“The Purest Sacrifice”

Broken wings and a shattered halo.
Cracked horns and eternal damnation.
Their lost souls converged into one.
A forbid love that led to alienation.
One casted out from the pearly gates;
The other banned forever from Hell.
Forced to live amongst mere mortals.
In light of immortal love they dwell.
In a past life, were husband and wife.
Their yearning transcended even death.
Both hearts were tormented by the pain.
Until names spoken with unabated breath.
They committed heresy and even treason.
To hold each other underneath the stars.
Eternity being separated was cruel enough.
Being together again was worth every scar.
From their thrones, their masters watched.
 Perplexed at the trials they have endured
One casted aside their halo, the other horns.
The sacrifice for a love that remained pure.

"Computer Fight!"

     I’ve been meaning to write this post for a long time. As most now, I’m a computer geek first, and this idea has been on my mind for months. Now, with a new launch of processors from Intel this month, I figured I will write my thoughts about the state of new computer hardware. As some might have read over the years, every six to twelve months, new hardware is launched, which in theory is supposed to be exciting. Honestly, for the past few years, the launches of supposed updated hardware have been appealing as a keg of O’Douls at a college party. However, since March of this year, new releases are worth looking at due to one word: competition.

     In the hardware industry, competition between the major companies is always a good thing. I mostly focusing on processors today: Intel and AMD. Intel is, in sode terms, Coca Cola. A brand everyone has heard of because of countless ads over the years, and the fact shelves were always full of Intel based computers. AMD, on the other hand, is like RC. Even though AMD has been around, you mostly hear about them through word of mouth, or from the person you went to for computer advice. AMD could never truly compete outright, but they did one thing very well: beat Intel in performance while costing less. It always been about the best bang for your buck with AMD.

     However, AMD was more like Pepsi for a few years: Intel and AMD keep fighting to be the top company. For a few years, AMD was actually beating Intel in performance. There was a time during the early 2000’s where AMD was suggested way before Intel during the Pentium 4 era. This was great because the industry was exciting. Every new release from AMD or Intel was worth reading because it made you wonder who was taking back the performance crown. 

 

     Sadly, around 2007, AMD began to lose the rivalry. By 2011 or so, AMD was back to fighting to stay in the market. It came to a point AMD was only suggested when Intel was too costly for one’s budget. They weren’t bad overall, but dollar per dollar comparisons, Intel was the way to go. A $80 Intel CPU was outperforming a $200 AMD chip in the one area that truly drives the market: gaming. So, AMD retired itself to being the go to for basic, everyday web browsing systems. 

 

     This lead to Intel being the equivalent of GMC launching a new Corvette every year with five extra horsepower. They honestly quit innovating for the past five years, and got lazy.A new product with such a small performance increase being released because there wasn’t no other viable option. There’s actual test of a six year-old Intel chip being tested against their newest offerings. The difference in performance was only ten percent. In fact, most reviews of Intel’s new release became copy and paste. The overall thought was this: “Unless building and/or buying a new system, not worth the cost.”

     However, the fight is coming back as of March. Before I go into what’s happening, some very, very layman terms. All new CPU’s will list cores and threads when you look them up. Here is what they mean:

- Core – the physical processing part. A quad-core for example means there’s four physical processors i.e. it’s like a system having four Pentium 4’s inside it.

- Thread – The splitting of a CPU’s power virtually. Not all tasks need the core’s full power, so it will divide itself in light loads such as what I’m doing now: playing music and running Word.

     What happened this year which has shook up the industry is AMD finally launched a CPU that blindside Intel: Ryzen. This new launch came down to this: a $500 AMD CPU with 8 cores / 16 threads is trading blows even with Intel’s $1000 newest 10 cores / 20 thread offering. The difference in performance is so close that AMD systems make hardcore enthusiasts wondering if the extra $500 going Intel is even worth it to save a few minutes on some tasks. Once you factor in that a motherboard for Intel is $400 versus $200 for AMD, it’s a tough sell to even go with Intel these days. In other words, they’re fighting once again, and this makes me happy because unless it’s purely a PC gaming system (Which Intel still outperforms AMD as of right now), I would suggest AMD over Intel once again.

     Now, keep in mind even though Intel launched this month, AMD has a new line coming out this summer as well. AMD is launching a 16 core / 32 thread monster. With this on the horizon, the old question that used to be around is coming back: Do I buy now or wait to see what the new products offers? This means everyone wins because if AMD and Intel keep going back and forth, when you do buy a newer system, the performance over your five year old system will be noticeable. In fact, in the $100 to $200 range, I would go with AMD way before Intel because AMD offers more cores / threads for the money which is great if you do a lot of multitasking. 

 

     In conclusion, in any industry, competition is always a great thing. Without it, there’s no more innovation. The companies will keep slapping on shiny new labels on the same boring product, and act like they’ve made huge changes while raising prices. I hope this trend keeps going because for years because the biggest innovation in the PC world was leaning towards LED lights on EVERYTHING. Now, with real hardware being launched that does offering innovation, the market will shake up, and everyone will reap the benefits. In the end, I’m rooting for AMD to keep winning this fight.

"Writing Underwear"

      I’ve been reading a lot lately about fonts and the proper formatting for novels, so I decided to write this brief blog post. Fonts and formatting are truly like underwear for us writers. We all have one that we find comfortable, and will stick to it like our favorite kind of underwear. If we try something new, it feels odd like switch from boxers to briefs. Once we go back to our usual, we don’t feel so restrictive. Fonts and formatting boil down to personal preference, but in the end, there are some that you shouldn’t parade around in public. Also, consider this blog the same as shopping for underwear: find and do what makes you comfortable, but if unsure, nothing wrong with taking some advise.

     First of all, I’m going to get the one font that no one uses at all in the writing world. Comic Sans in the writing world is like edible thongs. No one will look at you without laughing if you publish anything in this font. You can write the greatest novel ever, but once they see it’s in Comic Sans, it will most likely end up in the trash. That, or you’ll get a very quick response to change the font like you wore a pair of edible thongs to a business meeting. My advice is to never use it at all, not even for a school paper.

     With that out of the way, let’s move on to the “tighty whities” of the writing world: Times New Roman. This font is the old, reliable font we all know, and most of us used at first, just like briefs. Some of us never moved on to more exotic things, enjoying the feeling of comfort we grew up with. In fact, every writing guide I have ever read said this is the safest choice for a font. I’m not ashamed to admit this is the only font I use for writing. Even my book on Kindle is formatted for Times New Roman. Again, it’s what I’m comfortable with using.

      Now, there are other safe fonts out there. If I had to choose another font to use besides Times, Arial would be my second choice. I love Garamond, but some people, like my editor, find it hard to read. A few other safe fonts I think are Book Antiqua, Bookman Old Style, Century, and Verdana. Helvatica was another safe one, but that’s no longer included in all modern word processing programs. It is still available online if you really need it. In fact, can be found here.

      Then there’s the new font out there introduced with Office 2007: Calibri. Calibri, to me, is like speedos. You think it might look good, but there’s a major flaw with using it for heavy writing. When using Calibri, capital i’s and lower-care l’s look exactly alike. This would drove my editor nuts since one of my characters is named William. I’m not sure the purpose of introducing this font, but that glaring flaw has made me steer clear of it.

      Of course, there’s those exotic fonts, which like some kinds of underwear, will either make you or your readers very uncomfortable. Fonts such as Wingdings, Webdings Papyrus, etc have no place in writing. They’re the skid marks of the publishing world. I’m not sure why they are even installed at all, but I guess someone might have a use for them. I might have 1,000 fonts on my system, but I stick to about five, and the big two are Garamond and Times.

      Far as switching fonts, my advise is to stick to one overall throughout the manuscript. I might use Courier to simulate a computer screen, and I also have a font installed that actually looks like an old school typewriter. After that, everything is in Times, even my chapter titles. There’s nothing worse than seeing a chapter where each character is a different font. It would be like changing underwear every hour. Again, only use a different font if it makes sense, and not to be creative.

      The last thing I want to discuss is formatting. I don’t think there’s any wrong or right way to format in this day and age since everything is electronic. Anyone can adjust it if need be, but a reader should be able to tell where one paragraph ends, and another one begins at least. When in doubt, this is the defacto standard, briefs of formatting which is the one I use as well:

1) 1” margins all around

2) Double spaced paragraphs

3) Easy to read, 12 pt font.

      Overall, like underwear, to each their own. However, even one Google search will tell you that there are some widely accepted guidelines when it comes to font and formatting. Does it stifle your ability to write? I never thought so. Besides, what’s the point of writing a story when no one can read it clearly enough to make it past the first page? So, until the industry changes, I will use the tighty whity font and formatting with pride.

Meatballs

-Ingredients

1lb of ground beef
1/2lb of Italian sausage
½ cup of bread crumbs
½ of grated Parmesan cheese
1 egg

1/2 tablespoon of the following:
Italian herbs
Garlic Powder
Onion Powder (Can substitute for ½ cup of sweated, minced onions )

1 teaspoon of the following

Basil
Parsley
Salt
Black Pepper
Red Pepper Flakes (Omit if you don’t like spicy)

- Directions

1) Preheat oven to 400 degrees
2) Mix everything together by hand in a large bowl
3) Roll into golf ball size balls - mixture makes about 12
4) Bake in a deep baking pan for 30 minutes. Flip about halfway through
5) Place on a paper towel lined pan, and let rest for 5 minutes before serving.

Wonderful Scammers

        I know I’ve been posting a lot about the Microsoft scammers, but today I decided to explain in more detail why they’re scams, and the tricks scammers do to make people think they have a virus on their system. The reason they’re scams is because Microsoft or any computer company never tracks viruses on a single system. They honestly don’t care if you do. The only time Microsoft will step in if there’s a virus that’s spreading across networks like crazy, such as the new ransomware spreading around (For more information, click here). Even then, they don’t have you call a number and/or call you. If every computer company tracked viruses, we would still be running 98 because Microsoft resources would have been tied up fixing every single infected PC.
       Now, below is an image of a typical scam site:

       The main reason this is a scam is the fact no major web browser (Chrome, Internet Explorer, Safari, Edge, and Firefox) can detect if you got a virus by default. Also, I can load them on my smartphone, which has nothing to do with Windows. If it was a legit threat, your antivirus would throw up a warning way before a browser will. Also, the only way a browser could in theory detect an issue if say you enabled the toolbar or extension your antivirus installs. The closest a browser get to blocking possible issues is warning you if a site is been reported as unsafe, and will stop you from seeing that site unless you ignore the warnings. In fact, the way I triggered that scam site to load by mistyping facebook as facebo0k. A simple typo of a website n the old days would only load a screen saying “Server Not Found”, but today, it might launch the scam.
       The other way they can generate is by clicking on the wrong links. The three major sites that generate these pop-ups are Facebook, Google, and email. In email, the best advise is if you don’t trust the sender or the email itself, don’t click on anything and delete it. On Facebook, they are created by the ads on the side, the ones that say something like “17 Reasons” or “Check This Out!”. On Google, they’re mostly caused by searching for computer help, and clicking on a bad link.
       There’s also the scam calls where someone calls out of the blue, and tries to tell you that you got a virus or a major computer issue. First, no legit computer company will call you out of nowhere. The way all of them work is you have to make the first contact before they’ll even call. The best way to avoid these is if you don’t know the number, do not answer them. If they’re a legit company, they’ll leave a voice mail. If you do answer by mistake, hang up if they make any type of claim they’re tech support that you didn’t even call. The scammers will do everything to keep you on the line, and it’s all a script. They don’t know anything about your system to the point they’ll call a household that only has Apple products, and will try to say their Windows systems are infected.
       The scammers main goal overall is try everything to access your system through legit software, and lock it to the point it can render the machine unless you pay them more than what most systems are worth, or a price that is so high, you can buy 8+ systems. No matter what, NEVER let strangers into your system no matter what nonsense they’re spouting. They’re not hackers because without you installing the software, they know nothing about your machine. If it was truly a legit hacker, they wouldn’t even have you on the phone to install software. They could be in your system, and you wouldn’t know it.
       Now, this is more to explain what they’ll do if gained access, which again I’ll stress only allow companies and/or people you trust access your system. Everything I’m showing is built into all Windows since at least 98, and only two can in theory show you if you’re infected. These four things I’m going to show are used to troubleshoot Windows issues and fix performance issues, so most people don’t know they exist. The only way to access two of them is by launching them through a command or know what folder they’re stored in. In order, they are Command Prompt, Services, System Configuration, and Event Viewer.
       The first one, Command Prompt, is very simply DOS. Below is what it looks like:

   
       This is the only one you can find within the Windows Start Menu, but has nothing to do with malware or virus checking. Far as I can recall, it could been used back before Windows XP to check for malware, but now, it’s mostly used to check for internet issues. The way scammers use it is type in legit commands, type in wrong commands which triggers an error message, or paste something into it.
       The second is called Services. Below is what it looks like:

       This is one of two that are buried within Windows that you have to know either where it’s at, or how to load it. The lies you would here is how everything that shows Running is a virus. Services are background applications that are built into every version of Windows. They manage networks, printers, etc. If they weren’t running, Windows wouldn’t load properly. I’m not going to show where it’s located, or how to access it because you only mess with services if told by a company you trust, or know what you’re doing because disabling the wrong thing can crash Windows.
       The second one buried deep within Windows is called System Configuration, as shown below:

        This is one of the four that can tell you if there’s a virus or malware on the system. This application handles how Windows boots, and what loads when the system fully loads. Like Services, just because it’s running it doesn’t make it a virus. The major use for System Configuration is to disable unwanted programs from running at startup. Some malware will show up here, and a computer repair person can disabling it from running when you boot the PC. Again, not doing into too many details because the wrong thing here can disable critical parts of Windows causing instability.
       The final one is Event Viewer:

 Event Viewer records anything hat has happened to Windows has had since you first turned on the PC. This one isn’t quite as buried as Services and System Configuration, but it’s buried enough that most users don’t even know it exists. The main reason this is even loaded is to figure out what or why a PC keeps crashing. Again, only computer guys look at this to troubleshoot PC issues. All systems will show errors and warnings if you loaded Event Viewer. Even on my system, which is barely a week old, I have errors and warnings that show up.
       The final part of Windows I’m going to mention is what I’m going to call the startup password. This application again is so buried within Windows, you have to really know what you’re doing to even think of messing with it. When enabled, it requires a password to be entered to load Windows. This is what scammers use to basically lock you out of the system unless you pay their outrage fees. I’m not going to show you what it looks like or the actual name because if it’s enabled, and you forget the exact password, you will have to wipe out Windows and all your personal files to remove it. I know what I’m doing, and I don’t mess with it unless required. In other words, you, and even your computer person, should never mess with this startup password.
       Overall, I hope this knowledge as enlighten some to how the scams work, and why you should never allow anyone access to your system unless you have their complete trust. Also, the other thing I can stress from this is always keep your security software up to date, as well as run Windows updates whenever they’re available. The updates aren’t sent out to cause your system to take forever to reboot. They’re sent out to fix things that can allow a program to gain unwilling control of your system. Also, if the link looks funny, when in doubt, don’t click on it. The last tip is never Google phone numbers. If the company hasn’t posted on on their official website, they don’t provide one so never one you find on a web search (Perfect two examples: Facebook and Google). One final thing:


NEVER ALLOW ANYONE ACCESS TO YOUR SYSTEM UNLESS YOU TRUST THEM AND / OR THE COMPANY THEY WORK FOR!

"I'm Offended!"

       There are two topics I try to avoid writing about and/or discussing even with family: religion and politics. I do this because there’s never a clear winner, and it can lead to some heated debates. However, after reading an article tonight, I’m bringing out the soap box, and discussing a political view that irks me. It seems in today’s technology driven, connected society everything is now deemed “offensive”. This bothers me because as a writer, I try to avoid most taboo subjects, but it seems no matter how hard I try, something in my stories can be labeled objectable. As they say, it’s impossible to please everyone, but pissing people off is a piece of cake.

      Why does this bother me? As a writer, some of us will push sometimes the envelope, and add our personal views about some forbidden subject into our works. In every story written, there’s some political, religious, society view in the pages, rather it’s the main plot point or subconsciously weaved into the story. We can’t help it because we are e putting our heart and souls into every letter on the page. Does this mean we should worry about every sentence typed might upset someone? I say no because if we did that, we would never write a single word.

      This also makes you wonder about genres that are out there for the shear purpose to shock and awe, such as erotica and horror. Other genres, such as sci-fi and fantasy can contain political and religious views within their chapters. Should all of them be banned? I say no. What might sicken one person will be enjoyed by millions. If you don’t like the genre and/or the subjects in a single book, don’t read it. Let’s quit raining on everyone’s parade because you don’t agree with the story the author has penned.

     I honestly feel like that if I wrote a best selling novel where every character was a gray blob with names of kitchen appliances, someone on the web would deem it repulsive because gray denotes skin tones. Yes, I feel in my heart we’re getting to that point. A novel full of non-descriptive locations and characters will be insulting to someone. There’s no mention of race, religion, creed, etc, but because there’s one mention of color, it’s protested because of the color gray. I could even change the characters all to atoms, and protested because it promotes science.

      If this madness doesn’t end, I envision a future all forms of communication will die off. The human race will be afraid to say anything fearing someone will attack them because of one single word that made them feel insulted. We’ll would be communicating through emojis so nothing can be taking the wrong way. Far as books, every character would an it named The, and there’s no dialogue at all between them. No worldly views, no taboo subjects, only pages full of Wingdings.

    My final thought is this: I do censor myself, but I refuse to censor myself to the point of worrying about who, if any, I will offend. I will write the story as I see fit, and it contains a subject that might shocking to many people, I will post a warning or something. After that, it’s wide open writing till the story is crafted the way I intended it to be. After that, I won’t remove a single word worrying about how it might be seen once released. That’s the beauty of writing. It’s an art that makes one think about how a fictional world mirrors the real world, the good and the bad. Until next time, stick to your guns and write the story you want to tell.

Four Steps To Strong Passwords

        Over the past few weeks, there’s been a lot of people who had an online account password cracked. I begin to wonder how strong their old passwords were, and how secure the new one is. In this day and age, passwords being stolen is a bigger security risk instead of actually hacking into a home PC. With almost everything being done online, a secure password is the best defense you can have to keep your accounts safe.

  

       Now, password creating can be broken down into four main categories. The first is avoid common passwords that any password cracking tool can do within minutes. The second is try not using the same password for everything. The third is to make them strong enough that unless they really want in, most people would give up. The final categories is writing them down.

       The first one sadly is still being practiced. A common password is passwords that is so generic, people can type them into any site to access an account with seconds. The most infamous example is the word password. This one is so overused that some sites will reject any password that even resembles the word (Example: P@ssw0rd). Another bad example is typing across a row of the keyboard such as qwertyuiop . I will not deny for accounts that I use for purely junk emails, I’ve used some of the passwords on the list linked below. However, if someone really wants my junk email that bad, they can have it. The accounts were mostly created because a site I was one really wanted an email , so losing them is not the end of the world.

Common Passwords

      Secondly, using the same password for everything can be just as bad as using a common password. Even if it’s not on the list, and is a very unique password, I try to make different passwords for anything I want to keep absolutely secure. However, even I’m guilty of using the same passwords for some things that I’m either too lazy to create a password for, or I keep forgetting the password that I got tired of resetting it the few times a year I have to log in
.

      Now, here’s where the fun begins. There are so many methods out there about creating a strong password that a Google search pulls over a million results. Overall, they all have the same guidelines which I’m now presenting below:

1) Minimum of ten characters. Some sites will go lower to say eight, but the more characters a password has, the longer it takes to crack.

2) Use a combination of capital letters, lower case letters, symbols, and numbers. Again, some sites say one of each, but the more you use, the tougher the password comes. The longest I will go is 15 total.

3) Avoid using common knowledge things, such as names, places, etc. None of my passwords for the things I absolutely want to keep locked have even my pets’ names.

4) Be random. Even a random phrase can make all the difference.

Here’s a few examples of what is considered a strong password:

Mar0oNEl#ph@nt5^

G$56ghty&()&)*fTgh

Ir3allyloveb@gels2

Un!c0rnsF@rtSR0cK

      If you want to get a rough idea how strong your passwords are, check out this link below:

Password Checker

       The final advise is write them down on paper, and store them somewhere safe. I know it’s easier to have the PC remember them, but the only downside is software and/or hardware will fail without warning. Then you’ll have to spend all day trying to either remember them, or go through the whole reset process. With having them offline on paper, you can get back into accounts within minutes instead of wasting a whole day trying to get back in. I have mine printed out because to be honest, I can’t remember them since mine can be that complex. In conclusion, if the password is so unique that you can’t memorize it, the less chances of it being cracked.