A Look at Beauty Through The Eyes Of An Engineer
One look at my wife’s website, NaturebyCarol, and you can see she’s enamored with daylilies. As an engineer, I simply don’t understand the fascination. You put all this time and effort into a flower that only lasts a day. When I work on a project, I want it to last...
After The Crash, Comparing Backup Software, Acronis, Aomei and Paragon
The idea behind a software review is to give an unbiased appraisal of the program. Unfortunately most reviews are anything but unbiased. As hard as I tried, this review is no exception. After my experiences last month, I decided to see what else was out there for...
Using Data To Influence My Content, How Opinionbypen.com Changes
In the design and maintenance of Opinionbypen.com, there are two guiding principles I always consider. When it comes to technology, resisting change is the best way to become forgotten. Then again maybe you’re still using a rotary telephone as you watch your VHS tapes...
Stop Insulting My Intelligence, A Rant For The Rest Of Us
I’m tired of people insulting my intelligence. No, I don’t mean the comments on Opinionbypen suggesting my writing is only slightly better than what my dogs could write or the few choice words my supervisor uses after reading my latest progress report....
If You Want To Become A Better Writer, First Become A Better Listener
Six years ago, when I started Opinionbypen, I had a goal to become a better writer. Somehow I assumed that the constant practice provided by weekly posts would miraculously improve my writing. That’s certainly not the first thing I’ve ever been wrong about. Think...From the Doghouse -It’s all about them
A look at dogs having fun!
Short Stories
With posts like these, ever wonder what kind of fiction I would write?
Random Posts
Whimsy, This Engineer’s Stress ReliefSuch a funny word, whimsy. It’s almost self-defining, although that could be because I’ve known what it meant for so long. For the rest of you, it’s defined as a capricious humor and I think there’s far too little of it in today’s life. Most people tend to think of …
Wordfence, Protection For Your WordPress SiteI first realized how much I appreciate Wordfence when WebHostingHub told me I had excessive activity on my server and I would have to disable Wordfence. That’s when I decided my relationship with WebhostingHub would be a short one. Wordfence is a free security plugin for WordPress sites. I’ve been …
The Great Courses, I Almost Missed ThemI have a long list of topics for blogs sitting in my Dropbox folder. I even have a few unfinished posts that would only take a short time to finish. The problem is that nothing appeals to me as a subject and I try to do at least one new …
Credibility, Amazon Lost It, Goodreads Failed. How Do I Choose My Next Book?There’s a big difference between consumer satisfaction and marketing. That difference is credibility and has become a major problem for me. Years ago books making it to the publisher had been carefully screened. After all, it was expensive to publish a book. This meant that the books getting published had …
The Way We Present Numbers Reveals A Lot About UsThe first time I saw Spock turn to Captain Kirk and say, “This plan only has a 5.377 percent probability of success,” I was hooked. Spock was able to use his massive intellect and compute the probability of the Enterprise surviving an encounter with the Romulans to three decimal places. …