Everything Great is *Nixbased

The Ultimate Fighter reality show has been a hit season after season, being someone who is involved in the world of MMA I have enjoyed the show even when the content is obviously cut and re-mastered to portray a specific character (like all reality TV). On Episode two of season 6 that I just finished watching there was an interesting theme, or sub-plot. Coach Matt Hughes, a believer in the Christian faith brought bibles for each member of his team to practice and asked if each member would read The Book of Esther. Now, I’m not Christian and Hughes isn’t my favorite fighter by any means but I can see both a fair and a not so fair side to this. Hughes tells everyone reading The Book of Esther is an option, which they do not have to do so. He also mentions that it’s “just a story” when Mac Danzig opts not to read it, he does seem pushy at this point but I will give him the benefit of the doubt on that.

The not so fair side of things was pointed out by Matt Serra when he asked if their were any Jewish members on the team, implying that it would be insulting to people not of the Christian religion and that religion and training are two different entities which do not need to collide (I think the Jewish celebration of Purim has something to do with this area of the bible though correct me if I’m wrong please). On the other hand when you are really interested in anything be it Christianity, MMA or any other topic you tend to want to share it with others. This is where I feel people get edgy because beliefs are such a touchy subject. If he had brought in a bunch of fly fishing mags would people have been so touchy about it (those on the show and on the net)? I don’t think they would have, I think he would just get laughed at.

Personally it seems like a lot of editing to make Hughes seem like an inconsiderate ass and people are overstating the meaning of the whole thing just because it was a bunch of bibles. As you can see from Mac Danzig’s blog their was a reason he brought in those bibles, it wasn’t out of the blue, it was however probably a poor decision image wise as it is not hard to see why people may think he was taking advantage of the situation. We have all met others who try to push their religion onto other people. As for him saying he would be the queen in The Book of Esther, you guys can play with that all you want, I will keep my trap shut because if he’s the queen and he can beat my ass what would that make me?

Overall I think Hughes may have just been eager to share another passion he has with people who already have something in common with him. Trying to open new doors maybe, I’m not sure. What do you guys think?

PS. For those of you who misspelled “The Book of Esther”, you may want to correct it. It is not “The Book of Ester” as was printed on many other MMA lovers’ blogs I frequent.

The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project is one that I personally feel is beneficial to everyone. For those of you who do not know about OLPC take a look at http://www.laptop.org/. The machine it’s self known as the XO-1 is a rather powerful machine for the price (see specs here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XO-1_(laptop)) and the cause is a great one.

Recently the OLPC association announced your chance to get OLPC laptops, which were previously only available to governments, and other similar organizations will be available via a Give 1 Get 1 Program for a limited time starting Nov. 12^th. What this means is if your wiling to buy one for a child in a less privileged geographical location you will be able to buy 1 for yourself as well. To see the initial announcement visit here: http://www.xogiving.org/.

From what I’ve read it will be a 2 week offer. I think it would be great to make this a permanent thing, it eliminates the issue of governments of under developed countries needing to choose between this program or things like building educational facilities and makes people in more privileged countries happy to be able to both help a child while getting something materialistic that’s really cool in return. It would also eliminate the fears of a “black market”.

Anyone out there thinking of participating or have any thoughts on the impact of such an offer?

I didn’t report on UFC 75 on Sept. 8^th because it sucked to the point I didn’t feel motivated to write but I’m here to report on UFC 76 now. Also The Ultimate Fighter is back and UFC Fight Night was decent but more to come on TUF in the coming weeks, the 1^st episode never is that interesting.

When I 1^st thought about the fight card for UFC 76, there was one fight maybe 2 I thought were worth watching, I wrote the rest of the card off as typical UFC hype. Last night however as I watched the event I had a rather abrupt reminder that such thinking was an error in judgment. The entire event was one of the best I have seen from the UFC. I have never been so happy when so many fights have gone to the judges. I was happy because of the excellent skill level shown and my desire to see more.

The 1^st 3 televised fights were extremely technical battles; the third between Jon Fitch and. Diego Sanchez was amazing. At one point late in the round Diego sunk in a DEEP triangle choke but Fitch escaped it. For those of you whom have never heard of Jon Fitch, this fight will amaze you. Then there was the fight I was looking forward to, Mauricio “Shogun” Rua Vs. Forrest Griffin. Shogun showed he had acclimated to the cage by opening up a new cut above Griffin’s eye with an elbow but Griffin dominated him and ended up choking his ass out with a RNC. I should have bet on this fight, I would have won big.

Now the last fight was Chuck Liddell vs. Keith Jardine, damn did The Dean of Mean ever land some deadly leg and body kicks. Chuck was outclassed. This one really surprised me I mean it’s the Iceman after all, how could he lose two in a row like that at this stage in the game. To give chuck credit he did land some good punches but it just looked like Jardine had him a little frustrated with his movement and style. It went to a decision but it was obvious who was taking that W with them to the after party.

Why do people eat “fast food”? I’ve never truly understood why people flock to places like McDonald’s or Burger King. We hear daily about the poor quality of food at such establishments and receive a poor quality of service while at them, yet billions of people still flock to their nasty food day in and day out. The idea that people are so shaped and controlled by the mass marketing of such garbage is almost terrifying. Heck it is even to the point that L.A wants to new fast food joints in some parts of the city, are we really to the point where the government needs to step in and control our food choices?

I was speaking with a friend the other day that was at work at the time. She informed me she had purchased a salad from Burger King for 6 dollars and something and even at that price they forgot the dressing. When asked why she went to BK for food she told me she was running late and needed something fast. This whole idea I don’t understand, have we in the western world been so influenced by the main stream advertising that we can’t think for ourselves AT ALL? It takes me around 30-45 minutes to prepare 7 nutritional meals for my day which I am able to carry with me in a cooler anywhere I go using a method designed by Dr. John Berardi over at Science Link Inc. It takes me anywhere from 10-30 minutes to get some horrible food from a fast food chain and costs 10x as much at said chain. How is this fast food? Where is the upside?

Yes some of the fast food chains have a few healthy options such as Wendy’s chicken salad or chili but most people don’t go this route or don’t really know what the healthy choice is. They often rely on the marketing instead of the facts. The fact is “garbage in, garbage out” if you don’t do your research on the things you eat before you eat them your not going to be in great shape. Even at home people tend to eat like crap. They don’t plan ahead.

Have you seen Super Size Me or Fast Food Nation? They are real eye openers for some while others ignore them and many real scientific studies and continue to abuse their bodies. You can eat healthy and it can taste great. When I ask people what they prefer between fast food and a home cooked meal, it is usually the home cooked meal. So if “real food” tastes better, is healthier, quicker, to prepare, cheaper and doesn’t come with the headache of bad customer service and forgotten items what’s stopping you from eating healthy?

How many of you remember a time when the Internet wasn’t cluttered with intrusive ads and lame phishing attempts? I do, and I wish it could go back to that state. Recently I have noticed a major increase in popup, pop under and animated ads on websites with large user bases. As you can see from this site I have nothing against using ads, I just wish Webmasters would do it in some sort of ethical manner. Statistics show that intrusive advertising does NOT work so why do these Webmasters continue to load even more of it onto the web?

Due to these annoying ads I am now forced to implement ad-blocking solutions on my home and work networks. It sucks because I like to support sites that use non-intrusive ad methods but some people have ruined that for everyone, at least in my case. For those of you who need an ad-blocking solution I have outlined the methods I am currently using below.

The 1st step is to change the DNS servers your network is using over to OpenDNS. Though not directly related to ad-blocking OpenDNS is generally a faster DNS then the DNS servers provided by your ISP and protects against phishing attempts. Corrects misspellings and allows you to block sites easily via their online interface among other things.

To setup OpenDNS visit http://www.opendns.com/ and follow the instructions for the hardware you are using. In short all you need to do is change your networks DNS servers to 208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220 (on your computers network connection if you are directly connected or via your routers admin interface if you are on a network) and optionally create an account via the OpenDNS website for all the bonus features the service provides.

Now if your not using Mozilla Firefox as your browser I suggest you start doing so. Mozilla has pretty good built in popup blocking and two great extensions called Adblock and Adblock Filterset.G Updater. If Firefox is already installed type “about:config” into your browser and in the filter box type dns, it should return a result of network.dns.ipv4OnlyDomains along with a few others. Change the value of network.dns.ipv4OnlyDomains from .doubleclick.net to true.

Now go to https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1136 and
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/10 and grab the Adblock and Adblock Filterset.G Updater extensions. If Firefox isn’t installed, install it, follow the steps above and then grab the extensions. This extensions are an optional step as the next step accomplishes the same task (in some ways) but I like to have as many layers of protection as needed within reason. Avoid Adblock Plus as it has some memory management issues.

The SafeHistory extension for Firefox is another worth mentioning, it allows control over cookies and allows you to defend against some web privacy attacks. The extension can be found here: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1502

In Firefox, Tools>Options>Privacy tab> you can manage how the browser deals with cookies as well, for those of you who are really paranoid, set the cookies to be deleted when the browser closes. You can also mange what sites are allowed to set cookies within Firefox.

The next step that is needed is to go to http://everythingisnt.com/hosts.html and grab the installer for “Mike’s Ad Blocking Hosts file” (if your using *nix grab the file for manual installation) The site explains installation in a rather simple format so let’s skip ahead. So you have the ad blocking hosts file installed but you notice the surfing is a little slower. What you need to do is browse to the directory where the file is installed and modify the entries in the hosts file, for those of you who used the Windows installer the directory is:

XP: c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc
2000: c:\winnt\system32\drivers\etc
95/98: c:\windows

Open the hosts file with your favorite editor and change all instances of 127.0.0.1 to 0.0.0.0. On Linux I use vi, on Windows I use Editpad lite as it is free, lightweight and has the search and replace functionality. This will stop the looping connection attempts to your local machine when you browse to sites which contains ads blocked via the host file. One thing to note is that using 0.0.0.0 may cause issues with some applications. If you notice an issue you can always change it back to 127.0.0.1.

Depending on your setup there are other ways to accomplish ad blocking on a network wide basis such as blocking via an internal DNS server. I may cover solutions like this if there is a interest, until then this should help the average user block ads and some malicious traffic.

I have always liked the whole idea behind Freecycle. For those of you who don’t know what The Freecycle Network is, here is an explanation from Wikipedia:

“The Freecycle Network (often abbreviated TFN) is non-profit organization registered in the state of Arizona, USA, that organizes a worldwide network of “gifting” groups, aiming to divert reusable goods from landfill. It provides a worldwide online registry, and coordinates the creation of local groups and forums for individuals and non-profits to offer and receive free items for reuse or recycling, promoting gift economics as a motivating cultural outlook. “Changing the world one gift at a time” is The Freecycle Network’s official tagline.”

To simplify even further I offer my definition: The Freecycle network is a bunch of groups (mainly yahoo groups) which trade their unwanted stuff to each other instead of tossing it in the trash. Their are groups for different regions all over the world, sometimes there may even be multiple groups for areas near you.

Okay now since we all get the idea, I’m moving on. The reason I really like the idea of Freecycle is that it’s free. I like free stuff and so does everyone else in the world. In some areas you can even find a free car up for grabs from time to time. So it all sounds great right? Well in some areas it is, atleast according to my buddy Trent his area is great about being fair and using the system the way it is designed. Not so much in my area.

Each area has it’s own variants on the basic rules and etiquette of the local Freecycle group. The local group has an extensive set of guidelines most of which are rarely followed such as:

KEEP IT FREE, LEGAL & APPROPRIATE FOR ALL AGES. This means, for example, no Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms or Drugs, legal or otherwise. Two strikes and you’re outa the group. This is our main Freecycle rule to live by and it’s a pretty easy one at that. No advertising your yard sale, though, as you’re looking for money and that isn’t free..

YOUR FIRST POST EVER TO THE GROUP MUST BE AN OFFER In the spirit of giving, we would ask that you make your first posting to the group an “OFFER” . No offer is too small…

NO TRADING PLEASE. Go to your local trading organization for this. It can be quite fun.

Each section of a rule indicated in bold is broken on a regular basis. The part about that which really bothers me is the Keep it Free rule. One would think this is a given seeing as the name is Freecycle after all but somehow when requesting an item I get people emailing with items for sale and even a few items for sale make it onto the group messages.

The other thing that bothers me is the pattern I’ve noticed as of late. I notice items being added, immediately going to pending pickup and then taken status within a 5 minute time period. This is physically impossible if the item was actually freecycled. There are obvious abusers of the system as well. People register with multiple accounts while others just trade between small groups of friends. What a waste of time, effort and bandwidth that is. Heck I’ve even seen Freecycle users collect items for free and resell them at yard sales.

What is needed in this case is a total change in who is moderating (or not moderating) the group.

I’m curious if anyone else has experienced this with a Freecycle group. Don’t get me wrong, I know some groups are doing it right and that is great but I’m at the point where the local group is not going to see me posting my items anymore. I’d feel more secure giving them to the Salvation Army.

Note: This is Posted in General tech because it’s mainly an online activity and a sort of social network on the web.

Is it just me or is their too much information out there? When looking up anything on the net we go take a gander at Google and browse through the results reading everything we can. When the subject we are searching is really significant in our lives we sometimes even join online communities related to that topic. The problem is the advice within various communities seem to shape the views of many people therefore creating so many opinions on the same subjects that a new person looking for answers related to that subject don’t know who or what to believe.

Just look at ant subject at all, on any given subject there are thousands even millions of webpages, books, videos and personal opinions. It’s overwhelming. Even attending higher education gets us no closer to the truth on many occasions. If a degree held the answers then a common curriculum would exist for each subject between all educational facilities. The fact is to find an answer to any question a person must research to find others opinions then actually try each suggestion and see what fits their situation the best. After all, even the experts disagree.

I want to someday be a writer; I want to write about reptiles and captive care. The entire reptile industry is filled with contradicting opinions and those who just “follow the leader” so to speak. When I entered the community as a hobby many moons ago I decided that I would not be a follower, I would try differing opinions and see which best suited various situations. I have since made some small innovations in the community and helped many with their setups. That being said for every 1 person I help I find two more whom are willing to argue that something I have tested and found to be a bad idea is superior to the advice in which I give. So what’s my point? My point is that when researching anything remember to try different options before discounting them or arguing with others, remember that opinions often differ but attitude and the way you present yourself are what people remember most.

One of the things that helps define who I am is my love of Mixed Martial Arts (MMA), I never miss watching a UFC or WEC event if possible. I train (or trained, I don’t know, call it a hiatus) in BJJ and MT and just generally love the community and close knit feel of it all. My favorite fighter is probably Randy Couture or GSP. Now with that being said you can probably see why I watched UFC 74 last night when considering both men were fighting on the card (Couture vs. Gonzaga and GSP vs. Koscheck).

Overall it was a great event, one of the better UFC events as of late. I don’t want to spoil it for anybody but Randy and GSP both did well and the other fights on the card were just as exciting. If you haven’t seen it go find yourself a copy somewhere…you all know how to get ahold of a copy.

The other day was a day like any other…. so I thought. I put a load of laundry in like usual and was doing some other chores around the house while waiting for it to finish. I enter the bathroom and now notice that the water from the wash is entering the bathtub. Now I’m no plumber but I do tend to do as much of the home maintenance and repair as I can. Immediately I know that because the bathtub is the lowest fixture the water will follow the laws of gravity when there is a blockage somewhere further up the pipe and come out in the tub. In the case of the washer and pretty much any other fixture, further up the pipe means the main sewer line.

Since this was the case and I don’t have access to a powerful auger I had to call a plumber. As a DIYer I absolutely hate calling plumbers. Plumbing is simple and in most cases I can figure it out myself. So the plumber arrives and tries to auger the line from the toilet even though I advised him that the issue would probably be best dealt with by auguring the clean out which is out back about 10ft from the house. His attempt failed so he took my advice and proceeded to auger the clean out. As suspected their were roots in the line and auguring it out did the trick.

So what did I learn? I learned that my logic is often better then the professional even when the professional is in a business sector I do not deal with on a daily basis. I learned that I won’t be calling that company again as the “professional” cost more time and therefore more $ then needed by not doing things the logical way. I also on a positive note learned where the pipes run to get to the city lines. Whoever designed it was less then intelligent and ran them the long way around.

So now that I know roots have penetrated the pipes I will be putting rock salt in the cleanout every few months to kill any penetrating roots. This trick I learned a long while ago, the plumber didn’t mention it. I hate to sound so cocky and negative but with any business the professional should give the customer as much info as needed to help the customer in the long run. It is what produces the repeat customer. Speaking of plumbing I need to send some bicarbonate of soda and vinegar down a few drains before they become clogged as well. I’ve heard nail removal products work for hair filled drains but I wouldn’t think they would be very environmentally friendly.

I may some day do a plumbing and electrical tips post, I don’t know. I just enjoy sharing what I know with other people (and sometimes bitching about things). Marketing may suggest that targeted content does better for traffic but I’m a jack-of-all-trades, making a site for each topic I know things about just won’t work well.

So last night I went to see The Simpsons Movie. As any Simpsons fan and everyone who hasn’t been living under a rock knows, this movie has been a long time coming and hyped up more then a crack addict with a rock the size of his fist. I love The Simpsons, at least seasons 1-9 with 12 and 13 earning honorable mention. For me show is just a way to turn off your brain and relieve some stress. However with the total lack of creativity I felt has been put into seasons 14-18 I really didn’t want to get my hopes up. With the amount of 7-Elevens turning into Kwik-E-Marts I started to wonder if the marketing team was trying to overcompensate for the lack of a solid product, after all something this big should really sell it’s self. It’s remarkable right?

We sit down and get comfy, the movie starts, skeptical me on one side, the woman on the other giddy with excitement. The movie starts, within 5 minutes we are both laughing. Right out of the gate the writers hit the nail on the head. The voice work is some of the best I’ve heard and the animation is great.

The movie focuses mainly around Homer, the man most men relate to on some level or another, and most females despise. In his own way Homer decides to try and help a pig about to be killed after a Krusty commercial has finished with said pig. This is the first in a chain of events that will land Homer in more trouble then fans of The Simpsons have ever seen him.

Through some rather ingenious comedic writing on the part of The Simpsons team Homer finds himself in various situations throughout the movie, all linking back to his selfish ways. From a flame filled mob to a long drive to Alaska The Simpsons Movie really does hold your attention. This is one movie I will be buying on DVD. I recommend everybody go and see it.