Tuesday 9 January 2007

09-01-2006_09-30-2006

Saturday, September 30, 2006

One More Thing
Shitheads Shooting Shinto Shrines Shit Me.
More so, some asshole poking bullet holes in a mosque here in Perth is just bullshit. Not the way to deal.
Someone firing into a mosque during their observances is just as much a loser as the fundamentalist extremists. Come on Aussie, we can be better than that. We have a thriving multicultural integrated society, and this is not a cool act.
One more thing, we should be encouraging everyone to knock dictator Bush off his pedestal. So don't shoot at these people, because our enemy's foe is our ally... Uh and guess what, John Howard is now a supporter of a corrupt regime....
Categories - ::/:: posted at 10:34 PM Ted More Comments: (2)
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Thursday, September 28, 2006

Two Things
Two things discussed on JJJ's Hack this afternoon deserve a special mention:
1. The enlightened yet benighted professor of liberal heart bleeding and hard drug supply whose attitude to drugs is to make them safer to use.
His concern was that drugs caused preventable deaths every year, make the addicts safer, and you save lives. My concern is that if you make a drug safer in some way, the idiots find some other way to take them that unsafe. They're called "substance abusers" for a reason you great hulking effwit! My second concern is that if you make a drug safer for the abuser to take, they will live. A dead substance abuser costs a State pauper's funeral at the most - a one-time fee of a few thousand dollars. A live substance abuser with half their rational faculties burnt to a methamphetamine crisp costs the State around $100,000 a year while they sit and drool all over their nursing staff and injure themselves and the people taking care of them, for years and years and years.
And to all those people who say "well they are a human being they will feel better for the care" I say - how do you know what goes on in what's left of such a brain? Consider that most substance abusers are acting out a death wish to begin with, remove all the inhibitory mechanisms with an ice lobotomy, and who are you to tell me what that shell of a former person is thinking and feeling?
2. The "Fearsome Weapon" brought into and discharged in parliament.
Here's a sword with three edges... The story is that a rather sophisticated Taser device was brought into Parliament and demonstrated to the Members assembled. Edge One is that they are right, there are sound reasons why weapons are absolutely banned from being brought into any House Of Parliament, and if you've ever observed a heated session you'd know why. On that level, I agree totally. On the other hand, (Edge Two,) imagine Tasering some of our pollies into shape. That's enough temptation to overlook such a minor breach, surely? Well, actually, as it turns out, I actually believe that once you let such a matter slip even just once as in this case, you've set a dangerous and inevitable precedent. And Edge Three is that perhaps the police needed to make this much of an impact in order to make their case for carrying these Tasers on the beat.
Because I agree with them carrying the things. In hundreds of thousands of deployments of Taser devices, only six people have ever died as a direct result of being Tasered. And I believe that of those, more than half were due to a pre-existing heart condition. Of the reported several hundred other associated deaths, they were all caused by ensuing violence and abuse, not the tasering itself. Why it should not bother you is that if you aren't doing anything wrong then why should you ever be looking down the barrel of a Taser? If you believe that you're a person at risk of being Tasered then you might possibly be a violent person and the Taser might just prevent you from going to jail for life, for committing a murder or two...
And lastly (drumroll) the main reason why I think the cops should carry zappers - they are mainly interested in the use of them to control violent people who in 90% of cases are only violent because they're off their faces on drugs they probably took safely but which have still screwed up their brains and turned them into mindless anger machines.
So I say to hell with political correctness - I think part of the Darwinistic "Survival of the Fittest" selection procedure might just be to have the brains to avoid drugs that kill you. And so, people who don't avoid them, probably shouldn't pass that trait forward. Oh, and as a fringe benefit, it would remove one of the major reasons why so many people all over the world involved in or affected by drug dealing die or are killed each year, and remove a major source of income that Al Quaida and other organisations use to fund their terrorism activities.
Oh and one last thing about Tasers - if you know you're going out to do anything which might involve a policeman needing to subdue you with a stungun, wear a singlet, wrap a few layers of aluminium foil around that and tape it in place, and wear a thick flannel shirt or jacket over that. Instant Faraday cage... Geeks rule!
Categories - ::/:: posted at 10:01 PM Ted
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Wednesday, September 27, 2006

Three Things
There are three things that TV is currently doing that they should be shot for:
ONE: Enough Irwin Already. Nuff Said.
TWO: Please. Please. Please. Stop using the phrase "he died doing what he loved." Please?
THREE: That ad where a tosser tries to act like a construction worker trying to act like a tosser with his coffee with the froth on top? It's working. I can definitely see the "tosser" part coming across...
Categories - ::/:: posted at 10:35 PM Ted More Comments: (2)
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What's time to a fossil anyway?
We seem to have it in for rocks. And rocklike things like fossils. In a story that sounds like it's straight out of Terry Pratchett's Unseen University, some ichtyosaurus fossils have been discovered by a new faculty member at Canada's Alberta U.
Under a pingpong table.
Unbelievable as that sounds, these three fossils were apparently found by Mr Caldwell, under the pingpong table, in a cardboard box. So it's actually a rediscovery, not a discovery, but still, new fossils, hey!
What makes this so funny is that these fossils have apparently hung around, under that same old pingpong table, for twenty-five years... Only in a lovely old-fashioned University can you be sure that the old boots you left in the common room will still be there for your grandchildren to use when their turn comes to go to Uni. A comfortable University, where the cleaners respect property rights and don't get too fussed about things like cleaning...
At least it won't bother the fossils - after all, what's another 25 years to a fossil?
Categories - ::/:: posted at 8:18 PM Ted
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Monday, September 25, 2006

Selling Selling Selling!
Things have finally fallen into place here and we're tiddling the place up prior to placing it on the market. Consequently, I'm totally exhausted after the weekend. We're planning to move to a smaller place in the country and I've realised that I've been carrying books around with me for over thirty years, carefully packing them and the bookshelves from place to place - some of these books have been mine since my early teens, when each book was an adventure and took me there among the stars with the Stainless Steel Rat and Slippery Jim Bolivar, phasertronic gun spitting death. Hehehe those were the days, young stupid and easily amused...
In any case I've catalogued about 200 of them online so far, at this page. You're welcome to take a look around and make offers, there are book from the sublime to the {Trog! Trog The Destroyer!} ridiculous in there.
Oh yeah and vinyl. Did I tell you that in the early 80's I was an announcer on a 24 hour community FM station and have done shows from 9PM to lunchtime the following day? Well, I did, and I have about 130 of my on-air and favourite records of that era. All stored nicely flat and in very good condition for working records. Additionally I have a few extremely rare and impossible to get hold of records that shaped music along the way, and rarities like a WRAAF canteen record, a 78RPM brittlepitch platter, several odd format records, a lot of European records, and many that set the mold in their particular styles.
Note some records belonged to my mum and dad and ssisters and you'll get an included story of that item and how it met our family.
Text is now typing me and that means I'm low on charisma man I can feel blood all wet and spray and cold For The Horny Tempters. And With That the Horny Tempters take up with out band and rooting seems to be good cos Miff has got his end in and doing the horizontal mamba. Hey was =THAT= the big idea, Curse me I'm fixin to stick on that surface here and examine what we have left.
Anyway - ramble aside, I have great books and GREAT vinyl records, also some old brittle 78's 10" ande 12" - many the forebears of music these days.
And the books,they slowly write, secretly write --- YOU! --- in return, and before long you too will be there among the stars with the Stainless Steel Rat and Slippery Jim Bolivar, phasertronic gun spitting death...
Categories - ::/:: Edited on: Tuesday, September 26, 2006 1:41 AMposted at 12:33 AM Ted
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Friday, September 22, 2006

Pushin' Buttons, All Around.
Food - why it's really unsafe. You may have seen on ACA tonight that some foods are unsafe after just one day in the fridge. If you don't bevel your edges...
So lemme tell you the real reason why the food's unsafe after you get it. And sometimes (although you wouldn't know it) even, borderline already at that stage. Most places that sell food like to make sure they turn a decent profit. So they stockpile enough of the different "Fresh Foods" and keep it so they can even out minor market glitches. The tomato in your sandwich from the local deli may well have hung around some large distributor's coolrooms for a long long time...
See, I can remember when fridges were unreliable and somehow we managed to keep foods for up to a week in the fridge. I remember that I picked tomatoes and put them in the fridge and, while they weren't as tasty after a week, they were still firm and good. Nowadays I get a "fresh" tomato and put it in the fridge and it is wrinkled after a day. That tells me it's been stored in ideal conditions for at least two weeks already.
So all the sage warnings about keeping food for too long in the fridge are caused mainly by this overstocking by food suppliers. As I say in my diet book there's a sound financial reason they do that, but it has nothing to do with our health or wellbeing. And the places that use that food to make meals for us, they have to make a profit too. So they'll use the ingredients even if they are pretty close to the use by date.
And that's the real reason why putting what you thought was fresh food in the fridge results in food poisoning.
Looks like I stirred up at least one person in one sector of one community with my posts. Tell me what you think, I think they're trolling and deliberately missing all my lampooning and satirising.
Richard Branson - I LOVE the man! Best thing anyone can do, I admire the guy I really do! Bill Gates putting all his money into that foundation didn't touch me. Once you've got the things you want, living is cheap, and the difference between living on one billion dollars or forty billion dollars is pretty immaterial, yes? Branson's not in that league yet and this is a pretty magnanimous gesture you must admit. It's a guy realising that "they" won't save the world, and it's down to people like him who now have the means, to become the mystical "they" and do what they can to salvage this mess.
It also helps that he's taking a very public dig at our government for sneaking out of the Kyoto Protocol, I kind of wish Steve Irwin had had the presence of mind to say something like that in one of his shows. Fawnin' Johnny would have been falling over himself to sign up to something one of his heroes mentioned. Anyone ever think how sad it is that the man who supposedly has the most power in Australia finds it necessary to suck up to just about everyone including a Texan vote scammer?
Peter Brock and Steve Irwin - will we ever get over them? I'm so disappointed in our media, they've really taken their pounds of flesh. "No we'll never show the stingray incident!" is what I seem to recall a week ago. Now I'm hearing that it may well feature in the autobiographical movie. And Terri and Bindi giving "exclusive interviews" to Nine. Come on fellers Steve's barely had time to cool down and you're already whipping up a circus that would have a saint spinning in their grave!
Categories - ::/:: posted at 8:23 PM Ted Comment made, yay!
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Tuesday, September 19, 2006

Am I Too Harsh?
Ummm have you been following the news about the teen girl who SMSed herself out of a kidnap? I have nothing but respect for the girl she had guts and she used her head. But here mother, I just want to push her down that bunker and then fill it in after her. Instead of seeing the positive she's doing her best fat moll American whine "if someone had just lifted a twig" she's blubbering, and all I can say to that is she is so lucky to have her daughter back, and instead of being grateful she's effing well whining that she didn't get her kid back quickly enough.
Why do people go through life seeing only tragedy? She had the perfect reason to celebrate - and she bitched and complained instead. She's the sort of person that sees a dark cloud and ignores the glint of silver lining. The sort of person that sees a silver lining and immediately starts looking for the big black cloud.
She's making herself miserable with her loser outlook and in a small way I have to say that provokes a smile of schadenfreude around my lips.... I've told countless people that other people don't make then feel bad, they hand other people permission to make them feel bad. And now I've seen someone who circumvents the supplier and the middleman, and directly does her own happiness in. Yanks are so clever!
Categories - ::/:: posted at 12:18 AM Ted More Comments: (9)
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Monday, September 18, 2006

I'm With Ratsinger On This One
I think this shows the basic differences between religious fanaticism and religion. When certain Muslim extremists blew up hundreds of innocent people for whatever reasons, there was some defacement of a few mosques, and we considered those people who committed those acts of vandalism to be too extreme.
Now the Pope has said a few words that has some self-important zealots' knickers in a knot and already they've apparently killed innocent nuns. Can you spell "nuts?"
I'm also (surprisingly) on Howard's side on the immigrant laws. We don't go and drive on the wrong side of the road when we're overseas, we don't go asking everyone in another country to drop everything for our religious holidays, and we don't go converting them to our religion just because we're basically insecure about our relationship with our women.
So as far as I'm concerned, although I grew up for formative part of my life in a Muslim country, I think that both I and Allah would turn our backs on these wrong-headed people. They are wrong in the eyes of the Christians, the Jews, the Buddhists, and the good Muslim people of the world. If anything, the Ayatollahs should call a jihad against these fanatical people who find their own lives to be so valueless and cheap that they make the mistake that the rest of the world is as hopeless as they are.
Categories - ::/:: posted at 6:45 PM Ted More Comments: (12)
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Thursday, September 14, 2006

QOTD
"... because people are probably uncomfortable with hearing love songs sung by someone who's never had sex."
- "David Tench" on why Shannon Noll has sold more albums than Guy Sebastian...
Categories - ::/:: posted at 8:53 PM Ted
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Tuesday, September 12, 2006

Meeto Benito
I'm looking for the signs here. Signs that things are changing. And I think that they are. Might be the USA that these articles are examining but how far are we ever behind Unca George W, given Howard's sycophancy? And besides, you don't have to look far to see those signs here already...
I was watching a bit of TV as is my wont, and thinking about how our government is taking the next step in "education" - that of separating the children from the parents - which is one of the dream goals of fascism. John Taylor Gatto is quite specific about the ideal controllable society, which the Government uses education to achieve. Trying to overlegislate parenting is the first tip of that particular wedge, and we're seeing that in spades here.
We're also seeing that rampant nationalism stirred up, Benito the Benevolent Howard is trying to pump up the status of the military by sending more and more of them to do "a man's job" and our human rights as a labour force are being continuingly whittled away. The tools we have for communication are under attack (and believe me privatising Telstra is an attack on our communications infrastructure which, if we did it, we'd be executed for) and twits like Liam Bartlett are being manipulated into bleating about "filtering the Internet" in their Sunday columns.
I'm not sure what you'd class the magnificent "handling" of the north west shelf oil and gas companies as but I think it shows just how much power the large conglomerates have compared to the government.
I'm looking for the signs here. Signs that things are changing. And I think that they are.
Categories - ::/:: posted at 12:49 AM Ted
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Friday, September 08, 2006

Translate Me.
For fun I used a Googleboomerang program to translate two phrases to other languages and back. Results are interesting, if only because of the way you can often pretty much pick which boomerang language resulted in which phrase.
Here's the target phrase: A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse! It is better to light a single candle than to curse the darkness. END
German:A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse! It is better, an individual candle than lighting up to verfluchen the density. E
Spanish:A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse! He is better to ignite a single candle that to curse the dark. E
French:A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse! It is to better light only one candle that to curse the darkness. E
Italian:A horse! A horse! My reign for a horse! Single candle is better to illuminate one that curse the nerezza. And
Portugese:Horse! Horse! My kingdom will be horse! It is to better you light single candle than you attends a course the darkness. E
Arabic:Think! Think! And to think that the Kingdom. It is better lighting one candle rather than curse the darkness. ا�
Japanese:Horse! Horse! My kingdom for horse! As for attaching the single candle rather than being good, in order to denounce the darkness. e
Korean:End! End! For an end my kingdom! The candle it recovers and that it ignites, and in order darkness to curse. E
Chinese:Ma. Ma. I race Kingdom. Candles to illuminate the dark than the wave or curse. E
The END word was placed because the software seems not to translate the last word properly, so this made a test of the actual phrases more fair. And more amusing...
Categories - ::/:: posted at 8:10 PM Ted
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First A Big Razz to Foxtelscum.
A week ago I got a call from Foxtel. "Your account is overdue, it will be disconnected, can you make a payment today?" So I told the young man that I couldn't because Trish had just changed jobs involuntarily and we were in a three week financial hole and I couldn't pay until the end of the month. No problem said the young man we can arrange to waive the reconnection fee when you can settle up the account since you've been a long time customer. I'll put a note on your account.
Today I got a letter from Foxscumtel telling me that I'd better pay or they'd put the matter in the hands of a recovery agency, oh and by the way you'll owe a $35 default of contract fee too.
When I rang up the pompous woman on the phone explained that it was "the system" and tough tits, despite haviong made an arrangement with Foxtel I was still going to get handed off to the collection agency. I asked her too if I had been a bad customer in almost ten years of using Foxtel and she admitted not. So I asked why they couldn't stop their stupid "system" from pissing off their good customers and she basically sniffed disdainfully and told me that "the system is the system."
My last comment was that it *wasn't* the system, they could either choose to screw their system or screw their customers, and that if I received a notice from some dunning gency I'd never use or recommend Foxtel again sad as it was to lose a ten year relationship. And you know, after - twice - making arrangements to pay by a specified date, and in the absence of either representative of Foxtel telling me that this was unacceptable, I think if I get a dunning letter I'll sue the bastards too.
Remember my "Pride In Incompetence" series? I think this is more of the same. Too bad they will never again get my custom.
Categories - ::/:: posted at 8:00 PM Ted
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Wednesday, September 06, 2006

Internet tools I wouldn't be without
It occurred to me the other day just how much of my work, hobbies, and leisure are now managed by little text files everywhere...
For work I tend to use only what's on the work LAN, but I do keep my appointments and contacts synchronised between the Outlook at work with an Outlook I maintain at home just for that purpose. I use Plaxo for that. Stupid name, good product. As I said, this keeps my contacts and tasks and calendars sync'ed between work and home, and means that if I think of anything at one place I can be sure it will be at the other by the time I arrive there. I tend to use the Tasks as little stickie notes but - there's a full-on application that I use for stickies, see Syncnotes further on. FREE but has a more comprehensive paid version.
I use a product Microsoft acquired recently to sync file folders between my laptop and the PC at home. Foldershare is a product by Bytetaxi that rocks, is pretty functional, and FREE. Foldershare encrypts the peer to peer file folders and you turn off the web access as a matter of security so it's also reasonably secure. Lastly, you can share a single folder with any other Foldershare user. There may be a tie-in with Office Live which may render this paid software but I suspect that the free version will stay around.
Allowing me to pop up "stickie notes" on all the computers I've installed it on, Syncnotes is a fairly limited program but it opens new notes on the desktop so if I have something really important to remember I use this because nothing sticks out more than a bright yellow window on top of all the others when you get home. Also works on a range of PDAs and they may be making a Yahoo Widget for it as well, and lastly, the stickies are all available from the web interface so you can access the notes from any Internet PC with a web browser. FREE.
Need a secure, easy to set up VPN in a hurry? I do, I often need to securely log into my machine at home to run tests or open an FTP server or whatever. I can set up Hamachi in about five minutes and tear it down again in the same time when I'm out. This also encrypts all traffic so I can log into my home PC, and surf from there, without leaving URLs and passwords all over a public access machine. FREE, but the latest versions may have two variants, fo me the free one suffices.
Files that I need access to a lot I store at Streamload. Again, basic service is free, and I can access important text and documents from here which is basically all I need. FREE or you can pay for more.
Of course, any files I stash on Streamload I make sure are encrypted so that they're no good to anyone. GnuPG (GPG) for Windows is the easiest way I know to do that. FREE.
Keeping notes on stuff I go out to work on is always easier when I log into PBWiki. This is one cool internet tool, and I can store up to 10Mb of text notes and images there for FREE. (More features for money, but the basic PBWiki is fine for me.)
Since every place I go has an IE web browser, 2go is the bookmark manager/synchroniser I tend to use, and then manually sync to Firefox on any machine I need it on.
My instant messenger program is Miranda - okay it doesn't do fancy emoticon icons or nudges or winks but it does do AOL, Yahoo, ICQ, IRC, MSN, and Jabber. At the same time. On a USB stick so you can run it anywhere. FREE.
Abilon isn't so easy to get these days but it's the nicest RSS aggregator I've used so I stick with it. FREE.
And I don't know where I'd be without Thingamablog blogging s/w. Because the data files are pretty straight forward I can use this on multiple machines and blog from just about anywhere thanks to Foldershare. FREE.
I know I've missed a few more. Once you have a website up for anything, you tend to collect tools like blog advertising sites, sitemap creators, keyword analysers, and all that lovely stuff. When you publish a book you tend to end up with a lot of typesetting and editing tools. And so forth. But that's not really in the tools I wouldn't be without, so that might be another article.
Categories - ::/:: posted at 10:03 AM Ted
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two Middle Easterners
So much for Mr Howard's Integration Policy as detailed on TV recently:
These two Middle Easterners come to Australia. They get separated from each other, and about a year later they get together to see who had become more Australianised.
So the first guy says, 'I'm picking up my son from footie practice, and then we're going out to Macca's. And then I'm going home to watch some AFL football. How about you?'
And the second guy says, 'Hey screw you, towelhead!'
Categories - ::/:: posted at 9:18 AM Ted
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Monday, September 04, 2006

Spirit of CMOT
How did I spend Sunday? Since I'm not a father (or at least, not that I know of) I didn't spend it doing fathersday things. Instead, we started off with a late and leisurely breakfast, followed at a discreet and leisurely time by a visit to Bunnings to buy some stuff for finishing off the wooden floors in the hallway. Because we're pretty definitely selling up, and that pretty definitely soon.
Anyhow - at Bunnings, it being almost midday by then, the usual sausage sizzle was in full swing. We bought two wobbly grey things in buns, drowned them in sauces and mustards, closed our eyes, tried not to inhale too much, and - they weren't half bad for wobbly grey things...
While we were repasting, I also gave a quick potted history of CMOT (Cut Me Own Throat) Dibbler, who features in every Terry Pratchett Discworld novel ever I think. Top marks to Mr Pratchett for his observations, it's true - every country, every city, town, village and suburb, has been visited by CMOT. When the last nuclear hurrah has rained down on us and wiped out everything except the cockroaches, CMOT Dibbler will be there selling wobbly grey thing on a stick or in a bun to the cockroaches.
Similarly, Steve Irwin. Look under every rock or piece of bark, in any rock ppol or river, and you'll see "Crikey" Irwin. As enduring a figure as CMOT, he'll be missed by many, not missed by a few - but he has definitely changed Australia and the world. I was never a fan, but I salute a showman and crusader when I see one. Vale Steve, be safe.
Now back to Sunday - the next thing was to check out the Muzz Buzz that sprang up mysteriously like the Weapon Houses of Usher in our Willeton IGA store's parking lot. We decided a couple of coffees would be nice to wash the wobbly grey taste away, and drove up to the window. Conversation went something like this:
Coffee Girl: "Hi what would you like?"Me: "Uh, a short black with three sugars and, um - Trish? Decaf capp? - yeah and a decaf cappucino."CG: "Okay is that both decaf?"Me: "No that's a short black, three sugars, and a decaf cappucino."CG: "Okay, decaf cappucino and short black."Me: "Which isn't decaf right?"CG: "Yep!"Me: "Thanks."
Some minutes later:
CG: "Here you are, your drinks."Me: "Okay which is which?"CG: "That one's the long black"Me: "But I ordered a shor... Never mind..."CG: "Pardon Sir?"Me: "Uh can we also have one of those low fat muffins?"
More minutes wasting...
CG: "Sorry we're all out of those, we do have blueberry."Me: "Okay we'll have one of those thanks."CG: "Um that's a blueberry muffin right?"Me: "AAAARRRRGGGGHHHHH!!!"
Well okay I didn't scream. Not right away, that came when we drove off with my long black that should have been a short black firmly stuck between my legs while I drove, to stop it spilling you know, and the dizzy bitch hadn't put the lid on all the way around... One set of LB blanched gonads later, I was sipping on a pretty crap and watery coffee and grinning. It just wouldn't have been a CMOT day without this...
Categories - ::/:: Edited on: Tuesday, September 05, 2006 12:46 AMposted at 11:59 PM Ted
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Sunday, September 03, 2006

Why We Don't Need To Worry About Terminator 3
I just realised that the Terminator series is not real and is not gonna happen. Why? Well remember back through all three movies. What one thing doesn't Arnie say, among all his smartass sayings? I mean, if he's going to use every hackneyed cliche in the book, surely he'd have used this one.
Terminator (In thick Arnie Austrian accent): Relex! Aye Googolled it!
Categories - ::/:: posted at 9:00 PM Ted
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Saturday, September 02, 2006

QOTD
"Political Correctness: a system of thinking where it's OK to offend someone right in front of you by enforcing a made-up rule to stop a theoretical offense to an unknown person later when you aren't even going to be there."
Randy Cassingham, This Is True
Categories - ::/:: posted at 5:55 PM Ted
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Friday, September 01, 2006

.. Or Blogging For Illiteracy ...
Headline of the day:
"Trees Killed To Preserve Water Views."
Isn't that a bit like fighting for peace or bonking for virginity?
Categories - ::/:: posted at 6:20 PM Ted
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---------------------------------------------> Done it to here
Passing Milestones
(and not in your water, either!)
Some major milestones have slid quietly closer and closer and then fallen away astern for me, some almost unnoticed. Some other milestones are looming pretty intensely, and some you just want to forget.
Last Saturday, (26th August) the first milestone that slid beneath the billows of time was the publication of my diet book online. I was rather ill that week, but this was the one thing I managed to achieve that I was most proud of. As a result of that effort, people around the world with "slow inflammation" based illnesses (and this includes several cancers including the one I designed the diet for, prostate cancer) will be able to give these horrible illnesses a run for their money. For me, it reversed my prostate problems in seven months and saved me from the risks involved in the surgery. On all counts, I'm glad I got the thing to publication.
The next milestone that derived from that is that I went from being an unpaid writer to being a published author. Published author! Okay this is very akin to being vanity press but it's still publication. I almost missed this in the excitement, and it was only the other day that it finally penetrated my consciousness. Wow...
What wasn't immediately obvious from that is the other hat I began wearing - I am now also a publisher. The difference between vanity press printing and publishing is that printing involves only taking a marked-up text and setting it in print. Publishing involves choosing the manuscript, editing it, marking it up, getting it printed, and publicising (that's where the "pub" in publishing comes in after all) and selling the finished product. If I only turned the text into an e-book I'd have been a glorified electronic printer, but I've also done the first publicising of the product by putting it online, and have the advertising and publicity plan coming together and launching this weekend. So I'm a printer/publisher now as well.
Apropos of which, I've decided that I'll assist other health/diet/lifestyle/recipe/DIY/home_improv authors by getting them into e-publication and letting them sell their wares on the zencookbook site - may as well act like a real publisher I guess. Also, more titles will equate to more useful information in one place, and that will mean that we all benefit. So if you know someone with a good idea for a book, or with a manuscript, which they want to put online using e-book format, get them to email me teddlesruss(AT)hotmail(DOT)com and I'll help them get it happening.
This Thursday (31 August) another milestone hove into sight and zipped by. As well as becoming a published author, I'm now a *paid* published author. Yep, the first copy of The Body Friendly Zen Cookbook sold online Thursday morning and made my day... That's within less than six days of publication, and without any advertising. Gotta love the Internet!
And since it's now September, I can also say that another milestone cruised in almost under the radar, being that this blog surpassed 1,000 hits in a month, at 1056 for the month of August. That's this suite of blog pages, nothing to do with the diet book, which hit its own high water mark of 35 hits a day yesterday as well, and I haven't even begun to advertise it yet.
Upcoming milestones:
I'd rather forget, but in another six weeks it will be the anniversary of my biopsy that showed the high level of deformed cells.
Six months from now also sees me hitting the half century mark, and should also see results from the CSIRO tests of the diet.
All in all it's been a pretty good week for milestones.
Categories - ::/:: posted at 12:54 AM Ted
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