Copied from my conversation on Facebook

Posted on December 7, 2011 by Alex

I was involved in a conversation regarding the Republican Nominee for President in the 2012 Elections. The first message I posted with opened with this, a reply to a statement the Gingrich should be it, “I wouldn’t vote for Newt if he was the last person on Earth running against Obama. Newt is just as two faced as the Obummer.

If you’re voting Republican just because it is the individual that is running against Hussein, than your vote has no meaning. There are more than two parties, as much as everyone seems to want you to believe there is not.

Look at the Libertarian Party and, more specifically, Alexander Snitker whom ran for President under the Libertarian platform in 2008. I wish I knew about him in 2008 as I had begrudgingly voted for McCain that year.

Never again. From now on, I vote principles. The R & D parties are nothing more than an insignificant title slapped onto, in the last 120+ years, the same sides of the same coin, differentiating themselves in the nooks and crannies of George Washington’s face.

Give me liberty or give me death.”

This was then followed by some blabber on their part where the main point being that Gingrich is so much better than most of the other Republicans and that we need a President, to which my reply was “I agree, in principal. It is better to have anyone in office that is not a Socialist, Communist, Statist, etc. that the Chosen One, our Lord and Savior, OBAMA! (These Obama titles and comments are all sarcastic, if it’s not obvious) However, 99.9% of politicians are just that; shiny fluff covering slop and even if the President is a person that fights for your liberty, we have the House and Senate and the Judicial system working against you.

Technically, The People is the 4th branch of Government in a Democracy but with the Government robbing Peter to pay Paul, you can always count on Paul’s support. Throughout history, that’s how Democracies have collapsed.

As with Matt Guerra I’m a Paul supporter, although, truthfully, my principles are more Anarchist than anything else. I believe that nobody is better at controlling my life that I am and that through mutually beneficial co-operation (which is what trade is) is when real progress occurs. Not when the Mafia that is the U.S. Government is scraping off a percentage of your profits to give to those tired, poor, huddled masses yearning to breathe free that it feeds without any need to pay back, just asking for the votes to support them, keeping them in office.

Throughout history, trade has brought tens and hundreds of millions even billions of people from utter poverty to sustainability and beyond, however, Obama and the cronies on both sides of the isle (and the fight between Liberty and Submission goes back further to the beginning, the Jefferson – Hamilton times of our Government) are working to slowly build the State’s all-encompassing powers around you.

At least, that’s what my studies of history has shown me.”

Those are some of my thoughts… I have more but I will leave those for later.

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The $300 bike ride

Posted on October 5, 2011 by Alex

Today is an unlucky day for me. I lost both a new blinking light that attaches to the back of my bike and which I use for early evening riding that might carry over to dusk or even twilight and my new pair of Oakley sunglasses. Actually, the frame wasn’t new, per se, as they were ones that I had purchased last year, however, the were holding a new pair of lenses that I had bought and installed over the weekend.

Both fell when I hit a bump in the road. My sunglasses were on my helmet, as it was too dark for me to ride with them on, and the light became detached. I thought the light was pretty securely attached; however, it appears I was in the wrong.

Consider it an offering to the Road Gods, I suppose, may the roads be safe and no cyclists are injured…

Posted in Bicycling | 2 Comments

Rum Sour

Posted on August 20, 2011 by Alex

Before this drink is mixed, simple syrup is a required ingredient. Simple syrup is, as the name implies, very simple, and is the combination of equal parts white sugar and water. Place the water in a pot and heat and add the sugar while increasing the temperature until the sugar molecules dissolve. Once that has occurred, allow the syrup to cool to room temperature (depending on the temperature of the room it is prepared in), add the contents to a glass jar and then place said glass jar into a the refrigerator and allow to cool.

As a side note, I’ve also made simple syrup using brown sugar instead of white. Using brown sugar subtracts from the overt-sweetness found in white sugar simple syrup and adds a slight molasses-undertone to the palette.

Pretty much the same drink as the whiskey sour; however, with white rum instead of whiskey. Interesting drink.
Lime juice

  • 2.5 ounces of white rum (Cruzan aged rum was used)
  • 1 ounce of simple syrup
  • 1 ounce of lime juice

The lime juice used was fresh squeezed lime juice, picked up at a local grocery store for about $ 0.10 each; nothing special. Often substituted are lime mixers, however, I find the taste of preservatives added to most lime-mixers to detract significantly from the final product.

rum sourAdd the above listed ingredients to a strainer, shake, and empty the contents into a whiskey glass. Voila.

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Hoover, FDR, and The Great Depression

Posted on August 18, 2011 by Alex

The Creature From Jekyll Island A friend of mine, a friend of his and I recently had a short conversation regarding the validity of Keynsian Economics and how it is as much the solution to the world’s fiscal ailments back in the 1930s as it is now. He was of the opinion that if the Republicans just let President Obama do as he pleases, everything would be fine and he agrees with the belief that racism drives the ideology of the Tea Party. There are several other issues that are of concern to him that I won’t raise at this time but I am going to bring my post on Facebook which was in reply to his.

I do agree that racism, pure hatred of a race that one does not belong to, could be behind some; however, I am of a belief that most people want the freedom to do with their lives as they please, which is my reasoning for hating all overlords, no matter their race, gender, sex, or any other classification. The article that he linked to which is in question can be found here.

Following, find a clip from my blabbering from our discussion on John Meynard Keynes and his “solution” to the Great Depression is not the correct solution and how the approach advocated by President Eisenhower would be the correct solution. If there is anything that you disagree with, please comment on why you feel it is incorrect. Thanks in advance.

“Pre-Panic of 1907, before the creation of the Federal Reserve, there were plenty of Market crashes, significant falls in employment, etc.; however, thanks to the fact that there was no one, or a small group of individuals, looking to command the economy, a la Soviet Russia, the recovery was quick. Although there were several other attempts to create a bank that could control U.S. Monetary supply and policy, none had been as powerful as the Federal Reserve and all had been dissolves several years after inception.

For example, after WW2 ended, there was a platitude of people claiming that with the war over, and all the soldiers returning home, unemployment would be a huge problem and that we needed massive amounts of public works projects to keep people earning income so that they could re-channel it into the economy.

However, then President Truman decided to agree with the critics whom were exclaiming that, with all the soldiers returning home and the economy set up for war, unless we were involved in another war or spent huge amounts of money on public work projects, like the Hoover Dam which was begun during the beginning of the Great Depression, unemployment would skyrocket and we would continue the Great Depression. However, with the election of Dwight D. Eisenhower, and the economy not being taken in control by the Government, we were able to transition, not smoothly, there were several hiccups along the way. However, and as most should know, the economy did not enter a Depression 2.0 or re-enter the Great Depression even without the huge amounts of public works spending.

So, yes, the majority of people whom side with the Tea Party may may not understand economics, but neither do most of the professors who try to teach economics, it appears.”

I believe a strong fallacy exists in the notion that trade is a zero sum game, which I feel is the notion behind Keysian Economics. I, on the other hand, feel that trade is a trade-off between two, or more, parties where both parties end up befitting. For example, an individual goes into the store to purchase a new pair of shoes. When the purchase is made, the store is in a better condition than it was before the transaction because it was able to trade it’s good, the pair of shoes, for something that it sees to be more valuable than shoes, money to pay the employees of the store, restock inventory, exchange for the utilities, location that allowed it to make the sale, and any that is left over as profit which it can use in whichever way it finds most promising. The customer, on the other hand, was able to trade their money for something that they desired; the pair of shoes.

In this manner, trade is a transaction where parties on both sides of the transaction are better off than they were before the transaction took place. Keynsian Economics, on the other hand, feels that it is just as beneficial to the parties if party a purchases something that is made by party c, where party b is in the position to tell party c what it is that they will produce and in the process party b removes a commission from party c’s income.


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Thoughts on the debt ceiling and credit rating of the U.S.

Posted on August 6, 2011 by Alex

A few quick thoughts: Recently, S&P downgraded the credit rating of the United States from AAA+ to AA+ (story linked to here). This move, to me, feels similar to how Volcker slammed on the brakes of inflation during the latter years of the 70s and early 80s by raising rates, to, if I recall correctly, near 20%. In a world where individuals and institutions are grasping for yield, doing so provides, in essence, the same effect that Volcker performed (money will come into the U.S. to purchase their bonds; however, a move from a AAA+ rating to AA+ means little as Japan also has a AA+ rating).

Although I am also on the side that believes we should not have our economy run by one or a small group of individuals, I am in agreement with S&P in so doing and, furthermore, feel that even with a slight move down from AAA+ to AA+ would mean very little in the rate of real inflation.

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Google Webmaster Tools : Google Site Verification without a Plugin for your WordPress Blog

Posted on July 29, 2011 by Alex

Google Verify Ownership

Code to be added between opening and closing <head> tags

Adding Google’s site verification requires a few very simple steps when one is utilizing a normal website; however, things become a tad bit more complicated when your site is a dynamically generated site such as a blog utilizing WordPress. Thankfully, though, the process of doing this is quite similar to a previous post in which I added Facebook’s Insights web-monitoring tools to my WordPress blog and in a few steps one can integrate both Facebook Insights and Google Webmaster Tools to have a better view of their site’s utilization.

Google Webmaster Tools2The first step required is to have an account in Google’s Webmaster Tools, which a link to can be found here. After creating an account on the site you are required to verify ownership of the site(s) which you are claiming are yours. This can be done by uploading a file that is provided by Google to your web-server, adding a DNS record or by adding a meta tag to your home page. I chose the addition of a meta tag to my home page. The page that appears when you click the radiobutton for Add a meta tag to your site’s home page contains the code that requires aggregation between the opening <head> tag and closing </head> tag on your site’s header.php file.

Assuming one is using WordPress to manage their blog, navigate to the folder where you have WordPress installed and in that folder navigate to the folder /wp-content/themes/xxx where xxx is the name of the currently active theme. in your themes/xxx folder you should see the file header.php Access that file for editing and add to your code,

<meta name="google-site-verification" content="0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000" />

where the content="" is that which was provided by Google when you choose to add Meta-data to your website as verification of your ownership. Meta-name should be the same no matter whom the site is accessed by.

Upon adding the supplied meta-tag to your website you should now have a plethora of information regarding which Google queries are used to find your site, whom is linking to your site, and keyword usage in your blog posts, what the average positioning result is for your various pages in a Google search depending on keywords, which keywords are most activley searched that appear on your site, etc., etc.

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Thoughts on Gold and Silver

Posted on July 27, 2011 by Alex

A thought came across my mind as the result of an e-mail that I received from a company called the U.S. Gold Bureau stating “Debt Ceiling Stalemate Pushes Gold to New Highs” regarding how gold and silver’s price has been rising because of Congress’s inability to agree on how much the U.S. should increase their currency in circulation by. Some of the facts that lay behind said statement are true but I’m not quite sure if I agree with that statement 100%, even 50%.

Peace Silver Coins 1921 - 1935

Peace Silver Dollars, minted between 1921 - 1935

First and foremost, I do not believe that it is the inability of Congress to decide on raising the debt ceiling of the United States that is leading to the rise in price, rather, it is the increase in the total U.S. money supply (the Monetary Base, MB [M-bee] which includes cash and coins in circulation and in bank vaults as well as M3 which is no longer measured [as of 2006, I believe] but includes traveler’s checks of non-bank issuers, demand deposits, negotiable order of withdrawal (NOW) accounts at depository institutions, credit union share draft accounts, savings deposits, time and money-market deposit accounts, money market funds, short-term repurchase and other larger liquid assets PLUS MZM, which is financial assets redeemable at par on demand.) The rapid rise in the Ms that we’ve seen since 2001 in relation to the supply of gold and silver is the cause in the rise of the cost of said precious metals. Meaning, since we have more dollars in circulation that do not correspond to a rise in the amount of gold and silver available, prices for said items rise. That same principal applies to most things that we use in our daily lives, including fuel, groceries, animal feed, electricity, housing, etc., etc., etc. All of these were open to manipulation and the results of said manipulation were furthered significantly when they were opened to means of multiplying their values. Furthermore, it is people’s confidence in the Dollar that also effects this. As the World is less and less willing to view the U.S. Dollar as the de facto reserve currency, the price in dollars for said precious metal will increase.

From what I’ve understood of history and currency crises in the past as well as both Gold and Silver among other items with intrinsic value, items that one is not able to print more of or make appear electronically in a bank account in New York or wherever, will rise significantly. Ancient Rome and the Weimar Rebublic are prime examples of how a country’s government can destroy the wealth of it’s citizens and the return of a barter system ensues when the value of the paper money, no matter the multiple applied to it, is worthless. The only reason the U.S. is currently able to act in such a manner is the result of the U.S. Dollar being the World’s Reserve Currency, the day when that is no longer true, though…

Businesses buying politicians and politicians passing regulations so that these companies can maintain or establish an unearned advantage have been manners in which countries and companies have operated since countries with independent companies have existed. The Railroads were that way, drug companies are protected from competition by Leviathan, which is why drug costs are so high, and the end-result is quite clear. The ever-encroaching leviathan that is Government devours more and more freedom as time progresses.

I’ll end with a favorite quote of mine, which is attributed to ‎Alexander Tyler, and has a strong correlation to what this blog post was about; “Great nations rise and fall. The people go from bondage to spiritual truth, to great courage, from courage to liberty, from liberty to abundance, from abundance to selfishness, from selfishness to complacency, from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependence, from dependence back again to bondage.”

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Pegu Club Cocktail

Posted on July 19, 2011 by Alex

Pegu Club Cocktail ingredients

Gin, Triple Sec, Lime juice, angostura Bitters

The ingredients required for the Pegu Club Cocktail are gin, orange liquor, lime juice, angostura bitters and a slice of lime wedge for garnishing.

Another classic cocktail, the Pegu Club Cocktail is named after the Pegu Club in Burma (Myanmar) where it is supposed to have originated from. Before any of the ingredients are mixed, fill the glass with ice cubes and add water so that the glass can cool while you prepare your ingredients. Add gin (Gordon’s was used), 2 ounces, 3/4oz of orange liquor (I used Triple Sec), 1/2 an ounce of fresh squeezed lime juice (I can’t stand lime mixers), and 2 dashes of Angostura Bitters. Empty the glass containing ice and water, add the aforementioned ingredients to a shaker filled with ice, jar repeatedly, remove the cap from the strainer and flush the liquid contents of the strainer into your chilled glass. Tear a small slit into the wedge of lime and garnish your glass.

Pegu Club Cocktail

Pegu Club Cocktail


On first glance, the visual aspect of the Pengu is reminiscent of a dirty martin, slightly cloudy; however, on closer inspection it yields a pale yellow to the murkiness that is not found in aforementioned drink. Furthermore, when one takes a closer look, it is apparent that much of the cloudy-ness is procured from the miniscule particles of pulp within the squeezed lime juice. On the nose it provides hints of both lemon and lime and a certain, almost Band-aid-like medicinal quality derived from the bitters.

Mouth-feel is very soft and the finish is accentuated with the slight tingle of citrus juices. Personally, and this may weird to most, I much prefer the flavors once the drink has warmed to room temperature. Similar to my thoughts on wine, when the liquid is provided at room temp, the flavor profile is much more easy to navigate.

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Adding a Favicon to your WordPress Blog

Posted on July 12, 2011 by Alex

The favicon, sometimes referred to as an urlicon or a website icon, is the icon that can be found in the upper left hand corner of your browser and, if you have tabs open, the lefthand side of said tab. The favicon is a 16 pixel by 16 pixel image (sometimes 32 by 32 or other multiple of 16, to suit your designing) that is a visual representation of your company, a product you offer, your Fav Iconsmascot, or whatever you feel fit that you would like users to view when they have your site open as well as the image that appears next to a bookmark of your site.

Adding a favicon to your site is a rather straightforward process. Although it may feel a bit more difficult to do to your WordPress Blog, it is actually a very simple process if you have access to the root directory of where your Blog is installed. The first thing one needs to do is create or download a fav icon to be used on their site. Below is a list of two favicon sites that may be of interest.

After a favicon has been created, download it to your computer and then upload it to your website’s root directory. Next, open your Header.php file and between the opening and closing <Head> tag insert the code <link rel=”shortcut icon”
href=”http://yoursite.com/favicon.ico” /> where yoursite.com is your site and anything following the / is the address for where your favicon is located.

Now, when you open your page, you should see the icon that you’ve created sitting to the left hand side of your url, providing you with the opportunity to further ingrain your company into your site and your patrons’ mind.

Posted in Work | 1 Comment

Gin Lime, Pink Lady and Another Whiskey Sour

Posted on July 7, 2011 by Alex

Ingredients used to make a Gin LimeI decided to mix a few drinks over the last few evenings and decided to first use gin as the base for several drinks. The first drink I prepared is called the Gin and Lime. The drink is a mixture of, not surprisingly, Gin and fresh squeezed lime juice. The other ingredients of the mixture are Orange Juice and Lime Mixer. The first step, though, has nothing to do with the alcohol mixed into the drink, rather, take a martini glass, fill it with ice and then add water. Let the glass cool while you mix the remaining ingredients of the drink.

Combine 1.5 ounces of gin with 0.5 ounces of fresh squeezed lime juice, 0.5 ounces of orange juice and one teaspoon of sweetened lime mixer in a shaker, lightly shaken, and then strain into a highball glass. I found the citrusy-flavor to be quite strong but on the back of the throat, as you consume the concoction, a warm tingle hits your throat, reminding you that “Hey, I contain alcohol!”

Pink Lady

The Pink Lady

The next mixed drink I will mention is one referred to as the Pink Lady. The pink color comes from the mix of Grenadine and light cream that was used as part of the ingredients. Combine the ingredients in a strainer filled with ice, apply the cap and shake.

  • 1.5 ounces of Gin
  • 1 teaspoon of Grenadine
  • 1 teaspoon of light cream
  • 1 whole egg white

It sits in ones glass with a similar look to that of Pepto-Bismal with it’s off-pink color, however, on the palate carries the smooth feel that only egg white can bring. The pink color makes one believe this would be an overtly sweet drink, an attribute I am not fond of, but the egg white as well as the light cream diffuse the patent sacchariferous qualities of pink drinks does not appear so brazenly as to be overpowering.

I tried another recipe for Whiskey Sour which utilizes 1/2 Oz. of lemon juice, 1/2 teaspoon of powdered sugar and 2 ounces of Finnegan’s 8 Year Old Scotch Whiskey. Instead of lemon juice I decided to use lime juice as I currently have an abundance of lime in my refrigerator. It’s a little known fact that zombies suffer from Scurvy, which presents itself in the symptoms of malaise and lethargy. If anyone has watched movies with zombies in it or is in acquaintance with one, those are some of the most significant attributes of zombies. Well, besides their hunger for brains, of course.

As for the drink; I’m not sure I am a fan of this incorporation, the sourness of the lime juice overpowered almost every aspect of the drink. Perhaps it was the Finnegan’s as I’ve had several opportunities to try this whiskey and I’ve been quite unimpressed each time with the end result of drinks containing it.

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