Bogieblog

Waiting

I am so looking forward to next week - sometime after Memorial Day. The reason - we might actually see the sun then. We literally haven't seen the sun since last Friday night. It has been cold (40's to low 50's), dark, dank and nasty. We thought we might have seen the sun on Sunday (no, this isn't a joke), but it was just a brief brightening of the clouds.

If this keeps up as it is supposed to, I won't be able to plant my vegetable garden this coming weekend. Even worse, that will mean the Wonderful Spouse will be riding his bike in the rain when he goes to DC.

So, if anyone from the Deep South or the West Coast would be so kind to send some good weather our way, we would be mightily obliged. Of course, if you have previously arranged to send it to the Mid West, don't bother changing the plans - from what I've seen on the news, they need good weather worse than we do!

Bites

Despite the cold, wet weekend (Satureday it got up to a magnificent 48 degrees), the mosquitos and black flies were out in full furce. One of the forces got a bite in just under my lower, right eyelid yesterday, and it is now starting to swell (and itch). Did you know that your eyelid is a very sensitive area? I can tell because the bite left a pea-sized bruise - even before the swelling began.

The swelling is forcing my contact to stay a little out of place, so the eyesight in that eye (of course it's my good eye) is not really all that great at this point in time.

So, I'm going to work today with a swollen black eye. Should be good for some comments anyway.

Musical Blog-Commenting Idea

The Secular Franciscan is passing around an idea from The Monkey Cage.

Musical Blog-Commenting - a new game - you read a blog, and comment on it, but comment on the NEXT blog you read. This will keep people confused, and confusion is a good thing, it keeps a stranger's mind from getting bored.

So go over and confuse someone!

A Little Linking

I haven't linked to other blogs in a while (or not to any extent other than to pass on the news that people are back/have moved or to give credit where credit is due). So here is a list of interesting stuff:

Essay Canajun has moved into the Blue Barn and has gotten her official Welcome Home.

Rachel Lucas has posted pictures of flowers and her dog Sunny.

Billy had a harrowing experience, which was a good lesson in life (you would have thought at his advanced age, he would have learned that one by now).

Buffy's irises are blooming (I'm soooo jealous, mine still have a couple of weeks to go).

Da Goddes went thru surgery yesterday (I believe it was on the sinuses) and Mrs. Smash posted to let us know everything went fine.

JimSpot tells us about the greatest moment in sports history (through his eyes).

Fred is looking for someone to breed the Lab that is best for photography; a Neutral-Gray Lab (and of course there is a great picture of a non-neutral-gray Lab included).

The Weekend Pundit has met a wonderful woman and naturally his blogging is suffering.

Kristi's dear daughter, Ryan, has won athlete of the year. Congrats!

Alex took over some of Tim's space to blog from the Preakness. I know it is a bit late, but go over and look at the pics, even though you know the outcome of the race. And while your at it, visit Tim's main page and look at his pics!

I guess I've given you enough stuff to read for a while, so I'll stop here. Have a great weekend!

Spammers Beware

TypePad has developed a way to keep a lot of spammers from commenting using other's machines to get past the one-comment-in-a-span-of-time rule. That means that other innocent commenters could possibly be cut off. However, if this happens to anyone of my faithfull readers, a fix is given:

Recently we added some simple tests that eliminate a large amount of comment spam on TypePad blogs. According to our logs, most spammers try to cover their tracks by sending their posts through an "Open
Proxy Server". An Open Proxy Server is a misconfigured or infected machine that forwards web requests for anyone on the entire Internet. The spammers use these proxies to avoid the one commment-per-minute restriction and the Blog Owner's IP address blocking.

So, we started blocking Open Proxies -- all 1.5 million of them. It immediately reduced the comment spam problem. In fact on our first day it blocked over 20,000 spam attempts!

While effective, these open proxy checks are not always perfect. If our server thinks your machine is an open proxy it will display an error message when you try to post:

Your comment has not been posted because the computer you are using appears on a list of machines exploitable by spammers.

You can fix the problem by consulting the following results:
If this happens don't panic, it's possible that a virus or malware installed an open proxy on your computer. Run a scanner from a trusted vendor, such as Trend Micro's HouseCall to rid your computer of o-pen proxies and virus infections. An extensive discussion of the problem and possible solutions written by Chrstian Wagner is also available.

When you are confident your machine is secure you can remove the blocks. You can do this by visiting the web sites mentioned on the TypePad error message you received when you tried to post.

Short

I couldn't figure out why the local hummingbird would visit our feeders, take just a sip, then move on. That was, I couldn't figure it out until I made another batch of hummingbird food. When I read the directions it said mix 1 part powder with 4 parts water. I distinctly remember using 1/4 cup powder with 2 cups water last time. DOH!

At least the right mixture is in the feeders now.

Say Goodby - Then Say Hello

Amish Tech Support has closed up shop. However, Laurence hasn't stopped blogging and can be found here as well as at the Command Post where he is a regular contributer.

Another Move

Ravenwood has moved his Universe. His old address does shoot you over to his new site, but updating your links (or whatever) would probably be a good idea.

Something in the Air?

Dave, at the Axis of Greeblie has been looking for a job for a while. He too has recently found a new employer (although it wasn't exactly in the same field that his background is in). Go over and wish Dave well in his new endeavor!

Heavy Metal

Heavy metal! You rock! It's mostly about the
music instead of lyrics for you...but you
channel most of the emotion through the lyrics!
Mosh pit for you! Just be careful you don't
give yourself a concussion with so much
headbanging...


What genre of rock are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

I must say, I have never thought of myself as the mosh-pit type. But otherwise - yep.

Thanks to Billy for bringing this quiz to my attention.