Raam Dev

Hello, future.

Build a Strong Foundation for your Body

Most bodybuilders that you see will have a big strong upper body, but a smaller, disproportionate lower body. Lower body muscles are probably the second hardest muscle to work, second only to abs. A strong lower body is very important though. It's the foundation on which you build your strong upper body.

Those who do physical labor for their daily job generally have a naturally build lower body. Lifting objects and moving around on your feet all day constantly tax the lower body muscles, causing them to grow. I salute those who hold jobs which require large amounts of physical labor (construction workers, the military, etc). Sure, I'm a computer guy and my job generally requires that I sit on my ass all day in front of the computer. Not very healthy for lower body muscles. However, I don't see this as a misfortune, but rather as one of many challenges I must face.

I had another thought today with regards to lower body exercises. Those who actually do work their lower body on a regular basis probably don't see the gains they'd expect because the muscles are so tight. The muscles can't grow if they are not relaxed enough to stretch. With this in mind, I'm going to start doing 20 minutes of yoga and stretching twice a day, morning and evening, concentrating on lower body and hip stretches.

As promised, here is the second workout in my new routine. You'll notice there are a lot of lower body exercises. While doing exercises, it's extremely important that you keep perfect form through each rep. If the weight feels too easy, then slow down each rep and keep perfect form. If after a whole set of going slow they still feel light, then, and only then, increase the weight.

(workout moved here)

An Oceanic Day and the Damn Sunburn

Sitha and I went to the beach today and we were actually able to find a place that wasn't too packed.

I was stubborn and didn't put sunblock on.

Stupid.

Now I have a bad sunburn. Lesson learned, I hope.

The ocean is so beautiful. I was thinking how nice it would be if I could find a place to rent for three months of the year (June, July, August). I'd go to work during the week and return everyday to the beach house. Since I don't have the expense of a permanent residence (a whole house to myself), I may actually be able to make that work. I was also thinking about the plausibility of either renting a place, or buying a multi-family house, in Cambridge so I don't have to commute to Aerva. I'm sure I'll be working there full-time within the next couple of months, so I'll be commuting a lot more.

I started a new workout routine this week. It's a 4 week routine designed to cut fat and maintain muscle. Hopefully by August 1st, I'll be around 8% or 9% body fat and looking cut. For this routine, I lift three days a week; Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. On the days in-between, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, I will be doing 15 - 20 minutes of interval training.

Because today is apart of a holiday weekend, I almost forgot it was Monday. I really wasn't in the mood to workout because of my sunburn. But then I realized: We don't take a day off from breathing, the Sun doesn't have a holiday in which it doesn't have to rise, and I don't decide to not workout simply because it's a holiday or because I have a damn sunburn!

So I worked out. One hour. Here's today's routine:

(moved here)

A Productive Week

Yesterday I only had 4 hours of sleep because I was up until 4:30am working on a programming project for Aerva. Amazingly enough, yesterday was probably my most productive day of the week. I felt more awake and energized than any other day! All on 4 hours of sleep! I managed to workout AND go for a bike ride (which by the way didn't last very long because the horse flies were swarming around me like I've never seen). I did manage to take some nice photos while I was biking though. Click the frog below to visit the gallery.

Near the end of the day however, I started to feel the effects of only getting 4 hours of sleep. I decided to lay down and take a nap, which ended up lasting 2 1/2 hours. When I woke up, I felt like crap, as if I hadn't slept in days. I believe my mistake was sleeping too long. I should have set my alarm to wake me up in 30 minutes. Last night however, I had a full night's rest.

The traffic was insane today. I couldn't figure out why until I heard the radio mention it was 4th of July weekend! Duh!

I signed up for a Fotki account, just to try out the features and compare them to the open-source photo gallery I'm using. If you view my Fotki albums you'll notice I only have one album uploaded. I'm still trying to decide whether I want to give in and use Fotki for all my albums, or if I want to continue to manage the albums myself using custom PHP programming. I might add a feature to picKLE (the photo gallery I'm using) that uses a random thumbnail for each of the galleries (which is what Fotki does) instead of just the album name. The only other feature I might want to add is a comments feature, so visitors can leave comments for certain pictures or galleries. The other reason I might want to host my albums on Fotki though, is bandwidth. If I have enough visitors browsing my gallery, my bandwidth limitations will really slow everyone down.

I'm considering changing my workout routine starting Monday. I've been on my current routine for 4 weeks and I've made some nice gains, however it's starting to feel a bit monotonous.

And last but not least, thanks to you my readers, last month saw the largest number of hits to this site; over 1000 unique hits last month alone. I appreciate the support and look forward to your comments!

The Observer

Yesterday, I was driving home from work in Boston to my parents house in New Hampshire. As I was pulling out of a side street, onto a major road, I looked to my right and saw no cars. I looked to my left and saw no cars. However to the left I was unable to see more than 50 feet down the road because the road went up and over a hill. So I looked quickly to my right once again to make sure it was clear and took my foot off the break petal. As the car started to roll forward and my foot moved from the break petal to the gas petal, some uncontrollable force jerked my foot back over to the break petal, for no apparent reason at all. As my head moved to look to the left, a car flew right in front of me, missing me by inches.

As I exited the side road, pictures of what could have just happen flashed through my head. I saw my car being smashed in the front, spinning around and hitting another oncoming car, and causing a pileup. All of this in a very dangerous location just over a hill, where cars normally travel 50mph. The pictures in my head were so realistic that it was as if all the physics needed to make a realistic recreation of what could have happen, had already been calculated. Is it possible that in an alternate reality my foot continued to press on the gas petal and I slammed into the oncoming car? Is it possible that the repercussions and effects of such a disaster were so strong and profound, that signals from the event were felt even in an alternate reality (mine), which somehow helped prevent me from making that alternate reality my own?

Ironically, when I arrived at my parents house a few minutes later, my dad put on a 2 hour science show about the quantum world, interestingly called "What The Bleep Do We Know?". It touched on so many controversial ideas and asked so many of the same questions that I have always asked myself for as long as I can remember, that I'm going to buy the DVD just to hear to them again. I've always felt a sort of disconnection from reality, an unreal, dream like feeling. Many argue that such a feeling isn't good because it prevents me from taking responsibility for my own actions or being receptive to the feelings of others. However, I believe that since I have felt this way my entire life I have been able to make the clear distinction between "this world" as everyone perceives it, and "the other world" that I feel I exist in. I can still live my life and respond to others as anyone else would, however I'm always aware that something else exists.

Masaru Emoto, a Japanese photographer, has shown with his photos that thought and emotion can affect the properties and shape of water molecules. If that's not proof enough that thought and emotion can directly have an impact on the world around us, then I don't know what is. There have been many unexplainable cases of patients miraculously being cured by their strong will to survive. Positive thoughts do more for us than strengthen our self-esteem. They strengthen our physical bodies and make our world a better place. I always observe myself whenever I'm in a difficult or stressful situation. Just observing yourself through a separate identity that isn't effected or touched by worldly problems, makes dealing with situations much easier. It puts problems into perspective, just like the photographer behind his camera always sees more than his camera ever could.

In the movie there is a story told about the Indians who were the first to see Columbus when he arrived in the New World. The Indians could not see Columbus's ships, even though they were anchored near land, because they had never before seen such a ship. The medicine men noticed ripples in the water around where the ships were anchored, so they knew something odd was happening. Only when the Indians put their trust and belief in what the medicine men were telling them, and when they genuinely believed, did they actually see that the ships existed. Whether this story is true or not, it does make you wonder: Is it possible for us to see something that our mind cannot imagine? We can imagine a rock floating in mid-air, so I suppose if someone had the power to make a rock float, we'd see it. We might not want to believe it, but our brain could certainly imagine it. Now suppose there's an alien spaceship, a spaceship like we've never seen before. It doesn't look like any spaceships we've seen in the movies or in a cartoon and it has no likeness to anything we've ever seen before. How could we see it? If we can't even imagine it, how could we possibly see it when it's right in front of us? Maybe that's why all the photographs of UFO's or eye-witness encounters have been so vague. We want to believe, so we see something, but we just don't know what to see. So thats what we see, something.

Die Habit, Die!

I found my cat playing with a mouse this morning. The mouse wasn't dead, but it looked scared as hell. Even when I picked it up with a paper towel to put outside, it wasn't moving very much and I didn't see any visible wounds, so I guess it was just stunned. This event puts making an appointment with the vet a top priority. My cat really needs to get all it's shots.

I'm tackling the challenge once again. I'm going to limit, or eliminate coffee/caffeine from my diet. Of all the habits I have tried to kick, eliminating caffeine has been the only one able to elude the boot. The longest I have ever gone without coffee was barely two weeks. It takes about 40 days of no caffeine before your body is 100% caffeine free, which means my body hasn't been caffeine free since I started drinking coffee! I had no coffee at all yesterday and the day before and during those two days I experienced the well known "caffeine headaches". They were so bad I couldn't even think. Caffeine headaches happen because caffeine makes your blood run through your veins faster than usual. When your body suddenly stops getting a steady supply of caffeine, your blood has to work harder to pump blood to your brain, and the other parts of your body. This is what causes the headaches and the groggy mornings that feel as if you only had 1 hour of sleep, even when you had 8 or 9 hours. The headaches started again this morning but early this afternoon they subsided. I'm just hoping that was the worst of them.

I've been buying a tall green tea from Starbucks instead of coffee. It's $1.30, an unnecessary expense yes, but if that unnecessary expense saves me from a $5 a day habit, then so be it. Caffeine messes up your body in a big way and in more ways than one. Sleep cycles are screwed up, moods are changed, money is wasted, and worst of all a dependency is created. Besides, water rocks.

I probably picked a bad time to shift my workout schedule, with eliminating coffee and all, but what the hell. Working out in the morning makes the rest of the day much easier to get through. I don't have to worry about conserving energy for my workout at night.

The guy that was going to do work on my Ware street property said it was "too much work" for him after he saw it, and he wasn't interested in tackling it. My real estate agent, Paul Brouillette, gave me the number of another person who does that kind of work. I called him this morning and he's going to come take a look at the property tomorrow afternoon. Hopefully I can just pay him to do the work I need to have done, instead of spending the next few weekends doing it myself.

Would You Kill Your Mother?

Iran won't give up its right to use nuclear technology. I don't blame them. What gives the United States the right to dictate who is allowed to use a technology that can benefit developing nations? Money and power doesn't make one human better than another. If technology can be used in a humane way, and for a just cause, then it should be used. The United States acts like a big bully, trying to scare away all those who it feels threatened by. The United States is controlled by money and greed. If the oil companies, and all their wealth were of no importance to the government, and if our government woke up and realized what they're doing to the world, we'd already be living in a pollution free country. Hybrid cars are becoming a reality not because technology allows it, but because they are advertised as giving people "tax credits". Politicians can use this to their advantage. Oh, it also helps that the hybrid cars still require, *ahem* gas, so it's not as if the hybrids are taking money away from the oil companies. Electric cars, and cars that run on alternative fuels are already possible.

Global warming is going to force politicians to face reality. The only problem is it will be too late when they decide to do something about it. One third of Florida will be under water 50 - 60 years from now. London will be under water by the year 2100, only 94 years from now. These are facts. Because of global warming hurricanes are going to become more and more powerful. Already, the past 10 years has seen progressively worse hurricanes, setting historical records every year. Forest fires are the worst they've ever been. As the climate changes, storms like these will become so commonplace that much of our time and energy will be put into preventing, or protecting ourselves from these storms and natural disasters. But when will we realize what's causing all this? When will we realize its us? Al Gore's new movie An Inconvenient Truth, is an excellent eye opener and explains in plain English what's going on, and what the future holds. I watched it a few weeks ago with my parents and I highly recommend it.

Everyday that I drive into Boston, I think about alternative forms of energy. We need to figure out how to use what nature provides instead of modifying nature for our own use. This ties into food, believe it or not. The more "refined" our food is the less healthy it is for our bodies. We, as humans, can survive and live a very healthy life eating nothing but what nature provides us. Sure, we might need to use water and fire to steam vegetables or cook rice and beans, but its still natural. It's still directly from nature, using only natural things in the process of cooking. It's been scientifically proven that the more refined a food the less healthy it is for our body. And we already know that planet Earth is a living, breathing, biological creature, so why wouldn't those same scientific studies apply? We were born on Earth, which biologically makes it our mother. The Earth provides us with shelter and food, yet we suck up oil, refine it, and then burn it as gas in cars and factories. We're killing our mother Earth and we aren't even giving it a second thought.

So why am I driving a truck that gets 14 miles a gallon? Well, now that I've been educated enough to realize what's happening you can be sure that I'm going do something about it, as soon as possible. Which makes me wonder: Do I really need to own houses (which require a truck to haul stuff around)? Do I really need to travel as much as I do? (I could move to Boston, and ride my bike into work). Or I could wait a few years and get one of these, or something similar.

A Schedule Shift

I received a call today while at work. I usually don't answer my phone, so I let the caller leave a message. When I checked my voicemail, it was the Lowell Police department. They asked me to return their call, and gave me the number to call. I hate when they leave a message without telling me what's going on. I was worried it was something catastrophic. When I called back, they asked me for the number that originally called me. Uh? I couldn't check my caller ID list while I was on a call, so I hung up and called back. I gave them the number and they transferred me to the person who originally called. She told me there were three police officers outside my property and they needed the key to get into the first floor unit. I told them I was in Boston at work. The woman said to hold on. I could hear while she was listening to what was going on over the radio. She said they managed to get in through the back door, and told me they were all set.

Starting tomorrow, I'm going to shift my schedule a bit. Usually I go into Boston in the morning, work all day, and come back in the evening to workout or go for a bike ride if there's any sun left. But by the time I get home from work, I feel exhausted. My workouts are rarely energized the way I'd like them to be. So tomorrow morning, I'm going to do some yoga, workout, and maybe go for a bike ride before I head to work. That way I can work from 12pm - 8 or 9pm and not have to worry about not having enough energy at the end of the day.

Whortle Berry Hill

I stepped outside yesterday to find the sun shining (I live in a basement, after all), and decided to go for a bike ride. Feeling adventurous I decided to tackle Whortle Berry Hill (see trail map, on the top of the map. I park at the Main Entrance). By reading the topography, I could see that it was quite a climb but I was ready for it; or so I thought.

After going through a paved neighborhood, I found the trail entrance. From the start, it was harder than I expected. Half of the time, the hill was so steep I was unable to ride my bike and I had to walk. Wet leaves made the trail slippery going up, and runoff water ruined the trail going down. When I reached the summit, I was very winded. I stopped to catch my breath, but the mosquitoes had other plans. I looked down and saw 6 of them feasting on my legs and more were swarming around my head. It was incredible. They felt like bee's attacking me, as if I had just killed their queen and they were out to get revenge.

I gave up my plans to catch my breath and bolted off down the other side of the hill. There were 2 ft pot holes and 10ft long crevices in the trail the whole way down, created by the wonderful rain no doubt. I wiped out once coming down and almost hurt my ankle. On my way down I also passed an old abandoned car. I hadn't thought of taking pictures until I was already 5 minutes down hill, but I hiked back up to take them anyway. Looking inside, I could imagine people driving the car, as if it was brand new.

Here's the gallery. Anyone know what kind of car it is? A Volkswagen maybe? Could someone find a picture of one new?

I didn't think I'd be feeling the way I did, but by the time I reached the other side of Whortle Berry Hill, all I could think about was getting back to my truck.

Independent Thoughts
People who love high quality car audio systems always look for companies that make high quality system for cars. Manufacturers like audiobahn are rocking in market, as they are providing quality systems in affordable prices. While on the other hand alpine cd player is getting popularity because of its quality lens and advance features.

Stuff Reduction in Progress

Today, while waiting for laundry to finish (I haven't bought and installed a washer/dryer in my basement yet), I decided to get my oil changed and have the fan belt replaced. The squeaking noise the belt was creating was becoming unbearable. As I was leaving the shop, the cashier offered me one of their savings cards. Every subsequent visit saves you a dollar more than the previous ($5 the first time, $6 the second, and so on). She offered it to me right after swiping my credit card. Thats when I remembered I had one of the savings cards from the last time I was there. She wasn't able to refund my credit card, but she gave me $5 cash back instead. It was amazing. The real cash felt a lot more real. "Saving" $5 felt like much more of an accomplishment when I was actually holding the cash. It was REAL money. Had she simply credited my credit card, I would have passed it over as no big deal.

That experience got me thinking. Every time I save money, I should transfer that much money into my INGDirect savings account. It doesn't cost me anything to make a transfer, and I can make as many transfer's as I like without being charged. So today, I transferred $5 into my INGDirect account. I'm going to start keeping track of every penny I save throughout the day and at the end of the week, add up the total and transfer that much money into INGDirect. These "savings" transfers will be in addition to the weekly transfers I recently talked about.

I've also started the long journey of reducing stuff, and increasing peace. In case you'd like to give me some of your peace, please check out my two eBay listings, here and here.

Follow Your Intuition

A few days ago I was contemplating buying a charger for my Nikon D50. I had spent hours searching for it and now that both of my batteries were dead, I had no way of using the camera. I called the local camera stores but the only charger available for my camera cost $250! Twice I had considered buying it, but both times I changed my mind. Something told me not to justify spending that much money, no matter what. So I ordered a compact generic charger on eBay for $35, which included an extra battery and shipping. A few days later I received the charger in the mail. Then today, while in my Lowell office, I stumbled across my original battery charger laying in a heap of wires. Now I have a portable charger to bring with me on trips and a standard charger to leave at home! Intuition?

Last night I checked my bank account online and the check for the lawyer hadn't cleared my account yet. I thought about putting a stop payment on the check and then calling the lawyer the following day to try and talk him out of making me pay full price for his services. I got as far as clicking on the "Stop Payment on a Check" link where I needed to fill out the information. But then something told me to stop. A vision of what the future consequences of that action might be flashed in my head: maybe the lawyer would get pissed off and tell me Continue reading →

A Chance to Save $1850

Lisa, the person living upstairs, approached me tonight when I arrived home. She told me she doesn't know when George is getting out of jail and since she can't afford to pay the rent, shes moving out to her mom's house. Great I thought. I just spent $1850 to get her evicted and now she's voluntarily leaving! She said she'll be out by next Friday and wanted to know if I could keep George's latter's for her until he gets out of jail, since they won't fit in the storage space she's renting. I told her I'll keep them until the end of August and if aren't gone by then, I'm selling them.

I'm going to call the lawyer first thing in the morning and tell him what happen. Hopefully I can get all, or at least most of, my money back. It's only been three days since I gave him the check. I just looked at my bank account and it hasn't cleared yet.

Postponed Trip to Florida

I spent most of today, the first day of summer, inside looking at the blue sky through my office window. I was up until 2 AM last night working on a personal programming project, savenotes.com, after spending the entire day programming at work (I love programming!). I was really feeling the sleep loss on my 8 AM morning ride into Boston. Half way there, while sitting in traffic, I realized the sunglasses I was wearing were probably tricking my body into thinking it was still time to sleep. I felt much better after a few minutes without wearing them. The radio mentioned how today's weather should feel like Hawaii weather: little to no humidity, blue skies, 80 degrees. Great I thought, and I was headed into work to spend the entire day inside.

Around 2 PM, I was surprised when I realized I didn't seem to mind being inside all day programming. I figured it must be because I have a huge window to look through all day. My office in Lowell has no windows at all and on a nice day I get very agitated after working only a few hours. I headed home a little early today (6:30 PM), hoping to catch enough sunlight to go mountain biking. The sun was already setting by the time I arrived at the trail head, but I still managed to get in 25 minutes of sweating.

I've been trying to decide whether or not to take a trip to Florida to watch the space shuttle launch, scheduled for July 1st. I know I just got through writing a few posts about saving money, but this is a trip I've been saving up for. I was going to go for three days, Friday - Sunday, so I could do some traveling at the same time and visit the Florida Everglades for some photography. I needed to have a backup plan, because space shuttle launches are notorious for being rescheduled. You may have read that watching a space shuttle launch is one of the things on my "to do before I die" list. NASA's plan is to phase out all space shuttle launches, replacing them with a newer, less expensive spacecraft by 2010. That only gives me another 3 1/2 years to watch a launch. I decided not to go this time mainly because of how much stuff I have going on right now, with all the tenants moving out, etc. Besides, right now there are lots of thunderstorms in Florida, so it probably isn't such a good time for photography in the everglades.

Appreciation

Can work make us feel happier? I don't mean in the literal sense of being happy while you're working, but rather the psychological effect work has on our experiencing happiness.

I came home tonight, after working 10 hours in Boston and hitting the gym for an 1 hour, and I heard Spanish music coming from an open window across the street. It was one of those slow, sad sounding Spanish songs (whatever that is). I couldn't see him, but I heard a guy singing his heart with the song. He seemed genuinely happy, as if he was the happiest person on the planet. But I know that guy. He's a bum. I see him hanging out in front of the house all day, and night. He doesn't work, or do anything. Maybe he's collecting welfare, or has a relative who is, but either way, he does nothing all day. I wondered to myself if I would feel just as happy if I was in his place, having nothing to worry about. Then I wondered if maybe the people who actually work, the ones who put themselves into use everyday, who have goals and ambitions, if maybe they are capable of experiencing more happiness than the ones who don't. Does work, worry, and responsibility teach us to appreciate the simpler things in life even more? A 4 year old child couldn't possibility be able to appreciate living in a big house or even having a yard to play in, until he grows up and sees how things could have been different.

I've seen first hand how experience teaches you to appreciate. After learning how to do basic plumbing, wiring, and construction from my Dad, I started teaching myself and taking on projects (shed / basement) that I never imagined completing myself. After seeing first hand the amount of work, planning, and precision that goes into building something (like the many months my Dad and I spent building the decks, stairs, and kitchen floors at his house last summer), my appreciation for the construction of everything has grown exponentially. The feeling of standing inside my shed, knowing I built it from ground up, carrying every single piece of wood from my truck to that spot, is unexplainable. Suppose I had built a dog house. Would I have the same feeling of appreciation? Of course not.

Experience, it seems, teaches us to appreciate what we have now because we're capable of understanding how thin a line we've walked to get to where we are today.

Think One Dollar

I sold my entire portfolio today. I wasn't going to, but after learning two tenants in one of my houses are moving out this Thursday, I took a hard look at my cash position and where it was headed. A third tenant in the same property left a few days ago, leaving three vacant units; an extra $2000 per month I need to come up with to pay the mortgage. One of my other property's also has a vacant unit that I'm about to put an ad in the paper for; another $800 I need to come up with for that mortgage. Oh, and the first floor tenant at my house, George, hasn't paid me rent in over 8 months; a total of $8000 worth of rent, all of which came out of my pocket to pay the mortgage. I'm sure you're beginning to see why I've become desperate enough to sell my entire portfolio at a 50% loss. Grrrrrr. You have no idea how hard it was to press those sell buttons, knowing I lost so much. Who knows, maybe the stock market isn't for me.

It's said, a penny saved is a penny earned. In today's terms, that penny is equivocal to a dollar. When we look in our wallet, or purse and see a dollar bill, we treat it with Continue reading →

More Stuff, Less Peace

I was reading comments by a user on Slashdot and he was talking about how he lives a very simple life. He carries around very few things and he owns very little, however the things he does own he can do a lot with, such as his single computer, a laptop.

It made me start thinking about how much I would like to live a simple life. It made me realize how we accumulate so much stuff because we think we need it, or because we think it will make life easier. Instead of asking ourselves what we could buy to complete a specific task, or to fulfill a specific desire, we should ask ourselves what do we already have that could be used to complete a specific task, or what will we do with the object when our desire for it is gone in a few weeks (or days).

I've started to ask myself, "Do I see myself using this 6 months from now?". If not, then maybe buying it is a waste of money, and peace of mind! I've saved myself from buying lots of things by simply asking myself that question.

Children will often pick something up in a store and say they want it. They will cry and scream until their parents buy it for them, as if their very life depended on having it. And then, the very next day, if not the very next hour, they will put it down and forget it ever existed. They will loose all interest in it.

The sad thing is, most adults grow up and continue the same pointless routine. They see something they want, justify to themselves why they think they need it. Then, after putting down the cash, or the plastic, they add it to their already growing collection of stuff they rarely use, as if they're in a race for less space, trying to collect as much stuff as possible before their last day on Earth arrives.

What a waste. A waste of money, a waste of space, a waste of natural resources, a waste of the peace of mind they never knew they were giving up. And for what? You don't take any of that stuff with you when you're gone.

So next time you're about to buy something, ask yourself if you really need it.

Financial Fury

This heat is awesome. It was 100 degrees, if not higher, all day today. Before visiting my parents for fathers day I went mountain biking and observed an interesting phenomenon. The ponds are full of tadpoles; so many tadpoles that all you see are tadpoles. You don't even see any fish! Anyhow, the tadpoles were jumping out of the water causing it to look as if it was raining. I'm not sure what made them do that, but it was pretty interesting.

Yesterday I went to get my bike tuned up at the place I bought my bike, a small family owned bike shop in Dracut, MA. The owner told me that he sold his shop along with his house next door, to a developer who is going to tear everything down and build a plaza. He will then have a brand new shop in the plaza. Time, he said, is the only issue. He doesn't know when everything will be done, or even when the construction will start.

During the past few days I've spent several (at least 12) hours going over my finances. I finally reconciled all my bank accounts and credit cards, a whole 6 months worth. And today I decided I'm going to sell all my stocks tomorrow. I've already lost a considerable amount (paper loss), but a feeling inside told me not to be greedy; to take my money and put it in a safe place while I still can. I would feel so much better if the money was in INGDirect, where I can be guaranteed that I won't lose money. I've also decided to get back to tracking my expenses to the penny and start budgeting everything. $25 per week on food, $80 per week on gas, $20 per week on other recreational expenses, and so on. It's going to be tough, but I need to do it. I'm riding on too much debt and I don't like it. I'm also going to start committing as much money as I can to paying off my credit cards.

Bookmark Sync and Sort

I often bookmark websites when I come across something I think I might want to come back to later. Usually I'm searching for something and I'll come across another, unrelated, page that I also find interesting. Then there are common pages, such as banking sites, credit card login pages, domain control panel login pages, and others, that I bookmark just to have a quick way to access them. As you can imagine, my bookmark list has grown quite large. I found it very inconvenient when I use one of my other computers, or my laptop, and I don't have access to all my bookmarks.

This is where Bookmark Sync and Sort comes in. It's a Firefox extension that allows you to upload your bookmarks to an FTP server, and then download the bookmarks from another computer that also has the extension installed. This way you can keep your bookmarks synced. It has lots of options, including a very useful one that allows you to merge bookmarks, so your existing bookmarks don't get overwritten. I setup a free shell account (thanks to freeshells.ch) which also includes FTP access, and I simply configured the Bookmark Sync extension to use that FTP server. Now whenever I add a bookmark, or several bookmarks, I choose "Synchronize Bookmarks" from the Bookmarks menu and the data is uploaded to the FTP server!

When I realized how many bookmarks I have, I thought it would be nice to share all those links with everyone. I'm going to setup an area where you can view my bookmarks, but first, I need to figure out a way to hide the bookmarks I don't want to make public, such as certain login pages.