What Starts With W…

So I don’t know why I keep ignoring little things.  I’ve always meant to keep a journal and every time I write an entry I start off with saying “I’ve got do keep this up more often”, but yet I don’t.  This blog is the same way.  I guess I just stopped having profound statements.  Actually, that’s not true either.

I have a YouTube Channel and I tend to spout my crap there rather than in words.  Why, you ask?  Because I guess I find it easier to talk and run my mouth rather than writing things down.  When it gets written down or typed out, there is a modicum of thought and genuflection in the content and making sure that you are printing the right thing.

For example, I cannot tell you how many times I have hit “backspace” to correct my poor grammar and spelling (i.e. I just spelled “grammar” wrong… yea spellcheck!).  But when editing a word, sometimes you need to go back further and rephrase the entire thought process so that it makes sense.

When I make my YouTube videos I try to stick within a script or a set of notes.  But since The brain sometimes just takes off, it’s easy to get off track and then you lose your place.  Granted, this is what they have created video editing software for.

So I’m thinking about my writing style and I’m not sure that I have one, to be perfectly honest.  I can look back at old term/research papers from College and realize they are just the biggest loads of crap.  I really don’t know how I got passing grades on any of them.  What is even worse is the writing samples I created when taking Journalism classes (that was my Minor).  I have realized that I have very little aptitude for writing.

Currently I was thinking of applying for a part-time writing gig with a popular gun blog, but I don’t know if I will have the expertise or the discipline to submit a couple of articles a week.  On top of that, time is a factor.  One of the things they are looking for is reviews and news.  Wile I do my best to keep up with firearm related news, I’m certainly not the formost expert.  Never claimed to be…

Movie reference about political spin masters… you may have seen it.  What does that have to do with me?  I’ll tell you.

Lately, and I really don’t know why, I’ve been thinking about my future.  OK, we all think about our future, and I’ve come to the realization that winning the lottery is probably a long shot.  So I’ve been having thoughts about other things.  Holding an elected office.

Obviously I’m not about to run out and run for President, but I would consider starting locally and working my way up.  My problem is that I’m starting this thought a little later than I probably should have.  But that might work in my favor.

So why am I considering this?  For one thing (and this is more on a National level) I’m getting sick and tired of all the BS career politicians put the “general public” through.  I know you can never please everyone and that it’s all part of the game.

While I may not be as educated or rich as people that run for office, I feel I bring something to the table… common sense.  Some policies out there just do not make any sense.  I like to consider myself an “average joe”.  That’s what this world needs from politics, average people that have spent a good portion of their lives in the real world.

So I’m putting it out there now that the family has been informed…

We are “with child”!  Yes, my wife is pregnant and expecting our first sometime later this summer.  As we haven’t had the first doctor’s appointment yet, we don’t have a due date.  But we are guessing August or September.

With this comes a whole set of challenges that I hope I’m ready for.

I have started something interesting.  I am going to start writing e-mails to my unborn child with information.  Right now the e-mails are stitting in my “drafts” folder simply because we haven’t picked a name yet.  Once we do then I’ll create a GMail account and send the mail.  This will, hopefully, keep going until my baby is old enough to understand and have the address.  Once it’s turned over, there will be hundreds of e-mail that he/she can read about their parents and the backstory.

Plus, since a baby won’t remember those first few years, it’s a good chronicalling of their early life.  Using gmail will allow us to upload pictures and videos (thank you Google and 7+GB of gmail storage).

I remember reading about this or hearing someone else doing it and I thought how good of an idea it was.  So I’m goint to try it.  But then again, knowing my own history of trying to maintain a journal over the years, this could be an exercise in futility.

So another update to add for my site (http://www.jeremybeaver.com) is I am creating a wiki.

Why would I do this?  Simple.  A wiki is a great place to act a repository for information.  It really comes in handy at work when you, or someone else, can pass on information about a system or a way to solve a problem.  The same thing can happen outside of work.

By maintaining a wiki page I can deposit little nuggets of information so I don’t have to look it up all the time (on the web).  If I’ve learned how to patch a drywall hole, I can add the steps to a wiki page and photos as well.  (Just an example… mostly because I have a hole in my drywall that needs repair).

So I have actually taken the time to update my website.  Years ago I started it with a basic knowledge of HTML.  I prided myself on the fact that I wrote everything from scratch.  As times have changed, so have I.

I have re-published my site using iWeb on my MacBook.  Afterwards I wanted some greater functionality, so I tried RapidWeaver.  As of right now I’m still learning some of the ins and outs of RW.  But if you look, the site is still in iWeb.

Maybe it’s just me, but RW is not behaving the way I would like it to.  I started to import pages and since there is no import/export, you have to drag-and-drop everything.  That’s not a big deal, but the page styles I was working with were not cooperating.

So I’m staying with iWeb for now.  Need to research more WYSIWYG applications.  Or at the very least, give RW some more time and work my Google-fu.

So I just finished watching the season finale of Top Shot.  It’s amazing what the producers and experts come up with for challenges.  Not to mention the diverse array of weapons the contestants get to “play” with.

I really wish I had the skills to do something like this.  It would be awesome!  Hell, I’d settle for simply being able to afford some of the guns they use and to have the range space to mess around with dueling trees and reactive targets.
{sigh}… doesn’t hurt to dream… unless you live on Elm Street!

So in an effort to quit smoking, I have started taking Chantix (again).  A few years ago i did quit smoking for 8 months with this wonder drug.  I started back up as I was buying a house and planning a wedding.  Plus it didn’t help that my bride-to-be was still smoking as well.  She is such a bad influence!

So the 2 of us are quitting together this time.  So I have started on the Chantix again.  Also helped that my insurance covers some of the cost this time and with a coupon, makes it even better!

So one of the side effects they mention (among the many) is vivid dreams or nightmares.  I don’t recall anything like this happening the first time around, but now, whoa boy!

I really don’t know what it is, but I have had the strangest dreams lately.  Most of them I don’t remember any details, but I know they were completely convoluted in their construction (as most dreams are).

I wouldn’t call any of them nightmares, but some are in a grey area with just the right amount of weirdness.  I’m not going to go into any details, because the most recent one I do remember is a little too weird to put into words.  Plus I really don’t need someone trying to interpret my dreams and make it something more than what it really is.

I am hoping that I get a really good dream.  Something that could be turned into a book or movie.  That would be ideal.

No I am not talking about the meat-based product in a can.  However, and call me sick.  Sometimes to get a hankering for canned meat.  What can you do?  And along those lines, apparently Spam has been hit with the grocery shrink-ray…

No, I’m talking about electronic SPAM.  We all get it and some people are actually dumb enough to click the links in those e-mail.  Or click OK to a pop-up that tells them their anti-virus software is corrupted.  If you are one of those people, then I have the deepest sympathy for you and your tiny, little brain.

I’ve actually been getting SPAM under the comments section of some of my posts.  I’m glad that no one really reads this and therefore I know they are a bunch of BS.

Don’t ever read SPAM, don’t click links, and don’t ever download anything from a pop-up.