The Life of Riley is a weekly post that details my activities since I ended a thirteen year career as a corporate drone. These posts are usually long, personal, and geared more for my own memory than the reader’s entertainment.

Sunday (Day 133):

Went to the breast cancer walk up in New Hampshire with #1GF!. Maybe I’m selfish, but after 5 miles of walking, I started thinking only of the free go-gurt and cookies at the finish line. I ate 3 bagels, 5 cookies, 3 go-gurts, chips and salsa, and a chocolate milk. On the way home, we went to pick up a present at Target, and #1GF! got called a white bitch because some dude tried to jam his car into a parking spot before #1GF! could get out of it. He was trying to snake the spot from someone who was patiently waiting, but he failed to consider that #1GF! couldn’t get out of the spot while he was in the way. I don’t think that she’s a white bitch. I think he was just mad because he didn’t get to benefit from acting like an asshole and had to walk an extra 15 feet to the store. Eh. Some people just aren’t nice.

Monday (Day 134): What Was That?

Added some more games to an Amazon store. Wrote the rest of the day away. Oh yea, and we made an offer on a house and went out for Mexican food.

Tuesday (Day 135): Hacking Wordpress

I have over 80 drafts, and the panel only allows me to see 15 at time, so I set out to figure out how to increase the number of posts I could see. A little PHP and an hour of my time and I figured out a solution. I then spent four hours documenting the process, leaving no time for anything else.

Wednesday (Day 136): Backup and Maintain Those Files

Started the day off reading. Quit the gym because it’s not convenient any more. Called about my car which has been in the shop for 2 weeks now. Got some CDs off the stairs, burned to disc, and stored in the CD rack. Got an accepted offer on a house. Called the lawyer, the mortgage guy, the broker, and the home inspection company. Backed up my Thunderbird profile, Firefox profile, my documents folder, MP3s, and RSS feeds with a combination of Mozbackup and the Microsoft Sync Toy. Defragged my drives with Auslogics Disc Defrag. Got a request from a band to do a review for their CD. That was a first.

Thursday (Day 137): Cut Out the Middle Man

Set up my first direct advertiser. Got my Alexa ranking bumped from 1.5 million a month ago, to around 633k a couple of weeks ago to 394k today. That’s still not good, but it’s moving up. gained about 20 pixels at the top of the site by editing the margin property that had been set at 20px by default. That’s 20 more pixels of reclaimed space above the fold.

Friday (Day 138): Air Ball of a Day

Talked to one of my friends who got fired from my old job. I wasn’t surprised that he called me because I didn’t really fit in there, either. Worked on my posts for the following week. Took down most of my affiliate advertising because it takes up a lot of space and hasn’t made me a dime. Started writing an advertising page to attract direct advertising. I’m learning a lot about advertising, and most of it is by failure, which may not be fun, but it’s a good way to learn.

Got a call from someone at the Mitsubishi corporate offices who I could tell wasn’t paying any attention at all. When she asked me how I was, I answered “Fine, thanks” to which she replied, “yes I can see why you’re upset”. Later when I was asking when my car would be done, she acted like I was asking something unrelated like how the weather was. I normally don’t get irritated at people on the phone, but the whole call was a waste of time.

Noticed that the “friends” I have on Stumbleupon are nothing more than fan relationships. Noticed that I have 50 ways to be contacted and not many people care. Got a little discouraged at the really poor money that I’m making and thought that I might either have to resort to donations or simply focus my time on things that I can actually get paid at. Got word that our house offer was signed.

Saturday (Day 139): Downtime

I finished up my Monday post in the morning and went to enjoy the nice weather with #1GF!’s niece and nephew. Then we had a nice dinner out with my folks.

What I learned

• I learned how to set up a direct advertiser.
• I learned that after 5 miles, causes don’t matter as much as snacks.
• I still have no idea how to provide advertising that adds value to my readers.
  Found out that a lot of my readers are nudists.
• Mitsubishi pretty much sucks at keeping the customer happy and I probably will never buy one of their cars again.
• I found out that my online social networking is as valuable as networking in my previous career. And I still need a lot of improvement.
• The rules of blogging are the same as the rules of corporate America, and probably of life. It doesn’t matter how hard you work. It doesn’t matter who you know. What matters most is who knows you.

Posted in Leisure