Suicideville, WA

As my girlfriend is gone on a business trip for two full weeks, this is how my weekend alone at home looks like.










This is how the next weekend and the week after is going to look like...

Dark Bar of the Month - Chocovic Ocumare

I incidentally found this bar when I was doing my Monday project night drill, picking up water at Trader Joe's in Emeryville. There are several selections of dark chocolate at the register but the one with the tag "Unique Origin - Ocumare" offers specific sources of cocoa. Interesting idea, I think, so I gave it a try on the one from Venezuela.

My girlfriend and I agreed that it's the best dark chocolate we can find so far. Strong but not too bitter. Not at all any sour smell like what Lindt and Hershey's always screw their dark with. Absolutely right level of chewiness and sweetness. And it's just $1.99 per standard-sized bar. Great deal...

After a little more research, I found that the brand is Chocovic from Spain (so amazing that they don't really put their brands on the label; want the product to sell itself? Weird marketing tactic for chocolate bar). The one I tried was the Ocumare with the cocoa from Venezuela. Will try the one from Ecuador this Monday and will let you know.

Big thanks Trader Joe's for this dark sweet find.



If you don't have any Trader Joe's around your area, you can get it from Amazon below:

BlogRush Update: How to Write a Good Email

I wrote about the weblog headline exchange service called BlogRush about two weeks ago. Although their widgets on the lower right pane consistently stream links to contents similar to those in my blog, they have hard time keeping their member's dashboard up. Currently, what they can provide is how many visits (and the primitive blogrush credits) my blog got so far, and how many referral traffics my blog received and created which equal to... ahem... 0 from the start till now. Google Analytics hasn't identified any traffic generated from BlogRush yet.

Their report feature hasn't been up yet so I don't know what it does. Oh... one thing I found interesting is that I received an email, all in plain text, from the founder. I've copied it below. I'm a big supporter of innovative internet marketing concept so I'm not going to criticize their service which is still strictly beta right now. But man... you really need to find a better way to write your email.

Even though I never consider myself a good writer, my first and foremost recommendation would be keep it short. Then, I know it's hard to call something out sometimes when you are writing plain-text email, DON'T OVERUSE CAPITALS. Also the mix of *asterisk bold* and capitals keeps stopping me when I was trying to finish the mail.

TO: All BlogRush Members
FROM: John Reese, Founder of BlogRush


ARE YOU READY? Because *everything* is about to change. Forget
everything else up until now...

PREPARE FOR *BIG* CHANGES! (TWO MAJOR CHANGES ARE NOW LIVE.)

BlogRush CAN'T EXIST if we're not sending you a lot of ongoing,
targeted traffic. We fully recognize this and that's why this is our
ONLY FOCUS.

The BlogRush team has been hard at work making major improvements for
you and we won't rest until BlogRush is running 100% smoothly and
sending you tons of targeted traffic! This is OUR MISSION. Please
know that our entire team is working around-the-clock to make
improvements and fix any problems AS FAST AS HUMANLY POSSIBLE.

(We sincerely appreciate your patience.)

We've encountered some problems since our historic launch just over a
week ago, and we fully recognize that we've made some real 'goofs'
with the system for our Public Beta release...

For example, our data center provider (one of the largest in the
world) had a short, temporary outage (they had to replace a network
switch) two days after our launch. We had no control over this
outage but want to SINCERELY APOLOGIZE to those that saw this message
on their blogs (where the widget should have been):

"We are currently experiencing some technical issues and the site
will be back online shortly. Please come back in a few minutes."

We were completely *EMBARRASSED* when we realized this happened.
That simple message was part of our application code and was meant to
appear only on *OUR* WEB SITE PAGES if we ever experienced an
outage. This was accidentally 'marked' to be a global error message
for ANY outage -- including if our widget ever had a problem
loading. This was a major GOOF and we're willing to admit it. Our
code was planned so that in the case of a problem with our widget,
NOTHING WOULD LOAD in its place. So a visitor to your blog doesn't
see an error or anything wrong should the widget ever have any
technical issues.

This was quickly corrected and is now working properly. Should the
widget ever have any problem loading in the future, your blog will be
served a transparent space (which will show whatever background your
blog design has) and
your blog readers won't really notice anything.

Again, our sincere apologies for our major goof. It was quite
embarrassing.

NOW ONTO SOME SERIOUS ISSUES...

We also realize that we completely underestimated the number of
unethical people that would sign up and proceed to CHEAT and try to
'game' the BlogRush system. These cheaters ruined the click-rates of
many of our members (and burned through a lot of their credits using
automated 'exploit' methods) and hurt BlogRush's ability to send
maximum traffic to our honest members' blogs.

BUT ALL OF THAT IS ABOUT TO BE ERASED... LIKE IT NEVER HAPPENED.

In the next several days to come, we're going to be rolling out MAJOR
changes to BlogRush. BIG changes. And these changes (again) have
just ONE primary purpose -- to drive more ongoing, targeted traffic
to your blog.

We've listened to your valued feedback and constructive criticism and
we have been working in TURBO MODE to make the changes you want ASAP...

----- HERE'S WHAT'S COMING IN THE NEXT 48 HOURS -----

100% MANUAL BLOG REVIEW.

Our team is going to be manually reviewing every single new blog that
registers to participate in the BlogRush Network.

We'll be applying some quality guidelines and criteria to our
decision-making process. (We'll be publishing these guidelines very
soon.) If a blog does not meet our guidelines and criteria, THEY
WILL BE REJECTED from the network and not allowed to join -- i.e.
they won't be able to serve our widget, refer other users, or have
their blog posts distributed across our network. They will have no
access to any BlogRush services.

Our members, like YOU, made it LOUD AND CLEAR to us... BlogRush needs
to only have members that have quality blog content -- not blogs
filled primarily with ads and other spammy looking JUNK.

The only accurate way we're going to keep these junk blogs out of our
network is to REVIEW EVERY SINGLE ONE BY HAND. And we're willing to
do it to protect the integrity of our network. I don't care what it
costs us to hire more people (if we need them) to review 100% of any
blog trying to join our network. We will be reviewing ALL OF THEM
from here on out.

* We realize that several non-English language blogs blatantly
ignored our "ENGLISH BLOGS ONLY" warning on our Registration page.
Rest assured, though, they'll all be PURGED from the network when we
do our QUALITY CONTROL AUDIT over the next several days (you'll read
about it in a moment).

As I've said several times before, BlogRush isn't some passing "fad"
or short-term service. We're dedicated to building an incredibly
valuable resources for bloggers FOR MANY YEARS TO COME.

We'll also be doing a QUALITY CONTROL AUDIT of all of our existing
member blogs. We'll be reviewing every single blog that's currently
in our network (or that registers before the Manual Review Process
becomes active.) And we'll be completely *REMOVING* any blogs in our
network that don't meet our quality guidelines and criteria.

As you can probably tell by now, we're not messing around. We have
put a lot of hard work into the development of this service and we
will continue to bust our butts to make it one of the best Internet
services in the world. COUNT ON IT.

We're also deploying several new Anti-Cheat measures to SHUTDOWN AND
WIPEOUT the cheaters and unethical users that have abused our
network. Sorry, crooks, but THE FREE RIDE IS OVER.

We'll be dedicating an entire department to stay on top of any
abusive behavior in our network. We believe that our new measures
are going to instantly eliminate most, if not all, of our system
abuse. It's going to take us a few more days to roll-out all of
these measures (and to complete our entire QUALITY CONTROL AUDIT) but
rest assured, BlogRush is about to go through a major TRANSFORMATION.

And a quick word to any 'cheats' that might be reading this
letter... it's very possible that you may come up with something
extremely creative that temporarily gets by us, but you should know
something... IT'S NOT GOING TO BE WORTH YOUR TIME. And I'm not just
talking about the tiny amount of traffic that you'll receive before
we shut you off.

You see, we have other plans in the works...

If you attempt to cheat or abuse our network in anyway, shape, or
form, we will not hesitate to come after you. Our company is well
funded and has plenty of resources. And we WILL use them to punish
you to the fullest extent of the law (and civil court process). Oh,
you think you can just hide behind some anonymous proxy IPs? Sorry,
it's not that easy. ANY reason you'd have to try and cheat the
BlogRush network for traffic and any attempt you make to monetize
that traffic will lead directly to your front door -- whether it's
AdSense, any affiliate program in the world, any online pharmacy,
porn site, casino... ANYTHING. We will follow the trail and it WILL
eventually lead to you.

Our hard-working company provides the income for MANY families. As
the CEO of our company, I take this very seriously. I HAVE TO.
People that attempt to abuse or cheat BlogRush are affecting the
livelihood of all my employees and their families. And I will do
everything in my power to protect them -- it's MY DUTY.

So for all you cheaters that joined BlogRush and had your fun trying
to siphon off some traffic, hopefully it was fun. And I'll go ahead
and make this statement right now... IF you were one of the people
that has been cheating our network I'm going to give you ONE
opportunity... quit now and we'll pretend it never happened. I
think that's more than fair.

BUT... if you continue after this point, all bets are off. We WILL
eventually discover what you're doing, where you're trying to send
traffic, and we will prosecute you. I GUARANTEE IT. Sorry, but WE
HAVE NO CHOICE NOW.

* If you're one of our valued, HONEST users, I'm very sorry you even
have to read stuff like that. I know it's a waste of your time.
Unfortunately, there are unethical people in this world that attempt
to abuse and take advantage of others.

MOVING ON...

---- ALSO COMING SOON! ----

**** A LOT MORE CATEGORIES! ****

You asked for it, and you're getting it!

We're going to be greatly expanding our directory of categories to
increase the relevancy of post links appearing in the widget on your
blog -- this will also increase click-rates (and traffic) for all
members.

* Stay tuned over the next several days for more news about the
addition of new categories.

AND...

**** IMPROVED REPORTING! ****

The current Dashboard stats are being under-reported for all users
right now. This is the reason that users show discrepancies when
looking at Google Analytics data (or other stats packages). We're
currently sending more traffic to our users than we're reporting in
the Dashboard because we are giving all users bonus credits
everyday. We'll soon be reporting all bonus credit activity so all
the numbers will be accurate.

SPECIAL NOTE TO ALL LOW-TRAFFIC MEMBERS: In the near future we'll be
giving our low-traffic members (those that need more traffic the
most) the BULK of our bonus credit allocations. You'll get a ton
more bonus credits than high-traffic members because you really need
it. It's only FAIR!

* Also we apologize to anyone that has seen a "negative" credit
balance for their account. This is a minor bug that we're taking
care of. It doesn't mean anything and you can just ignore it for
now. We apologize for any confusion.

**** IMPROVED NETWORK DISTRIBUTION ****

A few of our users have noticed that they're building up credits
faster than the system is using them. This will eventually balance
itself out as the network continues to "adjust" to the growth levels
and traffic patterns of each category -- because our network provides
syndication distribution based on daily average "cycles" and then
adjusts moving into the future; so it's able to accurately predict
how fast to use a certain user's credits, etc. -- as compared to just
using them all "as fast as possible."

---- AND HERE ARE *TWO* BRAND-NEW ADDITIONS THAT JUST WENT LIVE!!!! ----


**** BLOGRUSH "FLAVORS" ARE NOW ACTIVE!

You can go login to your account, click the "Settings" tab and then
select "Flavors."

You can choose from (13) different widget colors. You no longer have
to only use our original "black" widget design that many users
thought was ugly! (Hey, just don't let our lead designer hear
that... he thought his black design was "really cool.")

Now you can select a color that more closely matches the look of your
blog. Our users have been asking for this since we launched our
Public Beta, and we've taken action to offer these new options.

* We have future plans for further widget customization but we're
working on one "stage" of improvement at a time! Please bare with
us. We're fully aware of the request for a more narrow widget as our
current one doesn't fit on some blogs. We're trying to produce a
solution and should have some news soon.

HERE'S THE BEST PART...

You don't have to copy and paste new code to your blog. Just go to
that "Flavors" section for your account, select the flavor you want,
then hit the "APPLY FLAVOR" button. That's it! Reload your blog in
another browser window and take a look.

And if you want to see what a different flavor might look like, just
pick another one, hit the "APPLY FLAVOR" button and reload your
blog. PRESTO! :-)

AND LAST BUT CERTAINLY NOT LEAST...

***** BLOG POST CONTROLS *****

Under the "Settings" tab you'll also find a new option called, "My
Post Control." Here's what this awesome new feature does...

You can create POST FILTERS for your blog posts...

For example, you can add a keyword or phrase and create a new post
filter. If you ever create a post on your blog (while you have that
filter active -- and you can add/delete them at anytime) that
contains one of those keywords in the TITLE of your blog post, that
post...

WILL *NOT* BE SHOWN ACROSS THE NETWORK. And you won't use any of
your syndication credits!

All bloggers post "off-topic" stuff from time to time, or short posts
that don't have a ton of great content. Well, now you can easily
keep any of those types of posts from using your valuable syndication
credits and from being shown across the network!

This is GREAT for you because now you can control exactly which posts
of yours will be syndicated. This can help you maximize your CLICK-
RATES and, ultimately, the traffic you receive from the BlogRush
network. AND it can help retain NEW READERS for your blog (your
ultimate goal that can grow your blog's traffic on a day-to-day basis.)

Here's Why...

By selecting which posts get syndicated (by simply adding filters
right BEFORE you publish a post on your blog that you don't want to
be used; or having setup one well in advance) you can make sure that
you're only syndicating your BEST POSTS. The ones with top-quality
content. Your posts that a new visitor to your blog will enjoy and
be much more likely to make a "YES!" decision to become a regular
reader for you!

AND OH YEAH, ONE MORE THING...

This is only the very beginning for BlogRush. We have so much great
stuff in store for you! As I said at the beginning of this
letter... we will continue to work VERY HARD to make improvements
and add-ons with ONE PRIMARY FOCUS...

To drive more ongoing targeted traffic to your blog.

I want to personally THANK YOU on behalf of our entire company for
your interest in BlogRush. We've received a lot of criticism from
many bloggers on the Internet, and we'll be the first to admit we're
not perfect and a lot of it was WELL-DESERVED.

But please know, we're busy working around the clock FOR YOU. You
have our word on it.

Now go login to your account and try out some of the new "Flavors"
for your blog! And also start setting up some Post Control Filters
so you can start maximizing your content syndication.

I'll be in touch when I have more "news" to share. Thanks for
reading this long letter. I had a lot to tell you about. :-)

Best Regards,

John Reese, Founder of BlogRush

Windows Development Uncovered

Paris Hilton on David Letterman Show

OMG... He tore her apart, rip, laugh at her, and tore her apart again, and again.



While I'm not a big fan of her, I feel bad for her that she was laughed at by Letterman and talked to like a three-year-old. It was a good move to try to stop it but the better thing would be not going to this kind of show at all. Don't know what she was thinking...