Archive for January, 2010

From my daughter’s homework:

Kudos to Mary for her creative problem solving...

I just joined the Biggest Loser contest at UVU. The person who loses the highest percent of their initial body weight wins, with prizes each week as well a grand prize at the end. My problem? A woefully efficient metabolism. No matter how much I’ve exercised and dieted, the weight doesn’t drop. My body is very good not only at living within a very tiny caloric budget, but also at saving some of those calories for later. The net result over a few years of living off 900 calories per day? 5 more pounds and zero energy.

So my goal is not only to lose weight, but to figure out how to get myself a spendy metabolism. And the wise words of my friends mom are seeming to make more and more sense. (more…)

My blog has always been a random hodgepodge of whatever happens to be on my mind. Luckily, WordPress allows you to subscribe to a single tag. Posts tagged with DGM2740 are responses to reading assignments from my Web Design class. You’re welcome to stick around if you’d like. (more…)

Who doesn’t love a kind comment, and yet who likes to support a spammer? Consider this comment, for example:

Just Googled and read the whole article and i must have to say that me and my husband loved reading your post. I liked your site because of the easy language you used to explain things here. Now i can stop my research having found my answer in this awesome article. We bookmarked and will regularly check more quality tips to come from your website. Thanks alot.

How sweet, right? Until you notice her name is “Watch Movies Online!”

Assuming your blogging software already has some good anti-bot intelligence going for it so the spam is few and far between, probably the easiest way to find a spammer out is to google their comment, in quotes. Disheartening, isn’t it?

A few other tell-tale signs:

- Keywords instead of a name
- Links in the comment body
- Name and email address both appear to based on real names that are totally unrelated

And of course you could click on their site to see what they’re selling, but I personally avoid that if I can.

One of Santa’s helpers brought me some new shoes for Christmas. Not just any shoes: Shape-Ups by Sketchers. Is that a hint? They’d probably work better if I’d dump the rest of the Christmas treats out already. I honestly haven’t been trying nearly as hard as I ought to be to get in shape these past several months. In my own defense, my mind’s been on other things. But it doesn’t help that I’ve actually gained weight recently. So I’m curious to see how and whether they’ll work. (more…)