Tag: blogging

Snow on the Way

It’s going to snow tonight. Crap. I was going to see if Jen and Harry wanted to go for a drive to look at xmas lights, but now I just want to pull a blanket over my head and hide until the weather clears. I mean, winter officially starts at like 4:00am tomorrow morning. It’s bound to snow eventually. That doesn’t mean I have to like it.

I did a couple of goofy things with this little bloggie today. This post will serve as a bit of a test for one of them. I added a couple of new share buttons. Bluesky and Threads (and Mastodon? Did I add that one too?) are new, and Tumblr was re-added after being removed at least once. I removed twitter/x as well because fuck that musk prick. Fuck him right in his fucking eye. I tested the Bluesky and Threads buttons and they work. I also set new posts to automatically post to Bluesky. When I publish this literary tome I will see if it worked.

Another change, which is internal and should only be viewable by me, is that I think I hooked up to Google Analytics. I’ve had that option for ages now but I never did it. I am at heart a stats geek, so why didn’t I? It seems like I am too late as my engagement stats (the ones built into wordpress.com) are down something like 70% since they peaked back in February. Allow me to make the same caveat I make every time I mention this page’s stats… I really don’t care about the stats, I am just a numbers nerd and like to mess around with them. Also, and definitely most importantly, being down 70% from a very small, some might say microscopic, number is just another small, microscopic, number, dig it? This is not one of those blogs that sees a gajillion hits an hour. I consider myself lucky when I average one hit an hour and in my experience that would be a lot. In other words, I am in no way interested in drumming up business with insipid brain droppings, dig? Like I said twice before in this post, I just like playing with numbers. I have a Computer Science degree for cripes sake. Numbers are fun. Whatever, I am curious if linking up to Google Analytics a) worked, and b) will show me anything fun. I’ll probably write 100000 posts about it over the next few days (assuming it worked, of course).

All of these changes are internal but they might be a hint that a bloggie shake up is coming, and you know what that means… that means I am probably going to start messing with the theme and the layout. Sometimes Robert just cannot stop himself, you know?

What the hell was I talking about? I can’t remember. Oh yeah, it’s going to snow tonight. Doesn’t that suck? I think that sucks.

Oh well. I am going to click Publish now. Here’s hoping we cross post over to the ol’ Bluesky Social. Wish the bloggie luck……….

Write Something

I feel this almost overwhelming need to write something today, but I don’t have anything to write about. Usually I when the drive gets annoyingly persistent I can come up with something to prattle on about, but today I am drawing a blank.

The Bruins won. That’s two wins in a row on a road trip that started out awful. I think the last game of the trip is in Edmonton tomorrow night. Can they beat the Oilers? I would say probably not, but I didn’t expect them to beat Calgary last night either so what do I know.

I keep seeing the Boston Red Sox mentioned as potential destinations for big name free agent players. Unfortunately I heard the same thing over and over again during last year’s off season and we landed exactly zero big name free agents. We’ve made a big trade to get a potential ace starting pitcher. Will that be a sign of better things to come this winter? Who knows.

Harry is coming to stay with us this weekend. He was supposed to be coming over on Friday at some point but now he’s coming on Thursday! For those of you reading this at some future date allow me to clarify by stating that Thursday is tomorrow! Nice! I am working in the office tomorrow so I have to move some of my stuff out of his room before he comes over. When he’s home his room is… ya know… his room. When he’s not home, his room is my office. The only thing I need to move is a backpack and some camera stuff that is sitting on the day bed, and a table I have been using as a gift wrapping station. All of that needs to move down cellar to the space I use as an office when he’s home.

What else… what else… anything else? I don’t know. My lunch break is over. I have a meeting in about half an hour. I think I need to wrap this one up. Will it scratch today’s weird “write something, you dope” itch?

Probably not.

Noting to Say

I’m wrapping up my lunch break right now. I often throw together a blog post at around this time of day but today… well… I have nothing to write about. I have nothing to say. There is nothing going on.

I’m working at the desk in the cellar instead of the desk in my step son’s bedroom because my step son is home for Thanksgiving break and he’s actually using his room. I’m cold down here in the basement, but I’m always cold. Nothing world shattering there.

Nope, I just don’t have anything worth saying at the moment. Maybe I’ll post a haiku later on or something, but for now?

Nothing. Sorry.

Blogiversary: Missed

Four days ago, November 18th, was the 16th anniversary of the start of this blog. Sort of. It was the 16th anniversary of the start of the blog I had on blogger.com that was moved to wordpress.com in 2012 and then moved to medium.com for a while and then moved to a new wordpress.com at some point in time that I don’t remember. 11/18/08 was the day that I started a blog that was public facing, so that’s the anniversary date that I celebrate here. Before that I had private posts on myspace. Before that (briefly) I had private posts on yahoo360 (remember that one? No? Neither does anyone else).

Allow me to celebrate the 16th blogiversary with a picture of a cat because what the hell else would I post to honor an anniversary?

83/365

Testing: Do Threads Posts Embed Yet?

I wonder if links to Threads posts will embed into wordpress.com posts yet. They usually code things like this into the editor eventually, but the last time I tried it didn’t work.

https://www.threads.net/@reallytallredhead/post/DBMkfoYSvNh?xmt=AQGzSMifRQz1HEdhLvNV4GCsrugwS21zUDkdnKpQVkLVnA

Nope. Let’s get on this, wordpress.com folks.

Do posts from bluesky work?

I would really like to go see The Pineapple Thief when they come to MA next month but it's the Sunday before Thanksgiving and I'd have to go alone and I don't know if I have it in me. Also, why does it suddenly take me five tries to type the word "thief"? What the hell is wrong with me?

— Rob (@robj1971.bsky.social) 2024-10-16T19:21:45.766Z

Yup. There’s that, at least.

Now What?

I spent the last three months writing a post about the previous day’s music progress the first thing each morning. Now that the music project is over… now what do I do? I got so used to that little piece of the routine that I feel confused and disorientated this morning. I felt about the same way when the year of answering daily writing prompts came to an end.

Now what?

Also… don’t you hate it when your candle burns out? It’s sad, somehow.

DSC_2957

I am such a nerd. Wow.

Having a Good Day?

Hey folks, how is your day going? I hope it is going well. No scary things going on at work. Nothing too challenging, but enough going on to keep you engaged.

I wanted to write something for an end of my lunch break kind of post, but I gots nothin’. Nothing at all.

So… yeah. A content free post. Maybe that will be my new thing? I ran out of daily writing prompts and should come up with some new schtick to replace it. Maybe long winded posts that don’t have any actual substance can be my thing now.

Hmmm… something to think about.

Directionless

It is weird, you know? Now that I’ve run out of daily writing prompts and have kicked the habit (so to speak) I feel like I’ve lost my blogging mojo somewhat. Like… now what do I do? You know what I mean, jelly bean?

Today is the 4th of July. That is meaningless now that the united states supreme court has declared that the president is above the law. We the people, except for the president, right? Fuck it, I don’t care. My country is dead. Nothing to do now except vote for the guy who won’t abuse his new dictatorial powers. Whatever.

The holiday no longer has any meaning except that it’s now 50 songs in 90 days challenge season. From today through October 1st I am going to try to write a shite load of shitty songs. Be warned, I am going to write about that a lot. It’s only 8:18am and I already have one riff written. There will be tons more to come, I think. Unless I wuss out and lose motivation and stop working… like last year… and almost every year that I’ve tried this dumb thing.

The holiday is meaningless now but it’s still a day off during the summer. The plan is to have a cookout. Burgers on the grill for lunch. Chicken on the grill for dinner. Of course climate change has turned New England into New Seattle and it rains here almost every day. The forecast calls for thunderstorms right around dinner time. Hoo-fucking-ray, am I right?

What else… binge TV watching. What are we checking out these days? The Acolyte is excellent. It was good through three episodes, then ramped up big time starting with episode four. There are six episodes out and two left to go. Really looking forward to seeing how it ends. The Boys has a new episode out today. I haven’t watched it yet. House of the Dragon is just as spectacular as you hoped it would be. Over on Netflix I am trying to get back into The Witcher. I watched each of the first two seasons when they came out. They were okay. I started the third season when it first came out but lost track of it. I’ve watched a couple more episodes this week and am having a hard time remembering who everyone is and what they are trying to do. I’ll power through. I started watching Dark. I think I am three episodes into the first season. It’s okay. It’s a little tough to follow given that multiple actors are playing each character. Also, it’s a German show and I’m having a hard time taking some of the hairstyles seriously. I mean… wow. Not that that sort of thing catches my eye at all, but really… wow. There is also Torchwood on Max. It’s good. It’s not great. I’ll power through it, for completeness sake.

I’m sitting at my desk in the cellar right now. I just saw a spider. That’s not unusual. Our cellar is kind of the Spider Kingdom. I am not one who is afraid of spiders or weirded out by spiders or anything like that. I usually just ignore them and let them eat the other bugs. This guy though… it was big. Like… it’s going to haunt my nightmares big. I tried to terminate it with extreme prejudice using a fly swatter but I missed. I can’t find it now. I fear that it is going to come hunting for me to get revenge. I mean… it was big enough that if we still have mice hiding out down here then they might be in trouble. It was that big.

Yeah… see what I mean about me being directionless, bloggily speaking?