Therealist Truest Blog

I'm Back.... Sort of

2011-11-18T14:29:00.001-09:00

I haven't logged in to these accounts forever, but now that I have, there are going to be some changes going on. I plan to start another blog that concentrates solely on radio. Yep, I said 'radio'. I figured if I'm going to write about anything, it's going to be something I have a lot of fun dealing with. Politics irritates me, especially these days. The weather, ugh, it's Alaska, so I'd rather just stay inside and try to pretend that there isn't any weather. Finance, well, I'd prefer to make money and not write about it. So that leaves only personal topics (off-limits for me) or radio. So there it is. Link to new blog coming soon, once I get things there situated.

Updates to Blog

2009-12-10T12:26:00.002-09:00

I haven't posted in forever, but then again I haven't had much to say. When I am able to post to a blog, most of my time has been spent on my finance blog and trading, so this one has suffered. I have no intention of closing this one however, but when something really grinds my gears is about the only time I will likely post here. For now though, check it out, visit the other one, or check out my sponsors too. Thanks and God bless!

Wow, it's been forever

2009-07-12T01:18:00.002-08:00

Since this is my personal blog and I have been busy with another blog lately, I haven't posted in forever. Looking back in the last month or more I see only two updates and one is now updated as well. I've been spending a great deal of time on my new blog at

realtruefx.com

Please stop by and check it out!

Rumble, Rumble

2009-05-29T21:22:00.003-08:00

Another bloody earthquake here in Fairbanks Alaska. That's the second one in six days. Looks like it's centered about the same place as Saturday morning's quake. Not a big one this time, but scare nonetheless. Here's the info
http://www.aeic.alaska.edu/Seis/recent/sub/quakes/2009150_evid106962/evid106962.html

New blog

2009-05-17T01:31:00.004-08:00

This has been a looooooong time coming, but I've added a new blog to my content. The new blog's focus is solely on investing stocks and Forex with a special emphasis on technical analysis. I don't have a particular strategy on updates, but believe it will be updated more often than this one is. The main idea is to help myself evolve as a trader and hopefully help others improve as well.

The new blog is at:

http://realtruefx.blogspot.com/

Maybe I should be like other white people

2009-05-01T10:46:00.001-08:00

This post is a first expression of something I feel very strongly about, at least for this blog. I can't understand why there are so few people, especially white people, who care about what goes on in 'the hood'. I regularly read the Time Picayune online in one of America's most troubled cities, New Orleans. Almost daily there are stories about violent murders, mostly young black males. The comments section never ceases to amaze me. The vitriol and lack of compassion, along with blatant racism still astounds me! I have seen it for years and I know it exists, but it still bothers me.

Note to Conservatives: Just because we have a black President does not mean racism is over. It still is not acceptable to say "Get over slavery". It is not okay to lay all the blame on minorities for the struggles in minority communities. I could easily put together a long diatribe about this, which most ignorant folks would still ignore or not understand, but this post it not about that.

This post is about a story I just read.
http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2009/05/man_shot_in_marrero.html

As a summation of the story, despite the headline saying a 'man' was shot, the event was involving a 14 year old boy. It is not okay for this to happen, not acceptable. Although I am a 'sensitive' guy and perhaps might cry more easily than all you macho types, I do not cry much. This story makes me want to cry though. If this happens just once, that is a major deal to me. Unfortunately, in the past two weeks, I've read about at least 2 children murdered in N.O., and at least 4 or 5 more between 18 and 25 years of age -- all with 'illegal' weapons. The boy above was murdered with one shot from an AK-47.

Unfortunately, I live in one of the most Conservative states in the Union where guns are a sacred right and the general lack of basic comprehension of societal issues is not understood or is not a concern. I see a general, let the criminals kill themselves or let me take a shot at someone if I am ever threatened, type of attitude here. Those people miss the point that the government is not our biggest threat right now. Hunting is not the most important thing you need to protect. I don't disagree with the right to protect one's self, in fact I believe that to be extremely important. The problem is this, if all you focus on is protecting gun rights and never for a minute worry about fixing the crime or drug problems, eventually you will be overwhelmed by the problems of society and all the guns in the world won't protect you from a collapse of civilization.

There are so many things more important than gun rights at the moment, but I'll only list one -- Babies are dying in the streets in every major city in the country. There are miniature wars, that kill more of our people yearly than have died in the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts, right here at home. Babies are dying in the street! So why don't white people care? Is it because they're not your babies? A child is a child-- bottom line. Man, I'm done, for now. :(

Cowards!

2009-04-10T17:46:00.001-08:00

It seems like there is a daily 'mass shooting' these days. Is it that our nation is being torn apart by the very threads that hold it together? Are we descending into a war where everyone is an army of one free to enact vengeance on whomever may have done us wrong or who might just be standing in the way of our bullets? Is it the economy? Or is it just that the media has picked a trend that has been occurring for awhile now and begun to bring it to the attention of the masses much more regularly? I can't answer any of those questions definitively, but I do know one thing. These acts of cowardice anger me. I mean seriously, what in the bloody hell is wrong with people?

I'll tell you one reason, cowardice, plain and simple.Poor little Billy got picked on and never had the guts to speak up before or some girl decided she was done with him and suddenly it is okay to slaughter anyone within shooting range. Seriously, how WEAK does one have to be to even begin to think that is a way to 'get back' at someone. Really?

To anyone who is thinking of shooting up a school, or a mall, or even a government building, I say this -- do the strong thing and cock that pistol or that shotgun or that automatic weapon and slowly, carefully raise it to your own brain and pull the trigger. It's not as messy to clean up one body, and other people, who often have nothing to do with your situation can continue to live a productive life. Better yet, get some counselling or some drugs to help your psychosis. I'm angry, but I'm not heartless. I think you too should be able to be a happy, productive citizen. Yes, I do. I don't think you should be miserable. I don't think people who might have hurt you should die though. See when you commit these weak acts, guess what? You lose! The hard thing to do is almost always the best thing to do. Is it easy to pull a trigger? Yes. That is precisely why you shouldn't do it, because in the grand scheme of things, you lose by killing. If you persevere and triumph, those coming against you lose. If you want vengeance, be strong and triumph, not by killing, but by showing everyone you are worth something and not just a WEAK coward.

As for killing innocents, seriously, army of one, that is inexcusable. You should pull the trigger on yourself long before you kill innocents. That's bottom line, no honor in killing anyone, especially innocent people who are minding their own business. Get over yourselves and stop being so WEAK.

The big problem with these assaults is that it masks the real problems in our society. I guess, besides the obvious anger caused by these brutal acts, my biggest problem is that we have for a long time been at war in this country. Ask anyone in the slums of New Orleans, Detroit, D.C., L.A., or any city from small size all the way up to the largest cities. This war is rooted in drugs, historical discrimination (no matter to what extent it may exist now, the legacy exists), and poverty. We have death tolls rivalling Baghdad in some cities and that is a city that is a legitimate war zone and there seems to be no attempt to change it over a period of decades. So we have systemic problems, which I might cover some time in the future, but for now, I'm running out of time and have to cut this short.

So simply put--- STOP THE SHOOTING!

Blog therapy

2009-03-26T11:25:00.001-08:00

It has been an extremely long time since a new entry. I don't think I have any real followers anyway, but nonetheless, this blog shouldn't have gotten to this state. I'm posting via email, so hopefully this won't look to horribly formatted. If so I guess I'll fix it when I have time.

Time, time, time. There really hasn't been much time lately. As usual there is family to take care of. That's a given and I accept that. I've also been plodding along in my forex travels. Unfortunately, that's not going well overall. I have been hanging in there and still showing promise, but still am missing some important keys to profitability and longevity in the industry. I had another temporary meltdown yesterday, so I'm recovering from that and trying to focus on moving forward. Still, I've halted trading for a few days. I plan to read, read, and read some more over the next few weeks. I may not trade until I've practiced some more and finished my course work. I've realized over the past several months, that I'm expecting success, but have yet to put in all the required work. I mean I didn't get started in my current career without a lot of hard work, why would forex be different? So cheers to hard work! I'm on it!

I'll try to blog more when I have time. It's a good distraction and therapy anyways. If I'm blogging, I'm not losing any money in trading. Also, I'm twittering. I'm not really sure why, but my plan would be for trade entries and exits at some point. I have some from the meltdown already up there, for future posterity and "look how far I've come" type stuff. Anyways, off to lunch!

The Bailout

2008-09-29T17:55:00.003-08:00

Cue scary music! The bailout has just failed, well several hours ago anyway, and it's scary either way you look at it. I am absolutely astounded at the ignorance of the average American and the cowardice of our "leaders". Main street 'hollers' let the Wall St. bastards hang, we're not rescuing them. What is wrong with people.

This is not a Wall St. bailout. Yes Wall St. will benefit in the sense that they will probably have jobs still. Companies like Goldman Sachs and Bank of America will still exist. Yes they will still be around, more than likely, if the bailout would succeed. Guess what America? So will you. You will still have your job and home and way of life, for the most part. I know that a lot of folks will lose their jobs and already have. I get that. It's already screwed up though. Trying to hang Wall St. won't help you though. Vengeance won't do anything other than hurt everyone.

What most people miss, is if we have a series of calamitous events, rather these series of events continue then the system WILL collapse. When that happens we all will suffer. This is not just a Wall St. problem, Main St. helped create it too. People who shouldn't have had mortgages got them and then didn't pay them. As a result, greedy Wall St. began to suffer and the whole spiral developed and continues to do so. The problems are global now too, the markets around the world are suffering, and millions, if not billions are losing trillions upon trillions of dollars(yen, Euros, etc.).

I am a hard working person, and I happen to pay my mortgage on time every month. Even when I had to relocate for a job and couldn't sell my home, I still paid my mortgage. Abandoning my home and letting the bank take the loss was never an option. Working multiple jobs, eating Ramen noodles, and walking in -40 winter weather were all options. (I live in Alaska currently). Sticking it to the people on Wall St. is not an option to me. Why? Because we are all connected in one way or another. I may not know that man with the 8 figure salary and the Rolls Royce. I may or may not ever be that man myself. I do think he should be held accountable, but letting those businesses fail is NOT accountability. It's suicide. It's stabbing myself in the eye. It's cutting my own hand off. It's ludicrous!

The main reason is this, trickle down economics. I do understand that the theory is, if big business does well, it will trickle down to Main St. The idea is that if the big businesses do well, salaries will be higher, there will be more jobs, and everyone will be better off. This is not theory, it is reality, to a point. So the people in charge take more than their fair share off the top, but it still makes it's way down, even if it is crumbs. The problem is this though, when there is no money for the man up top, there is less for the man on the bottom.

When Wall St. has nothing, or big business has nothing, we all have nothing. If you doubt that, go back a hundred years, before Lehman Bros., before Ford, before Wal Mart. Go back to when big businesses did not trickle down and compare the standard of living. The vast majority of us will never be wildly rich and successful, so we hate the next man who is. For the love of God, or whoever you do love, WAKE UP AMERICA. If you kill your brother, you kill yourself.

I am just in awe of my fellow countrymen. I cannot fathom taking such a huge risk to make other people suffer, when the consequences for all of us could be truly profound. I know that we could have another Great Depression and in these days I'm not at all looking forward to that. I'm not being an alarmist, but it IS possible. I don't know if it's likely or if it will happen, but we should do what it needed so that we don't roll the dice. Then we can work together to fix the system that if profoundly screwed up without profoundly suffering at the same time. Think about it! Look at the options on the table and figure it out for yourselves. But please, please, please don't let your bitterness get in the way . Think for yourselves and get over the ignorance and mob mentality and let's work towards a real solution. Even if it is marching on Washington and demanding real action, that is better than the current solution of doing nothing. I for one, will pray for all of us, because we need some sort of intervention, devine or not.

Kinda sorta closed, but not totally

2008-07-03T21:46:00.001-08:00

Nice subject ehh? The actual status of this blog is at the very least on hold. I haven't had time or motivation to continue to post in a while. I'm usually trying to make money outside of the blog as that portion never really took off. So feel free to take a look around at previous posts and post comments if you wish. I will respond to comments much sooner than the next time I might post. I'm learning a few new investing angles right now and that is my concentration. When I get that situated, I'll probably be opening a new blog focused solely on that. Until then, I'll make occasional posts here.

Until next time---

therealisttruest

Long time no see!

2008-04-11T14:18:00.001-08:00

Wow, it’s been forever since I’ve had an update. Honestly, I haven’t had much time to worry about posting as I’ve been making every effort to feed my family. The financial crisis seems to have been avoided, for now, but it’s still touch and go. If one thing goes wrong we could be kind of screwed. There’s no savings, no credit, no one to turn to if things do go south so at the very least pray for us. I see light at the end of the tunnel and think we can keep everything manageable in the short term. I also have plans to make the financial situation more stable long term. The only real solution is to increase our revenue enough to dig out of the trench. When that does happen, hopefully within the next couple months then I expect my posts to be more frequent, though not necessarily on this forum. I do intend to leave this up and posts updates on occasion, but my grand plan calls for adding at least two more blogs on Forex and stocks as I gain a better foundation on those concepts and get more money involved in those activities. I’ll be starting out very small, but I do believe when I make that move it will work. This is only the beginning y’all. Be easy everyone, it gets better.

Also, no thanks to those who didn’t help out as I requested. I honestly didn’t expect much, but held out hope. To date not one single person came forward. It’s no big deal really though because I am an independent person. In an act of desperation I was trying to open any avenue I could to raise funds and that avenue did not work out. I only hope that someday I will be in the position to help someone in need and not turn a blind eye.

Therealisttruest

Cyber pan handling

2008-02-27T22:10:00.002-09:00

I need some help. There are three ways you can help me.

Please click on the 'Donate' button to the right if you have a PayPal account.
If you need any web design work done, perhaps we could simply work together and I could earn it that way. Email me at the address to the right if you're interested.
Finally, just forward the link to this blog to anyone who might be able to help or would even be willing to visit this blog. I have Google AdSense so even having more visitors would be very beneficial.

Well for those that have previously read this blog, mainly in December and early January, you know that my family is having some economic issues. Things haven't changed much and in fact look a bit worse than before. The mortgage crisis affected us, at least indirectly as we were unable to sell our home but had to relocate. Savings got wiped out, credit debt rose in order to continue to feed the family, a wife and two little girls.

Please Please Please, if you have a Paypal account click on the Donate Now button to the left. Throw in a buck, or two. I need to get at a minimum around $1000 in the next couple weeks to meet rent, electricity, food, and heating oil obligations. I probably would need about 10 times that to get out of this financial crisis, but even a little bit to start out would be helpful.

For those that have no sympathy, let me explain quickly. I do have a job, and in fact a good one for the future. It just doesn't pay enough to dig out of a hole. I'm tech savvy, could probably throw together a website if you need one, so I'll work for the money as well. I just need to desperately get out of this situation and keep above water.

I know this isn't the best approach, but I don't have weeks or months and I still believe that in the roughest of times, people still do help each other. Last time I asked, didn't work at all, but hopefully you guys are nicer and more sympathetic. If not, well at least I tried. God Bless!

Humbly,
TheRealistTruest

Obama Osama?

2008-02-25T21:43:00.002-09:00

The picture says it all doesn't it? Vote for Osama so he can help his Muslim friends destroy the country. Oops did I say Osama, I meant Obama Osama. But wait just one second, what the hell is going on in this Democratic campaign?

Let's break down the truth first of all. Barack Hussein Obama is not a terrorist, right? This piece is for the truly ignorant out there. No he is not a terrorist. He's not Muslim either. In fact he is a Christian. No that picture is not a fake, but it's not him getting suited up in a suicide bomb belt either. He was presented with this outfit in a visit to Kenya a few years ago. It is basically a sign of respect to accept this apparel as gift from fellow dignitaries. He is in fact partly of Kenyan decent, as his father, a non-practicing Muslim is from Kenya. I don't remember what his mother is, ethnically speaking, but I do know she is a Christian as well.

What I don't understand is a Democratic campaign that is so dirty and desperate as Hillary Clinton's. I might expect this from the Republican side, destroying a Democratic foe, but for someone supposedly on the same side, this is crazy. This just goes to show what Hillary Clinton will do to win. It also goes to show how stupid her campaign thinks we are. I for one am a bit smarter than that, being that I have a college ejukatiun and all. I just really hope the folks in my home state of Ohio aren't that stupid. I hope the people in Texas aren't that stupid. If the Democrats of America have any intelligence at all (which I might question still regardless of the outcome) this will backfire on the Clinton camp and be seen as one of the dirtiest, stupidest campaign blunders ever. Go Obama! Beat Hillary! Then we'll see who's the better candidate Obama or McCain.

Alaska Weather

2008-02-18T21:40:00.002-09:00

It was about 30 degrees today, above zero. Records highs of up to 45 above are possible on Tuesday. That is about a 95F degree difference from what it was in the first week of the month. I love Chinooks! For those not familiar, a Chinook is a wind that blows down a mountain range causing warmer temperatures. In this part of the Interior when a southerly wind blows over the Alaska range, we can often get dramatic warm-ups in the winter. It is not unheard of to have the temperature rise over 40 degrees in several hours when there is a Chinook. This warm-up happened a bit more slowly than that, but man is it nice! I had planned a piece on law enforcement in the Bush tonight, but that will have to wait until tomorrow when I have more time.

So SAD

2008-02-14T22:05:00.003-09:00

Well the week is almost over and what have I got done. Ummm, yes that's right-- nothing really. My ToDo list is getting so long I might never catch up. I'm concentrating on making my time management skills better, but thus far still no extra time to be found. I've always been a procrastinator though, so that is no surprise. I came to the revelation quite some time ago that if I ever want to accomplish anything in my life that I'll absolutely have to conquer this time management challenge.

I think I suffer a bit from SAD(Seasonal Affective Disorder, I think). SAD is something people in the higher latitudes deal with in the winters, from the lack of natural sunlight. I have never liked winter, but since moving to Alaska over 5 years ago I have noticed the change in energy levels and mood from about November through March. I am really tired much of the time and just want to sleep. Oh wait, convenient isn't it, it's bedtime now and I'm overdue. Let me know via comments if you'd like to know more about SAD and I'll do some research and put together something for you all.

Less Cold

2008-02-12T19:55:00.001-09:00

Well it is official, as many in the local area know. The deep freeze has made it's way out of the area. 8 straight days of -40F or colder. The coldest official temperature was -48 in Fairbanks proper. Outlying areas got into the -60s and -70s for most of those 8 days as well.

At least it's finally "warmed" up though. I tell everyone it hasn't warmed up though, it actually got less cold. I mean it is still around 0 outside. To me that is hardly warm. It's forecast to get into the 20s within the next week, so the cold will be bearable, even to a Midwesterner like myself. Unfortunately, the cold weather is now in the Midwest. Minnesota was around -40 within the past couple nights.

You know what I say, better them than us!

TradeKing final review... for now

2008-02-11T21:31:00.000-09:00

For background information on this review please visit the two links below.
This is the third and final part of my experiences with TradeKing... at least for now.....
http://therealisttruest.blogspot.com/2008/02/trade-king-review-part-deux.html
http://therealisttruest.blogspot.com/2008/01/so-how-good-is-trade-king.html

The issue I was having with TradeKing now appears to be resolved. My account was able to receive transfers via ACH as of Friday the 8th of February. This was indeed 5 business days as was stated from the original correct setup. The first two setups were incorrect. The first of those was all my fault, so 3 business days were lost because of my incorrect info. The second was mostly my fault as well, costing 5 more business days. I say mostly because the feedback on the site, when giving the correct info, with incorrect formatting was a bit vague. I tried to input a dash, which was incorrect, but it simply told me the number was wrong. Thinking I did something else, I took off 4 digits before the dash as well. So that number was four digits short. Oops, another five business days.

Finally, after talking with TradeKing tech support and getting frustrated with them, and getting in contact with my other institution to verify the correct information, I got the correct numbers with the correct format (yes including the four missing numbers, minus the freakin' dash). I wish someone had told me that in the first place. Oh wait, yes the younger lady on the internet chat explained that in a vague fashion. Anyways, this was Friday the 1st that everything was setup. Time to wait another 5 business days.... On Sunday the 3rd I received an email stating I had an incorrect ACH profile, a- freakin - gain. WTF?!

I had never received an email about the second profile, so I ignored it and held my breath. Checking my records I saw that the original screwup by me also prompted an email by TradeKing on a Sunday. So it looks like these emails are sent on Sundays. That's a bit odd, I would expect to see it sooner, but whatever. What alarmed me is that I got a message about the second profile while waiting for the third one to go through. A less patient person would have deleted the third one as well thinking it was incorrect also. This is not what I did though. As I said I waited.

On Friday the 8th it was live. I immediately transferred funds into TradeKing from the third ACH profile. Tick, tock, time to wait another five business days, even though the funds are no longer in the other institution and TradeKing is showing the funds in the account, but uncleared. That means I might be able to trade this Friday, the 11th. So in all it will have taken me 18 trading days. Only 8 of those were fully or partially by my own error or misunderstanding.

So now I wait......
One final word though, is that even through all of this I would not dissuade anyone from using TradeKing. Mainly I am documenting my experiences for you. I am a beginning trader, so I can't speak about the interface or the research or even timely trades. Well I could speak a bit about timely trades in a few days and perhaps in the future I will do a full fledged review with specifics on different options trading, interfaces, research, experiences, etc. For now this is what I have. This is my final TradeKing review for the moment. Good luck everyone!

Therealisttruest

Good bye Mitt

2008-02-07T21:40:00.000-09:00

It was nice knowing you, or at least the image you presented. I can't say I care a lot about Mitt Romney dropping out of the race. All I really saw was a politician who cared about himself and his image only. So basically he was the average politician that is already in Washington. He's obviously an intelligent guy and was very successful at what he's done, but there are a lot of people in the world like that.

So what is a Conservative to do? Seriously, all we have left is McCain. I'm not sure about him either. He is status quo, good ol' boy. Again nothing special about him. I don't see him being a visionary or a real leader that will change things. Truth be told he's probably almost the same as Bush politically, only without all the burned bridges.

I was sort of sad that Thompson dropped out, but he never got his campaign together either so he didn't have a chance. The presidential race now officially sucks. I'm a Conservative, and the best choice to me looks like Obama at this point. If he were Conservative, without reservation I would fully endorse him. Unfortunately, he's too far left for me, so at this point the best I can say is that I'm undecided. At the very least, I hope he get the Democratic nomination. Anyone on the ballot would be better than Hillary Clinton. I seriously can't stand her.

Anyways, good bye Mitt. It was nice knowing you!

Breaking area news!

2008-02-06T14:27:00.001-09:00

Apparently, there has been a widespread power outage in the city of North Pole, about 10 miles outside of Fairbanks. As I was looking at the local Wunderground.com weather stations I noticed several of the North Pole locations were about 2+ hours outdated. Then I noticed a new post on someone’s Wunderblog explaining the situation. I don’t know much more than that at this time, but if I get more info and have the time I’ll update. It’s about -35 right now so a prolonged outage is a serious situation. Hopefully they can get things sorted out quickly if they haven’t already.

Temperatures in the interior last night were as cold as -70(unofficially) and -67(officially). In the Fairbanks area it was ‘warmer’ between -45 and -50. Brrrr. Keep warm!

It's freakin' cold!

2008-02-05T22:55:00.000-09:00

And that's no exaggeration. Seems the Russians decided to send some Arctic air our way. The temperature in the last hour was -42F. It's forecasted to be as cold as -55F tonight in town, definitely colder in valleys outside of town. It was in the -60s the last few nights north and south of here. For anyone who has never felt that type of cold, I can only tell you that you'd have to experience to fully understand it. I'm from the Midwest(not the northern part like Minnesota or the Dakotas) so I am definitely not used to this yet either.

The clear skies in the mornings are truly awesome, that is only if you are up in the hills. Town was socked in by ice fog, yet another term I had never heard of before coming here. Alaska is truly a land of extremes. I can't wait until July when it's 70 or 80. Yes that's above zero, a swing of 130+ degrees. Crazy, that's all I can say.

Also, for those of you who have left comments recently, I am meaning to get to them soon. Hopefully tomorrow sometime I will address that. Also I've been wanting to add my email address to the page as well. That should be coming soon. Well I've got to get to sleep and prepare for the deathly cold tomorrow morning.

Fairbanks NewsMiner Blogroll

2008-02-02T09:38:00.000-09:00

The local newspaper has drastically changed their website. I would say the layout is much improved, and it now even includes pictures... woohoo! It is still unfortunately a bit slow, actually slower with the new layout. As I speak it is sitting in another tab not loading either, so maybe some problems over there. Either way, for the best source of Fairbanks news (especially since it's the only newspaper) check out http://newsminer.com/

The blogroll featuring other area blogs is here http://newsminer.com/blogroll/

I'll be adding a links section to this blog soon and include at least one of the two above as well. For now I've got to get breakfast. Enjoy!

Trade King review part deux

2008-02-02T09:28:00.001-09:00

I called TradeKing again yesterday and couldn't get the help I wanted from them. Evidently my problem was 'investigated'. They showed my bank as having rejected outgoing transfers. I had verified with my bank the day before that this was not an issue, so TradeKing appears to be at least partially wrong for it. They did however give me some more background info on the issue, allowing me to pin down another error on my part. It seems I had the wrong account info or at least not all the info needed (I was short 4 numbers).

So I'm trying one last time to make this work. I'll know at the end of next week for sure, but if this doesn't work I'm closing my account with TradeKing. Even though they helped me some, they were not as helpful as they should have been. I think this shows some weakness in their support department. I'm a freakin' computer programmer, so I can handle tech support issues, and I do understand what people go through at a call center. I also know a disorganized group when I see one and that is a somewhat disorganized group. So I'm not going to say they are a worthless company. I don't think that at all. I just think they have a few kinks to work out. Had that been my bank on the other end, I would have had everything figured out from day one, not having talked to so many people and having to put the puzzle pieces together myself. So one more chance...... if they screw it up you all will know it.

EDIT --added links to other parts
part 1
part 3 final

So how good is Trade King?

2008-01-31T22:22:00.001-09:00

Not so good thus far... I'm hoping for better but it's not looking so good. I just recently got started trading in the stock market and have for the last couple weeks been using a reputable online broker, but the commissions make it almost impossible to make a profit. One reason is that I started out with a lowly 50 bucks. I've recently added 30 bucks in cash to that fund so now it's basically 80 bucks minus commissions. So at 12.95 per transaction that puts me in a nearly impossible position. By the way, on my first trade, I've almost recovered the commission and pretty soon will make a profit, at least until I sell, then I'll take another huge hit and that's in an almost nightmarish market. 12.95 isn't bad if you're investing thousands of dollars, but hey I've only got 80.

I figured I would try another brokerage that was cheaper so that my profits would be easier to come by and it came down to Zecco.com and TradeKing. Zecco lost out because of the trade schedule, basically twice a day. I would like to get a chance to ride the waves of volatility, especially in this market, so twice a day won't work for my plan. So I chose TradeKing.

The first problem I have is that I only have about $30 in cash and the other 40 something is in the two shares I own. So I needed to get the cash to TK, but without expensive fees. I didn't want to wait forever, but wiring is too expensive, so I chose to go the slow electronic transfer route. There is a 5 business day waiting period, which sucks, but that's life. At first I created an ACH profile (electronic transfer with no fees), but had the wrong info.

So I cost myself 3 trading days. I was sent an email and promptly re-created this profile with correct info. The website nicely informed me that I would be able to trade on February 1st. Earlier today I took a look to see if trading time perhaps came early, but to my chagrin my profile was gone. It was just gone, no notice, no anything at all. So will I trade via TradeKing tomorrow or not?

At first I tried the online chat feature on TradeKing's site. The guy was nice enough, but basically told me that there was no way it could be deleted without a notice being sent to me, but also in the same breath told me that if my bank rejected it then it might disappear. This didn't make sense to me, but I played along. He was going to check a few things, but I didn't have all my bank info handy at the moment so I let him off the hook.

Finding the info he requested, I went for the online chat feature again, getting a different person of course. This young woman(I'm assuming on age by communication style) didn't know what was going on. She did not communicate clearly and basically wasted a bunch of my time. I was pretty irritated at this point.

I called my main brokerage and explained the situation and they verified that they do indeed accept transactions and withdrawals and even checked to see if TradeKing had attempted any communication with them. There had been none, but I was instructed how I might do things from their end which unfortunately involves me sending a form and documentation from TradeKing. But wait, I've had this account for almost two weeks and I don't have any documentation from them yet, so again I'm screwed.

As a last resort I call the TradeKing support number. The nice gentleman on the other end tells me my profile shouldn't have been deleted, but hold on and let me check. I explained the situation twice and he told me there was something in the system showing two profiles having been setup, the first being deleted, just as I had said, but the person who can help me had left for the day. He asked me if I could call back tomorrow, February 1st, the day I should have been able to transfer money in. So it's not looking good. Instead of deleting a part of my account, I almost wish my whole account had been deleted, then it would be perfectly clear I should just give up. Unfortunately, me being who I am, I will call in the morning, hoping they can redeem themselves. We'll see..... I'll let you all know.

EDIT --added further links to rest of story
part 2
final part

Auto Review, Alaska

2008-01-29T21:36:00.000-09:00

Well I've been meaning to do this review for a couple days now so I'd better before it slips my mind.

Recently I had an automotive issue that had been unresolved since October. At first I went to Johnson's Tire Center in Anchorage to get it fixed. I returned the same day with an even bigger issue caused by a faulty repair and they promptly "fixed" it. Fast forward to December where the same problem re-occurs only worse than before. I took it to a place in Fairbanks and was told someone screwed it up pretty badly. I didn't have the money to fix it yet so I just let it go, while keeping an eye on it.

Well last week the problem became much worse to the point where it had to be fixed immediately. So I bit the bullet and took it somewhere else in Fairbanks only to hear the exact same diagnosis. Someone screwed it up royally and perhaps even did something unethical to cover up their mistake.

Needless to say I was pissed. After leaving it at the shop, I immediately called the Johnson's location in Anchorage (I won't say which of the two I went to though). I was calm at first, until the manager began to get defensive and back-pedal. Needless to say I didn't like the denial. It was pretty tense for a bit, but I don't remember cussing at the guy which was a good thing.

Long story short, after a bit of denial and some forcefulness on my part, the manager did the right thing. I was actually surprised, but he called the shop in Fairbanks and discussed the problem with the staff. After that he agreed to pay the bill. The problem wasn't apparently as bad as first thought, but nonetheless it was a result of a faulty repair job.

This brings me to two conclusions, one philosophical and one is just an opinion. Firstly, more people need to stand up on principles. I knew that the shop in Anchorage was responsible and knew the problem was solely their fault. The problem was mis-diagnosed and kind of made me look a bit foolish because what I was saying wasn't fully correct, but nonetheless it was their fault. I refused to back down, despite the insanity of the accusations and the vehement denial of the manager. Had he denied it and I accepted that, then I would have been basically getting screwed over. I'm glad I wouldn't take no for an answer, as I was able to get the problem fixed for free(as it should have been) and I was able to give my next statement.

Johnson's Tire Service in Anchorage is actually a decent place. Even though they screwed up, they made it right. They stood behind their work and when it wasn't right(after I convinced them of it), they made amends for it. That is a quality all too many businesses are lacking these days. Gone are the days when the customer is always right. Gone are the days when the businesses actually act like they need you, instead of you needing them. So for the repairs, well I can't say I'm pleased with the overall situation. But for old-fashioned customer service, I'll give them some credit where credit it due. Overall my recommendation to anyone looking to go to Johnson's is to go ahead and go. As with any auto repairs, do your due diligence to make sure things are right, but I wouldn't recommend against them. I personally wouldn't because of past experience, but only because of that. As I said before they're a decent place to go.

Ho hum...

2008-01-28T23:11:00.000-09:00

I hate winter! It's not so cold now, but Fairbanks Alaska is dark in the winters. I'm tired, sort of grumpy, and totally unmotivated(not even sure that's a word). There's a lot on my list of things to do, but honestly if I had one choice of something to do it would be sleeping. I would sleep twelve hours a day, wake up and eat and then take a 3 or 4 hour nap a couple hours later. Well, this is an attempt to make sure I post more regularly. Lately, I've been stressed by finances and now I'm just plain tired... So many things to do, just need to get motivated to do them. Anyways, for those in arctic climates, or just really far north, hold on just a few more months with me, spring is only a little bit away.

My life sucks

2008-01-24T21:58:00.000-09:00

I was trying to think of a better title for this post, but couldn't come up with anything better suited for today. Basically I've been concentrating on trying to make more money in the short term to stem this crisis my family continues to live through and have had a little success, but not nearly enough. It's been pretty irritating to say the least. I've been eating a lot of ramen noodles lately, riding the bus in the cold, and trying to keep my head up. Well it shouldn't be more than a month until the worst is over though. We never did sell our house, but someone is going to rent it out in February. That helps a lot, but it's just a bit too late as the financial damage has already been done. The last couple months literally might take years to undo.... Oy Vey! Anyways, I still hope to swing this site in a more professional direction soon, but simply don't have enough time to spend on something that doesn't make a profit yet, so basically not much fun in the short term, but soon I will get back to it again.

Update

2008-01-10T21:12:00.000-09:00

Well the last couple weeks have sucked a lot. We moved into a place, which was great, but a lot of work to get that done. Now that we are moved in, we're broke. I'm riding the bus, which I've never really done before. The ride isn't bad, but standing in below zero weather and waiting for the bus is horrible. In the next couple days it's supposed to be -40, and I don't know how I'll hold out doing that.

Money is the biggest problem right now though. We're waiting on someone to rent our home down south, meanwhile paying all those bills as well as the bills at our new location. We're eating off credit and if no one rents the home and takes care of our other things down south we're majorly screwed.

On top of it all, nearly everything else that might make money is so slow it's unbelievable. This blog has almost been dropped because I don't have time and not many folks come by anyways, even when I did put time into it. So it's not for lack of effort, but then I do realize content isn't usually very compelling. When things get straightened out I'll fix that, probably move to my own domain too.

And then there's the stock market, jeesh. I mean I don't have much in it, but if it could make some profit that would be real helpful right now. Okay, seriously I got like $50 bucks on a couple stocks, outside of retirement which I won't touch(and that's not going great either). Still those two stocks aren't moving more than a couple pennies at best. Well it's been an interesting experiment nonetheless. I don't have much time for experiments though, I'm nearing desperation. We only need to make it through January and February then we'll be fine.

Until then pray for me and my family or donate at the button to the right(yeah right, no one's done that either, thanks anyways though).

Till next time,
Therealisttruest

I'm back

2008-01-03T12:47:00.000-09:00

Hurray for me! After a short 'vacation' I'm finally able to resume posts. I was moving into my new place. It was cold(about 0 to -10 F), but not as cold as it could have been. I got to a point where I could barely talk or move my face after a couple hours. The best thing is that we are finally in our own place again though. Well I don't have much time at the moment, but when I do I'll be bringing some new content and other changes this way. I've still got some decisions to make about what I'll do with this blog, but there are definitely some improvements to quality coming as I've sort of been winging it the last couple months, me being sort of a refugee and all.

Al-Qaeda responsible for Bhutto

2007-12-27T22:10:00.000-09:00

This is a story that is not yet getting much press here in the States and in fact this is the first I've heard of it. Perhaps BBC or some one else is covering it, but I haven't seen it yet. Asia Times Online is reporting that an Al-Qaeda spokesman has made statements claiming responsibility.

From the Times--
“This is our first major victory against those [eg, Bhutto and President Pervez Musharraf] who have been siding with infidels [the West] in a fight against al-Qaeda and declared a war against mujahideen,” Mustafa told Asia Times Online by telephone.

If this is indeed the case our efforts in that region may have just taken a major blow. Pakistan was already on the edge of spinning out of control with Musharraf, but without a viable successor Pakistan is even closer to tipping over the precipice. No one is happy with Musharraf it seems, and what may have been a popular alternative has now vanished. The only real hope is that some one from her political party can gather enough support to become a viable alternative, otherwise the Pakistani people will move closer and closer to a revolution that may very turn out to become the next Islamist Sharia theocracy. Islamists with nukes is not a good proposition, so lets all hope they can turn this thing around.

Expand the death penalty

2007-12-26T21:41:00.000-09:00

In an editorial article today in the New York Times, the author espoused the recent national trend against the death penalty. In a country full of crime, this is a horrible idea. The article also railed against Texas, which is currently bucking that trend. I say Texas is right, not only should the death penalty continue, it should be expanded. Animalistic people should be put down like animals. That's my black and white perspective. Animals who are vicious and dangerous are euthanized. Do the right thing and protect the innocent, law-abiding citizens by executing dangerous animal-like humans. Don't slap us in the face by forcing us to pay for these denigrates to live. These are the same denigrates who have victimized us before and if let free would do it again. Expand the death penalty!

For your further perusal, I've gathered a couple examples of Texas's finest--

Segundo, Juan

This guy raped a woman and tried to strangle her 11-year-old daughter to death. DNA established his guilt 20 years after the crime.

Whitaker, Thomas

This guy murdered two people and attempted to murder another for a million dollars.

Ramey, Ker'sean

This guy executed three people.

I purposely picked three people of different races to profile, but there is an unfortunate racial disparity. Whites made up almost 30%, blacks almost 41%, and Hispanic 28%. This isn't unusual simply because the judicial system is already full of racial inequality. By expanding the death penalty, by offense, these issues should work themselves out simply because the action that a person commits has no racial discrimination. The criminal either did it or didn't do it, plain and simple. I doubt the legal system would ever be equal, so the racial argument would still remain, but at least it would be levelled out by being applied more fairly.

Also, for those who haven't come here from the Times, my response to that article is below.

I can say I agree with this article to a certain extent, only that innocent people should not be condemned to death. I am for capital punishment, if and only if the person is a danger to society. If innocent people can be hurt by another person acting like an animal, then the guilty person should be put down like an animal. With such a liberal audience, I doubt I would find many in agreement with me, but that is my stance.

People who are dangerous should not be warehoused, they should be disposed of so that they are no longer a danger to others. Capital punishment should not be used as a punishment or a deterrent, only to put down animals in the same way that a vicious dog is euthanized, so should vicious people be.

As long as no innocent people die, Texas is doing a great job! With increased forensic science, it is even easier to prove someone's guilt, as well as innocence. In that vein, more states should be working towards efficiency such as Texas. It's not about an eye for an eye as some on the religious right might think. It's not about a deterrent. It's simply the most cost-effective way to protect the public, by killing instead of supporting dangerous animals. Murderers, domestic abusers, molesters, and maybe even the worst of the worst drug dealers should be executed! Then maybe crime might drop overall, but at least violent crime would drop.

All info above, including pics, are courtesy of the Texas Department of Corrections,
http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/stat/deathrow.htm

TherealistTruest Meaning

2007-12-20T21:17:00.000-09:00

If you have never been here before or have been here but wondered 'wtf is wrong with this idiot? What is up with that title?' This post is for you. This name goes back over 10 years.

There are two important parts to my moniker. Realist and Truest

Firstly, 'Realist'
Well it is pretty much self explanatory. I am a realist. I am a cautious optimist, but I look at things realistically. I'm serious for the most part, probably because I see reality as it is, not the facade that people try to create. I hate fakeness, and respect genuine, honest people.

Secondly, 'Truest'
This is related directly to the 'Realist' because you can't have truth without realism. I try my best everyday to be the 'truest' I can be. I didn't always value honesty, but have come to the point in my life where I am honest, sometimes to my own hurt. Honesty is a noble calling that I wish more people would value. Unfortunately, it is much more popular to be fake and dishonest today than the 'old school'. I guess I'll continue to be my way and be TherealistTruest!

So now you know more about the man behind the moniker.

Brrrrr

2007-12-20T00:11:00.000-09:00

Well a couple days ago I was talking about waiting till next month for -40 temps. Well I spoke too soon. In the last hour it hit -40 here. It's -39 right now and expected to drop another 5 degrees or so. Sob, sob, I wanna go hoooome! This is just ridiculous! Oh well, I'll just have to get used to it. It'll only be this way off and on for the next couple months, then it'll start to warm up. Well, this is a sleepy post, meaning I'm too tired to continue so I won't. Check out the revised layout(still in progress of course) and the YouTube stuff towards the bottom. I'm still working on adding more content that I can fit into the layout. Till next time!

Changing Blogger Templates

2007-12-18T12:26:00.001-09:00

This one's for John who recently asked about this. Take a look everyone!

There is an easy way to change templates, but it depends on what you want to do on how complex it gets.

The easiest way to change templates is to use Bloggers templates. On your Dashboard just go to Template--> Pick a New Template.

If you want to change templates using one you've found somewhere else online then go to Template --> Edit HTML --> Backup / Restore Template section and click upload. You'll want to backup your current template first though. Also, finding a template is not that hard, just Google something like 'Blogger Template' and you'll find an endless amount.

As far as editing a template, well that's not that difficult, but you need to know HTML and at least understand CSS and XHTML. This is also on the Edit HTML tab of your dashboard.

*One last important note-
make absolutely sure you've backed up your old template. If you change templates, your widgets will disappear. You'll need some way to restore those afterwards if you have a lot of them.

Interesting article

2007-12-18T09:52:00.000-09:00

Well this article is funny to me anyways, and might be to you too. This is a story from the local paper here, the News Miner . Note this, and I quote, “It’s not really that cold.” , in reference to the fact that it's only -20F. For any of those that live below the 60 latitude, thats still pretty freakin cold. Okay, you have to look at it this way though, especially if you are in the SubArctic, it still gets much colder. Woohoo, can't wait till next month. 40 below here we come!

Working on it....

2007-12-17T11:56:00.000-09:00

Any of you that might have been here recently may notice that the layout is changing. In reality it is only starting to change. I originally downloaded a template from somewhere and had slowly begun to change the layout. Well I finally began to get really tired of that layout and am working on customizing it a lot more. Obviously the color scheme has changed, look for that to continue, but also there will be additions to the content as well. My posts might be a bit less frequent for a few days as I spend more time customizing everything, so keep checking back or perhaps leave comments as I will be keeping an eye on them and commenting back and forth with you all.

RIP Lance Titus

2007-12-15T15:06:00.000-09:00

It's been about 10 years since I left and never turned back, but sometimes in this internet age I like to sort of take a peek from afar. Death sucks, there's really no way else to say it. Unfortunately a couple days ago I found out that a guy I knew in high school died tragically about a year ago.

Neither one of us was what anyone would call popular back then. We used to hang out in the same circles sometimes and I remember going to his Father's store a few times as a teenager. He was indeed a unique person and that would be a good thing. I remember him being a funny person, laughing a lot, having a good time.

I didn't know him that well, really was just acquainted with him more than anything. I couldn't say anything bad about Lance though. It was a long time ago, but I do remember him being sort of anti-society, meaning he went against the grain and did his thing instead of what the rest of the world did. That's an admirable quality, especially in these days when you are expected to follow the flock, so to speak. Lance never really seemed to blend in, nor did he seem to want to. Again I think that's admirable. Even though I didn't know him well, I do know that the world needs more people like him and that we all suffer from his loss.

RIP Lance

Oil or not?

2007-12-13T23:25:00.000-09:00

I was just reading the comments over at Anchorage Daily News to a story they just ran and this fueled my rant for the day. Alaska's lifeblood is oil, plain and simple. For some, there is an absolute hatred of the oil companies. I can understand hating greedy corporations who exploit people, but these people have the gall to tell these companies to leave. To me this is just preposterous! Without these oil companies, Alaska is nothing more than a tourist state. I don't know about anyone else, but tourism isn't known to be the best paying business, unless you own the business. I guess it's the same with oil, unless you own the business you really aren't living the high life. I will tell you that it pays pretty good anyways. So for all those people who want the oil companies to go away, please do all of us who want to have a decent standard of living in this state a great service and get out! Bitter people are just angry because they have failed to live up to their own expectations, living in a trailer, driving a crappy pickup truck.... Seriously.

Back to politics

2007-12-12T22:36:00.000-09:00

It's been a while since I've taken on politics here, to it's time to take it back to politics. I really haven't been keeping up on the news lately and that's probably a good thing. What I have seen is a bit concerning though. As recent articles have pointed out, Mike Huckabee is now a front runner in the Republican race. Now I'm not sure if he could actually beat Hillary Clinton, which is what worries me. I really, truly believe that having Hillary Clinton in the White House is bad for this country.

It seems that she is almost a 'gimme' for the Democratic nomination. If that's the case, then we absolutely must have a strong candidate to run against her. Can Mike Huckabee do that? I'm not convinced. My preference, in order, would be Fred Thompson, Barack Obama, Rudy Giuliani, or anyone that isn't Hillary Clinton. Fred Thompson's campaign sucks. Honestly I have barely heard much from him since he came into the race. So that leaves Barack and Rudy.... Good luck fellas!

Bears and wolves, Oh my

2007-12-11T22:13:00.000-09:00

In a land known to be wild and full of wild life, the battle between wild animals and humans invading their habitat is no more evident than this year. During the summer of 2007, Alaskan wildlife made news headlines for venturing into human habitation. Of course humans are the ones who have continued to venture further into animal habitats. In sparsely populated Alaska though, the lines of wild habitat and human habitat are consistently blurred.

Even though humans and wild animals live in somewhat close proximity throughout much of the state, it is still somewhat uncommon to see bears and wolves in so many encounters with humans in the major population centers of the state. In the cities of Fairbanks and Anchorage, bears were the big story makers this summer. Grizzlies roamed near the edges of Fairbanks and black bears were encountered numerous times in the city of Anchorage. In one incident in Anchorage, a black bear was shot and killed in the Mountain View area after roaming through the West side and downtown, both urban human habitats, not bear habitats. In the Midtown section of the city we had an encounter just outside of my house with a young black bear. Bears in the outskirts of the cities are not abnormal, but having bears inside the city and so often is somewhat unusual.

Now comes several stories of recent encounters with wolves just outside Fairbanks and Anchorage. Wolves have killed several pets in the Two Rivers area of Fairbanks and areas around Anchorage. As it was this summer, residents are on heightened alert for these dangerous animals. I guess this is what life on the Last Frontier is like. All I know is that if another deadly woodland creature comes on my porch, I'm either runnin' or gunnin'. Dorothy, who's from Kansas, said "There's no place like home", and I have to agree. In the Midwest, you'd never see a story like this. Maybe it's time to head back down south... well someday anyways.

More mayor's stealing

2007-12-09T18:03:00.000-09:00

I am stunned that this is legal - ' ML&P gave $230,000 to charity in '06, over half of city's gifts'

For those that don't know, ML&P is the city of Anchorage Alaska's power company. In Anchorage there are two, ML&P and Chugach(CEA for short). When I was there we had Chugach. If they had given tax payer money to charity I would have been less outraged because as a private company they have that right. As a tax-payer group that is present to provide power they have no right to run charity programs that do not have anything to do with electricity. If they give breaks to poor folks on their utility bills or help them improve heating in their home that is energy efficient, I can see the merit in that. Giving money away, or buying fund raising dinners is ridiculous. That's the type of BS you get in a Dem run city though. There is absolutely no problem with them stealing money and redistributing it without permission. I am offended by this, but thankfully I don't have to put up with Anchorage stealing my money that way, since I've moved more into the wilderness of the Interior. But still this is almost unbelievable!

More Alaska

2007-12-06T23:22:00.001-09:00

I had mentioned Finland in my previous post and I have begun to get a bit fascinated by that country. One reason is that in some ways it is similar to Alaska. The capital Helsinki is in a similar latitude as that of my home, until recently, of Anchorage. The weather is similarly affected by the ocean, but Anchorage is colder due to exposure to the colder North Pacific, unlike Helsinki which is influenced more by the warm Atlantic. The Laplands also have similarities to where I currently reside. From what I have heard, dog mushing is a pastime there, as it is here. It's cold and snowy as well and sparsely populated. It's also near the Arctic Circle, like where I currently am, about 90 miles south of the Arctic Circle.

Another reason is that I am so enamored with Europe in general. I have never been there, but will someday. I have been to Canada and seen pictures of Europe. Canada seems to be sort of a cross between Europe and the States. With that in mind, the thing I notice about both Canada and Europe is the cleanliness compared to America. America seems somewhat like a crumbling empire at times, just past its prime. Alaska is a bit less like the rest of the country, mainly because of its isolation, but nonetheless I long to see other cultures and other places.

The main purpose of this post is to share Alaska with you. Unfortunately, due to my situation and being unable to access my main computer (I'm working on an old laptop right now) I can't share some of my personal photos of Alaska just yet. I do have pictures of moose, wolves, otters, and bears as well as pictures of volcanoes, Denali(the highest peak on the continent), and much more from the last five years here. I will share them when I get a place to live and get set up. If you want to help, theres a PayPal donation button on the side. I've dropped much of the ads for now as they were annoying me as much as you all.

Well on to the sharing, the best way I can for now, by links that I visit often.

The last link does not do the view from that location justice. Often the camera is blasted with glare from the sun. If you were standing at that location on a clear day you could literally see for about 200 miles to the south with a spectacular view of the Alaska Range and the peak of Denali(also over 100 miles away). It does give you an idea of the weather though in Fairbanks. That camera is located on a hill, with the temperatures being sometimes as much as +30 F higher than that of the valley locations a few hundred feet lower in elevation. Alaska is quite an interesting place. I'll definitely share more as time permits.

Here's a quick pic of Denali from Anchorage, courtesy ACS archives.

Finland Rocks!?!

2007-12-06T00:47:00.000-09:00

Well for the last couple days I've been getting a good deal of traffic on this blog from Finland. For this blog, a good deal of traffic is simply more than a handful, not really a lot. I've got to say I have been very pleasantly surprised though! So why the hits from Finland you may ask? Well I stumbled into another blog and posted a comment there, which was followed by the 'flood' of hits here. So as a show of gratitude I wanted to post a link back for others that might stop in from other locations. So if you get a chance, go to http://www.finlandforthought.net/
There are some really well written articles and lively discussions about life there, from an American living there. I'm keeping an eye out to go ahead and read the next post and maybe comment again, if I wish to do so. Anyways, check it out!

A bit of Alaskana.... cold

2007-12-04T22:35:00.000-09:00

Taking a bit of advice from a recent comment I received, I'm going to throw in a bit of Alaskana, with a weather report. I've done this before, but today's rant is about the cold. It's still warm, by Interior Alaska standards at -8 F. It's forecast to drop to about -25 F tonight. It gets much worse this time of the year and we can expect within the next month or less(basically any day now) to reach -40 (F or C doesn't mattter, this is the only place on the thermometer that the two scales meet) or even much colder. As I speak, it is almost -30 in Northway, Alaska, a small town near the Canadian border. I have not been in Alaska that incredibly long and the Interior even less, so I've only seen it reach that temperature a couple times the one winter I was here before. I'm told that winter was not that bad, so I expect worse. I hate cold weather! I am so living in the wrong place!

Well that is all for now, but I will post more about the Last Frontier, including weather, lifestyle, politics, and other Alaska specific topics.

Still busy, busy

2007-12-03T22:58:00.000-09:00

Well for those of you following this blog ( well okay no one is yet.. but still), I'm very busy and almost think sometimes I might have a nervous breakdown. I'm trying to sell my house, before I can rent a place to actually live and it's not going too well yet. I've moved almost 400 miles from my home and my family and I are staying with relatives until our home does sell. Damn the mortgage crisis! The sad part is that my region is not so affected by the financial aspects or falling prices. The idiots in the rest of the country are scaring the folks in this market though. So because of hype I'm stuck in one room with 3 other people (who I love dearly by the way). Being stuck in one room with any relative, friend, or even enemy still sucks much the same. It's very stressful to say the least. Anyways, one of those wonderful folks just came back... so I'm gonna run. If you stumble across this, please take a look at the other recent posts to get more entertaining (or not) info.

Go Bucks!

2007-12-01T22:54:00.000-09:00

Okay, normally I won't do sports posts at all, but I just have to support my team and represent! After blowing a game to Illinois a few weeks back, Ohio State football is on the edge of getting back into the national title game this year after last year's debacle against Florida. If Missouri loses to Oklahoma for the second time this year, or West Virginia loses to rival Pitt, then OSU will be back in. I'm not the kind of person who will literally pray for a sports victory, so let's just say I'm hoping really hard. I think the greatest chance is for Missouri to lose to Oklahoma, since Pitt sucks and WVU is a pretty good team. Anyways, I won't ramble long about sports... but I just had to say GO BUCKS!

EDIT
Looks like they made it! LSU is going to be pretty tough though. Oh well, hopefully OSU will win, but if they don't it's still better to be runner-up two years in a row than to not get a chance to play at all.

Help ... a little

2007-11-29T21:40:00.000-09:00

It occurred to me as I was reading an article yesterday, that I have a donate button on this blog, but I have never asked anyone to donate. Let me explain my situation really quickly first.

I am a father of 3 young girls (one is 2, one is 5, and the other would be 4). It's a long story I may one day share here regarding my other little one, but for now I'll let it be. On with the brief explanation-- I recently lost my job, then we had to relocate almost 400 miles from where my family lived in our first home. So it's been really rough lately. I've been short two main things, time and cash.

My intent was to start this blog to sort of share with the world and perhaps meet people who think somewhat like I do, or if they disagree can carry on a civil debate. Yeah, I did plan on making some money with ad space too, like I said I got a family to feed. Unfortunately, this all takes time to develop and time is something I've been short of.

So this whole project is unfortunately behind schedule and I hope there is someone who can help me out. So here is my proposal to anyone who is willing to help someone out. Comment on this blog post, letting me know any tips you may have for a successful blog. Anything you think might help this blog out, please contribute and let me know what I can do to make this more interesting. That would be most valuable! If you are able and willing, feel free to click on the Donate button while you're here. This will be the only time I'll ask, but the button will remain for the foreseeable life of this blog.

Thanks a whole bunch!
RealTrue

Muhammed Bear

2007-11-28T21:17:00.000-09:00

As an illustration of the kind of people most of the world is dealing with, there is the Muhammed Teddy Bear issue in Sudan. This is the same Sudan where Muslims (who control the government there) have been committing genocide in the Darfur region. So now they are possibly going to give a (Christian) school teacher a bunch of lashes for letting her students name a bear Muhammed.

Remember, there is no God but Allah and Muhammed is his prophet. Allah Ahkbar! All that good stuff!

I guess in many ways she's lucky. In other regions she might very well get beheaded just for being Christian. I think there are two reasons she might just make it out without punishment though. First, the school was one where the parents were well-to-do. That in most countries is almost a free pass. The second is the fact she is a British citizen and this is garnering a lot of press internationally. Sudan doesn't seem to care a lot about what the rest of the world thinks, but at least they don't thumb their noses up at everyone like Iran( don't get me started on Iran though).

I am a Christian and I don't think I would have a problem with a Teddy bear named Jesus. To me that isn't blasphemous or insulting. Children are especially good at naming stuffed animals, toys, etc. after things they admire. I understand that the bear is an object and might even be considered an idol (well sort of... no not really, ah never mind I don't relate to the Islamists position on this one either). Is there anyone out there who can give me a rational explanation on this issue?

Poor 'Baby Grace' (Riley)

2007-11-27T12:21:00.000-09:00

This is my rant for today....

Every once in a while you'll see a story in the news that makes you physically ill. Myself, I usually just wish horrible pain on the people who perpetrate such things on others. Any thing that is done to hurt a child should be dealt with in medieval ways, IMO. If you abuse children in anyway, you should die a slow, horribly painful death. So to the "parents" of that little girl in Texas, F*** U, die slow! Our justice system is so screwed up though, they'll get a trial, maybe counseling, maybe some jail time in the end. But they still might some day walk the streets again, which is unconscionable. I'm not for anarchy or mob rule, but sometimes that would be more just. Drag 'em through the streets bleeding and beaten along the way by the good citizens of this nation. Stone them to death, I don't care. Either way, on this earth they'll never get what they deserve. I'd like to believe there is a special place in hell for people like that. RIP little one.

It's been a long time

2007-11-24T22:12:00.000-09:00

Unfortunately it's been way too long since I've posted up here. I am still trying to situate after a huge relocation. I promise I will soon do much better since this blog is about to become a bigger priority. Coming soon you should see some HTML, SQL, SQR, and Oracle Forms tutorials for the software side, and since there's always politics to talk about some more commentary on that. These posts should start in the next couple days, so stay tuned.....

Britney Freakin' Spears

2007-11-08T19:09:00.000-09:00

So far not much traffic here, but I thought I would give you all some breaking news. Well news flash, Britney Spears is naked--- see it here

Sorry, I don't have those pictures, or any others. So what's the breaking news, you ask? Well guess what Britney did today. Did she run over someone, or get divorced, lose her kids, take dope?
How in the hell should I know? Seriously people, get a life! There will be no Britney news here, EVER!

Pakistan in deep trouble

2007-11-05T20:38:00.000-09:00

Well it looks like the American War on Terror is on the verge of having a major setback. This article gives a basic breakdown of the situation. As everyone knows, Pakistan is a major source of Islamic extremism. Not only do they have their own problems with the folks in Kashmir and elsewhere, but when the U.S. invaded Afganistan, many of those extremists (including Usama Bin Laden) migrated to the Pakistani side of the shared border. Now Musharraf thinks that cracking down on the nation is going to help curb extremism. I seriously doubt attempting to crack down on a bunch of lawless extremists is going to actually check those extremists. In reality it's tantamount to disturbing a hornet's nest. The only way Musharraf wins against the extremists is to crack down in the worst way, which is to pull all the troops into a genocidal massacre mode, which of course will turn the world and probably the rest of his own people against him. Well I don't know how he held on this long, but if he doesn't die in a bloody coup someday I would be surprised.

Blogging from the top of the world

2007-10-22T21:59:00.000-08:00

See my previous post for a brief explanation of the situation, but here I am posting another brief note letting anyone else know what's going on. I am almost literally at the top of the world in the subarctic city of Fairbanks Alaska. So amongst my other rants you can expect to see a few about the weather here. Right now its about 0 degrees F and falling and it's still only fall. So for those who don't know, it's going to get much colder and much darker soon, possibly down to 50 or 60 below. I almost can't wait to rant about it, but it's still "warm" for now so I'll hold off. Anyways, this is just a short update. I'm set up here now, so hopefully I'll post a bit more often and put some more interesting stuff up here.

Busy, Busy

2007-10-08T13:42:00.001-08:00

Well this is not quite how I planned for this blog to go, but I will be running all over the place the next couple weeks, so I won't be updating often. I was just starting to get this thing off and running, so for any of you who might run across this, check back in a couple weeks.

Votevets.org

2007-10-04T11:42:00.000-08:00

I simply had to react about an ad I just saw on Fox News which surprised me. Firstly, everyone knows Fox News is biased towards Conservatives. This is why I watch it mostly anyways, until it starts to annoy me with its alarmist and dumbed-down style. But I digress.... Votevets.org ran an ad on FoxNews that had an Iraq veteran(or supposed vet, but I'll give them the benefit of the doubt) that is trying to capitalize on the Rush Limbaugh story.

If you haven't seen it, Rush Limbaugh supposedly called some people in the military phony soldiers and Mediamatters.org picked up on it and took it out of context. In actuality, he was talking about a blogger who made up stories of our soldiers committing atrocities in Iraq. This phony soldier was indeed in the military, but never served in Iraq. At least that is how the story goes. So in essence he was a fake, and there have been other phony stories as well. If you have read any of my posts within the last couple weeks you would know I believe in intelligent debate and that includes members of our military too. They should be the first to be allowed to speak out about a war in which they will have to put their lives on the line. The problem is this -- if you lie about events that didn't happen or even try to take someone's words and twist them to your benefit, you are dishonest and phony. So with that in mind, the blogger who made up stories to get hits on his blog, mediamatters.org, and now votevets.org should all get the Phony Soldier Award because the lies and half-truths are simply dishonorable.

Amazon Honor System

2007-09-30T14:42:00.000-08:00

I just wanted to post a quick rant about Amazon Honor System and customer service. I just got on the phone with them after finding two transactions where they withdrew money from my account, without my permission. I opened the account, which was supposed to be free and they charged my account to verify it is valid. Now Paypal does the same thing, sort of, when you verify and that's just fine. They actually make very small deposits into your account though and they let you know in advance. The problem I have is that there was no advance warning, and that is what irks me. You should always let someone know upfront before you even think about withdrawing any money from them.

Customer service was sort of okay. I could tell he was reading from a script. Then he asked me for my credit card number, which they have in the system already, since they took money from me. I refused about three or four times, because he kept going back to his damn script and asking me three or four times. The only good thing is I think he asked someone for help and they came up with the real answer. This is normal and I will be seeing those verification withdrawals reversed.

Anyways, these postings do take time to do and if you are amused and appreciate them feel free to donate some change via the Paypal link below and to the right. The Amazon Honor System link has been removed due to my irritation and won't be back. If you don't want to donate, well thats fine as well. Just enjoy the posts or comment that you don't enjoy them, or whatever.

Dissent is not Treason

2007-09-30T01:42:00.000-08:00

I was just over at BlogCritics.org reading an article by Patrick and posted a comment to it as well. I was so irked by the article that I wrote what seemed like a book and felt I had to post my comments here. Check out the article over here first though-- Patrick's article

Man oh man! I could go on forever with this article. I barely even know where to begin. In trying to remain civil in my dissent, I'll simply say that I disagree with almost everything you have said. Obviously I am a conservative, but definitely not aligned with any political party. I would consider myself an independent, but the one thing I can't stand is Bush bashing. Fine he isn't the greatest leader we've ever had. There's a big mess in Iraq. Everything that is wrong with the world is all Bush's fault and since Patraeus works for Bush, well he is a traitor isn't he?

Look we are at war! Like it or not we are at war in Iraq, we are at war in Afghanistan, we are at war in places that neither you, I, or even the government fully know about as well. The War on Terror is global. We have been at war with Islamists for a quarter century at least, but just started fighting it after 3,000 civilians lost their lives in 2001. Bush didn't figure it out until it was too late, Clinton didn't have a clue, Bush 1, and even Reagan never took a serious look at this quagmire that started years ago. The bottom line is that they all suck!

To win a war, we need some unity though. No running, like the Dems want to do, no calling our generals traitors like MoveOn.org , no spitting on our troops like in the Vietnam war. Dissent is perfectly fine. You can have unity and dissent at the same time, if only you keep it respectful. When our "leaders" act like stupid children, the enemy sees us as weak and they keep fighting us even harder (ie Vietnam and Iraq). Laws won't save us, running from Iraq won't save us, and going at each other's throats won't save us either.

When the surge began I was actually a bit disappointed, because we sent so few soldiers(not victims like you claim) to clean this mess up. I thought we needed to send enough troops into Iraq to lock that country down, finish the job, and then get the hell out of there. Instead we got 30,000 troops(which really isn't enough) sent into a still prolonged, bloody war. We need to finish the job, politics aside, and get our families home, period. Leaving early under any circumstance is a horrible mistake which I believe we will pay for with our nations blood and probably our children's blood one day.

Vote Fred

2007-09-28T22:25:00.001-08:00

I'm joining the Blogroll for Fred Thompson. Why? Well I want to see someone win who has at least a semblance to America's traditional values. Personally I might vote for Obama if I had to vote Democrat but I would much prefer a Republican president. So with that in mind, Fred Thompson seems like the best dog in the race for now. He seems like the kind of no-nonsense guy this country needs to stay on track and win this fight we are in ( and no I'm not talking about Iraq only, there is actually a real war we need to be fighting.) It's too bad we didn't have someone in charge before 2000 that realized we were at war already (sorry Bill Clinton you did drop the ball big time). Anyways, vote for Fred, he's the only candidate who I believe can lead us through the next 4 or 8 years. Check out the blog below too!!

Al-Qaeda in Iraq Leader Killed Again....

2007-09-28T21:46:00.000-08:00

The leader of Al-Qaeda in Iraq was killed today, again..... Abu Usama al-Tunisi was killed in an airstrike by US forces. Not only was he killed, well he apparently was killed once before too :)
Here is an excellent post from Counterterrorismblog.org

Evan Kohlmann writes that he was reportedly killed last year. Peculiar?!? Hey and remember Abu Musab al Zarqawi. He's the one who was on a video beheading an American and when he was killed, the military made a big deal of it. You know I think it's absolutely wonderful to kill any terrorist that we can, but killing the leader of the group doesn't seem to make much difference, when there's always another leader to take his place. Personally I won't rejoice until Usama bin Laden is killed and this darn fight is over, but then neither might even happen in my lifetime.

Meathead endorses Clinton

2007-09-28T09:13:00.000-08:00

Rob Reiner, according to a Yahoo news story I just read, has endorsed Hillary Clinton for President. This is really a non-story if you ask me. A Hollywood big-wig endorses a Democrat for some position. It's not at all unusual and seems pretty typical. So what I wonder is this -- Why should I care and why did I waste my thirty seconds reading that story anyways?

New Affiliation with BlogRush

2007-09-27T21:08:00.000-08:00

To those who haven't had the chance to read my blog, after you do read it, check out the BlogRush links to other blogs on the side. If you have a blog and wish to join, please use this link http://www.blogrush.com/r54499462
to credit me for the suggestion.

thanks much,
Therealisttruest

Michael Freakin' Vick

2007-09-26T19:53:00.000-08:00

Mike, Mike, Mike, are you kidding me? So you got caught doing something stupid and quite frankly inhumane. You said you're sorry and now you're awaiting sentencing in court for the stupid stuff you did. So how can you pass your time? You can't play football, hmmm .... What's the most fun and very best thing you can do before you get your prison sentence. Hey, I know! How about you do something else stupid and by the way, illegal. Way to impress the judge! Now pass that blunt!

My rant for today

2007-09-25T23:30:00.000-08:00

This rant is actually overdue. So I had a good job with a pretty good company, but wasn't doing enough development work there. I decided to get a job elsewhere and ended up at a startup as a Junior Developer(I just graduated last year and am trying to gain more experience.) I took a huge gamble with this company and it didn't work out for me.

I got off to a bad start because I honestly was a bit complacent. I did not apply myself as much as I should have and because of that I was put in a bad situation. So when I did finally start busting my tail, I was told it wasn't enough. AHHHH! The fact of the matter is there are two reasons I was let go.

I really didn't work hard enough at the start. Lesson learned.
They didn't want someone who had little to almost no real world experience, they wanted someone who knew what they were doing, which at this point in my career I don't fully know that much. I can code, but I've never been involved in a serious project before. I needed leadership and guidance and they had neither of those qualities. Anyways, it sucks that it didn't work out, but I will be fine. Now to just find a job.....

Iranian prez is an idiot

2007-09-25T22:53:00.000-08:00

So there are no homosexuals in Iran, really? Well that is what the president of Iran said at Columbia U. Yeah, about that.... Anyways, what's worse is that as stupid as he sounded, Bollinger from Columbia sounded more stupid. By berating the leader of a sovereign nation, Bollinger, came off as arrogant and ignorant. So instead of accomplishing anything, hoping to put the Iranian president in check, he made Americans look like rude pigs. Then the American delegation leaves right before Mahmoud A's speech at the UN, because like little children, we aren't talking to Iran.

Does anyone else see why we are losing respect in the world? Despite the strongest military in the world, we can't defeat a bunch of disorganized terrorists in the middle of the desert. We have a little imp in North Korea that is constantly spitting at us, and then we have this other troll in the Middle East that is helping a bunch of disorganized terrorists fight us, but we can't solve that issue either. Seriously, please let's end the politics and fight this war! The only way to not lose it to win. The only way to win is to kick some a##.

What do you think the Iranian President will say at Columbia?

2007-09-23T22:57:00.000-08:00

Does anyone else out there think that President Ahmadinejad (wow that is not so easy to spell) is going to be a coward when he speaks at Columbia U? Seriously, does anyone think he will actually say 'Death to America' or 'Death to Israel' when he is in the U.S. ? I don't think so, as I have seen his rhetorical web-weaving when confronted on Holocaust denial and other such things. Do we hate America? , no he' ll say only the policies of the current government. Meanwhile back in Tehran he would be leading the chants of 'death to america'. I mean seriously, I think we should let him go ahead and visit the WTC site too, only without security. Then let the Good People of New York show him some American hospitality. Anyways, just my thoughts on the subject....

Hello Blogosphere

2007-09-23T01:48:00.000-08:00

Okay, well this is my first blog, ever. I don't really know what to put here, yet, but I am thinking this will just be rants, software stuff(since I am a programmer), and maybe politics. I'm about to turn in, but I wanted to put something up here since I opened it up this evening and thought I would just say 'Hi' to anyone who might come across this.