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!

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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!!!

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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…

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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.

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Roughly two months back, I registered a domain, Running Without Condition, for the very first time on my own. It wasn’t difficult, but this was my first step in setting up my own full-fledge website with a hosting company at some point in the future. The prompting of this was due to the fact that I love WordPress so much, that I want to be able to control it more on my own. When you’re using WordPress.com, it’s a great springboard for getting adjusted with the interface and the program for free. However, you begin to see that in its ease of use the .com version of WordPress is very linear (and for good reason), but if you want to get more out of WordPress, use it as a CMS (something that I want to do and learn from the experience of interaction and mucking around), or increase its functionality with the use of plugins; then you need to go the WordPress.org route.

Both routes are free, however, the WordPress.org version is completely controlled by the user and requires the user to have his/her own domain and server space. With all of that being said, I’ve been reading a lot since I registered my domain on how to install WordPress on my server and what I can potentially do with it when I am ready. Part of understanding that use is understanding how to increase its flexibility with the use of plugins. Plugins, in my view, are like constructing your own personal robot. You start with a base (that’s the wordpress.org installation) and then you start to think how you want to build your robot so that it can do what you want and how you want it to do it. This is where Plugins enter. They provide the functionality that you seek to increase WordPress (your robot) beyond its basic installation. 

I just came across another post about the use of WordPress plugins on Kikolani’s website. Her post, entitled, “WordPress Thesis Theme Customization Part Two: Plugins” speaks directly to the heart of using plugins with WordPress. Kikolani even provides some very useful plugins to start off with and short descriptions of what they do. If you have any interest in using WordPress and customizing it to your needs, then you should definitely take a moment to read her WordPress customization post. 

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A month or so back, I was on Linkedin commenting on a topic that I had initially started and someone posted something of interest about job searching. The gentleman brought up a situation that had happened to him and in it, he proposed the idea of offering yourself for free to a company in exchange for either: being considered for a future position later; references to jobs that you are still applying and seeking, and/or the benefit of keeping your skills abreast with the changes in the work environment. I thought the idea had some potential usefulness.

I recently came back to this idea and thought, “why not”. During this time of being laid off and the countless applications for positions, networking through my contacts and etc… not one of the employers have found me worthy enough to hire. That’s been very frustrating, because I can’t recall a time in my life where I was unable to find a job for a stretch of time as long as it currently has been. There was only one time before that I was out of work for just about 3-months, but that was because my internship with Disney on their College Program came to an end. That has been the only other time that I have been remotely in a similar situation. And, yes, I know that many others are going through this and that it is not just me. But it is still frustrating, nonetheless.

With that being said, I reread the post on Linkedin that spoke about offering your services for free and I decided to give it a shot. I saw a job in my field that was asking for an intern for the summer with the *possibility* of being brought on. I thought, “What better an opportunity to offer myself to a place than one that is seeking an intern to begin with”.

A short time later I received the standard reply that my resume has been received and that it will be looked over to see if it meets their needs. I couldn’t believe that in offering myself for free, it didn’t even yield a phone interview. I’m hoping that I am actually being considered, sort of like I’m hoping on all the countless jobs I’ve applied to (of which some responses are just now coming in and they have all been “no” so far). I know that this wasn’t a no, but I have a lingering sensation that it was indeed a “no”. I think my jaw almost dropped. I just lifted it back up.

Am I not even good enough for free?

Really?

——-@ds

Addendum:

This won’t deter me; the mission continues…  

It’s been a while since an update, but I do not have anything enormous to note. I am and have still been searching for work. I had a few sparks here and there, but nothing solid. Beyond this, I have been giving honest consideration to two project ideas that I have had in development in my mind for a number of years now, but am at the juncture of which one I want to start first and commit to. Then it will be necessary to find a few people that would be interested in contributing to the project, in exchange for partnership in the business and its creation.

During the last month, or since my last post, I was house sitting for a friend for about 3 weeks and spent a lot of this time meeting with people I haven’t seen in a while and reflecting on some personal things. Some of the reflection was on the projects I’d like to start and also about what I will need to do should my unemployment run out (which is set to do so in October). A bit of concern on my end. I had hoped that I would not be out of work this long, but it appears that it is unfortunately leaning this way.

That’s about it for right now, just a minor update on the state of things. I should have another post soon, as I have about 3 different ones in the works, but they’re just not ready yet.

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I’ve wanted to start working out for a while now, but just couldn’t get my mind in agreement with my desire. I haven’t weighed myself, which I know you should before you start working out, but let’s face it, I didn’t need another excuse not to start. A number of years ago I was part of an outdoor boot camp program and I loved it. It was great to be outside with others who shared the same desire; to lose weight and be fit. Although the fee for the boot camp program was very fair, it was still a stretch on my budget at the time. A couple of years after the boot camp, I started for a short time working out with co-workers, but that came to an end due to time constraints with everyone involved and life in general. Now that I am unemployed and am not making anywhere near the income I used to or back a couple of years ago, I decided to go with this P90x program. A friend no longer uses his P90x dvd’s, so he gave them to me. I’ve seen this infomercial a number of times on TV and the one thing that I liked about what it was advertising is that it talked quite extensively about not only maximizing your work outs, but also compensating for the plateau effect. The plateau effect (here are a few sources: Yahoo Answers and the Diet Blog’s 5 Ways to Break a Weight Loss Plateau to read more about the plateau effect and a third is my google search results on the term) is when your body gets used to the same work out pattern every day, such that it ceases to have an effect on your ability to lose weight over time. P90x compensates for this by changing the work out up over time. Now, I don’t want this blog to become a shill for advertising this system, I am only writing about why I decided to go with this program.

I’ve just completed day 3 of this (technically I didn’t do it yesterday, but I compensated in the day by doing something else. It probably wasn’t the best compensation, but I didn’t have the time) program and it is as crazy as it sounds. Everything is feeling all messed up, but in a good way. I’m about 5’7″ and I know I am over 280lbs. I think that I’m about 285lbs, but I am going to make sure at some point very soon. I’m happy to have finally started to work out. It’s something that I felt I should’ve started doing a while back. Now that I’ve been out of work, I wish I had started closer to around the time I was laid off, which was on October 15, 2008. I know that I should’ve started and I’ve blogged about that fact before in my Adrift post. No matter what, I’ve started now and I’m going to keep pushing myself to continue. I’ll chime in once in a while and blog about how well I am doing and will incorporate my changes in weight (hopefully that happens) at that time. One thing I’ve noticed about myself, is when I work out with people who are relying on me to show up and vice-versa, I’m more apt to working out. It’s almost like I need that dependency. The fight with in me right now is to figure out how to break that need and bring it back onto myself. So, while you can feel free to help keep me honest, I’ll be doing the same!

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Just making a minor post today. A couple of weeks ago, as many of you know and some probably didn’t know, I interviewed for a job with a local ad agency in Orlando, FL. The position was for a Client Services Manager and the interview went very well as it touched on all the major points that I was interested and/or concerned about. I felt that I represented myself very well. I was told that I would receive a call back by today. True to the owner’s word, I received that call and although I can not say that my search for my career is over, I can say that it was the most pleasant phone call one could receive when being turned down for a position. The owner was very kind in the reason why I wasn’t chosen and where most places really do not say anything or very little, I at least obtained beneficial information. I gave myself only three minutes to feel “down” about it (okay, maybe it was more like 5 minutes, and yes, for those that know me, this was a direct rip from the first episode of LOST), but I refused to let it shift my attitude from the positive experience I had with the interviews (the phone and face to face) and the follow-up phone call. I thanked the owner for the call back, stated that if anything changes or if the new hire doesn’t work out, that I would still be interested. I was told in kind that my resume and information would be kept and should anything come across in the future, I will be kept in mind. Although it is with regret that I didn’t earn the opportunity, this has not stopped me from my quest of running without condition. I will continue my career search and looking for the next best chance to “jumpstart my career“. 

I also tend to look at this in another way. While it is true that I am out of the running for this position and that 1-3 other people are still vying for the opportunity (to whom I wish them well); once one of those three obtain the position, that will be one less person for me to compete with for the next career opportunity, even though I would have preferred being the one chosen for the position. So I shall persist onward. I think it is far too easy for one to feel down (even hurt) about losing out on a great opportunity. Not only the opportunity to end the almost 8-month unemployment status that I’ve had (with many people being out of work even longer), but also the opportunity to have a fresh start. It’s much harder to maintain a positive attitude, accept the loss, firm up and commit yourself to moving forward; without any regrets. For me, it’s all I really have. I can either sulk or I can be proactive. I choose the latter.

——-@ds