0 comments on "Is anyone else really tired of CNN’s dramatics?"

I remember a time many years ago when CNN used to report news. It was a golden age of television when “24-hour news source” actually meant there would be more than one story, and the speculation and sensationalism was kept to the minimum. But that time has passed.

In recent years, CNN has been relegated to rehashing and regurgitating the same story over and over again for weeks at a time. They badger the victims of horrible crimes, and if the victims are unavailable, they go after their family members, their friends, and even strangers that happen to live in the same town.

BREAKING NEWS!!! “This is John, he might possibly have known the victim at some time in his life. He says she liked to chew gum and she wore shoes.” Gasp!

I personally wouldn’t care so much that CNN has become a steaming pile of poop, except my dad is a big fan of the show. He’s been a faithful fan of CNN for years, yet even he is growing frustrated with the crap they dare to pass as news. He gets frustrated with the so-called stories, he gets angry at the partisan commercials, and he rants about the stupidity displayed by the news anchors and the network. And I have to listen to it all, and I would just like to say, “No thank you, CNN. No thank you.”

I get angry at the victim-blaming. I get angry at the way CNN picks and picks at the same story, making up their own news as they see fit, and the insensitive way they badger the victims and their families. Poor grieving people not even given the chance to process the fact that their loved ones have been so badly damaged or even killed, yet there CNN is, jamming a camera in their faces, demanding to know “How does it feel?”

Well I’ll tell you what CNN, when I feel like crap just watching you victimize people, I can only think that you are doing irreparable damage in your quest for ratings. It is disgusting.

I was sad enough when the History Channel stopped being about history, but when news channels stop being about news … Is it any wonder that people turn to the Internet for some kind of sanity in news reporting?

All Systems Red at Amazon
2 comments on "This week in history: Table push-ups and jogging in place; Beta readers; Catching Fire"

Table push-ups and jogging in place

As you know, I’ve been trying to get a bit fitter, so I’ve been working some exercise into my routine in-between all my ass sitting and TV watching. So far, it’s been working out pretty good for me 🙂

I do about 200-300 push-ups a day — my sissy table push-ups, since I’m not willing to go down to the floor with my dog ready to stomp on my back. I don’t do them all at once, since I’m not secretly Superwoman, but I do groups of 40-40-20 within a ten minute period. Once in the morning, once in the afternoon, and once in the evening. I’m thinking about adding another two groups in there to get it up to a round 500.

I’ve already lost one pound since I started and my arms are getting toned and that annoying waggle has disappeared.

Tonight I added five minutes of jogging in place, which science tells me should have burned 45 calories. It got my heart rate up and I could feel it working my legs, so I’m going to add that to my routine as well. I don’t really like running, since my feet are a little flat and it starts feeling like the skin is tearing right at the arch, but the jogging in place wasn’t bad at all.

I figure 30 minutes of jogging in place (272 calories according to MyFitnessPal’s calculator) and 500 push-ups a day should see some serious results within a month. At the very least, I’ll honestly be able to say that I’m trying to get healthier. Plus, I’ll have me some serious arm guns.

* * *

Beta readers

I am on the lookout for some beta readers. I’ve made myself a little side-site and I’ve gotten some very helpful concrit, but I’ve always been of the mind that a few more eyes never hurt anything.

Projects I’m working on and will be posting:

  • Tuesday Night
  • The Brand
  • The Panic Pure
  • Paradigm Shift
  • Franz Caulder: Rescue Position
  • Faizel 02
  • Doggy Style
  • Residual Blue
  • Fiends
  • Spores!

So if you’re a cash-strapped fan of my work willing to read some stuff and offer some feedback, let me know. The rewards include clean copies of the ebooks once they’re ready to go, your name listed in the acknowledgments*, and my eternal gratitude.

I’m good at spelling and grammar, though I do occasionally double up words when wordwrap defeats me (it mostly seems to be “the the”). I had Seth finish eating the same sandwich twice. Solar’s clothes changed during a scene and no one noticed it. And sometimes it helps to have someone tell me “More details” when I don’t realize I’m glossing over a scene.

* I realize that some people don’t like to be associated with m/m stuff, and that’s totally cool. You can be listed by your first name and last initial, or your non-profane nickname (Ass Monkey Ball Licker will not receive a dedication, though A.M.B.L. will get a big thank you).

* * *

Catching Fire

I finally saw Catching Fire, the second movie in the Hunger Games tetralogy (there were three books, but there’s four movies, it’s weird). Jennifer Lawrence is my heterosexual girlcrush; fuck anyone that hates her, she’s adorable.

I watched the movie with my dad, and while The Hunger Games didn’t move him, I think Catching Fire has sealed the deal and he’s become a fan. I’ve loaned him my copies of the books and we’ll see what he thinks about them. (I expect there to be some bitching about the first person narrative, but I’m hoping he’ll be able to get past it.)

Phillip Seymour Hoffman played the Plutarch (game master guy) and he already filmed the first part and most of the second of Mockingjay, though he died with one week of filming left. I guess they’re going to CG him into his last scenes, so I’m not sure how that’s going to work out. Anyways, Catching Fire was a good movie, and it was brilliant on Blu-Ray. Though Liam Hemsworth’s face looked ginormous and I can see why he grows that beard between movies. I mean, I wouldn’t say anything, but I was seriously startled.

Fortress in the Eye of Time at Amazon
Small Gods at Amazon
3 comments on "Why is PeerBlock blocking CloudFlare all of a sudden?"

Okay, so I run PeerBlock all the time. Not because I download a bunch of stuff off torrents or anything, but because I don’t want to end up going to the wrong site and having my world wrecked. It works for me, and whenever there’s a problem loading a page I can take a quick look and see what’s going on.

Well, today I couldn’t load my own site because I use CloudFlare and all of a sudden PeerBlock has decided to see it as the enemy. What’s up with that?

I’ve run all kinds of Google searches trying to see what’s going on, but the only ones that seem to have had a problem with CloudFlare was Malwarebytes, and that was back in 2012. (The issue was that CloudFlare does not police the sites that use its services, and some of the sites they were serving were ones that give how-tos on creating malicious software and hacks. Malwarebytes objected; CloudFlare rebutted with “free speech and the rights of the users,” as the sites themselves weren’t producing the viruses, they were just giving instructions on how to make them.)

This is incredibly frustrating to me because I’m a big PeerBlock fan. It, along with WOT and Ghostery, has saved me from going to some truly skeazy sites because of reckless clicking. And now, if it’s not even going to let me go to MY OWN SITE, then I guess I can’t use it anymore. But what makes me worried is that other people using PeerBlock won’t be able to reach my site.

I have no idea what I’m supposed to do :/

I know that I can right-click and allow certain IPs for 15 minutes, 1 hour, or forever, but I don’t want to allow for forever, because while I use CloudFlare, I’m a paranoid person and I refuse to give any IP carte blanche. Just because they’re okay today doesn’t mean they’re going to be okay tomorrow. Plus there are some sites that really deserve a second thought before being clicked on.

These guys are located on the P2P iblocklist. Starting range to ending range. For some reason the Search doesn’t work for me. It’s a hassle, as the scroll on the side will jump down by hundreds of numbers, so you have to highlight one and page up or down.

CloudFlare IP: 108.162.192.0 – 108.162.255.255
Amazon Technologies IP: 54.224.0.0 – 54.255.255.255

It is possible to go into the iblock lists and edit them, but the only options are allowing them for a set period of time or allowing them forever.

What is Peerblock? PeerBlock lets you control who your computer “talks to” on the Internet.  By selecting appropriate lists of “known bad” computers, you can block communication with advertising or spyware oriented servers, computers monitoring your p2p activities, computers which have been “hacked”, even entire countries!  They can’t get in to your computer, and your computer won’t try to send them anything either. – Peerblock.com. Basically, while PeerBlock does not make you anonymous — that’s what a VPN or proxy service is for — it does keep your ISP from throttling your massive amounts of downloading (PORN!).

What is CloudFlare? CloudFlare is a content delivery network and distributed domain name server service marketed as improving website performance and speed and providing security. – Wikipedia. Basically, these guys stand between you and DoS attacks. When someone decides to start banging your servers to crash your site, CloudFlare is the one taking the hit. Though if your bank or other supposedly secure networks are using CloudFlare, you might want to look at banking elsewhere, as they should be able to afford a real firewall and not something you can tack on for free.

What is Amazon Technologies? A Reno subsidiary of Amazon. Amazon rents a lot of their servers to other services in the cloud. Basically, they take a snapshot of a page, and that’s what they’re serving to you when you visit those sites. It saves on load time, and if the site is down you won’t even notice because you’ll still be receiving a page to view.

I’m already leery of constantly seeing “Detected AP2P on Amazon EC2 Cloud” popping up in my PeerBlock window, as it makes me wonder what exactly are they taking from me while I’m visiting sites using their cloud services. Which is why I’ve refused to right-click and allow Amazon forever in PeerBlock, as I can’t know who they’re renting their servers to and for what purpose. Plus there’s always the concern that someone might be hijacking their IP, which I guess is totally a thing 😛

(AP2P = Anti-Peer-to-Peer. They keep watch to make sure you’re not using torrents to download illegal [copyrighted] materials. The Internet police, keeping you safe and jamming up your traffic logs.)

The only thing that seems to work on keeping CloudFlare, CloudFront, and Amazon powered sites visible while running PeerBlock is to disable the P2P iblocklist when surfing the Internet. Unless you’re actively torrenting, I don’t think it will be that much of a problem. And at least you’ll be able to see why The Oatmeal loves the mantis shrimp (which is a crazy awesome sea creature by the way).