Ramblings of the Mildly Insane

I like England. We have boring weather, except in Birmingham, where there was a tornado recently. I would still never want to get caught in a hurricane, not here or abroad. I like my boring weather, and call me old fashioned, but I’d like it to stay that way. And now I’m going to go to bed, and pray for sunshine, because let’s face it bank holidays are always rainy, so let’s have a bit of a change shall we?

Phill – it’s an FFAF bank-holiday bonanza at blackheart.

In 1985 (I think) Baytown, Texas, was hit by Hurricane Alicia. I would have slept through it if my mother hadn’t woken me up. I thought it was rather cool. Of course, I was just a kid and I still had a house when it was over.

The winds are picking up around here, but it may not be that serious as there’s no news reporting anything on it…but b/c I’m not really sure how the weather will look tomorrow, I’ve decided to open Free For All Friday a little early this month (and it will most likely run through the weekend).

As of now, you may feel free to login and post to the blog.

Rules & Terms:
1) Please do not promote any hate related or other negative type sites while you’re pimping stuff on my blog.
2) I reserve the right to moderate, edit or delete any entries which violate rule #1 at my sole discretion.

**This post will remain at the top until FFAF is over**

Click on finish reading for the instructions -> finish reading »

Well, it would seem as though I’m in the absolute direct path of this tropical storm/potential hurricane named Katrina.

I didn’t even know about this storm until last night, so, if I’m quiet here or don’t answer my emails for the next few days…this is most likely the reason.

I’ll update after everything is said and done to let everyone know that I’m alright.

Happy Thursday, and in case I’m not able to say it later – Happy Weekend.

I’ve noticed for the past few weeks that Google has been using a redirect for the search results pages. To the average user, you may not even catch it and it will look as though you go directly to the site.

I wouldn’t have caught it for myself, however, I use a Firefox extension which opens all new URLs in a new tab. When I used to click on a Google search result, it would open in a new background tab which is a lot better than continually clicking the back button or manually opening them in a new tab.

Well, one day I clicked on a result and it didn’t open in a new tab, so I clicked the back button and took a closer look – sure enough, Google was using a redirect…and it hasn’t changed in over a week. It’s mildly annoying because I have to manually right click and open the results in a new tab now – grrr…

You can’t even tell if you hover over the link, but the moment you click or right click on the link, the true URL is revealed (see screenshot below)

Notice the URL appears to point directly to the website

Notice that the URL now points to a Google redirect – this only appears after I’ve right clicked on the link

The other change I happened to notice was the actual page layout. It only happens a few times in a hundred, but, yes, the layout definitely changes – I even snapped some proof

The main differences appear to be the color blue used, the navigation bar across the top, and the Pay Per Click results.

For the average user, this would mean nothing really, however, for the internet marketer it seems that Google is doing some studying of what links get clicked and why and that can ultimately be used to tweak their algorithm yet again and throw the internet into an uproar (at least for those of us who make money based on organic SEO)

I’ll definitely be keeping a watchful eye on my websites and how they continue to do in Google – right now, it seems to be in my favor b/c I’m receiving a bunch of traffic from the big G and I’m hoping it stays that way.

You too can own the moon (or at least a 1 acre chunk of it)…

Amazing but true: You too can be the proud owner of property on the Moon!

Is it just me or are Earthicans very presumptuous in believing we own every corner of this Universe?

Well, I guess since the moon orbits the Earth it must be property of the Earthicans (I’m really just trying to find the logic in someone deciding to sell property on the moon…)

Oh, by the way, there’s this bridge for sale that I’ve been meaning to tell you about…

It seems I’ve taken up a new hobby — negotiating with referrer spammers, or rather – the people who sign their affiliate checks.

My .htaccess is busting with denied websites and my websites are still overflowing with referrer spam sites…it’s annoying to say the least, so, on a whim, I decided to click on one of those ‘contact us’ link and under the rouse of having a problem accessing my account, I plead my case.

I politely asked the referrer spammers to remove me from their software because it was a bad business choice to keep my site on it.

Well – I actually received a reply! (BTW, I set up a brand new email address just in case it makes its way onto any spam lists). It seems that some of the sites referrer spamming me are indeed affiliate sites.

I was just so surprised that I got a reply, from a person, asking for more info (which I promptly provided)…wow. I’ll continue to keep you updated on how my negotiations go and if it does have an impact on the amount of referrer spam I get.

It does you absolutely no good whatsoever to referrer spam me…if anything, it’s costing you money as my stats are not publicly viewable or spiderable — therefore, you gain no visitors, you gain no link reputation, and you gain absolutely no PageRank. Please take my website off of your spammer software’s list of websites to hit.

As a matter of fact, remove ALL of my websites from your list of sites to hit…you know what’d be even better?

1) Get more sophisticated software which tells you which sites are abandoned and display their stats publicly
or
2) Stop spamming altogether.

I’m opting for #2, but I know that’s just wishful thinking.

Seriously. When you go innocently clicking on links, you could find yourself staring at images you wish you hadn’t.

But, if you are one of those link clicker types, you don’t want to miss the comments…specifically this one which are my thoughts exactly, then, there’s this one and its rebuttal which are just funny.

You’ve been warned.

I figure I’m always sharing my dreams with everyone else, why not blog it? If there are any dream analysts out there, you may have a field day with this one .

In the dream, there were two men, one I knew, the other I didn’t. We were all walking down a road and in the middle was the man I knew. The one I knew mentioned something about a fishing pole and all of a sudden he had a fishing pole in his hand.

I said I hadn’t fished in about a year and think I pretty much forgot how to do it. He fixed the pole (untangled it or something) and I took it from him and cast it (perfectly if I do say so myself) – keep in mind, we’re walking in the middle of the street here and I just randomly cast a fishing line.

I ended up casting it directly into a hole in an old tree trunk across the street on a diagonal and the guy I didn’t know said,”Wow, that was amazing, I thought you said you forgot how to fish.” and I told him I thought I did. Then he said, “Well, start reeling it in.”

I thought he was on crack because 1) this wasn’t a fishing expedition, and 2) I cast the line into a hole in a tree. But I started reeling it in slowly so I could give the fishing pole back to the guy I knew and for some reason it started tugging on something.

So now both guys were like “OMG you caught something” and I’m still thinking they’re both on crack now and we end up at the hole in the tree and sure as shit I had hooked a white raccoon. Yes, white, with black stripes. Cute damn thing too.

It came out of the tree, but, then another 3 or 4 body guard type raccoons came out along with it – now, these body guards weren’t so cute. They looked normal, mean, and ready to attack me because there was a fishing hook lodged between the paw of their charge.

So, here I am, trying to slowly approach the white raccoon to remove the hook and trying to let it know I really wasn’t going to hurt it…then all of a sudden, it came over to me and stood up against my leg as if trying to hug me.

I safely removed the hook and tried to send it on its way, but it stayed with me and the body guards didn’t want to eat me anymore, which was cool – but they still didn’t like the guys though.

I vaguely remember petting it and I swear I found a new pet – yes, in a raccoon, but I don’t remember much after that. I think that’s when I woke up.

At least I’m not dreaming of variables. I really think I need a vacation.