This year is a leap year, and today day only happens once every 4 years. It’s February 29th, and I thought it proper to post on this day as I will not have a chance to post on February 29th for another 4 years. What would be interesting is if eSinner.com is still up in 4 years time, and if I still have enough things in my head to write about by then. The way my mind works though it’s virtually impossible to slow it down so it’s unlikely I will run out of things to say. I wonder who will be still visiting my site by then, perhaps I will have pissed everyone here off by that stage and I will have a whole new audience. I wonder what the comment leader board will look like. Eek! My mySQL is going to be so massive!!! **sigh** I am such a geek!
It’s really quite hard for me to think that far into the future. No doubt I will probably look back on my current writings with contempt and embarrassment. Perhaps I will be pleasantly surprised, who knows. I wonder where I’ll be in 4 years time. I think I’ll probably have a kid by then, I wonder if it will be a boy or a girl. I can’t wait to be a Dad. No doubt Melly and I will still be happily married and wildly infatuated with each other. It’s strange you know, we’ve been together over 2 years now and we still hold hands all the time. I hope we are still holding hands in 4 years. I wonder where my career and financial situation will be at, hopefully I’ll have a bit more stability by then, I’d want to if I have a kid. No way I’m bring a kid into the world without knowing that I’ll be able to provide for them properly. I hope I’m a good Dad.
Where was I four years ago? Let me see, 2004 minus 4 years puts me at February 2000. I’d just come out of Army training. Mum was still recovering from cancer, and Mum and Dad were trying to sell the house in order to move to the coast. Well they sold it, and they’re almost finished building their latest investment property. I was single, at least at that stage. I was in uni studying a Bachelor of Information Technology, a degree I later quit when it became apparent I was better off getting a job. I didn’t have the focus to study right then anyway.
Worked a full 8 hours today, and then I came home and did the mowing. Nothing really out of place about this except that I did the mowing in the dark. Yup, that’s right, in the dark. I didn’t get home from work until after sundown, so I relied on my good night-sight to get the job done. I know, I know, why the heck didn’t I wait until the morning? Well, firstly I have to work in the morning, and secondly I wasn’t going to pike on the slight burst of motivation to actually get the job done, even if that motivation did come at 6 in the evening.
After 8 hours of stupidity, an hour or so of mowing and a lot less sleep, I’m really quite stuffed. Luckily for me I don’t start until 11 in the morning, so I get a bit of a sleep in. I worked 6 days this week, and I have another 4 shifts in a row until my next day off. Blah!
This is a quote by Jim Caviezel, the guy who played Jesus Christ in “The Passion Of The Christ”. The quote is not directly associated with the movie, but I thought it interesting to post here because it really highlights the gravity of choice in society.
“A lot of people talk about choice like it’s the greatest thing. Well, okay, so you want to choose. Imagine you’re on a basketball team, and everybody chooses to do their own thing, without regard for the rest of the team. When you lose, one of your teammates says, ‘Well it was my choice to lose.’ And okay, maybe it was. But your choice caused me to lose, too. And that’s what’s happening in our society.”
People are over-exercising their free will to the point where the irresponsibility of their actions is adversely affecting other people, and society as a whole. While choice is our most inalienable right, people have taken this a little too far in recent times, to the point where the consequences of their actions have no baring on their conduct. Is society as a whole becoming more selfish? Or do you think it is a constant with mild variation? I personally think things are getting worse, but let me know what you think…
Absolutely blown away. I have no idea what to say, The Passion of the Christ has left me totally speechless (and yes I do see the irony in that statement). I spent about 90% of the movie weeping, constantly weeping. All I can say is that I am so sorry Lord Jesus. The immensity of the price you paid for us, moves me beyond the thanks that any words could possibly express. Here, convicted I stand, breathless, and trembling at the power of your grace.
Today’s Gypsie‘s 2nd birthday. Yesterday I went to the Pet-Cafe and got her some pressies. She needed a new cover for her bed, as she has a tendency to dig through it when she drops her kong underneath it, so cute. Anyways, while I was there I also got her a huge bouquet of doggy treats wrapped like a bunch of flowers. There was heaps in there and this morning she must have thought all her Christmases had come at once, because she got a lot of treats. She was a really good girl today…. I wonder why?
She’s grown up a heap these past few months, she’s not quite the little rascal she used to be as a pup. She’s always been a smart little wolfy, huskies have a tendency to thwart whatever plans you have of keeping them out of things. I remember one time (at band camp?) Melly and I went out to do some shopping and we came home to find she had dug through carpet and bitten though just about everything she could get here teeth on (including Mel’s glasses). I’d done my utmost to restrict here to one part of the house, but she was really tricky and figured out how to worm her way out of stuff. These days though she’s no trouble. All the effort Melly and I have made to train her to be a good dog have paid off. So not only does she look really nice, but she is very well behaved.
This morning we sang happy birthday to her, and then she gave me a big hug. I love my dog, they say a dog is a man’s best friend. I think I know why: They love you when you need love, the shut up when you need to tell them something, and they’re always ready for some fun when you feel social, all other times they quite happily nick off, nagging just doesn’t come into it. Unless of course you are a husky that’s scared of thunder, and then they’ll sob till you put them out of the rain. Other than that though they rule!
Well, it’s getting late and the birthday girl needs a walk, and I need to clear my head.
Listening to: You Still Amaze Me by Audio Adrenaline
Today what I think will be one of the biggest movies of the year will air in cinemas around the globe. The Passion of the Christ, for those of you who don’t know is Mel Gibson’s interpretation of the last 12 hours of the life of Jesus Christ, my savior. There’s been a lot of hoo-ha in the media about this film and Gibson has taken a lot of flack from various groups, least of all his colleagues who say this may be the end of his career. Personally while I can’t see this happening, the prelude to this film has been somewhat interesting.
People are complaining on all sides. The Jews say it’s anti-semitic, the critics say it’s too violent, all in all from the many reviews I’ve read I think it’s presumptuous to come to a conclusion without actually seeing the movie to begin with. I’ve seen on the news hundreds of Jews protesting against this movie, before it has even been released. The best they can be going on would be the opinion of others, those who were lucky enough to see the pre-screenings and probably have their own agendas and biases. I’m going to save my opinion on the film until after I have watched it, but this kind of thing has made me think about another issue, and that’s offense.
Web-wise, this weekend past few days has been terrible. As you may have noticed, eSinner.com has been down for most of the weekend. Even now as I type the site has been up and down every 5 minutes for most of the day. Apparently after sending a few abrupt emails to my “support team” (and I say “support” with all sarcasm) I get an email from the admin (three days later) telling me that one of their web servers died, and they were trying to install a new server to get things back up and running. It’s damn shame my ISP doesn’t claim any “guaranteed uptime” value, otherwise I’d be sitting pretty right about now. I am somewhat annoyed as you can imagine, I mean, if I was getting free hosting I would let this kind of thing slide (nay, expect it), but as it is, my site has been down more than Dan’s or Rob’s put together over these past few days, and theirs is free.
Things I dislike about my job:
The constant noise of loud operators; Louder customers; Constant key-tapping noise; Over-lit offices with fluorescent lights; No windows; Demanding/Abusive/Rude customers; Ergonomic Chairs (could this be a misnomer?); The false pretense of “Customer Service” evidenced by ridiculous performance expectations; Having to answer the same questions, and repeat the same introduction over 200 times per shift; The energy sapping, unrelenting continuity of it all.
Things I like about my job:
That I have a job at all; That it pays well providing I get rostered enough hours; That people think I’m the greatest thing since sliced bread, simply for finding them a phone number; That I am constantly reminded that a vast majority of the population is a lot stupider than I; the “mute” key; Knocking off; the “disconnect” key; Air conditioning; Free phone calls; That I was imaginative enough to think of 9 good things about my job.
Listening to: Savior by Skillet
Ok, so although I love you all and think you’re great, I am getting a bit jack of people using my comments form to post essays. So here it is, I’ve limited the comments to a maximum of 1000 characters, which is basically two decent sized paragraphs (code found on Felgall.com). If you can’t sum up what you’re saying in this space either find a shorter way of saying what you want to say, or write an entry in your own blog and trackback, that’s what it’s there for! The character limit is a trial, and I ideally hope that your comments stay under 1000 characters, but I may change this if I still think they are too long. We’ll see how it goes.
I also applied to alpha test :mt: 3.0, who knows if they’ll reply, but I am eager to see what they’ve included. I was a bit disappointed with the latest patch (2.661, installed here) as it has a few bugs (look at the bottom of the comments preview form for an example), and hopefully these are ironed out in the alpha of 3.0. I’d rather move forward then step backwards to my last stage install, even if it has it’s own problems. I’ll let you all know how it goes.
Other then that I’ve not been doing much. I wrote a php script last night to limit the “textarea” of a form so that I could incorporate it into my comments, only to realise after I got the script working perfectly that the comments page is dynamically generated by a cgi file, and thus will not take php script. Grr!!! Live and learn I guess. If you think you could use it for another purpose, here it is.
Anyways, I’m off to chill.
P.S. How would you all feel about comment registration? Do you think it would hinder people commenting? Would you comment here if comment registration was required?
Comments like these:
“I agree with everything that you’re saying…”
“I see where you are coming from…”
These kind of comments are usually followed with the word “but”, and you know what, they are really starting to annoy me. Why you ask? Because they are fake! They convey a false pretense of agreeing with any aforementioned statements purely to pay lip service to their author, all in order to gain their attention (or to come off sounding tolerant). I’m not one for patronisation, or empty words, so when people start out with verbal fluff like this the predictability of their subsequent disagreement is rather nauseating, at least to me. In future, if you have something to say here that doesn’t agree with something I have said, just say it. Really, I’m a big boy, I can handle it. Stop pussy-footing around the subject, purchase some fortitude and say it how you see it, that’s my M.O. and it’s one I’m much more willing to deal with.
Last night I edited out all swearing from past entries. Not because I have any conviction that swearing is “wrong”, but simply so my site would not be restricted for people like Ian who use computers with “net nanny” style filters on them. You’ll no longer see words like sh*t, f#ck, c#nt, and b*tch, in their full form, instead you’ll get edited versions like these, if at all. I’ve yet to edit swearing in comments, but I am open to suggestions to whether or not you think I should bother.
I’ve also added a comment plug-in called MTCloseComments to restrict comment additions on posts older than three weeks old. This should be plenty of time for you all to comment on my entries, but should help with the amount of comment spam by people trying to sell holidays and viagra. I’m 23, what the?
Listening to: ‘Till I Collapse by Eminem
Celebrities/Stars: Who gives a rip anyway? They are no more important than a mother, father, thief or priest. In the end everyone is subject to the same limitations of the physical realm and cannot transcend our own debased existence. You’re stuck, right here and right now in the dirty disgusting filth that is humanity. Unless you somehow work out a way to make your colon produce gold instead of crap, then, and only then will I ever recognise anyone’s transcendence of humanity. Until that day, such things as sports stars, celebrities, wealth, popularity, and so forth are all carefully established constructs that hide people’s insecurities of their own humanity. Everyone defecates, therefore everyone is equal.
Today I’ve been struck by a few instances in the news that have made me wonder, again, how some people can sleep at night. Maybe I have an over developed conscience, but what I am about to describe would shake me to the core, and I’d have so much trouble living with myself.
The first instance comes from the story of an old lady on Today Tonight who was robbed in broad daylight by another lady in a Woolworths shopping centre. The old lady was doing her shopping, collecting items off the shelves, when this thief strode up behind her, unclipped the latch on her handbag (which she had slung over her shoulder), reached in and stole here purse, then casually grabbed a carton of milk off the shelf next to her as if nothing had happened and walked away, all in plain sight of other customers too. The poor lady didn’t even realise she had been robbed until she reached the checkout. How could anyone do this, especially to a defenseless old lady? The poor old lass had over $400 dollars in her purse, all stolen by some morally bankrupt parasite of society. For shame!
The next instance comes from a young girl who claims that she was a victim of a hit and run accident. The show aired previous footage of this same girl and her story when she first took her case to the media. The segment showed a girl who could not walk without the aid of a crutch who had one arm with very little mobility. Today Tonight have taken secret footage of her since her first story and tonight aired it along with a confrontation with this same girl. The footage shows her walking around her house with full mobility, even pulling her wheelchair up and down her front steps without any assistance, and here she is claiming that she has been physically damaged by this poor guy who she claims hit her. What a leech! This chick was claiming a disability pension from Centrelink, and her physiotherapy and medical expenses have cost tax payers upwards of $15,000. Even with all this video evidence to the contrary she still claims that it is all lies! How could you knowingly rip your fellow man and society off like that, and put someone’s livelihood and reputation in jeopardy?
The good news is that this cheat has been found out, and as for the old lady, the local police all chipped in from their own pockets to raise enough money to replace the money this lady had stolen from her, plus Woolworths gave her that week’s groceries for free. At least there is a good ending here, but seriously, how could you do these kind of things and live with yourself? How the heck could you justify these things in your own mind to the point where you could sleep peacefully? Seeing this kind of thing really makes my blood boil. All I can say really is that it’s a damn good thing I’m not a judge, these people wouldn’t see daylight…..not for a very long time.
I’ve added a “Total Comments” section to my comment leader board, so everyone can see the total amount of user comments. This should be specifically helpful to :heather:, who has vowed to be the one who posts my 1000th comment 
This little addition is part of a larger php script I wrote last night to list :mt: stats. The script, which can be found here, will list the total entries, comments, and trackbacks of any :mt: blog. All you need is a site that supports php and mysql. To install the script simply save the contents of the above text file as a php file, edit the database settings to suite your server/database, and use the php include funtion to call the script. Pretty simple. If you are running :mt: and you’re not using php you’re missing out, but to rectify this problem go here. If none of this helps and you still want to use this script, send me an email and I might be persuaded to give you a hand 
That’s all for now, I have to start work early in the morning, so it’s an early night for me!
Listening to: Need by The Benjamin Gate
Tonight I came across some really handy web development tools…
There’s this site called BrowserCam that can take screen shots of what any website looks like in any browser on most operating systems. For instance, for the first time tonight I had the ability to see what eSinner.com looks like in Safari on a Mac. How cool is that?! Yeah I know, I’m a geek. Nevertheless, for anyone who wants to see how their website is formatting across different systems, it is really handy. You can get a temporary account without paying, but if you want permanent use of this site it will cost you a pretty penny. Never fear, as long as you have the time to register bogus email accounts you are free to keep starting temp accounts as you need. Can anyone say exploitation?
Another site which I am continually impressed with and have been using for some time is HotScripts. They host thousands of scripts from many different programming languages like PHP, ASP, Javascript, and Perl (plus many more). Some of the things I have found there have been very useful, especially the php quote of the day script by Mads Søgaard. If you’re stuck with your site and need a little something to spice things up a bit, check it out.
Listening to: Asthma by P.O.D.