Category: Life

Lessons I’ve learned through the school of hard knocks. This is my catch-all, miscellaneous category if you will, where I address topics that don’t quite fit into the other categories.

WordPress.com


WordPress: The iPhone App!

So, I’m using an updated version of WordPress.com. I didn’t want to, but I had no choice. I used to post my blog on my website at http://davidrodriguez.us using WordPress blogging software that I kept on my website. It worked fine for the first two years or so. Then one day, my comments section was filled with spam. Beaucoup spam! One spam message left in a comment was so long that my blog never finished loading. And I couldn’t log into my own account and update my blog. Or remove all the spam. This happened to me again. Two more times, in fact. Whenever I contacted my ISP, I was told to contact WordPress. The last incident caused me to stop blogging for months! At first, I thought, “I broke the Internets!” 

Another problem I had was upgrading the WordPress software to my website. My ISP didn’t automatically upgrade the software even though they provided me with the original version. I only attempted one upgrade and my blog was down for about a month. Somehow, mysteriously, I accidentally deleted my entire website! After hours of reading WordPress documentation and multiple attempts to install the new software, I finally had my blog up and running again. That was my one and only WordPress upgrade. I swore to never upgrade again. Now that I’m using this new version of WordPress software, I realize I was lacking many features and widgets that I now take for granted. I love the way new features, themes, and widgets mysteriously appear without me having to upgrade.  

If you look at my archives list, there is a huge gap between June 2009 and January 2010. That was the period when I didn’t know what to do about my blog that had been hijacked. And I was really in the mood to blog! I tried other blogs, but I liked the WordPress features the best. I did open an account at WordPress in 2008 when I was previously locked out of my own blog, but I never actually used it. Finally, I told myself, I want to start blogging again. I really missed blogging! And now I’m blogging, as you can well see.  

So, here I am back blogging with WordPress. I like all the features available. My current blog already strongly resembles my old blog. Okay, so I’m a little resistant to change. I mean, I’m not very pliable. Except for all those new widgets that I’ve added to the right column of the blog. I also like the way my blog appears on my iPhone. When I open my blog on the iPhone, it’s so much easier to read than in the regular browser. It’s so much more manageable. I also like the WordPress App that’s available for my iPhone.  I plan to use it very soon.  

But I promise that my current blog will be of the exact same high quality as ever. And, of course, you remember how low high I set the bar before, right? Well, I can’t vouch for the quality, but I can guarantee you quantity. Much more than you ever asked for. My goal is to write a blog entry every day for a month. Okay, I picked February because it’s the shortest month of the year, much to the consternation of African Americans who were awarded February for Black History Month. And since this isn’t a leap year, I should easily be able to write twenty-eight blog posts. Right? I sure hope so!  

You suck!


Chicago Tribune, January 24, 2010

I saw this advertisement in the real estate section of the Chicago Tribune last Sunday. I remember when the word “suck” was a swear word! Perhaps I’m just on the verge of becoming a grumpy old man, but maybe that’s the reason I still remember when “suck” was offensive. So, imagine my surprise when I saw this ad.

When I was growing up back in the 1960s, an age before political correctness had swept the land, people would purposefully insult each other. No holds barred. If someone had a physical deformity or a mental defect, that was exactly what the insulting party focused on. Racial slurs were not only permitted, but wholeheartedly encouraged.

But getting back to the word “suck,” most people who use the word today don’t even realize why they’re using it. Once, one of my students said, “Exams suck!” and many of the other students in the class agreed. She had a quizzical look on her face after she said it. Then, she said, “What does that even mean?” No one knows what “suck” even means nowadays. No wonder I hear it on the radio and TV all the time. That’s because no one knows the history of the word “suck.”

But getting back to the 1960s, if someone wanted to insult you, they would–in so many words–say that you performed fellatio, back in an era when oral sex was frowned upon. The main offense was to insult someone’s manhood by implying he was homosexual. If someone did something stupid–and about everything qualified as being “something stupid”–the person who didn’t like what you did would say, “You blow!” Sometimes people would hurl the insult to pedestrians as they drove by. Sometimes it was incorporated into everyday conversation: “Why aren’t you inviting Alloycius to your party?” “Because Alloyicius blows!”

Somewhere along the line, “blow” received fierce competition from “suck.” Both words referred to the same sexual act of fellatio. The only point of contention seemed to hinge on the direction of air flow. But both terms were equally insulting in a homophobic manner. No one argued that! If you did, people would not only say, “You blow!”, but also, “You suck!” It was the great philosophical debate of my generation. Is it better to blow or to suck?

Well, flash forward to the present, and the people using the word “suck” are unaware of the history of the word “suck” whenever they use it. Just think about it. Can exams really suck? Who wouldn’t like oral sex to relax during a grueling exam. If exams literally sucked, students would love taking exams. And, then afterwards, the students would smile and say, “Yeah, that exam really sucked!”

DDR

Test


iPhone

This was just a test to see if I could publish a blog entry from my iPhone. I guess I can. I think I’m getting ready to start publishing blog entries on a regular basis. I just went a whole week without the Internet in my house. I tried to upgrade to a faster broadband speed, and I lost all connectivity to cyber space.

If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

DDR

Making a comeback


Legoland, Carlsbad, California

Okay, I’m back. I think. I’ve been having so many technical difficulties lately. I like computers, but they don’t seem to like me. My blog at http://davidrodriguez.us is still up and running. However, I cannot post any new entries.

DDR

Relocating


Diego Rivera’s Typewriter
Guanajuato, Guanajuato, Mexico

I had problems with my blogging software, and I am now in the process of relocating all my blog posts here. Please be patient as this may take a while. Gracias.

DDR