Another record day

Hitting another blog visitor highpoint yesterday with 1,415 daily visits. Attributed to Storage Wars as per usual and I learned an interesting tidbit on how Google operates. Lately, I’ve been creating a post about the new Storage Wars episode as it’s airing. This gives me the first crack at any new searches which amazing happened last night. They had a new character on the episode named Nabila and I made mention of it in my blog post 2 entries ago. I received about 100 visits of people searching for “Nabila Storage Wars” last night. I googled it myself about an hour after it aired and my site was the #1 ranking for that search with no others being relevant. I just did it again today and I’ve dropped to 4 behind A&E (who created a page for her after it aired) and Wikipedia but to see that my site is still up there should give a good indication that being the first site to display content holds some value. Something to also notice is that reputation is another big factor in climbing the searches which should be obvious. I still haven’t figured out how to get people to read my content as the majority tend to bounce but I’m working on that. People like controversy and that is what will get them to stay.

I wrote a post a while back on Lindsay Lohan and why her career is dying. Unless you live under a rock, you’d know she recently posed for Playboy. Some good material of Lindsay Lohan Playboy pics can be found at that link7 . My only problem with them is it’s not like she’s Lindsay Lohan. People want to see Lindsay, not her dressed up like Marilyn Monroe. Killer bod though and great rack. I just feel like this could be any actress and not the cutie from Mean Girls. Nevertheless, I would be surprised if this brought some attention to rnningfool.com which is truly my goal in life.

By |2011-12-14T17:29:54-05:00December 14th, 2011|My Life|0 Comments

Jewing the Journal

I don’t let big companies run over me and neither should you. Here’s an example of negotiating for a print subscription to the Wall Street Journal. I want to fore mention that I really like reading the WSJ in the morning while I eat breakfast and it’s one of the few, simple activities that give me enjoyment. This is important in any negotiating process but in this scenario they don’t know how much I like it. I also have to be prepared to cancel the service if they do call my bluff.

I see a charge on my AMEX for 95 bucks (380 yearly) for the WSJ. Since this is an automatic renew, I wasn’t exactly sure what I was even paying for. I looked it up and it was a quarterly charge. I remember negotiating this situation last year and I looked up how much I paid for a yearly subscription previously and it was $290. I also armed myself with the information of what it would cost a new subscriber to join and that price was $256. I called the number on the statement and was put through to “the shell.” The shell is an employee who has no authority and can’t do anything but spit out the company’s standard rates. I explained to him that I wasn’t going to pay the $380 yearly and I wanted the new subscriber rate. He said there was nothing he could do. I threatened with cancelling the account. He obliged being the robot that he was. Considering this wasn’t what I wanted, I got him to transfer me to “the solutions department.” A very nice woman gets on the phone and explains to me that the rate I got previously was a special rate. Her voice was trembling as she was explaining this to me so I knew she didn’t want a confrontation. The next sentence I spoke is paramount to this entire post:

“You’re telling me that your company treats new customers better than loyal customers? Consider this ma’am, I could cancel my account today, re-register my account tomorrow to another address and I would be paying the new subscriber rate of $256.”

There’s no real good argument to that on her side and she offered me the $256 price. So this phone call only saved 124 bucks for the year but it’s the principal that’s important. Most things in life are negotiable and even these minor battles feel like a win for the little guy. Too many time people just bend over and take it and I’m saying that it’s important to make a stand.

By |2011-12-14T10:58:55-05:00December 14th, 2011|My Life|0 Comments

Comment Not Found

I have done the unthinkable and solved the comment issue that would bring the visitor to a page that said “nothing found” after leaving a comment. This was created because I had a backslash at the end of my custom SEO URL. I would say that this is a major achievement as I don’t have to burden my visitors with reaching a page that has no information and is surely annoying. Sorry for the inconvenience but I’m happy that it’s finally figured out.

Most people probably don’t know but this blog has really evolved from my beginnings on blogspot. I was reading through the entries and I would rate them about a two out of ten. Each one was generally the same with either a movie, a TV show, basketball or gambling. If you read one you’ve read them all. I surely think the material I put out now is a bit more thought out and the presentation is eons ahead. I probably still write about the same type of material but I think I do a better job of spacing it out. I can’t believe that was well over 2 years ago. I’ve really come a long way since then as I’ve essentially cut my sports betting out and don’t really drop tons of cash at casinos anymore. I’ve also done much better in the stock market and feel like I’m doing a better job living life. I’ve been feeling really healthy and been lifting more weight then I ever had and running miles in times I’ve rarely seen in the past 5 years. I still probably drink too much but I’ve been staying out of trouble which is good. Those were some serious degenerate posts back in 2009. I can look back on that and say I have improved to some extent. Especially professionally. I know some people probably don’t expect this but I have the experience to operate a profitable business by myself and I don’t think many people can say that. I’d say I’ve gotten my shit together financially, professionally, physically and now I just have to work socially into the mix.

There was one great line in my old blog that read I’ve tripled my traffic from 4 readers to 12. Seriously with close to 15,000 visits in the past month, this is truly an accomplishment. I’m still waiting for my loyal visitors to start submitting guest entries. I know its a monumental task but it’s some exposure and you make my site better in the process. The way sites grow is when other people help with content and it gives people more information to read and thus they visit more often. I know I’m not there yet but I’m just throwing it out there in case anyone is interested. I also expect comments to triple now that I’ve fixed that page.

By |2011-12-12T22:02:48-05:00December 12th, 2011|My Life|4 Comments

Going out with me

Last night I went over to the Shee’s at around 6 and started having a few beers. We ate some food, a few people came over and we played some pong and then we went out to a bar close to the Rittenhouse Square area. The only funny thing to note was there was a guy who brought a bottle of Johnny Walker Black and this other guy was making an attempt at sneaking a shot but as he was pouring it the guy who owned the bottle turned around and caught him. The owner said it was OK. Enthralling I know. Anyway, I abandoned the first bar we were at to go to Club Risque by myself. If you’ve gone out in the city with me you’d know that this is not uncommon. The girls who work on Friday are definitely the upper echelon of strippers in the city. I believe I had multiple lap dances with 4 different girls and I probably spent about 300 bucks there. The first girl was an Asian and said that if we went to the champagne room she’d make me bust a nut. Now a younger version of me would have jumped at the opportunity but since this wasn’t my first visit to a strip club I could see through her lies. I told her it would take her forever anyway and she wouldn’t be able to. The second girl was a smoking hot blonde with librarian glasses and she was exactly what I would be looking for in a female (aside from being a whore). She actually gave me her number which I found sort of bizarre but I don’t know what to do with it. It’s coming up with an Ambler area which is also amusing. The 3rd girl was a black haired girl with boobs not as big as I usually like them but she was a nice girl. The final girl was the same platinum blonde look with rock hard boobs but not as attractive as the second one. All in all it was a pretty good time and the place is open till 4 which is nice as well. I left at 3 or so and drove home (I wasn’t drinking at Risque). On my way home I saw this guy take off another cars side view mirror which was pretty awesome. I woke up at 12 or so today and am finally feeling like a normal human being again. I sometimes feel like a dirty human being going to strip clubs but then I get over it. It makes for good blog entries. Plus stripper do love me because I’m not an obese, old man and I have some money to blow so it can really be a big self esteem booster.

By |2011-12-10T13:49:01-05:00December 10th, 2011|My Life|0 Comments

Rnningfool.com Update

I wanted to share with my readers the stats of the site so you can get an idea of what I see when I choose what to post. Click on the image to get a better look. You can see that the traffic has really taken off as of late. Yesterday I recorded the highest amount of visitors in a day at 1260. This graph shows a little over 2 year period and you can see for the first year I practically got no readers. Although the bounce rate is high at 68%, I’m still happy at least it’s getting to someone. The substantial increase is due to the googling of “Brandi Passante.” I think I should send her a thank you card because without her I wouldn’t have any traffic. I think she fits the realm of fairly obscure but there aren’t that many websites to flood the market so I’m receiving the interest. I assume this will eventually die down but it’s good while it lasts. The main page that everyone searches for is Brandi’s mug shot. I can explain the success of this page and I owe it all to MSPaint. Taking her supposed mug shot picture and putting it next to another picture of hers is what sets this page apart from others on the internet. I just reread the content there for the first time and it wasn’t bad but if so many people are hitting that page I should probably spruce it up a little. I think it’s funny that people are drawn to the idea that she’s a stripper. The comments are vicious too but the last one saying “Why is this guy an asshole it happened, these are facts.” is hilarious how is judging that rnningfool.com is a credible source. People are drawn to controversy. This is something that I have to learn in future posts.

By |2011-12-07T23:20:08-05:00December 7th, 2011|My Life|3 Comments

Football & Poker Recap

Primetime had their playoff game this weekend and it didn’t end so well. We suffered the 2nd loss of the season and are now bounced from the playoffs. There wasn’t really much to say about the game except that our offense was limited and we gave them the ball in some good spots. With the score 14-12 in the middle of the second half, we had the ball on their 1 yard line and a costly pick was thrown. That shifted the momentum and they scored twice on us to seal the deal. Losing sucks in general but we didn’t have what it took to repeat as champs this year. We were missing a few key players and just basically lost.

Fantasy wise, things are coming to playoffs. I’ve made the playoffs in 4 of 5 leagues which isn’t too shabby. I got completely lucky to sneak into the Schmidts playoff having a 5-7 record. I needed everything to go perfect today and it actually did. I put up a big number in Evan’s league to separate myself a bit in the points race and get a record that should get me a playoff berth. It’s not final but I should be in control. I will make Bake’s playoffs which I’m pretty sure I have the best team. I did much better in the Yahoo leagues when compared to the ESPN league. Not sure why.

I didn’t place any bets this weekend but did play poker for a few hours on Saturday. I ended up winning 260 in about 4 hours of play. A key hand was when I raised to 10 in EP with QQ and got 3 callers. The flop came 743 and I bet 25. A guy raised to 75 and he had about 125 behind. I thought about it for a minute and decided he probably wouldn’t be doing that with a set and with no other reraise pf I didn’t think he had AA or KK. I put him on a smaller pair and went all in and he ended up calling quickly. He ended up mucking so I just assume I was way ahead. In one other hand, I had K6 on a flop of k65. A man bet 25 and I raised him to 65, he called. On the turn a 5 came and the guy pushed. I ended up folding and he said he had AA. I played pretty well I thought and was happy to walk away with a winning session.

By |2011-12-04T20:06:47-05:00December 4th, 2011|My Life|0 Comments

7 Seldom Known Driving Techniques

1. Avoid slow left turns on left arrows – There is nothing worse than being at a light that is governed by a left arrow that develops a line behind it. The goal should be to get as many cars through that left light as possible. However, some self centered asshole always finds it in him to make the turn like he’s the only person on the planet thus preventing more people from making the arrow. People should be flooring it through this scenario.

2. Turning on a yellow light – This situation occurs fairly often and I see it done incorrectly time and time again. People make lefts on a green arrow and then the arrow goes away and the opposite side gets their green light. You are sitting there patiently waiting to make a left but there is too much traffic and no opportunity. The light turns yellow and I see people wait and do nothing. On yellow this person should be driving into the middle of traffic and making their left when there are no more cars coming through.

3. Reverse using your side view mirrors – I feel like the normal (and bad) driver doesn’t make good use of their side views. You should be able to reverse in just about any situation using only your mirrors. The sideview mirrors should be the indicator of how close you are to other cars. They tell you when you are going to hit something. I believe I could drive accident free with only my side view mirrors. They show you everything you need to know. There isn’t any hand over the seat full 180 turn for reversing. If you don’t use your side views, you are more likely to get into an accident.

4. Blinking yellows don’t mean stop, they mean caution – When it’s a 4 way intersection and you have blinking yellows, the other side has blinking reds. If you stop on the yellows you are just creating confusion. The goal of driving is to eliminate confusion. Don’t stop and act like a retard. Be ready to brake and slowly proceed through the intersection. I see this in Philly all the time when I light malfunctions and people can’t handle the situation. What do the people with the red light do? It’s a great question. My answer is they have to grow a pair and find the opportune moment.

5. Proper seating and mirrors – I think this is probably one of the main reason people suck at driving. I’ve been in people’s cars and their seats are real low and far back. Their side view points to the ground. You can’t drive properly without being positioned properly. The seat should be so your feet reach the peddles and you can see clearly over the dash. Your side views should be set so the main focus is on the road beside you and you should just be able to see the side of your car. Rear view should be able to see entirely through the back windshield.

6. Stay in your lane – I know this seems so obvious but people are careless. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to swerve further into my lane to avoid being struck by people crossing over the yellow line on turns. This is easily the best way to lose your life by getting a head on by some numnut straying over his lane. This is important especially on curves where people seem to just be happy by making the turn.

7. Don’t Text and Drive – I’m not telling you what to do but this is the most dangerous thing you can do while driving. It distracts you from driving smartly. Your head is down, your head is up, your head is down, your head is up. A lot can happen when your head is down and things come up on your much faster then you realize. This is how accidents start and most likely whatever text your sending isn’t that important. I’ve been guilty of this in the past and I always know how dangerous it is when I’m doing it. That still doesn’t make it right but you have to at least be aware that it’s probably the most accident prone task you can do on the road.

By |2011-12-02T00:14:14-05:00December 2nd, 2011|My Life|1 Comment

What would I save in a fire?

Laura gave me this idea and I gave it some thought. Just to present the scenario clearly, you wake up and there’s a fire in your room and you can only escape carrying one item, what would it be? My first thought was to eliminate everything materialistic. Books, clothes and basically anything that can be replaced by buying it. So then I thought, what can’t be replaced? People for one but I don’t really have anyone I’m responsible for so that’s out. When I was home for Thanksgiving we were looking through pictures of our youth and those are pretty much irreplaceable if it gets burned. You can’t recapture time. People in today’s age have such an advantage at safe keeping pictures digitally compared to physically. Fortunately I don’t have any physical pictures so nothing to worry about there. Back in college I used to burn porn onto a CD that would be valuable but with spankwire and tube8, there isn’t a need for that anymore. Then I thought if there was anything I was emotionally attached to like a lucky hat or favorite article of clothing and I couldn’t think of anything either because I don’t really believe in that sort of thing. Then it struck me, Gusto’s external hard drive with hundreds of gigs of music. Now of course if I know Gusto I can always get him to replace it but I would devastated if I had to listen to music like normal people. Every album by almost every artist and this turns into an unbelievable collection. I think it’s by far and away the most valuable item I have because of the time put into accumulating it. I feel like I might be missing something really major with this question but after this initial thought, that’s what I’ve come up with.

By |2011-11-30T14:44:28-05:00November 30th, 2011|My Life|1 Comment

There is No I in Team

In direct response to Sam’s Post, I decided to have a little fun writing this one. After reading his post I initially thought I was being insulted. I thought this because the post he was referencing was actually terrible and took me all of 5 minutes that I shat out at work just because I didn’t want people to think I don’t update my blog frequently. I have a few thoughts though on his comments that I’m happy to share with my plethora of readers (writing is difficult because people who know me would know I’m using the word plethora sarcastically but that cannot be known unless I italicized it (which doesn’t make sense for sarcastic writing) and then you would probably just be more confused)(but probably less confused though if I eliminated these double brackets).

I’ll agree that usually something has to happen to be able to maintain a blog. You constantly have to be thinking about things during your day that could make for entertaining fodder. So I don’t really feel the word inspired is as proper as the willingness to keep a blog. His last line of “Something tells me that he as well as I realize that a couple hundred people viewing your blog in a day, while harder than you would think (and more than I can muster), is nothing earth shattering” I also don’t really agree with. We can’t explain why Google sends people to our blog. Why my website comes up higher in the search engines now then previous on certain keywords is all part of their algorithm. My personal opinion is that the more times certain keywords appear in posts, the higher they rank you. This all ties in with Google+ and Facebook and all other relevant content. So to get to this point (where some keywords actually hit) has taking years of work and although Earth shattering might not be right, it is still somewhat of achievement because I assure you most people would have given up a long time ago. If you told someone to spend hours and hours for 2 years of their life and get 0 out of it, I’m fairly certain there wouldn’t be many takers. So my point is that eventually we might see the fruits of our labor.

My final thought on Sam’s post is that I agree 100% with initial success leads to motivation. Success of any sorts makes you want to improve. The blogs are improving and I’m sure if people were willing to give feedback, they’d say the same. Noticing how Sam is hyperlinking some keywords is bright because that strengthens the pages. Our themes are better and without ads the sites look clean. This post and the simple interaction between two websites makes people more aware of the two sites which is helpful. If we could only find more sites to link to and us to them, we’d be in business but our readers offer no help. I don’t even care anymore though because if we don’t get any help we just do it ourselves. Sam and I spent some time together over this break and I give him major credit in many regards. Not his ping pong prowess (except against the Shee) or his BBall skills but most importantly that we can get along and have a family friendship. I can’t really see us ever getting into major disagreements and we genuinely like each other (only speaking for myself here). It’s nice dealing with someone who I don’t have to worry about pissing off with any small bs. It’s easy to work together with someone like that and who knows where these stupid websites may go. I honestly wonder how many people sit there and read this entire post. Sure 300 people may visit my blog on a day to day but how many people read this and actually care? A handful is my guess. How to turn it into relevant, high end content that people want to read is the next step. I go through phases of disgust with this project but quitting and leaving baby bro hanging is something I’m not willing to do.

PS – Sam you owe me 35 dollars for the hosting of Bansheeman7. It’s a shame you didn’t pick a better domain name than that. Not that rnningfool is any gem but at least I think it might fit my personality whereas I didn’t know when you became practicing the rituals of a banshee. And a mann. With 2 m’s no less.

By |2011-11-28T19:01:01-05:00November 28th, 2011|My Life|5 Comments

Upper Dublin 10 Year High School Reunion

Yes its been 10 years since I’ve graduated High School. Time doesn’t seem to be slowing down much. On Friday night we had the reunion at Ladder 15 in Philadelphia. I met the Rock and Larry down at the Fieldhouse at 4:30pm to watch some college football. I had a few beers and then we went to eat dinner at the Palm. The Rock had a hotel room at the Bellevue which was conveniently next to Ladder 15. We showed up at a little bit before 8pm and were literally the first people there. In a night that you know ahead of time is going to be awkward this made it worse. People started showing up and things actually were unpredictably fun. I wasn’t sure what to expect and I really enjoyed myself. I’d say it was probably one of the best weekend nights I’ve had in a remarkably long time. Some conversations weren’t exactly smooth but who cares because you probably won’t see them again for 5 more years. Every conversation began with “what do you *do now” so there wasn’t really any introduction needed which was nice. People who you didn’t really hang around with much in high school become your best friends. I just thought the experience was well worth it for the 50 dollars and one that doesn’t come around but every 5 years. I could use this post to go into the details of conversations I had with people and I’m sure it would be good material but I’m gonna pass on this one.

By |2011-11-28T19:52:48-05:00November 27th, 2011|My Life|1 Comment
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