Earlier today, I called The Bullshit Police. If you’re going to call them, in the interest of fairness, you should call them on yourself from time to time.
So I thought it would be fun to do a post where I lay everything on the table for you, about me personally and professionally, and about the things I’m working on. This way in the future, if someone wants to call BS on me, I can just point them to this post or posts like it.
Rest assured, this is everything.
Personal
I blogged and tweeted about Amanda’s miscarriage in the Summer. We’re still kid free and will probably be that way for a few more years.
We’re still living at her parent’s house, saving money from both of our jobs so we can move out.
I want to move to Los Angeles some day, Amanda wants to stay here in Glens Falls. We butt heads about this, but we’ll wind up living here because I love my wife and she wants to be here with her family.
One exception: We may move to Omaha. My job is based out of there and I love the city. But thus far it’s proving difficult for Amanda to get cleared to teach there. One of us can’t go without a job, we have too much student debt.
Some day I’ll need heart surgery.
I still kick myself about losing our car in Vegas. Although assisted through other people’s idiocy, I accept and take full blame for us being without a car.
I probably won’t go back to school at UAlbany or SUNY Plattsburgh in the Fall. We’re paying off our student loans and I’d like to not push our debt much farther over the $100,000 mark.
I work full time for Wounded Warriors Family Support. It’s an awesome job with awesome people doing a wonderful thing for our soldiers and their families. I will do just about anything to make sure this organization outlives me.
Everything John Harker says in Dracula And Kittens is what I really think.
I hate phonies. I’m hostile to them, probably more than I should be. I’m working on ignoring them. This weekend? I didn’t do a good job of that.
Worth noting: I don’t call people frauds or say something is bullshit to be malicious. I write strong. You have to today to keep people reading. I do it as a criticism. Hopefully it gets those people to think and reconsider their presentation. If they do, I have no problem praising them and telling you about it.
I need to install a filter between my brain and my mouth.
I also have no problem saying I was wrong. When Dave Winer was criticizing the Suggested User List and I was defending it, he was right and I was wrong.
I don’t spend enough time with my parents. When my grandparents were alive, I didn’t appreciate the time I had with them.
I named Fry and Bender, the cats, after the Futurama characters. I don’t care if that makes me a geek. I am a geek, and I make no apologies.
Actually, I make no apologies for who I am or who I want to be or how I want to live my life.
This Blog
The only affiliate links I have on this website or to stuff I use every day. All of the books linked through an affiliate link are books I have read and recommend to you. You won’t ever find advertising on this website or affiliate links to items I don’t use and enjoy.
The only time I broke my “No Ads” policy? To support Tucker Max’s film. I thought people were trashing the film because they didn’t like him, not because of the quality of the film, so I wanted to support his efforts.
If I don’t believe something to be true in a post, I don’t say it.
This site doesn’t make money and I’m ok with that.
I don’t (yet) have something to sell you. When I do, it’ll be for a good cause (see below). This is intentional. If you buy the affiliate products, great, I can pay the hosting bills, but nothing on this website is financially motivated. I can pay the bills myself, but prefer to be saving the money (see: Replacing the lost car and moving into our own place.)
The SBI 750 was a great idea and one that should come back. Anyone who purchased membership in the original form will be honored as life time members when the feature comes back. It was removed, like the other crowdfunding tools, when our A Million High Fives project hit a production delay in the Fall.
I turned blog comments off for reasons listed in an earlier post. And truthfully, I prefer we email and converse because it’s easier for me to keep track.
That really is my phone number on this website. You can call me too.
A Million High Fives
We hit delays for financial reasons. The critical mass wasn’t there to crowdfund successfully (again proving the number of Twitter followers you have is irrelevant), and although we have a lot of interested sponsors, the economy prevented them from participating in 2009. 2010 looks to be a better year.
I’m still signed to a non-disclosure agreement, which is why I stopped blogging about A Million High Fives. I can (sort of) now because we split the project into three distinct pieces.
I was supposed to blog about A Million High Fives over at ReadWriteWeb. They wanted me to exclusively write for them, which meant I couldn’t contribute to Mashable. As much as I joke about Mashable, I like Josh Catone and Sharon Feder a lot, and they’ve been kind enough to publish my stuff. So that was the first issue. The second was a style clash. We parted ways, which is why you can still find one blog post up there about A Million High Fives, but not any follow-ups.
I still enjoy visiting their website. Actually, of the big three (TechCrunch, Mashable, ReadWriteWeb, I think RWW does the best job of reporting tech news.)
The odds are I’ll keep a regular journal for A Million High Fives on The Huffington Post in their Impact section, and then re-blog those posts here.
AMHF Part 1
The first part of the project is done in conjunction with Wounded Warriors Family Support and will start in June. I can’t say more just yet because the Colonel and I have agreed not to say anything until April or so. At that point, we will both be updating you. You can follow the updates on Twitter with the #WWFS hashtag and on their Facebook Page.
AMHF Part 2
Social Publishing MBA: Every dollar crowdfunded has been put toward this aspect of the project, a free (for the homeless and for not-for-profits) document that will help provide folks with everything they need to find a job and utilize social publishing to assist them in life and in business. There are three versions, one for not-for-profits, one for homeless shelters and the people they’re helping, and one for you.
The public version will be available for a donation to Wounded Warriors Family Support. If you have participated in my crowdfunding efforts, for both the pilot of A Million High Fives to September of 2009, I will send you a free copy and your signed business card and validation (if you did not receive yours.)
Depending on my travel schedule and your location, I will make every effort to thank the crowdfunding participants in person. It won’t happen right away, but you’ll all hear from me and receive a handshake and a high five in time.
The Social Publishing MBA should be out in December.
AMHF Part 3
-IF, and this is still a huge IF, Dracula And Kittens is published, I need to go out and promote it. Moderne Communications and I have agreed that doing A Million High Fives and promoting the book at the same time would not be appropriate. The focus is supposed to be on volunteerism and community, not how many books I can sell.
Depending on the book’s launch I will then be working with Moderne on the second half of the project around the book’s possible publication schedule, again, if it even comes out.
AMHF Part 3′s dates will be configured differently than part one. Part one is a straight-up tour, part three is based on Amanda and I’s work schedule.
Part three of AMHF will feature the business card wall and e-waste collection. Basically, if we don’t get to it in part one, we’ll get to it in three.
So there you have it. Everything you need to know about me, this website, the projects, and everything else. Full disclosure and transparency. I practice what I preach.
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