NEVER KNOW WHAT YOU GOT TILL IT’S GONE
Happy anniversary to Admirable Thoughts: Writings of Code Monkey. Today marks one year in the life of this blog. THE FIRST ENTRY was posted and Feb 1, 2005. Many things have changed over the life of the blog since then.
So in honor of one year, I thought I would share a few thoughts, changes, and stats about the blog since it came out.
Reasons For The Blog:
In my first post, I mentioned that I had a few reasons for starting this blog. One was because I figured it would be good to know how to set them blogs in case I had to do one for professional reasons. Well, since that time I have set up three blogs for clients and knowing how to do it helped a lot.
Another reason for this blog was to help my writing and grammer skills. I still have a longs way to go on improving my skills, but I think there has been some enrichment of my word power. I think it’s really…really…really good. 
So after one year, I would say the blog is a success based on those goals.
Site Looks and Makeup:
Over the last year, the look of this blog has change a few times from improvements of the side bar to a face lift of the overall look of the blog The back-end has had a lot of work, too. This blog was built on software from WordPress. I started with version 1.5. Since then I have had to update it to versions 1.5.1 and 1.5.2. and now version 2.0.
The site continues to be rss and xml readable so that you use blog reading software like Newsgator or other blog content readers to know when a new story has been posted. Also, you can sign up on a email list (on the side bar) so you will be emailed immediately when a new story has been added. At first, there was an email list that sent users an email alert about a new post, but it would only send the email out the next day. It was not very reliable and frankly too slow in today’s instant world, so it was replace with the current email notification program which is a plugin to the blog.
Number of Plugins:
Playing with blog’s make-up, I have learn to love what are called plugins. They are third party software that adds features to the blogs. I have added eight plugins to this site so far. The plugin functions range from tracking stats to fighting spam.
Fighting Spam:
Yep, if you allow comments on your blog, you will have to fight spam. A lot of trashy websites have tried to add comments to this blog that would link to their garbage. So I had to make it so that I have to approve comments. Then I had added a program to help determine what was spam before I had to approve it. To date, 1466 spam comments have been blocked by the spam blocking code.
Then I saw the pattern that spammers were trying to add comments mostly to old entries. So I added a plugin to turn off comments on old entries. That has been an awesome plugin and pretty much stopped spammers from adding spam as comments.
Number of Accepted Comments:
The number of accepted comments is eighteen. So I don’t get a lot of comments via the comment section on the blog. I tend to get email from my friends about the stories, but I do not know how many as I have not keep track. The most comments for any story is two. The longest peroid without any comments put on the blog by readers is seven entry in a row.
Number of Entries:
There have been seventy entries posted to the blog, including this one. So a little more than one per week is my average for writing something for the blog.
Titles:
After my first entry, I decided that once and in while, I would have a bullet point format of thoughts called Monkey Meditations. So far there has been ten entries of Monkey Meditations or about 14% of the entries are the special Monkey Meditations posts.
There has been two different three part series on the site. I never thought I would have entries that were divided up into parts when I started the blog.
Another change to the site after the first entry is that I decided every title would be a line from some song. Stonestead was the first who let me know he had caught on to my title names idea, but a few others let me know they caught on before I let anyone know what I was doing. So eventually, I added a link that is in on the side bar called Name That Title; so if anyone wanted to know what song the title was from, they could find out.
So far the break down of the types tunes titles are:
25 were Christian
17 were Country
06 were Rock and/or Roll
03 we will call Other
The most used performer/band is a tie among a few groups. Newsboys, David Crowder, and Delirious? each had three different songs used. No surprise to me as those are three of my top five favorite artists. My other top five favorites were used a few times. Third Day had two songs used, and Chris LeDoux had one song used in honor of him.
“DID YOU FEEL THE MOUNTAINS TREMBLE?” by Delirious? became the official title for entries that involved the completion of a 14ers. It is also what I write in the registry on top of each 14er I do, so it seem a good fit for the blog.
“I NEED YOU” by Jars of Clay became the first song to have different lines from the same song used as different blog entries.
Number of Visitors:
Sorry I do not have good stats on this because I did not add the stats program till six months into the blog. It does not tell me much about visitors, but I do know that in the last six months the blog has a 58295 Total Page Hits.
The story that has the most hits was from May 7, 2005, DELIVER ME FROM ALL THE MADNESS with 695 hits. Why, I really don’t know.
Well, I hope you enjoy today as a celebration of this blog, or at least enjoy your day. I am looking forward to another year, Lord willing.
LikeMonkey Meditations
- Gifts I would like for Groundhog’s Day: A new ending to the 2006 AFC championship game where the Steelers don’t win.
- After watching the AFC and NFC games, I was thankful my name was not Jake. That was a bad day for guys named Jake, especially if they were NFL Quarterbacks.
- The good news is that we are less than three weeks till Spring Training!
- I hope the Rockies are in contention at least till May this year.
- Gifts I would like for Groundhog’s Day: To be in shape again.
- Ok, that one is up to me. So I am going back to the old routine starting Monday. Time to start getting up at 4:30 AM and going to the gym and working out hard.
- Over the last few years, I have gotten out of a consistent work out schedule and I feel it.
- I am writing my goal in this blog so you can ask me if I am doing it and help to keep me motivated. Accountability.
- Gifts I would like for Groundhog’s Day: Time to go snowshoeing at least twice this winter.
- Thus, another reason to get in shape.
- Hopefully, one trip will be with Todd, even if it is not a snow cave trip.
- The other trip, I hope my wife is part of.
- Gifts I would like for Groundhog’s Day: To spent more time on my mountain bike.
- My wife got me a nice on a few years back and I need to use it more.
- This is would help me with getting in shape, too.
- While also being a reason to be in shape.
- Gifts I would like for Groundhog’s Day: A new and nice vacuum cleaner.
- Sad, I know.
- However, I hate the vacuum cleaner we have.
- I wonder what one of those Oreck models are like.
- Gifts I would like for Groundhog’s Day: To have the ability to dream up more exciting gifts for myself.
- What? Don’t you exchange gifts to use over and over again on Groundhog’s Day?
- As for right now, only 131 shopping hours left.
JUSTICE IS THE ONE THING
Justice:
If there was justice all the time, Goose would have gotten into the Hall-of-Fame this year for sure. However, it appears the sports writers blew it again. Is it time for a new hall-of-fame voting system or at least new voters?
If there was justice all the time, Phil Simms would never cover an important football game on TV especially those involving Denver. Yet, it appears he will be at this weeks playoff game involving the Patriots and Broncos.
If there was justice all the time, Senator’s questions to a Supreme Court Nominee would be limited to 1 minute or less so it is a question not a speech. Also, at the end of the questions, the same nominee would then get to ask the Senators the same type of questions and they would be required to answer. That would be a lot more fun, don’t you think?
Congratulations:
To my high school buddy, Randy, and his wife, Julie, on their firstborn, Joshua!
Condolence:
To another childhood friend, James, and his wife Angela, on the passing of her father. We are still praying for you guys during this tough time.
Did Not Take Long:
Finally, it appears a sequel is on the way for Naria Fans. More information here.
BA NA NA NA…. HEY!
What do Todd, Mike Haynes, and I have in common? No, it has nothing to do with jobs forcheesy companies like for example, Altitude TV. We were all in the stands on January 9, 2006 to watch the St. Louis Blues get beat by Colorado Avalanche, 6-1.
I did not know Mike Haynes was in the crowd with his family till I was driving home and he was being interviewed on the radio. I guess this is the first time in 10 years that he has been able to just watch a game as a regular fan with his family.
It was interesting to hear his take on the game and what it was like from the stands. A quick summary is cowboy hats do not get thrown on the ice for a hat trick because of cost and he thought the music was too loud with a circus atmosphere and a hockey game. He said he would have liked the music to be a quieter so he could have explained things to his kids about the game and talk to his family at breaks. I guess they will have to turn on the TV/Radio to hear him like the rest of us.
As for me, it was exciting to see a hat trick, two goals overturned, 3 big fights, the refs avoid getting hit by players and pucks for the most part, line changes, and a near shutout. I was hoping that the shutout by Abby would happen, but no such luck. Around 9:00 minutes left in the game, the Blues scored.
I learned that I don’t think St. Louis Blue’s player, Eric Weinrich, is not a good role model for kids learning hockey. He had a lot of questionable type actions especially after his shifts.
A few other things I learned is that Marek Svatos has a nasty shot. Wow.
Also, that Alan Roach, the Rockies and Avalanche PA, Bronco sideline reporter, and radio personality, is going to the 2006 Olympics as a PA man. Good for him.
It was nice to get to a game with Todd as we had not been able to hang out much because of a lot of his family health issues. I was suppose to go with my wife on this as our date, but because of events we can not control, we could not go together. So that was kind of sad. Not to take anything away from Todd, but I did want some fun time with my wife.
Overall, it was fun to get to a game in person with a good friend, instead of watching it at home on the house “movie-plex”. It was nice that they won their 5th straight game, too.
Some Game Information
Stars Of the Game
- Marek Svatos – Had a hat trick.
- Rob Blake – Lots good to me.
- Karlis Skrastins – I am just starting to appreciate him.
Best sign that I saw
“We drove from St. Louis to watch the Blues lose in another town.”
HOW YOU KEEP FROM GOIN’ CRAZY?
Some-days being a Code Monkey will just push you off that little edge between sanity and insanity. This weekend, a software program made sure I was long pass that line. I am still here waiting for the server to reboot again for the nth million time this weekend.
All I was trying to do was create a system backup, but the backup software has pretty much ruin the boot process of the machine.
Right now I am stumbled, so I am going to do is take advice from my one of my college profs. I am going to walk away for a bit and pray, hope, and trust that a solution will enter into my head.
This is why I say computers are evil.
I wonder if it is too early to retire and make no money?
UPDATE
7:45 PM: Ok, so getting away and some pray made the last two days of headaches seem to dissappear. With a little help from another 3rd party software, I was able to get around the mess the backup software made.
MUST BE SOME MISTAKE
So if clean air is bad because it causes faster global warming?
Then does that mean trees are bad.
Ever wonder why people want to be on American Idol? Maybe we need to get a big grant to study it, but at least there is a starting place for the study.
This story is just fishy.
Have you taken the Holy Grail Quiz, yet?
So Pat Robinson want to continue to make Christ followers look bad. Well, I was wondering what to say about it. I was not going to say anything as I hate to bring attention to him. Then I found that another friend of mine has a blog. Now, he did not write specifically about Mr. Robinson, but the post is very good and relevant to the current and strange comments of Mr. Robinson. Took a peek.
