ben robison
when only more words will do
Subscribe to RSSTips for 1st Time Home Buyers
I think I found the Get Rich Slowly blog through the Google Reader recommendations, but regardless of how I found it, I like the way this guy thinks. My father and my father-in-law have very different philosophies on money and how to spend it, but my risk averse nature means that I tend to play conservative when it comes to spending thousands of dollars at a time.
Alison and I are saving money to buy a home. Alison shops around online and keeps an eye on prices in different neighborhoods around the valley. I rule the monthly budget with an iron fist to make sure that a few hundred dollars goes into a house savings fund every month. We’ve never bought a house before, and it’ll be awhile before we can afford it, but for anyone who finds themselves in this situation, this article at Get Rich Slowly offers some advice.
Some of my favorite tips are:
- Get pre-qualified for the mortgage and spend only 75% of that amount
- Make a list of priorities
- Buy less than you can afford
A Use For Game Consoles Even Mom Can’t Argue With
The folding@home project started back in 2000. The idea is that thousands of computers all over the world donate their spare processor time to performing hugely complex mathematical computations that normally take supercomputer strength. People have been using their game consoles for the task as well, and for some reason, (I’ve never understood) PlayStation owners seem to be particularly fond of this.
I thought it was a cool idea (though I’ve never done it myself), but didn’t understand the focus on PlayStations. Now the PS3 has scientists all excited again. Apparently, the calculations required to show the intense gaming graphics in today’s games are quite similar to the ones required by physicists and chemists the world over to model their moving particles (whether atoms or stars). According to the article and the folding@home site, the Cell processor in Sony’s (mildly successful) new console takes the cake in terms of scientific usefulness.
Sony’s latest version of the PS3 software now includes an official folding@home client that allows your game console to perform work in 8 hour chunks called work units. So it’s probably not something you’d flip on during the day, but why not help out at night? Tell mom you need a PlayStation 3 to help make the world a better place.
How Well Does Your Name Google?
So if you’re anything like me, from time to time you google your name. I like to see how many of the top 10 results are actually me. Since I started doing this a year or two ago, I simply cannot compete with Benjamin Robison the apparently famous violinist. Though my blog gets a fair amount of traffic, I can’t make any headway against him.
Next in line is Ben Robison the director of an aircraft carrier fleet and then third on the list is me. Then you’ll find a link to Ardesco’s site and find out that Benjamin Robison the violinist is also a director (no wonder I can’t top him).
Then there’s the Blue Dwarf’s blog talking about my visit to the Web Analytics class at BYU. Whoever the Blue Dwarf is, he must be an SEO expert, cause my name is only on that page one time, and I was surprised to see it ranked so high.
The there’s ISLand where my blog gets resyndicated, followed by a few more blogs mentioning Ben Robisons that aren’t me. And finally my LinkedIn profile rounds out the top 10.
So that gives me 40% of the top 10. Not too bad, I thought until I googled my neighbor’s name just for fun. Dang Him! All top 10 results are relevant to him. Sure he’s got his own photography business. Sure Apple has spotlighted his work. Sure he’s got movies about him on YouTube. Sure his photography rep links to him. But does that make him more special than me =)
Anybody want to make popular movies about me and post them on YouTube? No takers?!
5th Cable Gets Cut - Sounds Like An Inside Job
Or a U.S. job =)
When two cables got caught, we chalk it up to coincidence. The third was a little strange, but still possibly explainable. When the fourth was cut, suspicions arose. Today, a 5th undersea cable was cut, and now it can only be explained by the super-secret government James-Bond-but-US-style agent.
That’s my theory anyway. Five cut cables is a little too much to chalk up to coincidence and given the strategic location of the cuts, someone had something in mind, when they got out their industrial strength underwater internet cable cutters, climbed into their robot-armed submersible, and took it down a few thousand feet.
No terrorists have no reason to cut internet access to their hidey-holes do they? It’s a guessing game of who would have a motive to do something like that. Maybe we (the US) are testing out new forms of warfare. Somebody in the Pentagon said “I know, let’s cut off their Internet access and maybe they’ll just give up.”
Tags: conspiracy
Super Tuesday Demonstrates Liberalism, Prejudice, and a Few Other Things
A few quick thoughts on yesterday’s primaries.
It’s not secret that I’ve been supporting Mitt in my own small ways, but it’s been acknowledged many times that if you’re looking for a conservative who supports the three traditional conservative pillars, Mitt Romney is your man.
Sure McCain is gobbling up lots of the independent votes, but the number of Republicans voting for McCain says one of two things: Either Americans in general are getting less conservative and care less about families, life, lower taxes, etc. or they’re (for some reason) willing to believe that McCain will not continue to do as he’s done in the past and thumb his nose at the conservative Republicans from whence his support comes.
All the people voting for Huckabee says something a little worse. Though Huckabee staunchly refuses to accept the fact that his completely unexpected success yesterday represents anything but a resurgence in his bid for President, it’s now widely known that McCain was throwing his votes in the Huck direction in an effective (though below-the-belt) tactic to keep Romney from getting votes.
Whether people don’t like Romney because he’s a Mormon, or because McCain’s palpable feelings of personal hatred towards Gov. Romney are contagious, it certainly seems that though the country is willing to elect it’s first woman president, or it’s first black president, the fear/misunderstanding of Mormonism has not been completely overcome.
Prejudice works both ways and the incredibly strong showing at the Southern Polls shows a bit of prejudice in the opposite direction.
Well, things look bad in the Mitt camp this morning, but what scares me the most is how divisive this has been for the party in general. I’ve heard many good conservative people voicing opinions that they’d rather vote for Hillary than McCain. There’s a scary thought.