Month: December 2008

We received our Census form today.  It’s a very thick package considering everyone is supposedly getting the short form this year.  I haven’t opened it and I probably won’t for several more days.

Article I, Section 2 of the US Constitution gives Congress the right to ENUMERATE the number of citizens in order to apportion members of congress: “The actual Enumeration shall be made within three years after the first meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent term of ten years, in such manner as they shall by law direct.”

This really means the census is legally only able to require you to account for yourself and members of your household.   Enumerate means “: to ascertain the number of”.   Congress is allowed to count you, but this is all that is provisioned for in the Constitution.

According to the U.S. Code though:

Title 13, Section 221 (Census, Refusal or neglect to answer questions; false answers) of the United States Code reads:

• (a) Whoever, being over eighteen years of age, refuses or willfully neglects, when requested by the Secretary, or by any other authorized officer or employee of the Department of Commerce or bureau or agency thereof acting under the instructions of the Secretary or authorized officer, to answer, to the best of his knowledge, any of the questions on any schedule submitted to him in connection with any census or survey provided for by subchapters I, II, IV, and V of chapter of this title, applying to himself or to the family to which he belongs or is related, or to the farm or farms of which he or his family is the occupant, shall be fined not more than $100.

• (b) Whoever, when answering questions described in subsection (a) of this section, and under the conditions or circumstances described in such subsection, willfully gives any answer that is false, shall be fined not more than $500.

• (c) Notwithstanding any other provision of this title, no person shall be compelled to disclose information relative to his religious beliefs or to membership in a religious body.

So basically you can be fined $100 for not filling out the Census form.  Many people will say the government has no right to the questions asked on the Census.  However, I sometimes think privacy advocates go a little overboard.  I can understand how getting reasonable demographic data can be helpful to our government.  As per the Census website:

• Census affects funding in your community
  Census data directly affect how more than $300 billion per year in federal and state funding is allocated to communities for neighborhood improvements, public health, education, transportation and much more. That’s more than $3 trillion over a 10-year period. Spending just a few minutes to fill out your census form will help ensure your community gets its fair share of federal and state funding.
• Census affects your voice in Congress
  Mandated by the U.S. Constitution, the census is also used to apportion seats in the U.S. House of Representatives and to redistrict state legislatures.
• Census affects your representation in state and local government
  Census data are used to define legislature districts, school district assignment areas and other important functional areas of government.
• Census informs your community’s decisions
  The census is like a snapshot that helps define who we are as a nation. Data about changes in your community are crucial to many planning decisions, such as where to provide services for the elderly, where to build new roads and schools, or where to locate job training centers.

Having said all that; yes I plan on filling out the Census Form.  *sigh*

It turns out that marinating your steak in beer or wine reduces cancer causing compounds in steak.  Just make sure you don’t drink the marinaide after it’s done soaking

Marinate your steak!

As of last night the automobile manufacturer bailout has flopped.  It’s amazing to me that our government is willing to spend trillions bailing out financial institutions with little or no oversight.  These financial institutions that gambled on crazy schemes like interest only loans and credit default swaps.  Yet, the brick and mortar manufacturers, their suppliers, advertisers, and hundreds of small businesses that support all of that overhead are being left in the cold.  They are at fault to be sure, for not responding fast enough to the future needs of the end users.  However, I believe the price of oil, the declining value of the dollar, two ongoing armed conflicts, dropping interest rates and printing money we don’t have has done more damage than lack of foresight on the part of auto manufacturers.

GM alone spent over $1B in advertising in the first half of 2008.  These manufacturers do more than just produce cars, they drive the economy.  They are too big to let fail.  If in the worse case senario one major manufacturer falls, it is very likely that Ford and Chrysler will be the next.  All of that will amount to nearly 2 million jobs lost. Most of these people will no longer be able to pay their mortgages and rent.  So we fall back to the financial institutions once again faltering.  If we think our economy is bad now just wait and see what happens next.

We often are asked by clients about search engine optimization.  More specifically they usually state they want to be on the first page of Google.  Don’t we all?  After I take a deep breath I try to explain there are good ways and bad ways to get search engine rankings.  If an SEO company is trying to sell them position on a search engine, I’m immediately confident it’s either a scam or a company that uses dubious means of achieving goals; goals that often will get a website blacklisted and cause them to completely disappear from search engine rankings.

Search engine optimization in basic terms is pretty simple.  There are simple steps every web designer and web builder should take when designing and building a website.

Page Title:  This is the <title> tag that displays in the title bar of a browser window.  The title should be a basic description of the page content with keywords that are relavant to the content of the page.  These keywords should be the most important terms relative to the page.

Page Filenames:  Here is where search engines often tie some importance of the filename of the page to the content.  That’s one of the reason for permalinks on blogs.  The page filename should contain the strongest keyword of the title of the page. Names like my_dog_kayla.html actually lend some weight to keyword importance on the page

Meta Data:  Keywords and description in the meta data is less important than it used to be – but it should not be discounted.  The description should be a simple one or two sentances that summarize what the content of the page represents.  The keywords on the page should match up with those defined on the page with the title, header tags and bold tags.

Alt Tags:  Always use alt tags on images.  Search engines cannot read text in images, nor can they determine what an image represents.  The alt tag is intended for browsers or readers that are unable to display or view images.  This is helpful for vision impaired readers too.

Title Tags:  These are often confused with alt tags.  The title tag should be used to add text inside of links, not repeat it.   Title should be more descriptive than the link text it represents.  This shouldn’t be a paragraph, just a simple description.

Header Tags:  These are used by search engines to determine the importance of words.  Instead of using CSS style classes to create headings on text, use the header tags (h1,h2 etc) and simply redefine them in CSS.

Bold Tags: Bold tags are used to make keywords stand out in sentences or in places where a block level tag (such as header tags) are not appropirate for the layout of the page.

Probably one of the most important aspects of good search engine ranking is quality content.  A good content page shouldn’t consist of dozens of links, images, or specialized layout.  Search engines are looking for text to search and index.  The content should be representative of the title, keywords, headings and all combined.

I cannot say enough about quality incoming links.  These are external websites that point to your site, or pages on your site.  This should be QUALITY links.  Link farms do not count and aren’t recommended.

In summary, search engine optimization is really about common sense and remembering that search engine spiders are trying to make sense of the content on your pages.  Try to use the simplest and most obvious techniques to help the search engine spider do it’s job.

Just testing to see how images come out with the current layout.

Kayla

John “Black Jack” Geary returns to the Alliance Fleet from being stranded in a 100 year suspended animation aboard an escape pod.  In the years since his supposed death fighting to the end, Black Jack has been immortalized in the Alliance Fleet as a hero.  “The Lost Fleet” series of books covers his return to the fleet and assumption of fleet command after an ambush that nearly destroys them.

Jack Campbell provides a riveting storyline covering the Alliance Fleet escape from the Syndicate Fleet after the ambush.  At every turn he seems to come out on top of the Syndics bringing back the old ways of fighting with tactics instead of headlong senseless assaults on the enemy.

Dauntless, Fearless, Courageous are the first three books in the series.  Sadly at the end of Courageous I discovered it wasn’t the finality for which I was hoping.  There is yet to be another book released in April 2009 titled Relentless.  I recommend the books, but if you are hoping for a complete story line I have a feeling you’ll be waiting for the completion of another trilogy.

Learning guitar may have been easier when I was younger.  I’m 42 now and have been struggling with it the last several  months.  I’ve learned a few things, but sadly I wouldn’t say I can play any song from beginning to end even at this point.  Given what I have learned I can provide a few tips to make it easier.  First, at least at this point in my life, I’d recommend finding a teacher that can help getting past the sticking points.

Very likely the first things you’ll learn are some chords.  There are only about a billion of them, but don’t let that seem like a daunting task.  The reality is most songs only consist of a few chords.  Learn the chords, learn to move your fingers between the chords.  What you’ll be doing won’t sound at all like music; it at least won’t sound like the music you want it to sound like.  Practice practice practice.

When strumming, think of your arm as a metronome.  It must keep moving to beat of the music.  I’ve been working on this lately myself.  Some people will have an intuitive sense for strumming.  I don’t.  There are plenty of examples on the Internet regarding strumming patterns.  Just remember they are patterns, they aren’t written in stone – and variety or not quite getting the pattern perfect isn’t going to break the song.  There are many variations on strumming patterns for the same song – so I’m finding out.  Learning rhythm takes practice.

I think I may have found the perfect song to begin learning rhythm without the difficulties of numerous chord changes.  Probably the easiest guitar song to play for a beginner is America’s “Horse with No Name”.  It is just two chords and will give you plenty of opportunity to practice your metronome arm.  Try it!

I’ll follow later with more insights as I learn them.  I’ll even be posting some videos of my sad attempts at progressing to the next level.  I will persevere and I suggest you do the same.

Getting motivated to exercise is absolutely the hardest part of the exercise. It isn’t just going through the motions of getting on your gym gear and going to the gym. There is a deeper challenge with motivation while actually exercising! You plan on doing 12 repetitions, and call it quits at 10. I know because I have done it myself.

Sometimes people mistake this lack of motivation for running out of strength or energy. That happens, but more often than not — if you have the right weights and have been-there-done-that then it’s all in your head. You have to begin to look at the motivation part of exercise as an integral part of your day.

1. Join a gym. There’s nothing more defeating than going to the spare 10′x10′ bedroom to lift some little dumbbells and watch Montel on the TV. You MUST get out of the house and workout around other people. Other people will motivate you just by being around them.

2. Pick a time of day and stick with it. This not only helps you make yourself get to the gym to workout but you synchronize your body to expect it.

3. Plan your diet around your workout. Don’t gorge at lunch on a foot-long chili-dog and extra-large onion rings with that 55-gallon drum of coke. Think light but fulfilling. You don’t want to be feeling your lunch during your workout. And those around you probably don’t want to experience the effects of that chili-dog either.

4. Avoid sugars and food that converts to sugar quickly before your workouts. This includes large doses of bread, non-diet sodas, ice cream .. you get the idea. Once your body gets all that sugar it’ll tell you shortly after that initial rush that it’s time for a nap. Not a good pre-workout strategy.

5. Make some friends in the gym. This part is tricky. I have seen those that seem to only join a gym so they can have somebody to talk with for the entire duration they are ‘exercising’. It’s fine to have a chat during breaks between repetitions but it can be distracting. You must keep your mind focused on the task. Your gym friends should be there to help and encourage, and you can provide the same for them.

6. Determine how to make the gym a lifelong habit. Working out shouldn’t be to lose those 10lbs for the beach vacation. An exercise program is a life-long commitment. As soon as you are able to fix this into your mind you will have more energy and will-power to commit to this part of your lifestyle.

7. Music! If you don’t own an iPod or know how to use one, get one and learn. I prefer to buy music through Amazon downloads because they are DRM free (a long topic just in itself.) I find music one of the most important motivators, especially for cardiovascular workouts. You need something upbeat and motivating. I prefer electronic-techno music for the fast pace when doing cardio. With weight lifting it can be more challenging finding something to make you work harder.

There are dozens of other motivation tips that would take an entire book to cover. Watch here for more motivation tips!

People often ask me for advice on exercise and diet.  Sadly, all too often those people don’t really want to hear what I say.  They will either interpret what I said in some fashion that wasn’t intended, or they just don’t believe it.  I’m not really sure which.

The question usually starts with “How do I lose weight?”  or “How can I build muscle?”   Many people, even trainers will tell you they are exclusive to each other.   They say “lift light weight, do lots of cardio, eat proper meals to lose weight.”   These same people also have everyone doing their cardiovascular exercises before lifting weights.  And, the weight workouts are usually full body every 3 days a week.  I say “Bah.”

The exercise part is exceedingly simple in principle.  For most normal people (me included) it takes 5-7 days after a good weight workout for your muscles to recover.  Really!  I find it’s easier to break down weight workouts over a several day period.  It makes it easier to do, and easier to sustain.  For example:

Yes, that looks like a lot of work. It is a lot of work.   That is my current routine.  I sometimes vary it depending on how I feel.  You have to listen to your body.  If something hurts take the old advice “If it hurts when you do that, don’t do that”.  That isn’t to say you shouldn’t feel muscle pain a day or two after your workout.  But if it hurts while exercising, stop.  There are variations on workouts that you can squeeze into two or three days, for example a push day, pull day, and a leg day. (I’ll explain more on this later.)

Nobody ever said this was going to be easy. I also believe it’s wiser to do your cardio after your weight lifting. My reasoning for this is that your muscles will use the available glycogen for energy to lift weights. This is instant-on energy that’s readily available to your muscles. After you are done with weights and have used up most of your muscle supply of available glycogen, you move to cardio where your body’s fat burning will kick in by using available reserves for energy. By doing it in this order, you’ll be able to lift more weight with more repetitions, and burn fat faster.

But why more weight you say? “I don’t want to be a muscle bound lummox!” I can assure you that you won’t become bulging with muscles. I’d say 99% of the population just doesn’t have the genetics for it. If you are a man OR a woman you’ll only ever get huge muscles through genetics, drugs, or a more intense and professionally designed workout regimen.

The biggest frustration people experience is all that working out and not losing weight. Muscle by weight has less volume than fat, but weighs more. When you begin a workout routine you will lose fat and gain muscle which may seem on the scales like you aren’t making any improvement. The only real way to see progress is with a body composition test that can be done by any experienced trainer. I don’t trust the electronic scales that claim to provide body fat percentages. An alternative to that is to take a picture in minimal clothing to document your progress.

The key thing to remember is that muscle will burn calories while you just sit on the sofa. Fat will just sit on the sofa with you.

Next up will be what I consider the number one challenge of a workout.  “How do you motivate yourself to exercise?” and  “Am I lifting enough weight?”

** consult with your doctor prior to beginning any exercise program.

New domain name, new theme.  Let’s try this again.  I may be just copy and pasting some previous content here.