Posted on: August 26, 2024, 5:17 am

I was thinking about social circles recently and how I often see them succumb to negativity.

I’m led to believe, based on my life experiences, that human nature was just not meant to exist in any type of large and persistent social circle.

One major example of this is public schools, and the major stigma surrounding public schools is bullying.

Ultimately, I think social circles are meant to be small and intimate. Large social circles can certainly exist but are only healthy with limited interaction.

The old saying “keep your circles small” is without doubt based on life lessons.

Posted on: August 22, 2024, 6:13 am

In the final circle it was down to three contestants, two with three lives and one with fourteen.

After some deal talking the trio started to battle, one was eliminated leaving two. After some more talk they started to battle with the contestant with 3 lives beating the one with 14 after his vest failed during battle. The rule being if a vest fails during battle you’re dead.

It was a decent ending to the week long hunger games. With some refinement it could be a great annual event. I’m looking forward to next year.

Update: After posting this, I learned that Ice Poseidon reviewed the vest logs and announced a new winner.

Posted on: August 20, 2024, 6:28 pm

I’m starting to see the same trends occur as they did just before the 2009 crash. Restaurants and large retail chains are closing locations or going into bankruptcy.

The current economy is unsustainable. Housing prices, food, the insurance industry, healthcare, education, energy, and debt— all major sectors— are at levels that cannot be sustained and will eventually burst. It’s hard to give a time frame because there are so many layers involved. It could be 2 years or 6 from now, but the everything bubble will burst.

There are winners and losers in every crash, but I fear this one will be painful, worse than anything in the past because this bubble is just so big.

Economic turmoil has become increasingly frequent, something my parents and their parents never experienced. We need to get back to that.

The fix happens at the top, with the government. Unfortunately, the state of our current government is a circus 🤡, and given the current political climate, I don’t see them fixing it. I doubt they could if they wanted to at this point.

Maybe this bubble will finally usher in the reform and change so greatly needed.

Posted on: August 20, 2024, 5:12 am

As I get older, I find that I’m especially attuned to people with personality disorders who are around me. They stand out as if they have a spotlight on them.

I believe I developed this awareness as a child growing up in a family with mental illness (personality disorders) on my mother's side, and as an adult by working with various customers around the world, which has sharpened that awareness.

It’s rather disheartening to see both young and old living in this static state of toxicity, and it seems at times like life will thrust people like this at you unexpectedly.

This perception bias, if you will, while helpful at times, can also be a curse because I see a lot of the bad in a lot of people. Maybe it’s best to be naive, and this is why they say ignorance is bliss.

Posted on: August 19, 2024, 9:46 pm

As someone heavily involved in the shared hosting industry for the last 28 years, it’s time for people to stop using WordPress.

The WordPress core seems secure enough, but their open ecosystem of plugins and themes is a disaster that they can’t seem to get under control. Customer sites are constantly attacked and, worse, exploited, making the hosting provider look bad even though the issue lies with WordPress and PHP code exploits. There’s really little shared hosting providers can do from the server side to prevent exploits from poorly coded scripts. This is not new and has been occurring for over a decade.

I could get into site owners being lazy and not updating in a timely manner, but ultimately, WordPress has the responsibility to create and manage a secure ecosystem. That time has passed, and hosting providers are left to clean up their mess. It’s costly.

It’s time to move on from WordPress.