Here’s my tweet:

I’m typing on a computer. It’s what I do for both work and play.

If I’m not typing a computer, then I am in a meeting (where I might be typing on a computer), driving, sleeping, or playing with my son. You see, I don’t have much of a life or at least one people would find interesting. Unless you are climbing a mountain, crossing a continent, or making love to a beautiful woman, I’m not interested in your life, either.

But when I do something fun and interesting, then I have something better to do with my time than type on a computer. Therefore, I don’t tweet.

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

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Newspaper executives are panicking and laying off reporters and editors. Florida papers are suffering too. The Orlando Sentinel has cut back and forced many into retirement. Although the Sentinel’s circulation has risen for its Sunday paper, its daily figures are down 4 percent.

The South Florida papers are really hurting, with the Miami Herald down almost 8 percent, and the South Florida Sun Sentinel down 9 percent. Almost all are down, except for one – the St. Petersburg Times. While the Times is only holding its own, it is not dropping. In Hillsborough County, the Tampa Tribune’s home turf, it is gaining while the Tribune drops almost 6 percent overall.

Why the difference? The Times does have an older readership which is not as likely to turn to the Internet for news. But so does the Trib and the Sun Sentinel.

But the Times is the only paper not owned by a public corporation that has to answer to stockholders. Its parent is a not-for-profit foundation, the Poytner Institute. While others cut back and lay off their best writers, the Times keeps its staff.

The Times’ management get it. Media changes, but good writing and reporting never go out of style. They keep their staff and develop a user-friendly site that doesn’t have annoying flashover ads that interrupt your reading.

Just because I don’t get the paper at home doesn’t mean I don’t read it. Thanks to the Internet, I actually read several a day, and I don’t have to worry about recycling.

An animation fights the all powerful cursor.

Animator vs. Animation by *alanbecker on deviantART

If you would like to see a copy in Word or PDF, email me at or leave me a comment.

I have been promising to put my own personal site up for awhile, reserving my domain name. I also played around with a few blog packages and even Joomla before settling on WordPress. I have used Joomla to set up a site for a local non-profit, and I like its versatility. But it’s a little bit of overkill for a personal site.

I also looked at Nucleus, which has lots of themes (skins in Nucleus speak). However, Nucleus has one small bug that personally annoys me. I have an apostrophe in my last name, a vestige of my Irish roots. Nucleus does not like apostrophes.

When I enter my name in Nucleus, it is “Bob O/.” Now I have run into this issue quite often, particularly with UNIX-based applications. For a site that I use my own name, I would prefer that the blog software/CMS let me spell it correctly. So I switched to WordPress.

I first used WordPress for my wife’s site. I was able to launch her site within hours. After too long experimenting, I decided to try WordPress for mine.