Just Finished Jumper by Stephen Gould
Today I finished reading Jumper by Stephen Gould. A couple years back a movie was adapted from this 1992 book. The movie was average, but the book was better than average. In the movie the main character is extremely shallow choosing to sun bathe on the pyramid or the Sphinx for example. In the book he gets involved in more important problems.
In the movie Hollywood takes us on a rehashed ride where a secret society of supernaturals have apparently been dueling for centuries. yawn.
The book involves no such silliness.
The book actually turns out to be more action packed than the movie. It’s a little surprising that it wasn’t followed more closely. There is even enough teen angst to satisfy a devout twilight fan, although this book is thankfully more of a twenty something novel and not a teen book.
Anyway, well worth the read.
Distractions, Stumbling Blocks, Obstacles, Time
Trying to get back into the swing of writing a bit more regularly, and in the original spirit of this blog, I’m just going to let my brain go and dump some of my thoughts. I apologize in advance (actually afterwards because I’m writing this sentence after I wrote what follows), well, apologize in general for the complete lack of organization of thought below.
Its Sunday and I have just about recovered from a week that was a bit distracting. I’m in the middle of a challenge where I’m attempting to recreate an existing website for a client entirely within wordpress 3.01 and Pods CMS(which was going great and then I hit a brick wall). I like the Pods system quite a bit, love its potential, but the site itself and the tutorials/examples seem to be missing quite a bit. It seems like one of those deals where the developers keep building and improving it but never quite get around to explaining how to use their masterpiece, even though they seem to respond well in a quirky chat program.
I suspect they wouldn’t have to spend as much time chatting, if they or someone else took some time to explain how to use the thing. In short they need an evangelist/mentor type.
Last weekend, my primary laptop started acting up. Based on a myriad of details, I suspected that I needed to reimage the machine to clean it up or else face the possibility that the mother board may be dying on the machine.
Ugly no matter what, a pain in the butt, time consuming and possibly expensive.
The machine has been on borrow time for almost a month, but due to financial issues last year (which are now mostly solved) I didn’t make the move to replace it yet.
So around mid week, I attempted to prepare to reimage the machine, using a borrowed laptop to hold my current image temporarily, I proceeded to take the machine back to a factory state, then upgrade it to Windows 7. That took about 4 days, when it should have taken 1-2, but tech happened. ATT Uverse went down when some gas pipe layers wiped out the new fiber optics in the neighborhood. I had several other stupid issues of that nature as well.
Long story short, despite hoping to avoid it, I lost about a week of work on this challenge and I still don’t have my old broken laptop working again (ergo it runs, just don’t have all my tools on it yet).
All of that took place while I was trying to finalize a different client’s website. One of the stumbling blocks on that finalization is that the client states that one of the fonts and font colors of text on the pages is incorrect. I used the fonts they told me to use, so I asked, OK, what’s the font and color supposed to be?
Its been almost a week and they haven’t said what that should be. If its wrong, tell me where its wrong and I’ll fix it. Its a simple setting switch. Not sure where communication is breaking down on this issue.
[deep breath]
I did take time out for a stress break yesterday. My wife talked me into a trail run at the US white water center in charlotte. That was a lot of fun. During this whole week, I’ve been trapped in front of laptops trying to get mine migrated/upgraded/repaired, and my running almost came to a stand still, which isn’t great for peace of mind and overall well being.
But yesterday the run helped, and then we went next door at the last minute to a neighbors party. So I got to celebrate with some carbon life forms and get my head out of a stupid display for a while.
In the meantime, I’ve been listening to the Pillars of the Earth audio book from Ken Follet. We’ve been watching the show itself on Starz and I’m pretty hooked. Its not as riveting as Deadwood or as titillating as True Blood, but I do like it. nice change of pace.
Anyway, my challenge deadline is coming up this Wednesday. I have no working laptop yet. I have no working solution for Pods CMS yet. I don’t even really have anytime yet, so it looks like I’m probably going to lose $1k in revenue. 
The $1k isn’t going to make or break me, but I hate to miss an opportunity. More importantly, I really hate getting bogged down with tech issues in hardware and stuck on learning a new system because there are no resources for teaching that new system.
Oh, well, there’s only so much I can do.
In the meantime, Becky and I are going to see Tears for Fears at the Fillmore on Friday. Been a long time since we had a date/concert so I’m looking forward to that.
Winning Despite Failure – Thanks Jim Kukral for the Timely Perspective
Yesterday, I found myself sitting in bankruptcy court, definitely, a first for me. Long story short, business has been good, but my personal finances went into a tail spin when Wells Fargo foreclosed on my home in the middle of an Obama plan refinance. BoA didn’t help the situation eith
er by jacking my interest rates up to 30% even though I hadn’t ever missed any payments at the time.
So after months of work reorganizing my personal finances, things came to a head when my wife and I went to court and asked for a discharge of debt, aka we went bankrupt filing chapter 7.
Not happy about it, but as I was thumbing through the book, Internet Marketing from the Real Experts by Shawn Collins and Missy Ward of Affiliate Summit fame, I came upon the 3 minute lesson from Jim Kukral, whom I’ve had the good fortune to have known for a few years now.
The chapter was his famous ‘Are you a Loser or a Failure?’ topic.
Now, I have been lucky enough to here Jim speak more than a half dozen times. In fact, one winter, I heard him give his presentation ‘Are you a loser or a Failure’ three or four times in a week. It’s a good presentation, but by about the 2nd or 3rd time, well, I had heard that one before. Lesson learned, internalized, filed away, and appreciated.
Context is Everything
Then yesterday while I’m sitting in bankruptcy court with dozens of other people in the same situation, I came across this familiar topic again.
Well, even though I could just about give this speech myself from memory, it sank in on a new level.
The general point of the topic is that Losers give up and quit and people that are failures, learn from their mistakes and try again.
That pretty much sums me up. The downward spiral of my personal finances can be traced back to my corporate accounting days when I made $100k per year. Salary was great, but to support that salary and stay on the fast track, I had to relocate every couple years. That led me to rack up a lot of debt, which I could maintain when I was making $100k, but then the Chinese Mafia got involved (literally).
One day I found my division at Motorola transferred and sold to the Chinese Mafia. That’s not the type of thing they tell you during the HR employee transition meeting unfortunately. They just give you the name of the most visible corporate shell owned by the mafia, aka your new bosses.
So to keep my long story short, once I found out who I was working for, I turned those assholes in to the Feds as fast as I could, lost my corporate accounting job, but saved my life and the lives of my family. Who needs a $100k per year salary when you are dead or ‘disappeared’?
For the next 5 years, I worked to build my own business, and looking back, I have done pretty damned good. I just didn’t grow it to the point where I was profiting $100k a year, this that and another thing, and before you know it, I’m seeking bankruptcy protection and REALLY starting over.
But not starting over completely. Because I’ve got 5 years of lessons learned, a growing business built on my reputation and results (but not physical assets hence the chptr 7).
I wasn’t feeling down or negative yesterday, the low point of this whole mess was last March when I learned that I had been foreclosed on 
without any written notification. That blindsided action was depressing a bit, but there’s only so much you can do in that situation.
But it was definitely a boost to internalize Jim’s message again yesterday, especially in the middle of a week, when I’m working like crazy on projects for my clients. The future looks very good, business is looking good, I’m not only working from a clean slate financially, but I’m working from a clean slate with a lot of great experience.
Icing on the Cake
Now today, the day after bankruptcy, Amazon just delivered Jim’s new book “Attention This Book will Make you Money – How to Use Attention Getting online marketing to increase your revenue”
I’m expecting big things out of the future.
Born to Run by Christopher McDougall an Awesome Book that happens to also be about running
Late last night, I finally finished the book, Born to Run by Christopher McDougall. I could have easily stayed up and read the book in one shot, but I had to work and get some sleep and things.
The book rocked! It was like reading an Indiana Jones adventure novel mixed with a James Redfield quest searching for spirituality combined with a mystery and investigation into the science of the foot, the human body and , oh yeah, running. 
For the last 5 months since I started running in Vibram Five Finger Toe Shoes, people keep asking me, “Have You read Born to Run?”
They have this weird creepy gleam in their eye, typically. I always said, “No.” I kept thinking that they were caught up in some concept that was borderline fad or hype or something. I run in vibrams because they work, and I like it, and it is helping to make running both enjoyable and possibly make me into something of a serious writer for the first time.
I don’t really have any room in my life for hype or fads or whatever. Form rarely supersedes function for me.
So I mistakenly stayed away from the book. It sounded like as self help guru type of book, and I just wasn’t interested.
Well, I finally had some spare time and decided to listen to the audio book version of the book.
Within about 30 minutes I was completely hooked. Christopher McDougall is an excellent story teller above all else. Even if he was talking about a trip to the 7 & 11 to buy garbage bags in the middle of the night, I suspect he could tell a great yarn.
This book contains a great big amazing story, filled with lots of little amazing stories throughout, plus a bit of fact and science and hard investigative reporter like research too.
in fact, I suspect that this book might be one of the better books that I will read this year in 2010. Even if you are not a runner, I think you can enjoy this great story, the adventure, the jokes, the crazy situations and more.
Sure, McDougall might trick you into learning something, and DISCLOSURE/PLOT SPOILER there are a couple mentions of running barefoot and vibram toe shoes, but this book is NOT about TOE SHOES NOR barefoot running.
You might learn how to hunt antelope with your bare hands, you might learn about some of the newer theories of evolution, you might even learn about some extreme sports that you have never heard of, but above everything else, this book will entertain you very much.
If it doesn’t then leave me a nasty comment and I will apologize and wonder just what flavor of aum you were dosed with.
Life Changing Book?
Within the last few months, I have had possibly three experiences now that might serve to change my life in a positive way:
- The Beatles Love Show in Las Vegas
- Love is the Killer App, a book by Tim Sanders, and
- Born to Run by Christopher McDougall
James Redfield might even wink at me as they all ‘coincidentally’ share a similar theme either as a significant element in the composition or as the fundamental basis for the theory of the work.
Love
Screw New Years Resolutions, I’ve just red or experienced 3 different things that have inspired me. I don’t need a hollow promise when I can run forward with inspiration.
Here’s some relevant videos, but don’t let the videos fool you into thinking that the book might be boring.
Next Stop Affiliate Summit West in Las Vegas – Almost Next Stop
It is Thursday night and I’m writing this article early. Saturday, I’m flying to Las Vegas for my third Affiliate Summit. I’m going to be a mentor this year helping at least one person officially and probably 2 other people unofficially navigate Affiliate Summit West for their first time.
Its not even half way through the month of January and frankly things have been a good bit nutty after the holidays.
From a financial perspective I’m racing to make ends meet coming out of the holidays and a short working month of December. The month of January and February are both looking very good, but cash flow is not timed terribly well right now, so I’m doing everything on the cheap and as conservatively as possible this month.
Delta Maxed out my Amex
I’m also heading to a WordCamp in Boston next weekend, after Affiliate Summit. I will be sitting in at a couple Genius Bar sessions helping to show people how to design WordPress themes from scratch for the first time.
I was trying to keep my trip cheap, so I went onto Delta.com to book my flight using the last of my frequent flyer miles on Delta ( I used to live in Atlanta and have been trying to get these things used up all year long). Delta links my profile to my Amex and even when I pay for a flight entirely with skymiles, they secure the order with my Amex.
Well last Friday when I tried to book my order things went completely bonkers on the Delta site and without me pushing any buttons, the site automatically booked and confirmed a flight that I did not select, nor want.
Even worse it charged the order to my Amex with real money not frequent flyer miles and that maxed out my card!
I needed those funds on that card to book my hotel in Boston, so after the order I didn’t have a airline ticket and didn’t have the funds for a hotel!
I called Delta immediately after and they said they had cancelled my order. Five days later however, my card had not yet been credited and Delta.com couldn’t process my frequent flyer mile order with a maxed out Amex!
I called them up and they initially told me that I was shit out of luck, no refund.
I re-explained the problem and they relented and offered to give me a refund afterall. But a day later it still hadn’t gone through. So this time I called Amex and essentially disputed the charge. But another day after the dispute and my card is still maxed out.
Its now about 36 hours before I head to Vegas and I have no idea if I’ll be able to get my trip to Boston fixed before I would have left next Friday.
CES Was a Wash This Year too
Every year I always say that I’m not going to go to CES next year. This year ended up being that year for real. But my friend Joe Klein and Michael Butler did make it and had a good time. A new friend here in Charlotte Robert Enriquez (aka NC_SEO on Twitter) also went for the first time himself.
All in all, I’m kind of glad I missed the show this year, even though I would have preferred to have made that choice and not be forced into it by circumstances. Anyway it worked out as I have been getting a lot of website design work done for quite a few different customers. (more on that in a future post).
Dancing Last Weekend
Among other things I also had a chance to go out dancing with my wife Becky and some of her teacher friends. I had a great time as I love to go dancing. I could do that full time if I weren’t in my thirties. It wasn’t the best club I’ve ever been too, but it got the job done, we had fun and that’s a good thing.
Broken Laptops and Replacement Cell Phones
My Palm Pre finally died last week and I had a replacement shipped to me by Sprint (I pay for insurance on my Pre). This was my second Pre to die (I now have my third Palm Pre). I think its a great phone, but they are not terribly durable.
Once I get back from Affiliate Summit, I’m going to by a spare battery for the phone as well, as the standard battery just doesn’t cut it.
The keyboards on both my laptops flaked out again. I was able to rebuild my primary laptop keyboard, its less than a year old. Its a Toshiba and I love the little thing, but it sucks that the keyboard died.
The other laptop is 4 years old and despite spending 3 hours trying I was not able to get the laptop going again. In both cases, I think the plug for the keyboard on the Toshiba laptop motherboard is a bit defective and it basically causes the keys to seem to stop working.
So now with my older larger laptop, I will always have to plugin a keyboard via USB to type anything. I also feel like I am on borrowed time with my newer Toshiba laptop, so I will probably have to get ready to get a new one sometime soon. I really hoped that I’d get at least 2 years out of this laptop, and am a little miffed that it didn’t even make it a year before becoming unreliable.
Dragon Riders of Pern Series
I’ve recently been listening (re-listening/re-reading) all of Anne Mcaffrey’s Dragon Riders of Pern novels. I’ve read these more than a half dozen times and just enjoy the story. This time I’m trying to read them in chronological story order.
I’m also reading Love is the Killer Application by Tim Sanders, which is a good book and I think I’m getting some useful information out of it.
The White Dragon, Harper Hall Series and All the Weyrs of Pern are my favorites.
Meetups and Conferences
I am over due scheduling a WordPress Meetup in Charlotte and will definitely do that no later than tomorrow. Plus, I am now going to be scheduling the next Charlotte WordCamp picking up this responsibility from Jason Keath the founder of Social Fresh, who also ran the first Charlotte WordCamp. I’m looking forward to this experience and even more so looking forward to giving people access to some great WordPress resources, information and a people! I just learned this yesterday so you can be assured that I will have a lot more to talk about on this topic in coming days.
Frozen Lake
The lake is frozen, but I did just receive a new kerosene wick for my heater, so I am looking forward to getting back into my dockoffice, primarily so that I can do some video and audio work. Outside of my dockoffice I have not found a good location to record video or audio. Every where I work outside of my office is WAY TOO NOISY!
So that’s what I have been up to, if you have caught up with me, please drop me a comment with a link or two to your own blog and let me know what you have been up to lately. I’ve been fairly conversant with folks on Facebook, but haven’t been making the blog rounds as much as I would like, so give me a bread crumb (hyperlink) and let me catch up with you!
No Child Left Behind with Capt UnderPants
Mobile post sent by brettbum using Utterli. Replies.
Customize Your Sites theme today!
You don't need any programming experience to design Custom WordPress Themes. :)
