10. January 2007 · Comments Off on Mission and Metamorphosis · Categories: General, Site News, Working In A Salt Mine...

So here we are then, we few and happy few at the Daily Brief, standing in the middle of a cleared space and wondering where everyone else has gone. I looked back into the archives, and realized that I have been an active blogger for nearly four and a half years. I posted my first entry at the Brief’s predecessor, Sgt. Stryker, in August of 2002, after having been a semi-regular reader of it for a couple of months. When the war began in Iraq a few months afterwards, Stryker was one of a handful of military blogs, and readership soared. I am not sure exactly to what heights, but pretty far up there, and not at an altitude to be maintained consistently over a long period. Nothing in this world remains static; everything evolves.

Blogging is a hobby for most people, even those who take it seriously. Like all hobbies, people get bored and drop it, or find the discipline of providing content on a regular basis all too much. Or the persona they have developed is a bad fit, or they have changed and outgrown, or said all they wanted to say; mission accomplished. The original Stryker had other interests; he still blogs at another location, under another name, but many of first generation of contributors, and the second as well… they did it for a while, and moved on: Sparkey, Group Captain Mandrake, Kevin Connors and others, some of whom only contributed for a couple of months. Joe Comer, “HerkyBirdMan” died. It was the same with other blogs, some of which I read devotedly: Stephen Den Beste and USS Clueless, Diplomad, the Gweilo Diaries… and who was that movie producer, who was blogging most amusingly from Budapest, or Prague? They stop updating, and poof! They are gone, flying “forgotten as a dream flies at the opening day.” Vodkapundit is ill, and so is Cathy Seipp, Cori Dauber is on hiatus and writing a book, Rob “Acidman” Smith died. Nothing stays the same, everything moves on.

Which is not a circuitous way of saying that I am pulling the plug also… certainly not! Not after all the hassle of changing over to a new domain name! I don’t deny also that sometimes I am stuck for something to write about: after four years, I have pretty much covered all the endearing stories about my grandparents and my family, about Blondie as a child, and our adventures living and traveling in Europe. Practically everything I could write about current politics, and the war, and the military in general I have written before: three entries a week for four and a half years, it does add up. I hate to think I am repeating myself… especially when it was pretty good, the first time I said it.

As of this month though, I am ten years retired from the Air Force and Blondie is a year out of the Marines. We are milbloggers only in the sense of being veterans. We have both moved on, my daughter to college, and me to… well, that’s the point right there and the reason I am carrying on with The Brief. If I had quit every time I couldn’t think of something to say, in an interesting way, I’d have done it eight or nine times by now. Everyone has moments like that. I am sure James Lileks has moments— certainly he blogs about them… but he carries on. He’s a pro.

The thing that I came to take seriously over the last year was that I thought of myself as a writer, and not an office worker who did a little writing on the side. I upped my writing to a whole other level thanks to The Brief, and those readers who thought enough of what I wrote to encourage me. So, I can’t quit, it’s just that I am interested in other stuff; stuff like… oh, where Americans came from, and the people and events that shaped us, a hundred and more years ago. (Oh, yeah… and getting published by a real-live dead-tree no-kidding publisher,) My personal strength is telling stories. It’s what I do, what I want to do. If it’s what you want to hear, stick around, I’ve got some doozies. If not… there are a million stories in the naked blogosphere.

(PS Oh, I’ll do popular culture, and such events as catch my notice and interest, and the other contributors— Proud Veteran, Dragon Lady, Radar, and Timmer (Wow! That was the shortest long break in the history of this blog)— they’ll cover their own interests. It’s the way we’ve always done things here.)

03. January 2007 · Comments Off on Data Transferred · Categories: General, Site News

So, here we are… same as it ever was, here at the Daily Brief. That didn’t hurt a bit now, didn’t it?!

Please take note of the new URL, www.ncobrief.com. We have an automatic redirect from our old URL at www.sgtstryker.com set in place for a couple of weeks, but only for a couple of weeks, so if we are on your blogroll, please take appropriate action!

01. January 2007 · Comments Off on Taking a Very Long Break · Categories: Site News

I’m going to be taking a break, quite possibly a very long one from the whole blogging thing.

I’m bored, and worse, I feel like I’m boring. I’m not having any fun.

So, I’m walking away for now.

Thanks to Stryker, Sgt Mom, Cpl/Sgt Blondie and the gang for letting me play in their playground. It was an honor to be associated with you all.

01. January 2007 · Comments Off on New Domain Name · Categories: General, Site News

Just a quick heads-up for regular readers: we are registering a new domain name for the Daily Brief, and will hopefully have everything moved in by Wednesday! After that point, we will be found at www.ncobrief.com, but will keep a link here to redirect traffic there.

As you were

As you were what?

As you were… oh, never mind!

24. December 2006 · Comments Off on Spam, Spam, Spam Spam · Categories: Domestic, General, Rant, Site News

When Timmer upgraded the site to a newer version of Word Press, he also installed the Akismet spam-killing option, which keeps a running tally of spam comments intercepted and deleted. This is actually kind of amusing, because at current rates of accumulation, I believe we will have deleted 100,000 individual spam comments by New Years’ Day… none of which have actually posted.

I scroll through the pages of spam occasionally— like when there is only a hundred or so—just to make sure that there are no legitimate comments stranded there, and a depressing chore that is, too. Multiple identical, ungrammatical or just plain gibberish comments, with a link to a website embedded somewhere out the wilds of the internet.
Lots of kinky sexual practices, porn that to judge from the title line tends toward the disgusting side of the scale, boatloads of dubious drugs, a scattering of payday loan sites, insurance, and of late, a couple of sites that push ready-made term papers. A depressing collection of topics, and even more depressing is that it was probably less trouble for the originators to send it all out than it is for me to delete it all.

100,000 of these, all dumped on one site… none of which were actually posted. I presume there must be blogs somewhere out there with an unwary or careless administrator, where such comments do get posted and stay up, and presumably serve as free advertising, but probably not many. I suppose the spam-scum sending out this huge quantity of comments must get one or two links somewhere, and that must make it all worth while. But it’s kind of depressing… it’s the marketing equivalent of carpeting an entire town with spray-paint graffiti over every imaginable surface; walls, windows, other billboards, fences and retaining walls, all advertising some nasty sort of pawn-pornshop on the bad side of town. Even if all of it is swiftly and magically scrubbed away, a dozen times a day, I still resent the effort of having to do it. I loath everyone involved: the spammers who repeat this pointless exercise several hundred times daily, and doing it very badly, their disgusting clients with their rip-off business plan, and their schlubby loser clients. I hope they all get disgusting diseases, that their servers crash, and their pets all bite them. Bah, humbug, spam-scum… I wish a Merry Christmas for everyone else in the world but you.

So, taking bets on when we will get the magic 100,000; when will we cross the magic threshold?

17. December 2006 · Comments Off on Yay Us · Categories: General Nonsense, Site News

Apparently we’re number 1.

“You” have been named as Time magazine’s Person of the Year for the growth and influence of user-generated content on the internet. The US magazine praised the public for “seizing the reins of the global media” and filling the web’s virtual world.

Time has been giving its controversial awards since 1927, aiming to identify those who most affect the news.

Is there a cash prize? The cost of toys this year is about to make me cry.

15. November 2006 · Comments Off on Comments? · Categories: Site News

Is anyone still having problems commenting?  Please drop me a line.

No one’s said anything but some of our regulars seem to have completely disappeared.

13. November 2006 · Comments Off on I’m an Idiot · Categories: General, Site News

Okay, there are a few rules I live by that I normally don’t break. One of them is to always always always make a full backup before I make any changes to a website. Especially someone else’s website.
This morning I realized that I hadn’t really upgraded the site with the latest version of WordPress and had simply mananged to dump all of the files into a sub-directory. I was in a hurry and I just downloaded the recommended minimum files from WordPress’ easy to follow instructions. Sigh. Those of you who tried to log on this morning saw the result of that. I overwrote an apparently important file and trashed the site. Oh the files were still here and everything else survived just fine, I just made it impossible to see any of it.
The other rule I broke was that I didn’t leave myself any time to fix stuff after I made changes. I knew I had to leave the house at Oh My God it’s Early and I still made the changes.

I’m an idiot. Many apologies to all of you here at TDB and I can guarantee you it will never happen again.

I’m not saying I’ll never make another mistake, I’ll just never again subject you all to my own wishful thinking.

Thanks to Paul from DangerWest for cleaning up today’s mess. I owe that man a more beers than I can count.

And may I say, “Oh Wow.” to the latest version of WordPress. This is very nice. WYSIWYG. I like WYSIWIG.

12. November 2006 · Comments Off on And There Was Great Rejoicing in the Land, The Times They are a Changin’ · Categories: Site News

You know, once you have control of your database, fixing annoying little crap is EASY.

I want to send out much love and gratitude to our hosts at Cyberwurx. They’re a royal pain in the ass when it comes to making sure that you are who you say you are (a very good thing for a host) but once they’ve got verification, they’re golden when it comes to helping out.

I still have a lot of work to do but at least the comments are back up and running.

It’s going to be annoying again as I had to re-activate the Spaminator until I get some of the upgrades taken care of. There is NO way I’m going to leave us open with no spam protection.

Upgrades are still coming. But now I can back everything up before I do it.

Also.

We’re down to just a few regular writers again. Some of our crew have gone off on their own and good on them. We wish them the best. That means we have room for additional writers. Drop Sgt Mom a line and we’ll see about getting you an account.

Tim

08. November 2006 · Comments Off on Spam Filter Issues · Categories: Site News

Some of our regulars inform me that they’re still having problems. I’ll be playing with the filters until I find something resembling a balance. I’m not willing to open it too wide because frankly, I LOVE having the more annoying spam auto-nuked outright and I’m guessing the rest of the crew is just as pleased.

07. November 2006 · Comments Off on New Spam Filters Installed · Categories: General Nonsense, Site News

Please let me know if you have any problems posting or commenting. And by that I mean email me because…obviously if you’re having trouble commenting…

Not that I’ll get to it until much later tonight…I’ve got my monthly appointment with my massage therapist and NOBODY gets in the way of that.

TMI? Only if you’ve got a vivid imagination and some idea of what I look like nekkid. Otherwise, it’s kind of pretty when you think about it.

Thanks.

My computer, upon which I am now depending upon more than practically every other non-living thing in my life besides air conditioning… inexplicably crashed on Thursday night.

It is fixed now, mostly because the local computer consultant/expert/wonder-worker who sold it to me originally, and to whom I have steered a lot of business, made a house call and sorted it all out, knowing how much depends upon this, now that I am trying to work the free-lance writing thing, and writing for this site and for Blogger News Network. Besides my (miniscule pension) and a pittance for working at the radio station on Saturdays, that is my only income.

He also fixed the wireless modem that allows Blondie to use her laptop, had a stab at sorting out what has been wrong with my printer, swapped over all my important files to the newer, faster computer with more memory that he had sold to the office which closed down last year and which my employer generously gave to me. (There were two other computers in the office, like how many others did my former employer really need?)

He took my old computer in swap for an hour of work, but I still will owe him for a good chunk of time, although he is in no hurry for payment… which is good, because I cannot afford it. The just-completed book sits on the agents’ desk, and a lot of other proposed work has been sent to various pubishers. I have a promise of income from it, someday…. but I need to pay the computer expert soon.

So, I am blegging for small donations to pay for this work and to keep my internet connection. We were doing OK, but this has us stretching our resources to the snapping point.

Paypal is fine… e-mail me for particulars… and my thanks.

05. October 2006 · Comments Off on Hook’s Approaching 500,000 Hits · Categories: Site News

Be part of it.

26. September 2006 · Comments Off on Deluged! · Categories: General, Good God, Site News

We have been deluged with another tidal flood of automated spam, all of it offering a number of semi-legal, quasi-legal and possibly-barely-legal services, commodites, and experiences.

I have had to add a number of new words to the totally banned/instantly nuked list, and another number of words to the held-f0r-review list.

There have been comments held over, and not appearing for a while, and some which may have been nuked. Sorry. Repost. And if your comment included some questionable language, or references to insurance, prescription drugs, or assorted possibly x-rated personal services… maybe do the old-fashioned thing, first and last letters and dashes for all the letters in between?

Or something.

My life is busy enough, I don’t need to turn on the computer at 5:00 AM and begin bailing out 150 spam comments, at least two thirds of which have references to beastility, shaved nether regions and drugs of dubious provenance.

15. September 2006 · Comments Off on Some Bloggy Blogging…Stuff · Categories: Site News

How to Dissuade Yourself From Becomging A Blogger.
Hat Tip to Margie commenting at the soon to be non-venomous Kate’s.

Faster Than the World is looking for even more writers as Michele and Turtle realize that writing every day sucks…again. In case you simply can’t dissuade yourself and CAN write, submit sumthin.

Enlisted Swine is a new Mil-Blog collective that you can sign up to write for also. I like them, they use “fuck” as more than a verb.
Via Blackfive.

Andrew Olmsted has a very thoughtful piece called “Beyond War” that’s well worth your time. I was wondering when someone would notice and start whispering “Pssst, the War on Terror? Not so much a war…pass it on.” He says it better than I could have.
Via Enlisted Swine up above.

11. September 2006 · Comments Off on Faster Than the World’s Grand Opening · Categories: Site News

Michele and Turtle over at Faster Than the World have totally revamped their site.

Starting this morning (Monday), FTTW will be a magazine-type site with over 20 different contributors writing on a variety of topics each day. From sports to sex, from punk rock to video games, from fast cars to horror movies, we’ve got it all, including a weekly comic strip.

Every day – at least three times a day – you will find fresh content at FTTW. We’ve worked hard to gather some of the best writers around – people who are knowledgeable in their subject area and write about their topics with passion.

That’s 20 writers, 20 different subjects and seven days a week you get here.
Sometimes we will all pool our talents and write something together. Think of us as a collective. Faster than the World: The Wu Tang Clan of the Internet.

Sometimes they write about bands I’ve never even heard of, which makes me feel like I either missed out on things or I just never did understand metal that was harder than say…The Scorpions, but the crew over there always entertains or at least has things that make you go…”hmmmmm, yeah, never thought of that, thanks for sharing.” And I mean that in a good way.

17. August 2006 · Comments Off on Joyous Tidings · Categories: Site News

Michele and Turtle over at Faster than the World have finally decided to stop shacking up and living in sin and tie the knot this coming Thanksgiving. Shows you what I know, I thought they were married years ago. (Shacking up? Living in sin? When did my mother invade my blogging?)

Venemous Kate reports that Kelley over at Suburban Blight has had a baby boy. WooHoo. Selfish of me I know but all I can think is, “I wonder if that means Kelley will finally start writing again.”

29. July 2006 · Comments Off on Soooo, What About That Book? · Categories: Domestic, General, Home Front, Site News, Veteran's Affairs

It’s going rather well, which is the reason I have not posted much over the last week…umm, since being let go from the last installment of pink-collar wage slavery. Timmer has been writing about that still little voice that whispers “It’s time”, when you have to let go and move on… and I just kept thinking, as I was driving home with my personal stuff thrown into a cardboard box (and it took about five minutes to clear out all of it from my desk) “Whoopee! I can stay at home tomorrow, and finish that chapter!” Maybe it’s time to do what I really, really love doing!

They gave me a decisive push, just as I was working up the nerve to jump, and I have hardly thought of the place at all this week, although I did wonder on Monday if anyone could call the house, asking if something had been ordered, or delivered, or whatever; although frankly I can’t see how they would have the nerve, and they can figure that out from my files anyway. And I swear, I was that close to snarling, the next time someone asked me for copies of this or that, “The copier is over there, and your legs aren’t painted on!” No, time to move on.

So, another milblogger, blessed be his name, referred me to a literary agent, who read the chapter and loved it, extravagantly. (I googled him, of course… do I look like a fool? Me, who worked for an intellectual property firm for three years?) This agent wants to see more, basically about a third of the projected work, just to be assured that I can, actually carry through with it. It seems that a discouragingly large number of first-time writers have a failure of nerve at about the 15,000 word mark, and as I have mapped out an outline for “To Truckee’s Trail” of 19 or 20 chapters of 5,000 to 6,000 words…. Well, that works out to 100,000-120,000 words. Or more, if I really start to get into it.

I am working full time at this, and if I keep to my schedule and detailed chapter outline, I will have six continuous chapters by next Friday. Half a chapter a day of at least 3,000 words of polished prose, witty conversation, exciting narrative, and vivid descriptions. Piece of cake, people, piece of cake.

So, that is where I have been, back in the 19th century, coping with flooded rivers, recalcitrant ox teams, quarreling emigrants, cooking over smoking campfires, and generally keeping everything moving; all those cute children, brave women, and gallant men… and there’s a bit with a dog, too. Everyone likes a funny bit with a dog.

28. July 2006 · Comments Off on Still Learning the Ropes · Categories: Site News, Stupidity

If I don’t know or care who Glenn Greenwald is, does that mean I have to turn in my Blogger I.D. Card?

11. July 2006 · Comments Off on Oodles and Oodles of Punk Rock · Categories: Site News, That's Entertainment!

Head on over to Faster Than The World for your Punk Rock fix. Michele and Turtle continue their polls and requests for inputs to their polls to most thoroughly cover the spread of Punk Rock throughout the decades. Me…I wasn’t paying much attention in the 80s and 90s so I have almost no idea what they’re talking about. I blame AFRTS.

Oh, and don’t forget to check out Rock Star Supernova tonight on CBS. I’ll have more on that tonight or tomorrow morning. Maybe we could cuss and discuss the folks. I’d live blog it but I’m in Mountain Time now so not may of us would be on the same track.

27. June 2006 · Comments Off on R.I.P. Acidman · Categories: Site News

Love him, hate him, both…he will be missed.

If you never read Gut Rumbles, go there now and read some of the archives. I do love a man who can rant with no apologies.

19. June 2006 · Comments Off on Rafts · Categories: GWOT, Politics, Site News

Bill Whittle, author of some of my favorite essays, has a preview of his book, An American Civilization, over at Eject! Eject! Eject!

So where are we?

Islamicist terror masters are about to go nuclear, and an army of foreign nationals are flooding over the border. Liberals haven’t had a new idea since the National Health Card, Conservatives would lose the next election if they ran unopposed, Western birthrates are plummeting, lawlessness is rampant, everywhere you look the seams are starting to crack, and above it all sits an Imperial Congress riddled with corruption, stone-deaf to the howls of public outrage, and looking very tender indeed at the merest thought of being held accountable for anything. Why, it’s calamity enough to put you in mind of Shakespeare:

Now is the Winter of our Discontent, made more of a Bummer by these Sons of Pork…

Go read all of it.

15. June 2006 · Comments Off on Small Technical Notice · Categories: General, Site News

As some of you have noticed, we have a moderation queue, where comments that contain certain words go, until one of us can review them, clear legitimate comments to be posted, and consign the usual spam to oblivion.

There is also an option for blacklisting certain words— which when incorporated into a comment— will instantly, and without appearing in the moderation queue— result in that comment being “vanished”.

Being wearied to death of the current torrent of spam from idjiots too cheap to like, just buy an ad! I have finally taken the step of entering certain terms into the blacklist; terms such as the common names of certain games of chance, the common names of prescription medication, and certain less common terms for various sexual practices and perversions; all of which— based on my experience moderating comments, and emptying out spam by the trailer-load on a regular basis— probably won’t turn up in comments posted by our regular commenters; most of whom, I would assume, are not gambling addicts, sexual perverts, or addicted to prescription drugs.

And if they are, they are kind enough not to share the details with us.

Which is my round-about way of saying if you legitimatly do need to incorporate names of prescription drugs, casino games, or sexual practices into your comment, you would best be advised to either put dashes in between the letters, or astericks, or something. Otherwise, it goes straight into oblivion.

24. May 2006 · Comments Off on Michele’s Moved · Categories: Site News

A Small Victory has closed. It’s gone, completely. Not even any archives. Sigh, I knew I should have saved “Don’t Pee in the Millineum Falcon.”

Michele’s moved her operation over to a new site, Faster Than the World, where she and The Turtle will be talking about cars, punk rock, or whatever else strikes their fancy.

Update: Michele sent me a link to where the story still lives.

Reader Scott sent me the full story, which is below the fold.

More »

17. May 2006 · Comments Off on New Blog from Robert Ferrigno · Categories: Site News, That's Entertainment!

Robert Ferrigno, Author of Prayers For The Assassin is blogging. His latest post, Ahmadinejad and the Hidden Imam is about, well, The President of Iran and the Twelfth Imam.

Disclaimer: Other than sending me an advance copy of his book, I’ve received nothing but email correspondence from Robert. I’m a fan. I find the way he explains the Muslim world interesting and that’s saying a lot from a guy like me who resents having to know anything about that part of the world.

08. May 2006 · Comments Off on A Small Victory Returns! · Categories: Site News

Michele is back at ASV!!!

I’m soooo doing the Happy Dance. (Imagine short-bald-chubby-middle-aged guy dancing like the Caddyshack gopher..that’s if my back isn’t acting up…or head-banging like Beavis and Butthead…if my neck isn’t acting up…or…nevermind. I’m just happy to see one of my favorite bloggers back and ranting again.)

She’ll also be guest-blogging on Fridays over at Wizbang where she’ll be talking about cars, music, music to have blasting out of your car windows.

01. May 2006 · Comments Off on Linky, Linky · Categories: Air Force, General, Site News

Former long-time contributor to TDB, Kevin Connors has taken up solo-blogging, at Westpundit, and is now blogrolled in appreciation.