Remembering 6 7 and 8

I've been crunching my brain trying to remember classmates and events from 6th, 7th and 8th grade and it's trickier than I thought it would be. It's amazing to me that most of the people I remember were classmates over several years and through high-school. Carlin Walser is probably the only exeption, only knowing him from 7th and 8th grade. And what ever became of Mr. Rassmussen? (Chris?) I didn't ever get to know him that well, probably because I really didn't get excited about band until our Sophmore and Junior years of High School.
Anyway, just thought I'd share what's been on my mind. I'm also super excited about our new windows. ...and dissapointed with Alice In Wonderland. I've been busy at work, mostly doing computer inventory for all of our operations and offering support internationaly. Business is also good, I'm growing and learning. I'm learning Spanish, reading good books and learning the hard way what it really takes to be a good Varsity coach. :)
...Those are the basics. See you 'round.

I need a salesman

So I have been developing my skills as a programmer on iPhone OS and all that. I am pretty good at it and have some good ideas for future apps. I have a good idea of who I want to sell to, I just can’t really get myself to make the sales calls. I guess my enthusiasm and morale have dropped and I don’t know how to get past the slump. If anyone knows someone who would like to make a few extra bucks making sales calls let me know and maybe I will be able to keep programming yet.

9, and counting.

9 years?! Has it really been that long since we were Seniors in High School!? I think about it quite often because next year it will have been 10 years since graduation and the sealing of our time capsule. This also means our 10 year high school reunion is on the horizon! It's a weird anxiety I have, trying to be "successful" before seeing our old classmates. Perhaps I'm just puffed up with pride, It's hard to know when you're looking from the inside out. In my optimistic mind I perceive it as a healthy and obtainable goal demanding personal growth and responsibility, yet to many it may seem like a prideful ambition tied to money. This has always seemed highly debatable to me.

Is it reasonable to claim that the determining factor whether a desire is good or bad is found in the underlying motive behind the desire? It seems that would certainly be sound thinking. I recognize that "Success" encompasses more than just finances, it's overcoming any variety of challenge. But I'm going to be referring to financial success for this example. If someone wants to be "successful" so they appear to somehow be better than others, I would say that's prideful in nature. However, if someone wants to be "successful" so they can become interdependent (sharing their abundance) to bless more lives than their own in the world, I would say that's very horable in nature. And then of course there are those who declare that any desire for increase in any aspect of life is unholy and disrespectful. (I believe those people are blessed with a pessimistically humble attitude, and I don't agree with them.) I guess my true fear isn't how WELL other classmates percieve me to be, but how prideful I will appear to be to my friends because of said "Success". Is that even a valid concern? ...? (Gotta end here, I've got to get off the bus. Literally not metephorically.)

The Problem with Cash

I've recently been called on, again, to help a friend in need financially. I've done so on many occassions and have learned a lesson that many people go through life not ever really understanding. "More money doesn't solve money problems." That may sound incorrect, but the fact is you can give away as much money as you want - to fill someone's needs or not - and the same problems will come their way again.

"Then what does solve money problems, Mr. Know-it-all?" Without this turning into a lecure, let me keep it to a simple answer of "Financial education" and "Personal Development". I wish I knew how to share this with more people. Have a great day my friends - who haven't asked money from me yet. :)

Real good

Surely there is a way to do real good and be compensated for it monetarily, right? If I'm presented with a path to riches which doesn't involve doing much good for anybody, is the money worth it? Is the money worth it if I use it to support a more helpful, less profitable project perhaps?

It's beginning to look like "good money for good product" is old-fashioned idealism. Many of the most helpful things (to me, at least) on the Internet are free, like Wikipedia and Google searches. If I was to create something with that level of usefulness, how would I pay my mortgage and fix the Gremlin?

Money. Bah.

Happy Macheist Blogging

So I just got done with a fun purchase from macheist.com and I am trying out MacJournal. They said in the description that I should be able to blog with this program and I am thinking that might be a neat use for it. It also allows for keeping a personal journal etc. I am excited to give it a shot. If you have a mac I would seriously consider this MacHeist bundle great price and if we get to 50,000 people we get Tales of Monkey Island fun game from a great series. So it worked and I am now updating to see if that works, and it does my friends this is a sweet program.

1 comments?

For a bit of software with as much development muscle behind it as blogger has, you would think it could distinguish between the number 1 and all the other numbers, then make "comment" singular or not. In fact, here you go blogger folks, the fix in one line:

<?php

$commentLabel = ($numComments == 1) ? "comment" : "comments";

?>

And if you don't use PHP, I know that Java has an equivilant. ASP and C++ ought to, but I don't know. If doing it server-side is a big deal, here's a client-side, Javascript implementation, using my native jQuery:

$('span.comment-link').each(function() {

var numComments = $(this).html().split(" ")[0];

if(parseInt(numComments) == 1) {

$(this).html(numComments + " comment");

}

else {

$(this).html(numComments + " comments");

}

}

That oughtta do it. It's not tested though, so use it at your own risk.

Anyway, I'll be moving development of my book over to my personal blog. My intent was to generate some sort of traffic over here, make something interested that would help people want to come around every so often, but I don't think it quite fits.

All the best to you all,

-Benjamin