Day In The Life of Baz

No, I’m not crazy. It really is true. I know that people generally think of a fan as something that keeps you cool. However, people often forget about using their ceiling fan in the winter to keep them warm. Yep, it true.

Trying to Keep Cool

The blades on a fan are angled in such a way so that it pulls air from one side and blows it out the other end. So how does that keep you cool? Well, everyone perspires. Even ever so slightly. There’s usually always going to be moisture on your skin, even if you can’t see it.

When air moves over your skin it helps the water to evaporate, thus cooling your skin. This is called the wind chill effect. Now that’s about all I remember from college Biology class.

Popularity: 22%

Now I know Gmail is supposed to be about functionality. However, I must say, it’s been a long time coming. Gmail is functional to the bone, however the fact that everyone had the same identical theme was a bit bland. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a nice clean theme, but sometimes some folks want some personality to their email client.

Previously, these folks would have to resort to the Better Gmail Firefox Addon. But, as of late yesterday, Gmail has rolled out Gmail Themes. Now you can give your Gmail the individuality that you so rightfully deserve.

Popularity: 21%

Time management is something that has been a major plague in my life. Ironically, when I was in high school and looked at nothing but television, it was a bit easier. My schedule simply revolved around the shows I wanted to see. When something boring came on, I guess I would just go study. Television acted like a natural timer.

When I started college, all that stopped. The amount of free time I had was enormous and there was no constant television. It was totally up to me to manage my own time. I did a good job of scheduling time, however the problem I still had was when to stop doing something; or more importantly, when I should start doing something.

Egg Timers to the Rescue

Great lil’ tool this egg timer is. You can set up small blocks of time (15 or 20 minutes) dedicated to the task at hand. It works great, since you focus solely on one thing for the entire period. You also see that there’s light at the end of these very short tunnels.

I think this has been one of the longest Google Bitch Slaps that I’ve ever seen. Over at my other blog, mainly devoted to CakePHP and JQuery, I had gotten trounced by Google in the Page Rank department; it went all the way down to 0. I got offered some money for a few links on my site and, like an idiot, I forgot to apply nofollow to the links.

A few days ago, I noticed that the Page Rank went up to 3. So, after several months of no Page Rank, I’m quite happy with that. It actually gave me a lil’ bit of incentive to write more. But that’s going to be after the GRE, but that’s another story.

Popularity: 24%

About two (2) years ago I stumbled onto Local.com. It was actually a typo that got me there; I was looking for local.google.com, which is just an additional link to Google Maps. I must say, Local.com and their local search has surprised me. I used it primarily for their excellent call back feature.

Local.com has since removed this feature. I always wondered how they could keep up the cost of all those phone calls. You could simply click on the phone number of a company that you searched for, enter you home phone number and Local.com would ring your phone and connect the call. An excellent feature for those of us without a long distance plan or those of us too lazy to dial a number, like self.

At least Local.com still has a send to mobile feature. Using this, you can send yourself a text message with all the relavant information about the place you’re searching for. Searches, directions, reviews, and more.  You can’t go wrong with Local.com.

Popularity: 23%