Just testing out posting from the iPhone.
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dstaley
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dstaley
It’s 2008, a period in time where everyone has a Facebook, WordPress blog, Twitter account, Flickr, del.icio.us, and more, all of which are meant to be “social” in that they bring people together. But, what about bringing those services together? Meet Flock, an internet browser that does more than just browse. With integration in majority of the major Web 2.0 services, Flock hopes to bring together both people and the services they use. Flock is interoperability at it’s best.
While the current release of Flock, 1.2, holds it’s own in the browser wars of today, I want to take a peek at the future, Flock 2.0. While Flock 2.0 may not be the official current public release, it shows the same promise that Firefox 3 did a few months ago. But, Flock is built based on Firefox, so Flock 2.0 is going to have all the awesome social features of Flock plus all the amazinf features that we have come to know and love from Firefox 3:
- The Awesome Bar
- MAJOR Performance gains
- Operating System integration
- Powerful “Favorites” management
- Security improvements
- And much more
With Firefox 3 set to be released tomorrow, expect the final version of Flock 2 within the next few months.
Blogged with the Flock Browser -
dstaley
I believe Evan Cordell had it right when he said “LSMSA keeps you so busy all the time that summer almost feels horrible - a huge vat of empty, stress-free time. Nice at first, yes, but after a while it feels irresponsible to not be doing anything.” Sure, I haven’t even begun to attend LSMSA, but spending just one weekend there has made it almost impossible for me to have a decent summer.
Last weekend, I spend Friday, Saturday, and half of Sunday at the school of my dreams, The Louisiana School for Math, Science, and the Arts. I’ll spare you the intro speech, just go to the site if you feel the insatiable urge to find out what makes LSMSA so amazing. Anyway, in those three days I spent in hyperactivity-a time when everything felt it was moving at the speed of light-I had some of the most amazing experiences of my life.
Day One
Arrive. Get the legendary brown-paper packet. Walk the parking lot for five minutes. Drop luggage off at the dorm. Write on a wall. Go to lunch. Feel like an idiot for not being able to find the cups. Eat. Meet a friend. Run madly about the gym. Throw a ball. Go to some informative sessions. Discuss a plane. Make more friends. Have dinner in the courtyard. Meet more people. Have a friend sit by you. Get eaten by fire ants. Sit in the second row. Listen to someone talk. Totally forget what you did for the rest of the day. Go back to the dorms. Meet your roommate. Sleep.
Day Two
Day two was a bit more exciting, and so shall my recollection of it. I’m going to skip the boring parts. So, anyway, I went to breakfast, which I managed to find the cups all on my own! And then feel like a fat ass for not putting any fruit on my plate. Oh well. We had to sit through another group session in the Aud, which was unbearable, just like the previous one. Afterwards, we got to meet with our Academic Advisors, the purpose of which we haven’t exactly gotten down yet. My Advisor was Dr. Batman. HOW AWESOME OF A NAME IS THAT! If I recall correctly, he’s a Physics instructor. Well, during this pleasant little meeting, we scheduled our classes for next year. Nothing too exciting here: Acc. College Algebra, Trig, Acc. Chem. III, Government, Beginning Tennis and Fencing, Programming in C++, Acting I and II, French Immersion II, Junior English, and I’m forgetting one more course. Overall, I am excited with the courses I have planned, even if they aren’t the really impressive courses with really long names.
Then, it was lunch again. By this time, I had gotten the hang of the procedure one goes through at meal time. But, my Advising meeting had gone a bit longer than planned, so I decided to lounge outside in the courtyard instead of eating. You do not know how much pleasure I got from sitting outside in the sun during the school day, a hell of a lot more than what I got at EA, with it’s disturbing lack of foliage. After lunch was the dreaded activity of Speed Meeting, which is like Speed Dating, but only more boring and more pointless. Needless to say, I did find a great multitude of people who have never watched “The Price is Right”. (And I really don’t believe the guy who thinks Bob Barker is a robot.) Afterwards, there was another Group Session in the Aud, which was followed by an amazing Improv session in which I believe no one was able to remain the gender they walked in as.
After the Improv, we had Dinner, and then marched up to Front Street. While an amazing journey, I was so preoccupied with the pain in my feet that resulted from wearing flip-flops that I didn’t get any pictures in the Historic District. But, we did have fun in that nice, air-conditioned Toy Store! We then walked back, managing to make it back to the HSB without one hit-and-run by a college student.
Once back at the HSB, my group went our separate ways. My social extroverted tail went straight to the Student Activity Center for Karaoke. THREE HOURS OF NONSTOP KARAOKE. It was one of the most amazing conclusions to one of the most amazing days of my life. I walked back to Caddo and plugged in my nice noise-isolating headphones and vegged out to the smooth voice of Michael Buble and filled out my Roommate Questionnaire. I can only hope that I’m pared with someone who is at least a 5. (I’m a nice 7 on a scale of Extroverted-ness (Which, by the way, isn’t really a word, but it still makes sense.)
Day Three
Got up, showered, ate, said good-byes and left.
All in all, it was an amazing weekend filled with amazing people, amazing events, and it all took place at the most amazing school in the state, LSMSA.
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dstaley
It is estimated that the American government spends about $10 billion ($10,000,000,000) a month on the war on Iraq. My question today is: What can we do with $10 billion?- Provide government-provided meals to over 74 million people for one month, with three meals a day. (Considering the average school lunch being $1.50)
- Provide 83 billion single-dose (nevirapine) treatments for mother and baby, to prevent the transmission of HIV from mother to child.
- Provide antiretroviral (ARV) treatment for four months to two hundred million people living with HIV.
- Provide a year’s worth of school materials and daily hot meals for 143 million children orphaned by AIDS
Sure, my maths may be off, and you can say I don’t know squat about economics, and I’ll admit, I don’t. But I do know there are hundreds of better ways to spend $10 billion dollars of American tax payers money a month.
It makes you think, don’t it?
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dstaley
This Tuesday, Kentucky and Oregon will have their Democratic primaries. With Obama only needing 14.5 delegates for a majority, these primaries could give them to him. On Saturday, I make about 50 calls to people in both Kentucky and Oregon to get them to get out and vote for Obama.
I received 25 numbers of voters in Kentucky, majority of them being female, to call. I was beginning to get worried when I was not getting answers, machine or otherwise. Then, I finally got in contact with someone. My heart was racing, and I frequently lost my breath while reading through my script. Unfortunately, I didn’t give the caller time to respond, and was promptly hung up on. But, thankfully, this trend did not carry into my calls to Oregon.
While receiving a lot of voicemail’s, I did manage to get in contact with a decent amount of people and notify them that their ballots were due by 8PM on Tuesday, May 20th. Quite a few people told me that they had already dropped off their ballots, and quite a few had voted for Obama. But, there was this one woman. She answered the phone with a baby screaming in the background. I asked for the name that my call-list had provided, who turned out to be the woman’s husband. I then asked if he was available, which he was not, and I then asked if I could just have a volunteer call back. “Well, why don’t you want to talk to me?” she asked. A bit taken aback, I then went through my script with her. At the end of my script, she then questioned me about my knowledge of Obama. While the purpose of the call was to notify them of the due date for their ballots, I felt the need to discuss Obama’s policies with her.
She was a strong supporter of Hilary, as far as I could tell. While she identified “Undecided”, her accusations of Obama leaned toward supporting Hilary. I did my best to answer her questions, but then she questioned my lack of support for Hilary. Well, it wasn’t something I was prepared for. I never really thought about why I didn’t support Hilary. I’ve always supported Obama, mainly because of his stance on issues important to me. But, I never stopped to consider why I didn’t support Hilary. She didn’t provide much convincing, but she did point out a few things that I had not known about Obama. Sure, none of these were major things, but her knowledge was admirable. She knew several cases where he had changed his stance, and she also knew quite a considerable amount of his bills. Though, she did not have much knowledge of the bills he passed while in the Illinois State Senate, many involving health care reform and the degradation of lobbyist influence in the State legislature. I was ill-informed about many of the things she presented, and I did my best to research them while on the phone, I do feel that I did not have much effect on her decision. I can only hope that the things I presented encourage her to research more into Obama, and lead her to make an informed, educated decision about who she chooses to vote for in the upcoming primary.
All in all, it was an amazing experience. I do hope that I can call-bank again for Obama in the near future.
For more information about Barack Obama, including the issues he supports, please visit barackobama.com.
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dstaley
In an effort to increase my writing ability, beginning today, I will be writing a blog everyday.One of the many tips I give people who want to increase their ability to write is to write everyday. But, how hypocritical of me to not follow my own advice.
So, keep an eye out later on tonight for my first post.
Now, just to figure out what to write about . . .
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dstaley
This is Sam’s fishy:
This is my fishy, better than Sam’s fishy:
But, Sam turned my fish into food!:
And then I did the same:
And then Sam countered with his POISON CLOWNFISH!:
But, he didn’t know I had some dirt on him:
But Sam had dirt on me:
So, I threatened to beat Sam up:
But, Sam called on the knife wielding dolphins beluga whales!:
So, I called upon the forces of the Beanie Babie on monster thing with knife:
But Sam got a bigger bear, and a bigger knife!:
So, I got my crazy bear and crazy hat!:
But, Sam pulled out the CRAZY PURPLE JAGUAR plus TIKI MAN MASK:
So, as my last resort, I had to pull the single cutest thing in the world. Something Sam would not be able to resist:
BUT HE ATE HAMLET:
So, there was nothing else I could do. Sam had won, I had to admit defeat:
So, in the end, Sam won…:
But I’d be back:
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dstaley
It is vitally important in life to do things. Everyday, we have tons of things to do, and many people are crushed under the sheer weight of the things they have to do. Many people have worked out what I am going to call a system. A system is your set of habits that allows you to see what you need to do and do it.
There have been many pre-made systems, most notably Getting Things Done (GTD), that explore ways to (1)process information and (2)execute actions. My goal today is to explore the basics of my system with the hope that you find some good habits to pick up.:: Process ::
We have information thrown at us all the time. Everything in our life is information: appointments, goals, the fact you are slowly running out of money for food. Everything we encounter in life can be processed. Processing is the action of assessing your information to better help you execute the things you need to do. I follow a simple routine. When I receive information, it goes through the following questions:1. Is it actionable? - Meaning “Can I do it?”. If the answer is yes, continue. Otherwise, this information must be one of three things:
1. Reference - Reference is anything that is not actionable, but is important for the successful completion of another task. These items include things such as actual reference material, receipts for past purchases, etc
2. Someday/Maybe - These are tasks (or goals) that cannot be achieved now, but you want to achieve in the future. Now, these are not future actionable items, such as Dentist Appointment next Tuesday. These are items such as Skydiving, New Car, etc.
3. Trash - Information that has absolutely no purpose at all is put into this category. The information should be disposed of immediately, otherwise you are clogging up your system.
2. What context is it? - Simple. If your information is a Business Meeting next Thursday, it’s context would be “@work”, the ‘@’ symbol here meaning “action”. By putting things into contexts, you can easily see where you need to put forth effort. Now, it is important to have broad contexts. Work, school, car, home, phone, computer, etc. Also, if you are a students, the subject is a suitable context.
3. Can it be done in less than two minutes? - Self explanatory. If an action can be done in less than two minutes, you should go ahead and do it.
4. Can I do this? - Sometimes, something can be done, but is dependent on something else. Such as “Buy ring for wife” being dependent on getting your paycheck. This action would now be classified as “Waiting” as in “Waiting for something else to happen before I can do this”.
5. Does it need to be done on a specific date? - If so, you would now put this event on your calendar (Might I suggest Google Calendar?)
6. Next Actions - If a task has made it this far, it should now be put on your “Next Actions” list. Your Next Actions list is your suped-up to-do list. It is basically a list of the things that you can do right now, take more than two minutes, and are not dependent on something else. You can also rate the importance of getting a specific task done on a scale of 1 to 5, thus allowing you to take care of high priority tasks first.
:: Execute ::
1. Your “two minute” tasks should always be done as soon as possible.
2. Next Actions - Try to complete your next actions list, one task at a time.
3. Remember Calendar datesNow, anyone can do this, but there are some things I recommend.
1. Some kind of small notebook or pad to carry with you everywhere. This notebook will act as your “Inbox” or where all information goes first before it is processed. You should try and “empty” your inbox everyday by processing the information in it. I recommend keeping index cards handy for your context lists and next actions lists. They’re cheap and they really work well.
2. A folder, box, or index card box to keep all your materials in. It’s good to keep your context lists some place where you can refer to them as needed.:: WARNING ::
Try no to change your system up too much, as it can result in confusion, loss of information, and worst of all, stress.There are also some amazing software programs out there to help you keep your system. While these may not form completely 100% to your system, they can still be useful.
Please visit these sites for more information regarding productivity:
Lifehacker - Daily weblog on software and personal productivity recommends downloads, web sites and shortcuts that help you work smarter and save time.
Lifehack.org - Pointers on productivity, getting things done and lifehacks.
ZenHabits - Aims to provide psychologically tested methods, with a touch of Zen, to handle anything that happens in a mature and powerful manner.
43 Folders - Merlin Mann’s family of sites about life hacks, personal productivity, and simple ways to make your life a little better.Also, I do recommend picking up a copy of David Allen’s book Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity, the book that started the GTD craze.
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dstaley
Today, I recieved my ACT Test Scores via the Early Web Score system. The Early Scores only include your multiple chioce answer score. Lets just say I was happy.
I am taking the ACT so early (Freshman Year) beca use of my desire to attend the Louisiana School for Math, Science, and the Arts in my Junior year. To do that, I needed to have a score of 24 or higher by February 10th, 2008. This means taking the test early. I took my test on June 9th, 2007 at Baton Rouge Magnet High School. To say the least, I was suprised at my scores.
Out of a total Composite Score of 36, I received a 27. This is FANTASTIC for me, and it makes me feel so much better about the test now that I’ve seen that I can make a good score. My goal is to have a 31 by the time I apply for college.
So, with all the days excitement , am very tired so off to bed I go!
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dstaley
Sorry for the random post title as I couldn’t think of anything better.
I’ve finally moved back in with my Mom in good ol’ Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The move is a result of my experiences at my fathers house in Gonzales, Louisiana. My time there was spent counting the seconds until the last day of school, the day I was to pack up my stuff and return home to my Mom.
Life there wasn’t hell, but was extremely close. Everyday it felt as if I was unwanted. I did not enjoy my stay there and would not stay there under those conditions. The occurences there are too many to number, and would be too time-consuming even for me. Let’s just say that my stepmother and I didn’t see eye-to-eye. Under any other circumstance, this would have been okay, but my stepmother redefined the meaning of aggervation.
But, it was not all my stepmothers fault. My Dad did his fair share. Sure, he was just being a parent, but his actions spoke otherwise. During the week, my Dad was at work. From Monday to Thursday, my Dad was out of state. Sure, I know that he needed to to make a living, but I came there with hopes of getting to know my Dad more. Sadly, this never came to pass.
During my excruciatingly painful ten months living at my fathers house, I learned that just because someone gave birth to you, doesn’t mean that you are above anyone else. When I was two years old, my Mother and father divorced. Me, being two, didn’t really care. I then lived with my Mom for the first 14 years of life, only seeing my father every other weekend and on holidays. I was fine with this, as I grew up with my parents seperated. But, nothing could prepare me for the reality check I was in for when I moved in with my Dad.
From the start, my Dad and I butted heads. Not in a terrible way, but in the normal parent-child way. Sadly, my father did not see it this way, and claimed that my attitude towards him and his home was because of my “problem with athority”. At first, this wasn’t an evident problem, but it grew for my bubbling anger towards the way I was being treated. When I tried to resolve the problem, I was met with endless amounts of confrontation and underlying verbal abuse from my stepmother. This was something I was not ready to take when I moved in with my Dad.
Of all the things my father has told me over my 14 years of life, one thing will always burn a wound into my heart. We were riding home one night when I expressed my extreme dislike towards my stepmother. As always, I was told I was being a typical teenager, not liking my parents, and that I had a problem with athority. At the time, I was used to these things, but one hit me like a right-hook to the jaw, “She’s my wife, and she will always come before you.” At this very moment, the smidgen of respect I had for my father both as my father and as a human being was deminished. Nothing short of “I hate you” could have hurt worse.
From that moment, my goal was to leave my fathers house, and not return. So far, this has worked well. I’m not feeling bad for pratically abandoning my father, but I can’t go back there. There are too many bad memories there and I don’t want to open old wounds.
By writing this, I hope that I’m able to release my anger and direct it into something creative. I now hope that I can continue on with my life, and that one day, I’ll be able to live in peace with my father, as I do love him, and I hope that in a few years, I’ll be able to look back and see how this has strengthend me both emotionally and mentally. If you never do anyhting else for me in my life Dad, I hope you can be glad that you’ve given me the strength to talk to you like a man, even though you will always see me as a rebelious teenager.
