Today counts as the first day that I have written a blog post using my new iPhone 4. No, I am not gloating, but I am really enjoying the device and all the functionality that comes with it. I am typing this post using the wordpress app that I just downloaded. I just had to enable an XML feature within my self-hosted WordPress blog and I was off.

The interesting thing that even caused me to question using the WordPress app was the pic that I took when I went out for a morning walk. I saw a puzzle piece on the ground and thought that it looked like a piece of the sky laying on the concrete sidewalk. I walked past it initially, while listening to music on my phone, and then turned around to revisit it. A secondary thought came to mind about how I should take a pic of it and post it to my blog. And that’s when it hit me, I now have a phone that can do all of this. The camera on my previous phones had never been good enough, but that’s all different now. Fact is, I don’t know if I’ll make another post from this phone or if I will, but it’s nice to have that option now.

Below is the pic that I call, a piece of the sky.

——-@ds

Again

All the things that you want out of life, but can not have. Those tender moments that are sometimes so sweet and peculiar that you know you will never experience them again. Or, just the yearning for something that will always outpace you. These are the thoughts that always haunt me. Everyday, it’s the realization of an explicit rule that somewhere along the lines became written without my consent or knowledge. And it strips everything from me. It dangles the possibility in front of me, while pulling it away just far enough for me to know, and yet, never achieve. It’s there and it is everywhere. It’s the sign on my forehead that I can’t read, but bears a foreboding to everyone. I try to scrub it off and attempt to remove it, but it just won’t leave.

I want and am left wanting. I yearn and am left without.

I’ve tried and I’ve failed. And it’s always the same. I’m the one always left watching and I suppose if fate is real, then maybe this was supposed to be my path. I am curious as to why. I question what makes the alternative so much better, or why I desire it. I can’t, for the life of me, understand why this other path is so damn special, or figure it out. But I know I can’t be part of it. I suppose I’ll never know the answers to these specific wonders and maybe that’s the point; it’s not meant for me to know. I wish this wasn’t the case.

There was a lot of things in my life I thought I had accepted, but sometimes the reality of those things come back in full force that no matter how much you want to fight against it, you can’t do anything but sit there and accept it. I’m always at my best when I am in the middle of something terrible. But when the sea is calm, I always feel like a fish without water. Always gasping and straining for something that I can’t attain.

So, I am full circle (again) to where I was a few years ago (no, not the job, that’s fine) and I am having to accept what I thought I had already let go. I guess I didn’t. I suppose I have to.

These are my brief thoughts about a life that is less.

——-@ds

Get In The Game (or out of it?)

As a child of the late 70′s (1977), I was part of the generation that grew up playing video games, both at home and at the arcade. When I think back on my history with this illusory past time, I remember all the fun and excitement that I had with playing them. Yet, at some point in my life I grew past playing video games all the time. I don’t quite recall when the turning point was, but I also know it never fully left. The last console I purchased was the Gamecube Nintendo and that all changed a little over 6 months ago. During a pre-black Friday sale, I bought an Xbox 360. For a brand new system, I paid only 99 dollars. I figured it was a good deal and given the hell of a year it has been, it was the first “gift” to myself in a long time (even before the lay offs). After buying this system, I got it home and opened it up, just to make sure everything was in the box. Then I packed it up and put it in a storage bin where it sat for a little over three weeks. And again, that all changed months ago. So, as of today, I have been actively playing my Xbox 360 and using the Xbox Live service. I’m meeting up with some friends online and meeting some new gamers via the online games that I have. I’m enjoying it a lot and the more I play the more I start remembering the part of me that I left behind, and how I used to be.

Over the past eight years I have had a few skirmishes here and there with playing video games, but even with my new console, I still haven’t scratched the surface of the hours I used to give to my gaming past. In many ways, I am glad that this is the case. However, there has always been, and I suspect always will be, a desire in me to get back into heavy gaming. Even though I have controlled the habit over the years, I still get that persistent itch once in a while and I have given into a few all night sessions. However, after getting back into the groove, I’ve started to reflect upon my memories as a child growing up in Seattle, WA, California and later in Oklahoma and Minnesota; a reflection of how much video games were a part of my life. Another reminder of this fact actually came to me prior to purchasing this Xbox 360 when I watched the movie, “The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters” back in June or August of 2009. Now for me, the arcade game of choice from the classic arcade game era was the fast version of Ms. Pac-man.

I clearly remember being a very young kid, unable to reach the joystick on the system, but wanting to play. Every once in a while, my mom would take me to this BBQ shack that was around the corner from our apartment in Seattle, WA, and she would sometimes provide me with up to five dollars in quarters, put them down on a table and then hold me up to the video game to let me play. I believe this was the juncture for me that started my descent ascent into gaming. As time went on, I was brought up on Nintendo consoles. Through the years, I never swayed from Nintendo, until recently. When I was of age, I also gamed at local video game arcades, comic book shops that, at that time, had arcades in their stores and pretty much anywhere else that I could pop in a quarter. And they were everywhere for me. I swear, the 80′s to early/mid 90′s were a great era for arcade gaming.

Arcade gaming provided something that console gaming, at the time, never could: community interaction of like mindedness. It also provided the aspect of direct competition and the warrior mentality of wanting to be the best (in a digital world). And this was the life for me. Some of my best times and friendships were made, even if temporarily, with people whom you only saw at the arcade. Hanging out and talking about the newest game or some new, secret path you found in Mario Bros.; or how you demolished a friend at your home on some past night. Standing around, with your quarter on a machine in a line of quarters denoting your spot in the imaginary line that is winding and crunching all around the game as everyone is watching another person(s), play the latest and greatest and being in awe of their mastery. Asking someone how they did a move or sweating in the heat of the moment as you’re accomplishing some new goal on a game that you’ve played over and over again, but at that moment it feels like it is a first time experience. Finding a quarter or a token on the ground, because you knew you didn’t have any more money to play, but if you could find that one coin you could be the best for one more evening (or at least kill more time from having to return home where chores and boredom awaited). Being in an arcade was like being in another world, one in which you rose and fell based on the power of your gaming.

The movie The Wizard, starring Fred Savage (the child actor from “The Wonder Years”), was the movie that you had to see back then. It was the movie for us in the gaming world, even though it was very cheesy (you never admitted it then, because you couldn’t see that aspect. In hindsight, even if it’s a whisper, you have to admit it); it still pressed upon the desire of the inner gamer to be the best at what you play. The song, from Karate Kid, “You’re The Best” by Joe Esposito was informally adopted in my gaming mind (and I suspect many others in the gaming community). I had that song in my mind so many times, even today it sneaks back in, “You’re the best–around–nothing’s gonna ever keep you down… you’re the best–around…” I mean, who didn’t hum that song at least once while destroying a competitor or obtaining that next level unseen before. I know I did.

Now, I am full circle to where I am at today. With a new job and career in tow, and my first new console after skipping a console generation of gaming; I enjoy how powerful this system is and the games that I am playing (Left 4 Dead 2, Borderlands and Army of Two: The 40th Day). Yet, I still find myself longing for more. I’m sure others would disagree or consider it not as important, but that external interaction with others in a sea of machines with the imaginations of their creators displayed for our enjoyment was unlike any experience that a console can currently provide and yet, this disparity will soon diminish as time goes on. As fun as it is for me to play with friends online and with new gamers that are waiting to join up to play the same game, I still feel as if something is missing. What we gain in the online connection of our systems, we lose in that social interaction that was so prevalent at an arcade. Sure we can chat and even video chat online, play the game together and do all the things you could do at an arcade, but it can’t take the place of those times when you would high five someone for doing something great; grabbing the person next to you as someone achieves something unseen before; besting player after playing during Street Fighter or Mortal Kombat and being able to watch them leave in defeat. And yes, even the face to face shit talking. I realize most of this is still able to be done through our consoles, but there’s a unique experience when you’re physically next to others while it is happening. I suspect that gaming may never truly see its way back to an arcade environment again, outside of a few niche areas or some ‘event’ that is taking place, but what a wild ride it was and I wish some of these younger gamers could truly experience what those in my age group grew up with.

——-@ds

The title says it all and to be honest, I’ve been very busy with a few things. I haven’t forgotten about this blog, but I have been neglecting it (can you really neglect a blog?). I’m committed to continue writing and expressing my opinions and thoughts. I’ve had a few of my readers (wow, I actually have a few, that’s awesome!) ask me if I have any more planned content. I can tell you that I have a few posts that are still being written. I know that I want to write about my personal year in review, but when I was laid off, I had an abundance in time. Now that I am working again, having moved, getting my life back together and setting things up on a personal front; the act of writing has taken a back seat.

As of today, I am looking forward with the same perspective I had during my lay off. I want to continue this with a renewed vigor and spirit. I still find how amazing it is that as we stand in the middle of the constant shifting that happens around us, there are still those pocket moments of opportunity that make themselves available at odd moments in our life and allows one to step through to other possibilities. I firmly believe this and I think this is becoming one of those times for me to get back to this blog.

——-@ds

I wanted to take a brief moment and make a new post. I haven’t posted in a while, because I’ve been setting up this blog and trying to mold it into something that I was comfortable with. I’m at a point that I am happy with its current version, but I am just lacking a logo at this point. That will be coming soon. Setting up my own site, installing wordpress (manually), finding and editing themes, installing a comment system,working with plugins; essentially creating the initial building blocks of my personal site has been a great, but trying experience. It’s a useful skill to have and it is something I want to have more experience with.

I did this during my spare time when I was laid off and solely as a hobby. Currently, I am employed, but still on a contract basis, however, this project has taken a slight back seat while I re-adjusted to the working life. I didn’t want to get burned out with doing it, or trying to do it quickly, which is why I went slowly. As of now, I am going to move forward with this site and start the process of leaving my other site that was hosted at wordpress.com.

Lastly, I am going to put an end to the “spouting” series. I’ll just stick to regular post titles. Initially, my thought process was to make the “spouting” series a slight deviation of my blog post, although they served the same purpose. The distinction is negligible and thus, unnecessary. It’s quite possible I may find a better blog-post distinction in the future, but for now, I’m just going to take it one step at a time.

I’m enjoying what this is shaping into and I can’t wait to see how it evolves. I implore anyone that has any hobby or knowledge in anything, even if they do not consider it worth sharing, to give it a shot. I’ve met a lot of interesting people through my blog and the small amount of promotion that I’ve done with it, and you never know how many others may share your interest if you do not take that first step forward and put yourself out there.

Thanks for reading and when my logo is complete, I’ll be sending updates to everyone and will continue running without condition with my blogging!

——-@ds

My soon to be self hosted WordPress blog is coming along very well. I’m taking my time with this, so that I understand fully what is involved and how to manage my blog site going forward. As I stated in Spouting 13, I will be using this blog to detail my progress of my self hosting WordPress install and set up. Afterwards, I will transfer everything over to my self-hosted blog and continue blogging from there.

I decided to use a subdomain of my site to do all of my testing, as I learned that it would be very easy to transfer my completed test blog to my main domain when the time is right. As such, I’ve completed the phase 2 of my sight: installing and playing around with plugins. I haven’t installed every plugin that I will need, but the two that I did install contributed to the learning process for me to know how to actually do the installation. The two plugins that I chose to start with is the All in One SEO Pack and Tweetmeme. Both of these plugins installed quite nicely. WordPress offers a great internal installer. And the beauty of all of this is that you do not need to install directly from WordPress if you choose not to. If you’re interested in doing it manually, you simply need to upload your plugins to the plugins folder on your server via FTP. Not that I’m afraid to do it manually, after all, I’m quite proud of having installed WordPress manually. As noted in my first phase, Spouting 13: WordPress Update, the installation was a piece of cake. I really only had to change 8 lines in one file called: wp-config.php and then upload that file with the rest of the WordPress application files to my root server via an FTP client. Now that I understand the manual process, I don’t have a problem with letting WordPress automate it for me. Another nice feature is that WordPress will decompress the .zip file the plugins come in as part of the auto installation process. I simply can not believe how easy this has been. I also installed a different theme. It’s not the one that I will be using, but I also wanted to understand how theme installations were handled. The fact that WordPress is setup to allow the user to search for and install plugins within its own dashboard is wonderful. This prevents the user from having to go to another site. Yet, if the plugin you want to use isn’t available within the dashboard’s plugins page, then you can still simply upload the .zip file and have WordPress take care of the rest!

As of now, Tweetmeme,was the easiest of the two plugins to understand. Although I have the All in One SEO Pack installed, I’m not sure if it’s really working or how to determine if it is or isn’t. I did a test post, but I didn’t see anything beyond the general stuff that appears with a post. This means that I will simply play around with the plugin a bit more, visit the forums and see what I can discern. For those of you reading this and considering the same, some resources that I found to help me out with this part of my installation were:

My Google seach string for the “must have” plugins for a WordPress blog

WordPress Plugins Page

How To Make My Blog’s 18 Most Downloaded Plugins Ever

Thesis Theme Plugins Customization

Quick Online Tips’ Must Have WordPress Plugins

Business 2 Press’ 30 Must Have WordPress Plugins

Most of the information is repeated in the above links, but I put them in the order that I found them to be most useful. With regards to the Thesis theme, I’m not sure if I will be going this route. It’s a highly customizable theme for WordPress with a very clean structure. If you like to control everything and have the time to invest, then this is the theme for you! My personal opinion, and I could be wrong, but it’s really for those that are more high end users. I’m keeping my eye out on it, maybe one day, but I really like more visually laid out themes, like Elegant Themes, and while I’m still on the fence about which direction I’ll take my blog, I am leaning more towards Elegant Themes. That being said, I will be saving my theme of choice to the very end. As far as plugins are concerned, I would enjoy reading anyone’s suggestions on any other plugins that I should consider using, whether they are on the lists noted by the url’s above or not. I make no promises, but to check them out!

——-@ds

This is going to be quick. I haven’t posted for a while, because I’ve been working since Saturday, September 19, 2009 with setting up my own hosting service for my already purchased domain: runningwithoutcondition.com. I purchased the domain back in May and now am actively working to become acquainted with my own hosting service (which is setup) and the self-hosted version of WordPress (I’m currently testing it out). I want to say that I not only successfully installed it without a problem, but I did it entirely manually. I was only able to do it this way, because I installed it on a subdomain of my main site, while the main domain is still forwarding to this site: laid0ff.wordpress.com. All in all, I’m quite proud to have done it manually, and after it’s been all said and done; it was not difficult at all. I may even do it again, just to make sure I understand the process (OK, maybe not, ;p)

That’s it for now. I’m going to hold of any of my new posts for my new site when it becomes ready. I’ll post status updates here about my progress or any difficulty I may be happening and maybe anyone that has experience could lend some assistance!

I want to thank Adria Richards and Kikolani for all the advice and answers they’ve provided on Twitter/Facebook. You can find these awesome Geek Girls at: (Adria) askadria.com or butyoureagirl.com, and Kikolani at kikolani.com

I also want to thank the following website: howtomakemyblog.com for providing a kickass step by step process, in a non-cluttered way.

Also, WordPress.org for making such a powerful program for free and so extensible!!!

——-@ds

While doing my daily perusing of a few internet sites, I came across a post on Digg.com about a guy who saw an image of a flock of birds sitting on electrical wires. Now, there really isn’t anything truly unique about this picture on its surface as I’m sure we’ve all seen similar scenes in our lives. Yet, it was his interpretation of that image that really piqued my curiosity. Whereas many people see that and just think of a bunch of birds dropping bombs; Jarbas Agnelli, from São Paulo, Brazil, viewed the image as musical notes.

On his vimeo page, he posted a video called Birds on the Wires. This video details the arrangement of the notes and shows how he interlaid the notes over the birds positions on the five electrical wires. You also are shown, while the music is playing, the original image that he saw when he was reading his newspaper that prompted this musical interpretation. Personally, the music is beautiful. It’s not very long, just under 2-minutes. It seems to start off with a very young and curious ambiance. My thoughts were “childish” in nature, but in a positive sense. As the music starts to grow, it blossoms into this very open, yet uplifting arrangement that teeters on the edge of wonder. It is as if the listener is being playfully teased with something that is as close as a whisper, but is never revealed. I find myself in awe each time I have listened to it. What a wonderful piece of music that makes me feel a bit better then I was before, for having listened to it.

Thank you, Jarbas Agnelli, for sharing this with everyone. His local newspaper, (the entire site is in Portugese, so unless you speak the language, which I do not, you’ll have to have it translated) Estadao, has a write up on their site, under their Cidades (Translation: City) tab entitled, “Foto de pássaros no fio publicada no ‘Estado’ vira música” (Rough translation: Stock photo of birds on the wire published in ‘State’ newspaper turns into music). It seems that Jarbas is very talented and creative, as he has other videos on vimeo that displays his other creations. I hope that more sites, readers and people pick this up and pass it along for others to experience.

It’s an oddity how nature continues to find ways to position itself in such manners that leave it open for interpretation and yet, translates so well.

——-@ds

*translations done by wordmonkey.info via iGoogle.

The title says it all. I have a small notebook and in it contains a few of my ideas. Most of the time, I tend to intimately consider things I’d like to create or endeavors I’d like to make, but I hardly ever write them down. Rather, I store them in my mind and recall them as needed. However, I have kept coming back to an idea that I’ve had for a while. I contacted the owner of Please Feed The Animals, Erik Proulx, and asked him for his advice on how best to present one’s idea on the web to share with the larger community, but to also protect it from those who may have better resources to implement a potentially good endeavor. His reply, and this is paraphrasing at best, was that far too often many people keep great ideas locked away in notebooks that never see the light of day. This one statement was the one thing I needed to hear.  Since then, I’ve added a few more thoughts to the idea; talked to a few more people about it and have committed to writing it out and posting it on my blog site.

I can’t quite state when the post will happen, but it will. I may very well wait until I can transition this blog off of WordPress’ hosting site and onto my own self-hosting service, and let that be the first new post of my new, self-owned/contained, blog site. Either way, the time is ticking and one of the crucial elements will be to find a few people that have the resources needed to accomplish the goal of this idea. This is just one post to get the ball rolling…

——-@ds

It has been about 3 weeks since my last post, but I am happy to report that I am working again, at least on a temporary assignment. I’ve been re-employed at my former company that I was initially laid off from. I am back in my previous department, but in a new role. As I’ve told those close to me, I’m very happy for the reprieve, even if there is an end date. This all came about on the 3rd of August. That day I had to fill out all the paper work and fax/email it back to the company. By Wednesday, I had to accept and sign the offer letter and take the mandatory drug test. And all of this was being rushed so I could start on the following Monday, August 10, which I did. It has also been an odd transition of getting back into the mindset of having a schedule to adhere to in order to get some sleep, wake up at a proper hour and get to work on time. After almost 10-months of sleeping whenever, waking up whenever and doing whatever-whenever; I am slowly coming around to this familiar, but re-enacted routine.

This past Friday, I received my first pay check, but only for the first week, because I had not completed a full two weeks yet. A former colleague of the company (and now friend), who worked out of another state and was also laid off (he has recently relocated to Orlando, FL working for another new, but soon to be great, company) told me about a month ago, about how good it felt to receive his first paycheck in such a long time. I have to echo those sentiments: it does feel really good. But, I have not let this positive turn deter me from my current goals and path. I still have every intention of paying off my car. This should happen, if everything goes as planned, in October. After this time, I should be saving more and planning what I will do once the job is set to end by December, 31st 2009. With everything that has happened since October 2008, I’m not ready to bank on anything beyond this being a temporary position for me. I’ll always keep an open mind as to the possibilities and make some, not so formal, plans should those possibilities become realized, but my consistent plan will always be on the reality of what currently “is”.

So, as of now, what becomes of my website: www.runningwithoutcondition.com? I will continue to post. The metaphor still applies in all aspects of my life, not just my goal (which is still not completed) of being permanently employed as full-time somewhere. I still have plans of transitioning this site off of WordPress’ servers and set up my own hosting site. I still have a number of drafts waiting to be completed. I think that I will probably start publishing my “spouting” posts anytime, but any of my longer posts will most likely be done during the weekend.

It’s strange how you take for granted receiving a paycheck every two weeks when you are working.

I also want to thank JRM. You know who you are and I appreciate what you did.

——-@ds