This Blog Has Moved to Blogger

I apologize for any inconvenience. I thought I left a post like this behind. I’ve been using Blogger for the last several years. My active blog can be found at http://emuelle1.blogspot.com.

I love the elegance of WordPress, but I had a few reasons for choosing Blogger.

Newsflash: Windows Live Spaces To Become Useful

This is an interesting development. Windows Live Spaces will migrate to WordPress. That should make it useful.

I’ve tried several blogging services. I had a hosted TypePad blog for 2 years, and I was generally happy with it. But when it came time to renew and money was tight, I migrated to a free hosted WordPress blog. I’d actually had the blog for several years, but never did anything with it.

I like WordPress. It’s simple and elegant, yet powerful. When it comes time to have my own site, I might change to a self-hosted WordPress blog.

I didn’t mind Windows Live Spaces, but it had little power. Also, no import/export functionality. I briefly considered moving my TypePad blog to Spaces, but I wasn’t about to copy and paste over 800 blog posts, and lose the comments. Everything migrated to WordPress without a hitch.

Let Me Know About Broken Links on This Blog

Since I imported all of my blog posts, I’ve been going back in time and trying to update all of my links. Some of my linked videos didn’t import, and of course most of my links are to posts on other blogs.

My TypePad blog is likely to go down soon, and many of my old posts still like to that blog.

But I see little evidence that anybody reads my old posts, so investing the time necessary to update 600 blog posts (the most recent 200 have been done) seems like a waste. Maybe some day I’ll get around to doing it, but for now, I’m stopping.

If you find yourself in my archives and find a broken link, please report it to me. I’ll either fix it or send you the link to the proper post.

Also, if you enjoy a post, please let me know in the comments. I’ve made it as easy as possible to comment, even though that leaves me open to spam and flames. At times, I’ve considered shutting down my blogs due to lack of interest. I keep hoping I’ll develop my writing skills though, and some day find that one topic where my unique perspective draws an audience.

From this point on, I’ll ignore my blogging past and move into the future.

This Is My New Blog

I’ve been on TypePad for the last 2 years. I really enjoyed it, but my account is up for renewal at a bad time. Perhaps in a few months I could go back, but for now, I’ve decided not to renew. My TypePad blog will go down around Aug 22.

I agonized over where to go. I have several other blogs from years past. I finally settled on WordPress. It is simple and elegant. That largest drawback is that I can’t monetize it, but I’ve been trying to monetize blogs for years and gotten nowhere. Maybe I should just focus on writing and see what happens.

I imported all of my blog posts onto this blog. The scary thing is, they seem to already get more traffic than I had previously.

I’m slowly going through and fixing my links, pictures, and video. Most of my internal links still reflect either my TypePad blog, or my Blogger blog. I’ll get that fixed. Please be patient. If you find a broken link or formatting problem in one of my posts, email me, or leave a comment.

Thanks for reading.

Tim Challies is Shutting Down 10 Million Words

In a blog post on April 22, Tim Challies announced that he had to shut down his 10 Million Words project.

The concept of the project was very exciting to me. Tim was going to read every New York Times non-fiction bestselling book in 2010. He was also going to write a review of each. It was a VERY ambitious project. I would love to have done something similar. But, I don’t have the money or the ability to read fast enough to keep up. I envy people who can read a book a day or more, and still comprehend.

Tim hoped to gain an understanding of our times through this project. I enjoyed following along. You can learn a lot about a society and a worldview by which books are popular.

A fascination of mine is to analyze what ideas and philosophies influenced history.

Tim stepped down because of the book he was writing. That’s right, a man who was writing a non-fiction book also somehow found time to read 4-5 books a week on top of his own research. He was also called to serve as an elder in his church. That is quite a time commitment.

When Bad News Is Good News (And People Won’t Deliver It)

I wrote this post yesterday. Then I deleted the entire thing. What came out of my hands onto my keyboard was very angry and reactionary. It was also immature. I should expect better of myself.

Have you ever found yourself in a situation where you know the news you’re likely to get is bad? Of course you have. But have you also wished that the shoe would just drop so you could get on with your life? But the shoe never drops. The call never comes. And it all boils down to people not keeping commitments.

Last Monday, I got a call. It was for a possible job. It sounded very exciting. This company was looking to branch into something that I have some very direct experience in. I also happen to be available to help them with it. There were drawbacks, like a 60 mile commute. But I was excited about the possibility.

How Do You Handle Link Exchange Requests?

I have a question for other bloggers. What is the best way to handle link exchange requests? I've gotten two of these so far. I checked out the most recent one. It appears to be legit, but the benefit to me is minimal, since the link page I would appear on has so many links on it, I'd be better off appearing in the top 1000 of a Google search.

It Finally Happened

Earlier today I wrote a post about anxiety. I was really feeling it. I didn't want to give too many details at the time. But now, it's all moot. 

I was let go from work today. They'll pay me through Monday, but I'm out of there. It's not a bad deal. It saves me about 60 miles of driving and $8 in bridge tolls over the next two workdays.

Amazingly enough, when I got called into my manager's office, most of the anxiety went away. I guess a lot of it had to do with knowing that I would be let go soon, but not when. Once I knew when, it cleared things up. I think my job search was being hampered by the possibility that I might be kept on. Knowing that I'm out the door somehow eased it.

I have no idea how I'm going to keep food on the table, or keep the bills paid.

On the bright side, I can blog as much as I want now.

I guess I can look at it two ways. I'm either

• unemployed

or

• self-employed

I have a couple of ideas. Maybe I should go for them and see what happens.

Bringing My Blog Into the 21st Century

I often laugh at other blogs missing common features like an RSS syndication. What, you expect me to have to remember to stop by to read your blog?

But then I made tweaks to my blog, and realized that TypePad has added a bunch of new features that I didn't know about. 

So now you can share my posts through social media along with other common features that I laughed at other blogs for lacking. This is while I didn't have them myself.

Enjoy the features while I think up compelling content to keep you coming back. Enjoy the 700+ posts I've written

2010, Goals, and Direction

This will be a quick post, as I have to get somewhere soon. As the new year dawns, it dawns as a year of uncertainty. There may be some serious changes on the horizon. Or not. I don’t know.

As I wrote about before, I was fired from my position in November. Since I’m a contractor, my company kept me on board in the hopes that they’ll have another position to fit me in. They’ve had me helping out on one project. I’m grateful to them for keeping me around. It shows class, and shows a company that values people. Also, I know the recruiting and hiring can be expensive. I have skills that might be useful to my company in another position. But, if another project doesn’t come up, I’ve got the life of the project I’m on. No telling how long that will be.

Why did I get fired? I screwed up. The best thing I can do is take responsibility for it. There are always at least two sides to every story, but as the side that was dismissed, I can only assume I was in the wrong. I committed to a deadline that turned out not to be reasonable. When asked about progress, I replied “Oh, everything’s fine. No problems.” I didn’t ask for help. Help was available, but everybody portrays themselves as being too busy to breath, so I was afraid to take away from anybody’s busy schedule to ask for help. When the deadline loomed, I kept up the “It’s fine” facade, secretly hoping that “one more week” would give me the time I needed to get it together.

A deadline that seemed reasonable 4 months earlier suddenly became impossible. Equipment that wasn’t delivered on time and documentation that was either nonexistent or incomplete combined with my lack of imagination set me further behind schedule. Then there were other job responsibilities to be attended to. So, I blew it.

Then, to make matters worse, I got ticked off and cc’ed the wrong person on an email where my frustration was on full display. That’s only happened once, but it was the wrong once. I think that’s what ultimately did it, but I was probably on the way out by then anyway.

So where to from here? I don’t know. I’m hoping that my company comes up with other work that I can do. If not, I guess I need to see what else is out there.

After 5 years of blogging, it’s apparent that nobody is going to pay me to blog here. So I’m considering something else. I’m considering changing the focus of my blog to building my brand. That’s about what I’ve been doing, but I need a better focus. Whatever I end up doing next, I’d like to find a way to point people to my blog as an example of why I’m an expert in something.

I’m just not sure what that something should be right now.