for our users. As of June 15, 2004, you'll enjoy the following benefits:
Increased storage capacity – from your current level to 100MB
Increase in total message size to 10MB
A streamlined interface that's even easier to use
You will continue to access your Yahoo! Mail account as usual. No further action is required, and there will be no interruption of your service.

We hope you enjoy the new features and benefits. If you have any questions, please visit our Help page. Thanks again for using Yahoo! Mail.

Sincerely,
The Yahoo! Mail Team

Robbie Seay Band

If you go to the Robbie Seay Band website, you can click on the button for “Open Media Player” and stream all the songs of Better Days.

My Bad...

So, no post since last week... That's bad of me. I'm sorry.

I saw my first episode of Futurama last week! I went to our Church's guys group and the host had all the DVDs & showed me the time travel/Harlem Globetrotters episode. It was a pretty funny show.

Also, I did some further tweaking to this site - added a photo & better info on the side & am experimenting with a shoutbox at the top. Log into it & let me know what you think...

I finished my book Fellowship of the King and have started New Way To Be Human by Charlie Peacock. It's really good. The first chapter was a bit over my head academically, but it is all worth the effort to move into the rest of the book.

The Reading Corner

So, too many books to read, not enough time... Do you ever feel that way? I'm currently in the middle of Fellowship Of The King. It is a great look at lonliness, isolation, and the community that the church should be. However, I will be joining our church's guy's group since I'm not taking any classes right now. They are going through Uprising by Erwin McManus. I've already read it, but it's been a while so I need to catch up to Chapter 11 by this Tuesday... Meanwhile, There's this Charlie Peacock book called New Way To Be Human that is currently on sale at The Discerning Reader for only $5.19 (normally $12.99 60% off) until June 15th as part of their fourth birthday celebration. Of course I had ordered it as soon as it came out a few months ago for a bit more money... While I haven't read it yet, I wanted to pass along the great deal while it was still good. It will be my next read after the others :)

I caught this shot in Holbrook on the way back from New Mexico... Aaron Norwood's nickname is Woody & I had to snap this for him :)

So anyway, I woke up about 5:30 this morning having the strangest dream… I was in some school (high school, junior high) for some reason & saw this older kid beating up on this younger kid – you know knocking his books out of his arms, pushing him against a locker. So I walked over to him & blocked a swing & basically gave him part of the “everything a boy needs to know about being a man” speech. (for more on that speech, check out the movie Second Hand Lions) Anyway, he took a swing at me & I blocked his hand & played Mercy with him & explained that being a man did not mean picking on kids smaller than him – that took no courage, no real strength, no manliness… It takes a man to defend the weak. That takes courage, strength, etc. I told him I figured he already had the courage it took in that he took a swing at me, so he’s ready to start acting like a man & I felt he had what it took to do it well. Anyway, as I let go of him to walk off where I should have been I heard a female teacher say to me something like, “well, I won’t be reporting that to the principal…” I go to whatever I went to the school for and as I’m coming out I see police officers talking to the kid… I woke up before anything happened to me. I have a feeling this dream came from an experience I had over the weekend, coupled with the movie Second Hand Lions, along with a book I finished reading a bit ago called Wild At Heart.

My Apologies - It appears as if the TurtleCam has been going down occasionally. I have installed the client for the United Devices Cancer Project. I don't know if that has caused the webcam to crash or not... I'm running an older version of WebcamXP on a Windows 2000 server box at 400 Mhz Celeron... I might update the version of software or the OS, but am too cheap to replace the box. Anyway, check out the United Devices Cancer Project and Folding@Home. The both have clients that use unused CPU cycles on your PC to simulate folding proteins to help in cancer research and understanding other diseases & disorders...

I've been visiting this new site for a while now. It's Daily Rotation. It has headlines from 300+ tech sites & you can just browse their headlines & click on the link to go to the full story. It comes with a default selection of some sites & you can re-configure it to set up the specific sites you want. The great thing is that it is free & no account needs to be set up or anything. The downside I've found is that your site selection preferences are kept via a cookie. You delete your cookies - wham! You need to re-configure your preferences... Pretty cool otherwise!

Check out my new Interactive Worship Station Blog. I'm documenting all the different Interactive Worship stuff Terri & I are doing at The Bridge. I haven't gotten comments up over there yet, but hopefully folks can start using the ideas or tweaking them into better ideas!

G E E K T O O L S: GeekTels

Wanna travel somewhere & make sure the hotel you stay at has high speed Internet access? Check out this website where you can search by country & state for hotels based on Internet connectivity!

WoW. I'm really looking forward to going to this! May 5-7th. I'll let everybody know how it was :)

.::Jesus : easter::.
Check out this link for Easter meditations. This site in the UK (Rejesus.co.uk) has the greatest flash content & spiritual ponderings. Our prayer station for church this morning was a laptop with the Easter site for our members to browse before/during the service...

Go there - Browse the site - Let me know what you thought - Let them know what you thought.

PopupTest - test your popup blocker software and download software

Here's a great site to test your pop-up blocker... I use the google toolbar & was amazed how many came through. This is a reputable site & only does pop-ups when you click on the 'test' button. You might be amazed at some of these.

I'm going to try & link to an image... I saw this great Comic in today's paper & I'm going to try to link to it so it shows up in my blog...



Well, I think I got it to work :)

Well, I added a link for a page full of organized links (all my faves in one place) only I haven't put that page together yet - so far it's just a collection of favorites at work. So, I put up a lame template to make sure there was some content. Now I just have to get busy with updating it. And along the way I get to learn html... :)

Got some supplies at Michael's & Home Depot for a prayer station for church - will work on the documentation tonight after a retirement party for our friend Samuel L. Jackson (no kidding - that's really his name). If the station goes well, maybe I'll have someone take a digital pic & I can experiment with how to post it on the blog.

Well, we're off to the Kutless, Thousand Foot Krutch, FM Static, Falling Up concert!

Welcome to RouteWord - Find the Route that Reveals the Word

This clever little site will get your brain working puzzles & words in a new way...

The Morning News - The Passion of the Christ: Blooper Reel: "The Passion of the Christ: Blooper Reel "

OK, it's a bit irreverent, but very funny. For such a serious movie, it's kind of a relief to have a chuckle...

What does your phone number spell?

Put in your phone number & see what it spells... :)

Flatland: A romance of many dimensions

If you've never read Flatland before, you should check it out! Here is a link to a web based edition of the classic. It has a lot to do with Mathematics/Geometry & issues of dimension, but I feel it has significant implications for matters of Faith...

::: the Bridge :::
So, Just in case you know me, but don't know this about me... My wife & I attend The Bridge - a great church in the Tempe area right by ASU - check out the site!

Turtle Cam
Well, I've been away from the blog for a very long time... I gave up on the idea of tracking the book as I read it. I found that there were a number of times I wanted to read without having to mark up what I wanted to go back to & opportunities to read at the computer were just not that common. I really should have been blogging something, but I had not ever been in the habit of journaling, so it just wasn't in me. I decided I would put the google toolbar on with the Blog This button & perhaps I would at least blog when I discovered something interesting. This time I'm cheating a bit with some shameless self promotion. These are the turtle cams that my wife & I have on our two little three toed box turtles. They just came out of hibernation a few days ago!