Ok, so September is International Talk LIke a Pirate Day.  Here’s some freakin’ pirate jokes!

Have you heard about the new pirate movie?
It?s rated AARRRRGGH!

What’s a pirate’s favorite mode of transportation?
A cAARRRR!

What’s a pirate’s favorite letter of the alphabet?
arrrr

What’s a pirate’s favorite kind of socks?
arrrrgyle

What is a pirates favorite study subject?
arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrt.

What’s a pirate’s second-choice job?
an arrrrrrchitect!

This pirate walks into a bar with a big ship’s wheel down his pants. The bartender says, “Excuse me, sir, but do you know you have a ship’s wheel down the front of your pants?”
And the pirate says…
Aaargh, it’s driving me nuts!!

A little kid with a speech impediment dresses up as a pirate and goes trick or treating. he knocks on the door of a house and a man answers. “oh, i can see you’re dressed up as a pirate.” the man says. “but where are your buccaneers?” the kid gets really mad, and says “on the sides of my buckin’ head!”

How much did the pirate pay to get his ears pierced?
a buccaneer

what’s a pirate’s favorite kind of cookie?
ships ahoy

What do you call a pirate that skips class?
captain hooky!

A pirate walks into a bar and the bartender says, “Hey, I haven’t seen you in a while. What happened, you look terrible!”
“What do you mean?” the pirate replies, “I’m fine.”
The bartender says, “But what about that wooden leg? You didn’t have that before.”
“Well,” says the pirate, “We were in a battle at sea and a cannon ball hit my leg but the surgeon fixed me up, and I’m fine, really.”
“Yeah,” says the bartender, “But what about that hook? Last time I saw you, you had both hands.”
“Well,” says the pirate, “We were in another battle and we boarded the enemy ship. I was in a sword fight and my hand was cut off but the surgeon fixed me up with this hook, and I feel great, really.”
“Oh,” says the bartender, “What about that eye patch? Last time you were in here you had both eyes.”
“Well,” says the pirate, “One day when we were at sea, some birds were flying over the ship. I looked up, and one of them shat in my eye.”
“So?” replied the bartender, “what happened? You couldn’t have lost an eye just from some bird shit!”
“Well,” says the pirate, “I really wasn’t used to the hook yet.”

What does a vegan pirate do in jail?
Starrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrve!

What has 8 arms and 8 legs?
8 Pirates!

It has been a very long time since my last post, but I’ve had a ton of stuff going on. 

The major thing that has affected my life is the new diagnosis of my daughter, Erin.  She has been diagnosed with Fibrodisplasia Ossificans Progressiva, or FOP.  The short story is that FOP is a genetic condition that turns muscle and soft tissue into bone.  It is a progressive disease, so it gets worse over time, so we get to slowly watch our daughter turn into a statue.  We have another blog going about this issue at www.cureerinkate.com.

We’ve started several fundraisers to help with the medical bills (there’s alot of stuff that insurance doesn’t cover when you have a rare genetic disease).  Alot of free time has been spent on the fundraisers, doctors visits, and general family stuff.

Because of all the stuff going on, we decided it was time to take a family vacation.  We realized that we need to do as much with Erin as we can while she’s still mobile.  We went down to Astoria, Oregon (yes, where the Goonies was filmed) and stayed at a KOA campground in one of their cramped Kamping Kabins.  It technically had internet access, but I literally had to raise my laptop above my head to get enough of a signal to check email.  Good thing I queued up a lot of news and articles, so the site ran on autopilot for a while.

Of course we went to Canon Beach (also where The Goonies was filmed), and I even visited the famous “Goonie House”.  I’ve been there before, and I played tour guide to several others who hadn’t been there.

On the way back up to Seattle we stayed at the Great Wolf Lodge, which is basically a frickin’ huge indoor waterpark with a hotel slapped around it.  While there, I got a chance to actually meet Don (our latest kickass staff member) in person. 

Right before we left on vacation, I had fiber internet installed, so I only had a day to play with it before I was whisked away to life without Internet.  Since I’ve been back I’ve been doing a bunch of testing making sure it is stable enough to support all of my web servers.

While this other stuff was going on, we had finally gotten our crap together and files taxes for several years (don’t ask).  When we got back from vacation, we had two new IRS checks in our mailbox… so it was time to take care of a lot of things we’ve been needing to do forever.

We got several large things for the house (that we hadn’t been able to afford), fixed our family car, paid off bills, bought new hardware (to support the OCMS server move), and of course we couldn’t resist the temptation to get a few toys that we’ve been denying ourselves.

There’s several little detail-y things here and there, but basically dealing with new installations and things that break. 

That’s the overall gist.  The past month or so has been so busy that I’m amazed that I have anything to return to.  On a sad note, one of the OCMS staff members have left in the midst of all this drama, partially because I had to put some business aspects of OCMS on the backburner while all of this other stuff got sorted out.  I really appreciate the support that everyone has shown during this time, especially for the current OCMS staff members that continue to stick it out with me.

Who uses a Real Simple Syndication (RSS) feed? Maybe the better question is how many are not using RSS feeds?

Before we go any further let’s talk just briefly about what RSS is and why it’s important. Real Simple Syndication is a process that allows individuals to subscribe to content distribution. This is not like subscribing to email marketing or an ezine. This content is custom fed to your reader and viewable when you choose to listen, watch or read the content. That’s right, the content captured by a RSS reader is not confined to text information.

Say for instance you have a podcast you like to listen to; an RSS reader can capture the podcast and download it for quick listening when you’re ready.

OK, now that we’re past the primer, let’s get back to the subject at hand.

Who uses an RSS feed?

Your average information consumer thrives on RSS information, but there may be an even more interested group of users.

Many business bloggers have very specific RSS subscriptions. If a business blog is dependent on information about a very specific trade or business discipline they can, in turn, provide their readers with some of the most up to date information available.

Their RSS reader scours the Internet looking for the specific information the business owner requests. The information received through an RSS feeder can help the business bloggers establish themselves as trusted resources for quality information.

The truth is there is a two-step marketing plan that is happening when a business blogger uses an RSS feed to find information they can use. The first step is for the original writer of the article or the producer of the audio or visual content. The RSS feed is helping them reach a very specific segment of the online population that is motivated by the material they present. The second form of marketing is when the business blogger redistributes the information. It is marketing for both the business blogger as well as the individual or organization that supplied the original story.

If you are looking for fresh content for your blog or even your website you can utilize RSS through a free article directory that can allow you quick access to the latest content from a specific writer or on a specific topic.

The growth of RSS is incredible. You might even liken the service to something like a newspaper being delivered to your reader that only feature topics you’re interested in.

This can be a great resource for business as well as an incredible time saver as you can bypass multiple online searches for the same information that can be direct delivered to your RSS reader.

The work of online business is already hard enough. That’s why using an RSS reader is a component that can enable you to have more available time to work on other marketing chores and business development.

In an online world that recognizes the power in knowledge-based content RSS has become a goldmine for those interested in passing the wealth along to their customers.

I’ve been working with Home Theater Computers for over 10 years.  Back in the day, a HTPC was the only way to get a progressive-scan DVD player.  There were lots of caveats, and there were no fancy 10′ interfaces like there are today… it had the same usability as a computer.  I used a highly-programmable remote to attempt to automate everything (turn on everything at once, open up the DVD player application), but it ended up being many many hours spent with very little benefit.

There are a few media center suites, but the most popular by far is Windows Media Center.  The appeal to transforming a computer into a HTPC is that you can access all of your media (downloaded Divx movies, mp3s, HD-WMVs, DVDs, home videos, photos) from one location.  Imagine replacing an entire rack of home theater equipment with a simple box.  The HTPC cases available today also make your PC look like home theater equipment.

I’ve been using Windows Media Center for about 4 years, and I have a love-hate relationship with it.  A general-purpose computer will NEVER be as reliable as an appliance, and that’s my major problem with it.  Sure, it has features that other appliances can’t touch (download DVD titles over the Internet, stream NetFlix in real time), but it just isn’t reliable. 

You have to consider the SAF (Spousal Acceptance Factor).  You’re probably a busy guy, and do you really want your wife and kids bitching at you to fix the TV because it froze or crashed?  If you have a HTPC then you must realize that have to add “TV technition” to your list of support roles. 

One of the reasons I use Media Center is to save on the $5 fee that DirecTV charges for their DVR service, which calculates out to be $60 a year.  You can easily spend four times that in a new hardware upgrade.  Not to mention the electricity costs… a typical HTPC will eat up abour 200 watts, and it has to be on 24 hours a day, 7 days a week (4800 watts a day x 365 = 1,752,000 watts or $140 a year).  Compare that to a typical DVR appliance which uses between 20-30watts, and it costs $14 a year… 

I have several Media Center PCs (so we can watch recorded shows on any TV, no matter where they were recorded), so the electricity costs start to stack up.

Several other gripes: the remotes “crash”, not all of the buttons work, a PC is always noisier than a DVR appliance, the electricity and heat issues, hunting down the right codec when your DivX movie has no sound, limited high-definition recording options, tweaking your video card to get the best output…

You can spend a lot of time making things work more smoothly, but then you’re spending more time fiddling with the damn thing then you are actually enjoying watching TV.

So I’m getting rid of Media Center… I’ll watch my downloaded videos on a Playstation 3 (which also has a BluRay player).  I’m using a QNAP NAS to store videos, and it can stream directly to an Xbox 360 or Playstation 3, which reduces the need for a HTPC… and the NAS only uses up 5 watts of electricity.

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Ad tweaking is one of those things that every dot-com mogul must do from time to time.  I spent alot of time this weekend compiling reports and running metrics on my ads to see which are effective, and which are not.

I’m always trying to find a good balance between having effective ads while not annoying the readers.  I’m also improving the usability on the main site so the articles are easier to navigate.  I always have a long laundry list of items, and I’ve just added a few dozen more just on ad tweaks.

On another note, it’s freakin HOT in Seattle… we got near 90 degrees.  Some of you in other parts of the country might not think that’s a big deal, but you must consider that most people in Seattle don’t have air conditioning (because it rarely gets this hot). 

So, our house bakes like a conventional oven… it traps in all the heat and doesn’t let it out.  The temperature drops at night, but the inside doesn’t get below 80 until about midnight.  

The temps are returning to our normal mid-seventies this upcoming week, though.  We usually have a one-week heat-wave in August, so there’s that to look forward to.

I’ve been using ergonomic keyboards ever since they came out… I just can’t have my hands all scrunched up on a “normal” keyboard… it’s stoopid… and some of the best gaming keyboards are NOT ergonomic at all.

I’ve been using the latest Microsoft ergonomic keyboard… it’s quiet and comfortable, but there are virtually no extra features on it… just some lame “quick-assign” buttons to open up web pages or whatever… not even media controlls.

So anyway I totally spilled pepsi on the side of the keyboard… I thought I caught it in time, but I went to use the computer this morning, and most of the keys wouldn’t work… I lifted up the keyboard and saw a pool of brown liquid… ugh.  I flipped they keyboard upside down so it can drain… hopefully it can be revived.

I’m using the Razer Lycossa keyboard (reviewed here) right now… it’s a fine keyboard and the keys have a nice rubbery feel to them, but my hands are still all squished together.  I will say that the low profile of the keys make for shorter finger movements, though

So now I have to find a new ergonomic keyboard, and right now the only thing out is the same MS one I’ve been using. 

Maybe it’s time to whip out the OCMS credit card and test out some keyboards for review… a fine idea, but I’m still backlogged on other reviews I have to get out…