You may have noticed I’ve been slacking about this blogging thing. I’ve been distracted by a nice little thing called “summer”, which is the fairest month in Oregon. I also haven’t been skating at all, which has got me a little grumpy.

I’ve taken a little time away from reading and engaging about Portland Public Schools, and despite the fact that the Winter Hawks have a new coach, I haven’t found the time to read, comment or blog about that, either. I should be back in full force with the blogging and skating soon. Until then, enjoy your summer, and I’ll see you at the rink and the school board meetings soon.

TTFN

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Well, it happened again, almost exactly a month after it happened before. Seven hundred-some Portland General Electric customers lost juice in North Portland, this time on the hottest day of the year. We didn’t have the multiple power surges like last time, and we managed to get all of our stuff unplugged just in case. The only casualty was the Wacky Enterprises blog farm, which does not function without all those electrons wiggling around in the copper, and was consequently off-line for five hours (from 4:30 PDT to 9:30 PDT).

So two lengthy outages in two months is making me think more and more of moving this whole enchilada to a hosting company. Anybody got good suggestions? Requirements: Wordpress (and all its requirements, e.g. MySQL, PHP, etc.) , ssh/ftp access, reasonable rates, 24×7 rock-solid reliability, decent customer service. Local would be nice. Maybe I should just collocate, since I’m kind of anal about running my own servers.

The bonus of doing it here by myself is that it’s basically free. Maybe I’ll just keep it that way, and consider PGE’s monthly outages a cost of doing business.

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Once in a while it’s fun to check the server logs and see the search terms that bring readers to a blog. On the one hand, it brings your not-so-humble blogger down a few pegs to see that his recipe for cholle or his review of Judy Park’s performance of Rach 3 with the Portland Youth Philharmonic is of much greater interest to the world than any of his views on hockey or politics.

That’s okay, because when it comes right down to it, I’m probably more passionate about food and music anyway (I just don’t have as much to say about them).

But when I noticed my piece about Vicki Phillips yesterday got at least one visit from someone at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, I had to smile. (I extend a sincere welcome to the folks at Gates, and invite them to participate in the discussion if they care to refute anything written here.) They didn’t get here by way of Google, but I decided to check my Google juice on some key search terms, like “Vicki Phillips Gates”. Hey, not bad! I’m the fourth result, just after Gates, PPS and the Oregonian, well ahead of metblogs, the Portland Tribune and Willamette Week. Sweet!

But it’s even better when you search for “Vicki Phillips Gates Broad”: this blog is the first result.

It must drive the spin doctors absolutely bonkers that they can’t control their image any better than that.

They seem to be learning, though, at least on the local level. Witness comments here and on Terry Olson’s blog by the likes of PPS PR person Sarah Carlin Ames, PPS school board member David Wynde and Portland Schools Foundation executive director Connie Van Brunt. I personally welcome them to this exciting and new (to them) arena for democracy in action, and hope their friends at Gates will join in as well.

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We were without power in my part of North Portland, and it turns out Web servers don’t work without electricity. And it turns out that when you run your own servers, you’re vulnerable to things like power outages (I don’t have UPS, not that that would have helped for the three-hour outage). The good news is that everything seems to have come back up. And that’s a wonder, because right after the power went out, there were two massive surges that blew a few light bulbs in our house and fried a couple GFCI outlets. I mean fried hard. Thanks for your patience, and hopefully that’ll be the last glitch for a while.

Edited 6/10/07: One more little power outage today, as I powered down to replace the GFCI outlets. I also took the opportunity to move the Web server out of our bedroom, which I’ve been meaning to do for some time. Dang, it’s got a noisy fan! Hopefully that’s it for moving things for a while. Blog on.

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(Not counting Wacky Mommy, of course.) I recently stumbled across the Dingleberry Gazette, written by a “middle-aged guy with the heart of a twelve-year old” who works nights in a 24×7 convenience store in downtown Portland. This is some good, funny stuff. Quoth the author, “The running commentary in my head needs a place to rest, so I chose here.” Check it out.

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Well what do you know, this blog turned one the other day, and it totally slipped past me.

I started this blog on February 1, 2006 as a successor to WackyMonkey.org, which was a non-bloggy blog I used to post on occasionally. It’s still out there, just as I left it a year ago.

This remains a relatively low-traffic blog, since I do very little (i.e. nothing) to promote it. (Wacky Mommy, on the other hand, has been around for two years, and her traffic has gone up dramatically in the last few months.)

Even though y’all rarely (if ever) comment, I know you’re out there through the magic of logging. I even know who you are and where you’ve come from. BWAHAHAHAHAHA! So thanks to both of you, and here’s to another year of hockey, politics, and life.

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Here’s a recent sample of search terms that bring people to my humble blog. I should note that for quite some time, MoreHockeyLesswar.org has been in the top 10 Google results for Cholle recipe. I get quite a few hits from India. I hope they like my recipe! A precursor to this blog, WackyMonkey.org , was the number one result for “weird monkey sex” for a really long time.

I’ve got to say, it always amazes me some of the things people will type into a search engine. I mean, Jesus H. Christ, what kind of meat head types “is it true that black people do not play hockey because of weak knees” into Google, and what the hell do they expect the computer to say back?

“I’m sorry Dave. You’re a fucking idiot, so I won’t be able to answer your questions today.” That’s what I’d say if I were their computer.

Anyway, what brings you here? Here’s my personal invitation for you to de-lurk and say hello. For your amusement, here are some searches over the last few days (and yes, people, I know I’m perpetuating this nonsense by reprinting these terms and further seeding the Google index):

• history of helmet use in u s. professional hockey?
• everett silvertips tickets wanted ads
• squatting laws in mexico guadalajara
• locker fights.com
• rough boys hockey fights
• you know ogie oglethorpe
• is it true that black people do not play hockey because of weak knees
• guy pulls worm out
• increasing junior a hockey game attendance
• www.morehockeylesswar.org
• pie hockey
• bong hits jesus song
• viktor sjodin movie
• marijuana penalties guadalajara mexico
• hockey is dying
• silvertips mascot portland
• i want to drive a zamboni
• ogie oglethorpe jersey
• feminist quotes
• cat fights.com
• how to make cholle
• children hockey accidents
• i want to drive the zamboni
• cholle cook
• more hockey less war
• silvertips
• dropping leaflets methods
• funny hockey expressions
• the rules the woman is always right
• bring back emotion in hockey
• network54 hockey forum
• easy garbonzo bean recipe
• more is less
• cum shot
• disney on ice half price
• swift hockey socks

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