Daily Plog

So, I have had pretty consistent website traffic since the sites inception in early 2008. Through all the updates, changes, broken features, people did not seem to care much and visited just the same. However, in the last two weeks I have found that my traffic has dwindled to nearly nothing. I mean literally, in two weeks I have had four visitors, and they were all on the same day. So, one of two things is happening here:

A: My methods for monitoring traffic have become corrupted and are no longer logging and storing traffic data correctly.

B: People really are just not visiting the website anymore. This could be due to a general lack of new content, a less than entertaining design and interface, and no tabloid-esque, American Idol, flashy lights drama on the index page.

My query is this, I would like those of you that visit, to simply shoot me an email, or take the time to leave a comment that is simply a number, a letter, or whatever it is you would like to leave as a way to signal to me that you visited the site, as I have a problem with the fact that the site has gone from 5-60 visits per day in the last two years, to literally ZERO in the last two weeks, aside, of course, from the six visits on January 31st, and the one, lonely visit on February 5th…

Thank you all for taking just a moment of your time to help me better the functionality of this website. If you could all contribute to this place it would be a much better website for all of us to tinker on.

~Jacob

For a long time I have wanted to write a story. After many years of fumbling around with ideas in my mind, and never quite having the confidence in my writing skills to start, I have finally written what will be the first part of my short story, realizing that what better to write about than my personal experiences. Some of you may know where the story starts and ends with respect to my life, some of you may not. I will not be answering ANY questions about the story(ies), but feel free to ask in the comments section and someone may be able to answer. I will be reading comments, so if you would like to critique my work, please do so as I am certain there will be errors somewhere.

There will be no distinct chronological order to the story(ies – should there be more), and they may jump around even within themselves. I do hope this is something people will be coming back for from time to time, as I hope to put out a portion of them on a weekly basis, they will be very well organized on the site, with each part of the story having it’s own page and subpages, so they will be easily found and read in a distinct order. Anyway, the first story begins HERE. Please take a look and I do hope that you enjoy, as it is one of my new years resolutions…

Happy Birthday to my good friend Eric, though it is a little late at this point, I had a bit of a busy day and it slipped my mind…

I had the privilege on Sunday to hang out with a group of my friends for a birthday celebration. After being the first one to arrive and sitting there for 20 minutes, alone, and very very awkward and uncomfortable, I got to thinking about the last three years of my life with regards to the event (which mostly means the company) that was about to take place.  I have always had a proclivity towards the unknown, be it culture, science, technology, religion, and pretty much anything that one could learn, some things would interest me beyond the information available, others quickly dwindled and were forgotten. However, in the last three years I have met two people that have had a huge part in my interest and desire to visit and ‘partake’ of other cultures.

First, I was fortunate enough to meet my friend Eric’s girlfriend Villa some time ago. She opened my eyes to an entire world of things. New foods, experiences, people, culture, I could seriously go on and on. It used to be that I would pretty much stick to the things I knew and not really wander outside of my comfort zone. After meeting Villa, and several of her friends, and just spending time with Eric and her my outlook completely changed. I started enjoying life and all it has to offer. There is a whole panoply of new experiences and adventures to enjoy, granted, I can be a depressive person and I go through moods at times in which I just do not want to see anybody or do anything, but for a couple years I was able to enjoy a completely different side of life, and getting out and doing things with my friends became an adventure worth taking part in. I am eternally grateful for all of the fun we had, and for them both always inviting me to tag along.

Secondly, the opportunity I had to meet a very interesting person named Chandra. Chandra was originally from Nepal, a very small country stuck between India and China, with a small mountain range called the Himalayas, and a little known mountain called Everest. When she was young she was adopted by an American family and brought to the U.S. (The story behind that is probably best left for another post). She is a very unique person and quite literally one of the most beautiful people I have ever seen in my life. She generally has a very positive and fun outlook on life. Something to which I was relatively speaking unaccustomed to. For the first three months of knowing her she opened my eyes to such a unique perspective on things. She was a great help to me in showing me that I am a generally well liked person. Our initial meeting was quite odd I must say. She had tried many times to get me to meet her, which I would fervently turn down. Though I do not recall doing so, at some point she got my phone number and called me after work, not knowing who it was I answered the phone and was effectively strong-armed into meeting her. Immediately upon arriving at my destination it was like we had known each other for many years. Effectively teasing one another about various things… I could not help but to point out her small stature, and she was intent on harassing me about my choice of ice cream and how long it took, then the fact that I could not finish it because I did not like it. I had never been so comfortable with someone in my life, albeit after 20 mins of physical interaction. Regardless, Chandra was able to have an impact on my life that very few people ever have the opportunity, one that will likely last forever. She opened my life to a place where money does not matter, and only one’s ability to provide for their family with food and shelter is of any significance. She told me stories of life in Nepal and captivated me with her adorable accent and absolutely beautiful Nepali dances and absolutely lovely attire.

My point in all of this is simple, my desire to travel the world and experience it and capture it via my photography is unparalleled by anything I have ever considered doing. Because of the cultural differences of two people, my life has been forever changed with the desire to experience new things, and cultures, and places. In so many ways I just do not understand how people can fear the unknown, why is society so insistent upon forcing some unnecessary fear of life, death, driving to work, travelling, having a Christmas tree, and pretty much doing anything. Yes, there are necessary fears in the world, but none that should cause an overwhelmingly abundant paralysis to an entire country. We should embrace the unknown with open arms, welcome the unknown with our minds open to the abundance of new information that we are bound to experience.

In essence, this post is all because I went to Amazing Thailand for a great friend’s birthday party and arrived twenty minutes early… Here is the photo that corresponds to the celebration. As far as the food, I give it an 11 out of 10 (Tip: Order the pineapple stuffed with rice, ingenious and delicious).

“A long December and there’s reason to believe, maybe this year will be better than the last… The smell of hospitals in winter and the feeling that it’s all a lot of oysters, but no pearls…”

This photo was taken on a last minute trip to Sedona with Chandra. As we were driving the view progressively got better and better, I waited until just before what I thought would be the cusp of the perfect portion of the sunset, to which I was correct. We stopped the car just after exiting the freeway towards Sedona, and it was a most spectacular view indeed. Well worth the trip up there if I were to only be able to view this and turn around. Again, I have heard this area of the world referred to as having sunrises/sunsets “Where God paints the sky” and it is one of the most accurate phrases I have ever heard.

I implore everyone that may have the opportunity to go to Arizona, and just relax, enjoy the beauty that is there, or any place in the world for that matter, that you find to be special.

I was browsing through my catalog of photos, of which there are over 13,000 (Likely 30% being potentially post-able). I found this particular photo, it was taken in a time that was difficult, as are many lately, in which Chandra had been gone for awhile, and I was on my way home from spending some time up north in Kathio State Park near Lake Mille Lacs. I did have a good time, getting away and relaxing. Though, somehow being so disconnected from everything was a bit emotionally burdensome.

In retrospect I wish I could more enjoy my time away from everything and have the ability to distract myself from my worries on occasion. On my trip to Arizona I was mostly able to do so, but that is primarily due to the influence of Chandra to distract me from the problems of my health. She has always been able to make everything feel like it will improve, even if all logic points to an alternate conclusion.

Having said that, I really like the peacefulness of this particular photo. Living here a hundred years ago. Somehow imagining the peacefulness of having a small plot of land, a Wife and Children and what might seem like a little bit of solidarity. I can imagine how much simpler life would be without all the troubles of modern life, mortgages, cellular phone(s), fuel costs, car payment(s), and just keeping up with all of the things that a person is required to do on a daily basis.

“If you’re attractive enough on the outside, people will forgive you for being irritating to the core” ~E.L. Kersten

As it stands the problem surrounding the rating system not working was in fact one of the implementations I had made back in early October to speed up the loading of the site. No worries though, it currently (As of now) appears that everything works fine and the site is still loading at a “very” respectable speed… Let’s hope it continues.

As far as my ending with a quote, that only applies to the first post of the day, just to clear that up with everyone….

So, it has come to my attention that the rating system on the site has become non functional once again. I was told of this some time ago, and I distinctly remember making it functional again. No matter, I am currently working on a fix, and we will see how long it takes, so for now, perhaps comments are in order.

I have recently decided to end each post with a quote, whether it be one of my own, a movie, a song, or something I have read somewhere. So, should you have any ideas for a quote, feel free to contact me and I will surely include any ideas. Some of you that visit my site may wish to remain anonymous, and as such, you may freely post on the site, though when it comes time to typing in a name and email, feel free to type in something like “anonymous” as a first and last name, and “anonymous@anonymous.com”, and I will certainly make sure to approve your posts, as my spam filter will likely do what it does best, and filter them.

“… and perhaps all of the misfortunes one could endure would not be equal to this moment, here, right now, wherein you are gone…”