I told him I thought about getting out and doing something physical. Working from home hasn’t been melting the pounds the way I’d initially expected.

In some non-judo related conversation I relayed an epiphany I’d had the evening before: heroes make decisions early. The person that jumps in front of a bus to push a toddler to safety doesn’t decide to do that an instant before leaping, they decide to do it earlier in the day or last week or a couple years back. It just happens that they were unable to act until the last minute.

His responded with, “You need to train in aikido.”

I can’t say I’ve discovered how these two things are related. Maybe that’s black belt stuff.

“Dojo by Night” by Dimmerswitch.

I’ve had a blog in one form or another since late 2001. There is no evidence of this so don’t look. The earliest you might find would be some half-assed scribblings over a LiveJournal from March of 2002. That’s nearly six years of exposure to the technology, the culture, and the phenomenon without having made more than a 300k dent in Google’s cache. I’ve used or installed PHPNuke, LJ, MT, WP, Symphony, TextPattern, Blogger, WordPress.com, Drupal, and a few more I can no longer recall. Within just the stable of apps I can recall I’ve had maybe twelve blogs of no note come and go. Other’s just stall. I even had a podcast for half a year.

Amazon affiliation and Google AdSense are not the only ways to measure one’s success in the blogosphere, but if they were I’ve failed. Neither has sent me a check. By technical measures like Technorati or Feedburner or Analytics I chalk up in the fringes of WTFAY? When you read that there are now eighty gazillion blogs being created each month and you think to yourself, “Uh. What. How is that a good thing?” you might also come to the conclusion this is why I haven’t been noticed. Certainly the immeasurable glut of blogs hasn’t helped me any. Though if there were just ten of us bloggers I’d still be eleventh.

It’s all because I believe I don’t have content.

I’ve even said I don’t. It’s why I started blogs for my brother-in-law and with my brother. They had content. Natural, built-in, interesting content to populate page after page of readable, returnable, and rememberable¹ blog posts. I was satisfied with being the wind beneath their wings till they stopped enjoying flying.

The trouble is that I’m interested in going there and doing that and getting the t-shirt myself. I want to entertain and educate masses of drooling fan-boys and AdSense clickers. I want to kiss my day job good-bye and bring on the fame and fortune and fun.

As of now I’m going to pursue that fun. Since I am not inherently able to help you. I am going hunt content. I will sneak up behind it when it’s not looking. I will jump it, strangle it, and bring it back here bloody and steaming.

Bring a fork and a napkin because help is on it’s way.

Photograph courtesy of Whatknot

1. Alliteration trumps the use of real words any day.

So many parallels exist between me and The Waiter that I was only completing the first sentence of his latest when I knew the story he’d tell.

“I’m Batman” is a line from probably every one of the Batman movies. I am certain the one he references is the first. Micheal Keaton’s unlikely Bruce Wayne stammers the line to a room recently emptied of Kim Basinger’s Vicki Vale. In so many ways that scene characterizes Batman for me. Wanting recognition for his secret action’s knowing he can’t go public or he risks continuing to do good.

I think lots of boys want to have a secret. They want to be Zorro or King Arthur or to have a hidden door or a red phone. It’s exhilarating to know something about yourself that other’s can’t know. Especially when deep inside you know it makes you just a little better (not humble). Boys grow up to be men and I doubt they cast aside their desires to be a hero–I haven’t.

Maybe in an alternate universe I am The Waiter.

I suspect if you are looking for one of these already, then you are likely to be able to ferret out all the nuances, but here are the main features of v1.0:

• Displays 3 down-payment only amortization schedules
• Displays 1 Combo or second loan (good for avoiding Mortgage Insurance (MI) or if you don’t have down-payment money)
• Graphs the 4 loans by total cost
• Calculates principle and interest payments
• Estimates MI from an MI Factor value
• Allows for estimated Tax and Insurance values
• Tracks actual payments and check numbers
• Recalculates P and I if your actual payment exceeds your PITI (principle, interest, tax, insurance) payment

Mortgage Comparisons.xls

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