Mercury Retrograde Page

Sometimes there are things you want to know. It may not be useful to everyone; however, some people may find this page of use. I designed a page that shows the current status of Mercury retrogrades.

At first, I thought that I could build the calculations myself, and learn how to do this all myself. After buying some books on Astronomy and trying for about three weeks to do the calculations in perl. Well, to be honest, it was a lot more difficult than I thought it was going to be.

There was however a solution. Someone had taken one of the books, Astronomy On The Personal Computer by Montenbruck and written it in PERL. This was most useful, as they had already done the work, and translated the PASCAL programs into working PERL code.

I did have to ask for directions, but they were most helpful, and I was up and running in no time. So it didn’t actually take very long to get a working solution if you don’t count the time I spent trying to do the calculations myself.

Here is the link to the page I designed: Mercury Retrograde

This should be a fully functional page with the time in GMT -7 time zone for when the next Mercury retrogrades will be. It should work for as long as my site is up and running. It took a lot of effort to make this work. I was happy to have it done. I really was.

The calculations are provided by Astro::Montenbruck perl module, and the results are stored in a database, which PHP uses to get the date and time. It also shows the current status if Mercury is direct, or in retrograde.

It was a fun project to work on, I learned a lot about it. So head your browser over to the page I made, and check it out. You never know how the next Mercury retrograde is going to be. Sometimes, those can be real pain the ass.

Check the rest of my website out while you are there. Lots of content, and things I’ve been working on for the last year or so. Thanks for reading my blog, and taking the time to check this out. Much appreciated.

Written by: Ctopher Thomas, A Real Misfit

Photo Credit: Image by Bruno Albino from Pixabay

Thoughts On Validation – What Makes You, You?

Thoughts On Validation

A few days ago, a subject came up about someone else and how they must feel about themselves. My Mumz said the persons self esteem must be rock bottom because the only validation she seeks is online. Below are a few of my thoughts on validation.

After giving it some thought, I have reason to believe there are a wide variety of ways people seek validation. Let’s examine a few of them starting with the biggest first.

Money In The Bank

Money – Lets face it, those with money feel validated and like they are special. They have either worked for their money or they have inherited it through their family. Therefore, they are the most privileged among the humans. Because, they have special validation, because they have the power and the money. Those with the most money need no validation from poor people because they are above them.

Having Employment

Having A Job – This one is nice. You get validation from making your living and from the work that you do. It is really one of the best ways to feel valid. If you love your job and are making money at what you do then you feel a sense of accomplishment and like you have validation from doing good work.

Having Love In Your Life

Having A Significant Other – Having someone in your life that is willing to commit their whole life to you. Let’s face it, having a warm loving relationship gives people a sense of validation. Having someone that is willing to marry you and have your children is a great way to feel valid. It will make you feel like a man, it will make you want to do better because you want to make their lives better.

Having Family That Loves You – Having relationships that are in good working order and having peace of mind that there is nothing you could ever do that would make them not love you, this has a sense of security to it. Its a form of validation. Everyone needs to have family that loves them.

Having A Few Good Friends

Having A Few Good Friends – This gives you a sense of belonging and having meaning in your life. If you lack all of the above, then having a few good friends will help make up for the hurt of being poor, alone, and jobless. If you have none of the above, you are a special kind of problem.

The Problem

In my life, they have withheld the affection of giving me the validation I needed. But the realization that I don’t need their approval is such a feeling. Human society is set up so everyone needs some kind of validation and sense of belonging to live a happy life. When they deliberately withhold those things to get you to conform to their evil ways, you have to make the choice to cut them loose.

I’ve been nineteen years without a job, friends, or significant other. Been isolated, poor, and abused for a very long time. My family doesn’t care about the work I perform, and it doesn’t earn any kind of living.

I’ve decided that the human race has lost my respect.

I certainly don’t need validation from the human race that I’m any good. They couldn’t live my life. That is for sure. No one would have lived through what I’ve been through. It has almost killed me a few times.

So on matters of validation, the human race has a lot of things that make them feel valid, having money, having jobs, having love in their life, and having a dog.

What They Lost

Therefore, what they have lost is their humility and what they were supposed to be, which is human kind. They have been cruel to me. Wish it would have been better. I sure could have used some help. No one was willing to extend the offer.

Humans are victims of the insane. They couldn’t think if they wanted to.

In conclusion, what I think of them is below average. Because of the way they have treated me. They got what they wanted, they hurt me a lot. Wish they could have been kind. The world is a sick place. Seek your own salvation; friend see to it.

Those are some of my rough thoughts on validation, there is more!

Written by Ctopher Thomas, founder of MyDigitalChaos.net

This post has been edited to make it kinder.

Geek Tips – Five Design Points

5 Points Geeks Should Consider

a non technical article with valuable points

Web Design has come a long ways since the days of 1997. A lot has changed, some for the better. It seems we have rockets compared to the tools of old. Back in the days when we were coding html by hand and didn’t have the use of stylesheets. What we have today doesn’t require rocket science, just a passion to learn. Here are five design points to consider.

All that has changed now. We live in world where the tools to make magic happen are available to everyone and almost anyone. Anyone that can teach themselves and has the patience to stick with it can learn the basic in a few weeks.

For some of us that are more hard headed it may take longer. That doesn’t mean it’s not possible to really get the hang of things. It is however still very possible. Not only possible, but very practice. Learning how to do this kind of work can build skills in the rest of your life.

While you may feel like it’s not much fun in the beginning, once you start to develop skills then it’s like a fix that you have a difficult time getting enough.

While it’s taken me two years to adapt to the changes of today’s modern web design standards. There are some things that will make life easier for everyone. Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change. Hope it’s possible to unlearn the old ways.

With that said here are a few things that can help or hinder your progress in web design.

Negative Space

Beware of your use of negative spaces. In some design aspects they can be very useful. However you have to really look at the design as a whole and understand it completely.

Are you making full use of the whole page? Does it scale for mobile and still use the whole page? My findings are that people really like phones, but they aren’t too hip when it comes to using a computer.

Take this into consideration when designing your sites. Don’t use too much negative space in your designs.

And it has to scale for use on mobile ready devices. My thoughts in the matter is that there will be two groups of people. Mass consumers who use smart phones, and the Geeks that rule using high res displays attached to Terabytes of storage.

Typography

Please designers, do not neglect your typography. Because, this is really important. There are plenty of design solutions available today to meet or exceed your design requirements.

This means using fonts and actually designing your site to use the fonts in the ways that maximize your design. Gone are the days of html 1. Even web 2.0 is now obsolete. You have to adapt to new ways of making things look great.

Pick your fonts out and design your whole site to look and feel throughout the entire site. Design matters, and typography is key these days. Make good use of fonts and design for using them.

Photography

To be successful in todays internet market, you have to be able to take great photographs. You have to be able to have some WoW factor to your work. It’s advanced a lot. In addition you not only have to have good photography skills. Not only that but you also have to understand aspect ratios to make graphics that look good on your blog. Then it has to look great when shared on social media.

This requires knowing how to make the right size graphics that will port from your blog or website to the social media giants standards that will keep the content looking professional.

Don’t make the mistake of posting work to your blog only to have it shared to social media and look like junk.

A very useful webpage for design aspects and ratios is found here (Image Sizes For Social Media) and you will find it useful to make your graphics based upon these sizes depending upon where you want to be putting them.

You need to be a photoshop pro with today’s current tools and be able to maximize the look and feel for your images. The best results will be from work that makes the view feel something.

No feeling, very little response rate. Make them feel something, and you will get better results. The best thing to do is make them feel good, not bad. However if you focus on the good you will get better results.

Color Pallets

When designing your site. You have to think about the entire theme of your site, this includes what color pallet your viewers are going to be seeing. You want to pick a suggestive color pallet that leaves a calm and relaxed viewer.

While there is room for attention grabbing headlines, it’s best to stick to black for those. Using today’s available tools, pick a color pallet of at least twenty colors. Then decide what purpose each will have before you design. Staying consistent with your colors is key. While from page to page has to stay consistent you also have to wow the viewer with enough color that they feel alive.

Things to avoid are using fonts for text that have poor contrast from the background. Readers will tune out so fast that you will lose them all right quick. You have to have good color balance and make it easy on the eyes to read. I would avoid text in shades of red for more than just a headline and never body of text in red.

Dynamic Designs

Be creative. Don’t design static pages that look the same every time they are viewed. However keep the refresh rate low and design to be stable. Using content from your social media sources or using content from a randomized array that has been designed to group together is best. Update to dynamic content can be both content that stays the same for days or weeks, mixed with fresh work mixed into it on a per page view basis.

However don’t move the important content all over the site. Pages should keep content that is important in the same format and place for the entire duration of the websites life time. Therefore, consider these five design points, carefully!

Archive your websites. Save. Keep. Recycle. Update new stuff and move old stuff to the back of the board.

Really the goal should be to keep it simple, dynamic, fun, and stable. People have to be able to come back to the same point for the content they need most. Don’t move things around too much. Once you set it, pretend it’s set in stone.

Conclusion

Therefore, keep these Geek Tips in mind, they are good design points to consider. There are a lot of people that write technical content, but this should suffice as a high level overview of some of the things to consider when doing technical design work.

Creative Fuel – Guide To Success

How to have more creative fuel to burn

In order to be really creative, you have to have some fuel to burn. It is the process of using this creative fuel to create new work that produces a work of art. But if you are on empty how in the world do you fill back up?

You should prime yourself with this article about Calibrating For Success, then make use of this article.

The process is different for different people. However there are some things that will help inspire you if you use them correctly. Sometimes you have to fill the tank with good stuff. Other times you have to starve the beast and let hunger do the job.

Sometimes, you have to a little of both. So what works for me is that of careful meditation. By using a thoughtful approach I’m able to have creative fuel, and burn enough that work is completed.

Have More Than One Project In The Fire

Sometimes it helps to have multiple projects. This gives you a backup plan for when things don’t go as expected. By having more than one project to work on, you can stay busy and keep your flow going. Being able to do other projects also enables you to learn new skills. If you are always pushing new boundaries then you always be growing.

If you learn new skills you will find they come in handy in other areas of your work. It all adds up in the long run.

Do More Than Humanly Possible

You have to be doing a great deal of work. This requires doing more than humanly possible on a regular basis. You have to get to be so darn good that people take notice of you and your work.

If you plan carefully, it is possible. You have to be diligent and calm and relaxed. Then you have to work your butt off like never before. It is possible, you just have to be willing to do what is difficult.

Therefore, if you starve yourself from unnecessary activity, you have more time to do good stuff.

Be Careful What You Use For Creative Fuel

Too much TV will bum you out. Try listening to a lot of music. Change your music up enough that you are listening to old and new music from a wide variety of genres. Try listening to classical when you are sleeping at night. Its a great way to effect your dreams and your mood.

Therefore, these are some tips to get you started. Find out what works for you.

Written by Ctopher Thomas

Visit my Website Here.

Photo Credit: Photo by Ricardo Rocha on Unsplash

How to use technology to calibrate yourself

You can do this!!

We have a lot of tools at our disposal, the question is: Are we using them? Likely the answer is no. However we should! So ask yourself how to use your technology tools to calibrate yourself for success.

Your Phone

This is your greatest tool. Your phone is likely the most under used tool you have in your toolbox. Everyone has one, but no one is using them to make phone calls. Try to dial your contacts, and start the conversation.

Email – Use Wisely

Your email is a good tool to follow up those phone calls with. Send them the details, or more information. Be sure to ask for their email address when you are talking with them on the phone. Prepare them by telling them your email address so they expect that email coming from you.

Close the deal on the phone while talking with them. Then get their signature in writing.

The Calendar – Remember this!

The calendar is a tool that you can use to schedule appointments with. If you are planning in advance, you should have the important dates scheduled here.

There is no excuse for missing appointments! Because if you are using your tools, you won’t miss the date!

Text Messages – The instant mess!

Don’t use text messages to communicate important ideas and information. Its best to do this verbally over the phone. If you don’t want an instant mess, use sparingly. Therefore, use your tools for what they work for. Don’t expect people to know you from texting.

Having A Website

Chances are the only people that will visit your website are people you talk on the phone with, or have sent an email to. No one else is going to find your site online. So tell people about your website in person, on the phone, and via email.

Therefore, don’t expect miracles. Even with a good website, you likely won’t see results. You should plan on closing deals in person.

In Conclusion

Use all your tools correctly with a thorough understanding of them, and when and where to use each one. Therefore you can be successful, if you use them wisely. Be wise, use your mind!

Use your technology to calibrate yourself to success.

Photo Credit: Photo by Patrick Lindenberg on Unsplash

The Future: 1

The Future: Story

Planes no longer stop for passengers, if you want to make a stop in the next city, the only option is to jump. I have everything i need. My phone.

Jumping from twenty thousand feet is a joy. When I land, they scan my phone, a transport van takes me to my hotel. Upon check-in they scan my phone and take me up to my room.

I scan my phone at the door and it unlocks, seems they were expecting me. I enter the room and see its nice, very nice. There are fresh clothes just my size waiting for me. I take a hot shower and put them on.

The computer in the room unlocks using my phone. I connect to my files using the modem in the phone. It’s running at 100 Mega bits per second, fast enough I can upload the video of my jump today to my friends. After two minutes the five minute video uploads and I log out of the computer.

The Club

I put my shoes on, pocket my phone, and walk out the door. I hear Shelly is in town today, she made her jump yesterday. We meet in the club down the street and have a few drinks.

Afterwords we go back to the room and look at the news. Seems someone has hacked Facebook again and uploaded all the usernames and passwords to the public terminals. Since I don’t have a facebook account I don’t bother to check if my username and password have been stolen. Shelly on the other hand takes her phone out of her pocket and logs into the computer. She has access to all of her information and goes strait to facebook.

“Damn it!”, shelly says punching the desk with her left hand. “Oh they get you this time?” I say as she makes frantic clicking sounds trying to change her password.

Fly

“This is like the last time they compromise my account, I’m shutting the account down.” Shelly says as she clicks the final button on the computer to erase her data.

“Well about time you get off that merry go round.” I say as I turn the news off. Shelly doesn’t laugh, and logs off the computer. She pockets her phone and comes to lay down next to me. “At least I don’t have a virus.” She says confidently.

“Yeah that would be bad, if your phone gets hacked you are in deep shit.” Most people that get their phone hacked spend the next year trying to get a new key for their phone, not to mention the effort it takes to update all their accounts.

“I’m going to Paris tomorrow, you want to come?” She says to me, making little flicks of her long hair and looking me in the eye. “Well that might be fun, do you think we could get on the same flight?”

“I have two tickets, Vicki was supposed to go with me, but she stayed in LA this week.”

We spend the next hour talking about the movement of birds in New York, and how the best food in Paris is imported from Canada.

How Do We Win Your Hearts?

Why The Problem?

Why do we have these problems? First of all the world has become a cruel place to live, when we lack care. There is however hope. We need to advance as a society, not just five or ten years. As a whole we need to advance a hundred years or more in the span of just one year. Humans aren’t able to do it. They are however going to need our help. If they want to survive, then something has to be done.

Most of these people are living with the mindset from a hundred years ago. Therefor we need change and in big ways. Too many people watching TV and not enough people that are willing to get up off their butts and do something about it. However you have been trained to think isn’t working, please redefine what you consider viable.

Right now, I mean right now; creative people all over the world are screaming to be heard. While we are screaming for someone to listen to us. We want someone to notice, we want people to care. What we want is for people to stop hurting each other and start showing some love. The fact that we want consideration, isn’t too much to be asked for. Furthermore we come from all different walks in life, we are everyone and no one. Not only is there a way but we must find a way to be heard as a whole.

Are We Communicating?

It seems the people that we are trying to reach do not speak the same language, or may even talk in code. It’s unknown. Hence what we are asking is that they stop treating us like we are not good enough to be shown love and kindness. They need to start listening to our message.

As a group, we are a whole. First of all we deserve to be heard. We want peace and we want to be treated with respect. The problem is that too many people are being abusive to us. We are tired of hurting like this. As a whole we want our voices to be heard. We want a better world for everyone. Don’t tell us it’s not possible. It can be done. It is possible and not only possible, but practical.

Our needs must be met. Everyone’s needs must be met. Too many people are being broken, abused, and neglected. And this trend can not continue to happen. The world is tearing itself apart and we need to come together, or there will not be anything left.

In Contrast, let’s start working together as a whole to make life better for everyone. In today’s society it’s possible. For that reason we must grow as a whole. The changes that need made are possible, but only if we change as beings from being mean and cruel to being kind and more understanding.

Change

This is about making big changes. We can work the details out when we get to that point. The problem is that without making these changes, there is going to be no solutions to our problems, and life will only get worse for everyone.

Finally everyone having peace is more important than making lasting enemies.

How to go from having thoughts to thinking

HowTo:

How to go from having thoughts to actually controlling your thoughts. Instead of having thoughts, it’s better if you can make a logical line of reason to follow through a course.

Since emotions can be tied to thoughts, someone that can evoke a thought can make you have an emotional response to that thought.

The reasoning of animals, insects, and people today is group think. Group feelings. Everyone feels good about feeling bad about feeling good about having done something wrong.

By keeping people so emotionally wrapped up that they can not sort out their thoughts, it keeps people from getting more intelligent. The whole process is to keep people stupid.

Get Smarter

The problems with today’s world is that the media is controlling people’s thinking, which is controlling their emotions. People are being manipulated into feeling the way our whole society is feeling.

The only way to think strait is to take your emotions out of the equation. The only real emotion you should have is compassion and un-conditional love. They stir your emotions to keep you from thinking strait.

If you limit your input to stimuli than you can begin to control your thoughts in ways that allow you to control your emotions. Which in turn will allow you to sort your thoughts out and become a reasonable human being that goes from having thoughts to thinking. This allows you greater self mastery and control of your own being that isn’t being mass hypnotized by the media into believing that something is a certain way.

You have to develop the strength to have self mastery of your emotions, your thinking, and your physical abilities. Think about what self mastery means to you.

We can not always control the situations around us, we can however control our response to them. If your thoughts trigger an emotional response then your not in control of yourself as much as you would like to be. It’s important to be in control of one’s own self to the likes that nothing is going to bother you. This however doesn’t mean that one allows themselves to be pushed around, bullied, or taken advantage of.

The differences between having thoughts and thinking is that you have awareness and mindfulness of your thoughts. Thoughts come and go, beware of holding onto any thought for too long. This is especially true of thoughts that make you have emotions. Because then the whole cycle starts back up again.

Do Better

Perhaps the only way to limit these things is to control your social circle and limit the media’s influence upon your mind.

There is no success or failure. Those two imposters will both take you for a ride you don’t want. There is only the moment, in living life and being present. How you make other people feel is important and matters, you don’t want to be the person that abuses and takes advantage of others, and at the same time you don’t want to be abused and taken advantage of.

This requires that one doesn’t want beyond what is practical in life. To be content with a little and happy when their is abundance. But a truly intelligent society makes all it’s inhabitants equal. With everyone having something that they are good at. And many can be good at much. A wise society is one that cares for all it’s people in ways that no one feels left behind, forgotten, or alienated from society.

A wise society is one that has no poor in it’s midst, especially when all can have plenty. If your human, than that unites you with your fellow man, being that your all human. Beware of divisions that make you feel that someone isn’t good enough. Time and situations make all humans fall from high.

Knowing The Path and Walking The Path

Enlightenment an Essay

Finding enlightenment can not be understood through teaching. No matter how many times you read this essay, you will not become enlightened as per se. You may be able to find a path that will lead to enlightenment. The journey is strictly up to you as your own being. That said, take this as you find it as suited to your own tastes.

Most people find thinking a difficult task. Some even feel the act of thinking is painful. Perhaps society has made the very act of thinking so difficult that most people prefer to avoid it all together. I have found that thinking can be painful emotionally and mentally.

To achieve enlightenment requires that one be able to endure a great amount of that kind of pain. The process may be worth while, but why re-invent the wheel if a simple teaching would not solve the problems with the added avoidance of unnecessary pain and suffering?

The problem is that most people are hard headed and without some amount of discomfort and pain they will not be able to experience the essence of the teaching. That said, you understand that mediation is only an exercise in controlling your thoughts and the amount of pain necessary to attain understanding. It’s not the pain that brings the understanding, but the effort that is put forth.

Training

As any athlete would tell you it takes a lot of pain in training to have the endurance of winning a competition or event. Likewise true understanding requires sacrifice of personal self and sacrifice of comfort to attain.

True understanding is common yet unrealized. Many people wonder why they have pain but don’t think of the cause of the pain and only seek comfort to the suffering. But to have true understanding a person would avoid the problem that causes the pain in the first place. So how do you find enlightenment without suffering the pain of thinking painful thoughts?

Well somethings are possible and if you’re an exceptional person you may be able to attain such a feat without suffering more than a mere headache from the effort put forth. Perhaps an extraordinary person could achieve such a feat, perhaps. I know that I would like to save you that pain that I have come to know to arrive at this point. While I may have attained a deeper understanding, and perhaps true enlightenment to a degree. If I can save others from hurting, perhaps there is a way.

No one wants to read everything I have ever talked about or written or said. No one wants the reward without the effort, or that is to say everyone wants the reward without the effort.

Beyond all teachings, there are just a few basic points. Be kind in word and deed without using or resorting to harsh words. Enjoy what you have without feeling the need for always to improve or gain more. A humble person may have less and be more happy than those who are too prideful.

Understanding The Path

Understand simple things and simple principals. Without rushing to conclusions you will find that everyday until the day you die is a learning experience that you can benefit from. With that said, don’t let a day go by that you don’t learn or think something new. May your pain be minimal and your joy be great.

The biggest mistake you can make is to think you are an expert and to rule out every possibility that you don’t agree with in the process. Because true understanding and enlightenment is more than what an expert can understand but less than a common sensible person will do by instinct. Study yourself before you pass judgement on someone else.

The Story of Valdership

A parable

“Teach me how to think like you think, please.” The college freshman requested of his philosophy teacher. The professor looked for a moment into the sky and said, “I could no more teach you how to think like me, than it would be possible to teach you to think like a baboon.”

The boy took a sigh and looked forlorn. The teacher sensing his frustration added, “I could show you how to think for yourself. So regardless of what you are you could be a thinking person. That would be much better.”

Answers

“Yes please kind sir, that would be a gracious gift.” The professor took a seat and began by speaking. He talked about the differences between having thoughts which is common and controlling your thoughts in a civilized manner.

“The thing to be aware of is when thoughts create emotions.” The professor said in a matter of factly way. For instance lets say that I said something in class that makes you mad. And you stay mad and angry about what I said for three or four days.

Then the next time you come to my class, I say something else that makes you mad and you stay angry about that for four or five days. In essence what I have done is psychologically manipulated you into staying angry. If it makes you angry until you come back to my class, in which time the process starts all over again.

How to Grow

Now a wise person would let go of the anger and learn the lesson from the example instead of staying angry. But the emotional feeling of being angry keeps you from sorting out your thoughts. And as long as i keep making you angry then your thinking will not be able to change to learn the lesson.

The anger in your heart makes you have more thoughts that in turn fuels more feelings of being angry. Thus stoking a cycle of feelings and thoughts that if not stopped will result in your demise.

The truth is it’s no different than what the media of today’s world is doing. It’s designed to keep people stupid. It’s designed to keep their emotions stirred up to prevent them from thinking.

Keeping you from thinking a thought through to completion. If you really want to know how to think! You have to move from ‘Just having thoughts.’ that pop into your head to actually thinking thoughts.

Going from having thoughts to thinking

That makes sense right?

Well when you explain it in that way, yeah it kind of does.

Generally a persons output matches their input, so if you get bad input then your going to have bad output. It’s like the computer programmers old motto, “Garbage in, Garbage out.”

The difference between us is that one person can learn to understand. If you are trained to know which is garbage and which is useful bits of information. Then you can be effective. Always take the good training you get a do better with it. While always remember the bad training you get and don’t do that crap.