Welcome Back, My Friends, To The Show That Never Ends

Because time is not fungible, and because there’s a bit of a learning curve for me – WordPress may arguably better than Blogger, but I know Blogger much better – please be patient here.

So: if you have been blogging for five years, some people are of the opinion that you should either 1) quit or 2) get your own URL. Evidently, I have chosen the latter.

When this URL – www.rogerogreen.com – was available, and I got it two months ago, I did almost nothing with it. Then, pretty much in the past two weeks, I said, “Oh, crap, my blog anniversary’s coming up. Wouldn’t it be really cool if I switched at that point?”

But of course, life gets in the way. This site isn’t really ready yet. If it weren’t considered so déclassé, I’d have a great big construction sign sitting smack dab in the middle of the page. Among other things, I haven’t gone through my blogroll on the old site to bring them to the new site. If you were on my old list, and you are blogging regularly (once a week or more) or if you’ve blogged recently or if I’ve met you personally, you’ll stay. I suspect this will take the better part of the month.

Because time is not fungible, and because there’s a bit of a learning curve for me – WordPress may arguably better than Blogger, but I know Blogger much better – please be patient here. I should be settled in by June. Well, I HOPE so. All advice accepted, though not necessarily acted upon.

Also, if you would be so kind:
1) if I am on your blogroll, please change it to www.rogerogreen.com; I know it’s a pain, but I don’t expect to alter it EVER again
2) if you get a chance to mention in your blog or Facebook or Twitter that I’ve changed my URL, that would be swelligant, elegant.

Here’s an odd thing: this blog, with virtually zero content, was in the 120s for my name last week in Google, whereas my old Blogger blog, with five years of content, was invisible. One of the factors, I’m sure, in actually making the move.

Karn Evil 9 – Emerson, Lake & Palmer
LIVE
on LP.

Any observations or questions are appreciated.

Five Years

Stealing the idea from Bacardi, here’s Five Years by David Bowie.


Printed on April 29, 2010 at 2:30 p.m.

Frankly, I’m surprised I made it here. Five years of blogging every day, at least once a day. I have to work REALLY hard NOT to blog MORE than once a day, but I was reasonably successful; only 367 blogposts in the last 365 days, and I’m sure one of those was a prominent death that JUST COULDN’T WAIT.

But the other reason I’m surprised I made it is that last summer, I got REALLY discouraged.

I’m not one of those people who care about having hundreds of hits a day. When my monthly numbers dropped from 4109 in May 2009 to 3041 in June, it didn’t bother me over much. But when it sank to 1575 in July, THAT was really bothersome. What did I do wrong? I started posting notices of my blog posts on Twitter and Facebook, which actually did help a little, but I am not great at doing that regularly.

BTW, #1: I signed up with some service on the web to automatically post my blog post links to Facebook and Twitter. Instead, it was posting annoying advertising stuff to my Twitter account. So I canceled it, as soon as I saw it on my blog sidebar. Sorry about that.

BTW, #2: two people asked me why I have two Facebook accounts within 30 minutes when I went to the comic book show in Albany last Sunday. It’s easy: I started one, using my work e-mail, then I couldn’t find it. so I started ANOTHER one with my home e-mail. Now I know what both of them are. If I had the time, I’d just cancel one, but since there are people on one who aren’t on the other…well, it’d be work. Someday. When I retire, maybe, or take a long vacation where I actually just play on the computer. That is to say, not any time soon.

Then I noticed something: this blog, which had been on the first page of Google, disappeared from Google. It didn’t just fall off the first page; it seems to have vanished altogether.

Now, I can be found on a Google search. My Twitter and my blog on the Times Union can be found in the top 10. One of my Facebook pages and even my seldom-used Library 2.0 account – check out the vintage of the picture – are in the top 30. Even comments, articles I’ve written for other blogs, and specific pieces from the TU blog show up. But not this one.

This has pretty much forced a momentous decision.

You just can’t have too many computers

I had the idea for my presentation for the Underground Railroad conference months earlier. But on long-term projects, I procrastinate. (Or, conversely, I do it right away, because I know I tend to procrastinate.)

So it’s the Monday before the Saturday of the conference. I’ve taken the day off from work. The plan: in the morning, finally watch Hurt Locker on DVD. In the afternoon, go to the library and work on the presentation. Neither of these things happen, though; the daughter is home sick for the 10th time this school year. and as usual, she’s not SO sick that she’s sleeping, but rather needs regular attention from daddy.

So it’s now the Thursday evening before the Saturday of the conference. I blow off Bible study and choir, stay at work until 8 pm and actually get the presentation into some sort of narrative shape. It’s not finished, but it’s quite far along.

So it’s now the day before the conference. I dig out the thumb drive I was given which I had never used, and copy the program. My intention is to finish it up at home on the wife’s laptop. Except the wife’s computer doesn’t seem to have a cursor anymore.

So now it’s the morning of the conference. I still cannot get the laptop to work. As for my desktop computer, not only is it slow, it is so old that it actually doesn’t have a compatible slot for the thumb drive. I’m thinking I may have to go to the downtown branch of the library; the local branch doesn’t open until 1 pm, and that’s too late.

Then I play with the daughter’s new Netbook that her aunt and uncle just gave her for Valentine’s Day. I can’t get the Internet to work on it, but the word processing is fine, and the presentation is finished Just In Time.

Eventually – I have no idea how – I’ve gotten the cursor to work again on the wife’s laptop. I mean I’m a Luddite, but not as bad as this guy, at least most of the time.

So here’s the question: do you consider yourself technologically savvy, or do you go around screaming when technology fails? I’m not a screamer, but…well, let’s put it this way: DON’T hire me for IT.

ROG

ROG

35 Years After Vietnam

I admit to have been one of those people who actually supported the Vietnam war in the beginning of 1967. After all, it was an American war, I was an American, ipso facto, Q.E.D. My opposition to the conflict evolved over the next year or so…


Was it only six years ago when I realized that the Vietnam war, contrary to the historic record, was not over after all? I’m talking, of course, about Vietnam vet John Kerry and what he did (or didn’t) do in protesting a war he once fought in, dredged up during the 2004 Presidential election between Kerry and George W. Bush, whose own military record also came into question.

I admit to have been one of those people who actually supported the Vietnam war in the beginning of 1967. After all, it was an American war, I was an American, ipso facto, Q.E.D. My opposition to the conflict evolved over the next year or so, starting with the Beyond Vietnam speech by Martin Luther King, Jr. on April 4, 1967, a year to the day before he died. (Was that just coincidence?)

The group that most influenced me at the time was the VVAW, the Vietnam Veterans Against the War. It was one thing for civilians to oppose the war. It was quite another thing to see soldiers who had been fighting the war then come out against it.

In time, I found about some of the history of conflict in Vietnam, the fighting against the Japanese and the French, among others. The French defeat at Dien Bien Phu in 1954 might have signaled the end of colonial occupation, but it led to greater involvement by the Americans, first in small numbers of analysts in the 1950s to massive numbers troops in the mid-1960s, facilitated in no small part by the prevarication that was the Gulf of Tonkin resolution in August of 1964.

No doubt that many of the soldiers may have operated honorably, but it’s also true that the My Lai massacre in 1968 was not the only atrocity in this drawn-out engagement. My buddy Steve Bissette wrote a piece about a couple films delineating military failings during Vietnam and a more recent conflict. (I actually chuckled when I discovered his post was dated February 2, for that was the date in 1972 when the draft for those born in 1953 took place; that’s a LONG story.)

My general disinclination towards war is fueled by the belief that even in a “good war” (a true oxymoron), bad things, unintended things occur. Even the “good guys” get it wrong sometimes, regardless of the safeguards. Thus war should always be a last resort, not a first option.

In a bold attempt to be “fair and balanced, I point out to you The Politically Incorrect Guide™ to the Vietnam War — “the latest installment in Regnery Publishing’s bestselling Politically Incorrect Guide™ (“PIG”) series — [Phillip] Jennings gives you the surprising truth, and backs it up with facts that liberals ignore.”

I should note that I haven’t read the book. Among the assertions:
*The Tet offensive was a debacle for the North Vietnamese
*Communist Vietnam is now trying to emulate a more capitalist approach
I actually agree with both of those statements, but not with most of the others.

Thirty-five years after Vietnam and we’re still fighting the war.

***
Pete Seeger: Waist Deep in the Big Muddy from the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour. Pete turns 91 on Monday.

ROG

ROG

I am painting

I am painting the attic. The daughter helped me with the primer coat, but still–
I am painting the attic because, after we got half of the attic insulated – in JANUARY – the Wife said we had to paint that half of the attic.
I am painting the attic, even though she didn’t mention painting it BEFORE we got the attic insulated.
I am painting the attic, since she thought it was “obvious” that we would have to paint it after the insulation.
I am painting the attic, even though the only time painting is “obvious” to me is when paint is peeling or obviously faded.
I am painting the attic, even though I think it’s “just the attic”.
I am painting the attic because all of the items in the one half of the attic are now jammed in the other half of the attic, making everything in the attic inaccessible.
I am painting the attic because I want to play my LPs.
I am painting the attic because I want to access my summer clothes.
I am painting the attic because it’s the only way to get to about half of my books.
I am painting the attic because there are things on the second floor, including the Christmas decorations, that really need to go up to the attic.
I am painting the attic despite the fact that I hate painting – the feel of paint, the smell of paint. Don’t tell me that modern paint has “no smell”.
I am painting the attic despite the fact that I can’t see the difference between the current light gray walls, the white primer and the yellow paint, so I keep painting over the same areas. Maybe I’m just colorblind.
I am painting the attic now, even though it would have been better to paint the attic in the winter, when it’s not as warm.
I am painting the attic, even though it takes time away from writing a decent blog post.
***
Go look at these quite spectacular pictures of Iceland’s Eyjafjallajokull volcano.
***
May Day, May Day! Free Comic Book Day, the Kentucky Derby and May Day all converge on May 1.
***
Do pacifiers lead to drug addiction and masturbation?

ROG

ROG
Ramblin' with Roger
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