My blog will be changing very soon

I've been kind of ignoring the little messages at the top of the screen for the last few weeks (could have been months, and I might not have even noticed), but Blogger, which is owned by Google, is removing ftp access for its blogger service. What this means might not make a lot of sense to people who aren't all into the hardware side of blogging, but for someone like me, it's HUGE. For the longest time, I've really enjoyed using Blogger to make my blog. I was able to configure it to be exactly what I wanted, which meant having to hack the code a bit (all legal, of course), but I got it to be exactly what I wanted. What was most important to me was that the blog was actually hosted on my own website's server. I learned a long time ago that when you don't do that, you are at the mercy of some other company and how good its service is. I used to use Xanga some years back, and they constantly had hardware problems, so Blogger was my solution.

Well, they're ending ftp service for Blogger, which means I have to look for a different service. Oh, I can stay with Blogger if I want, but basically what it wants me to do (in order to use littlesarbonn.com) is to do a DNS change to my system so that THEY host my blog, and that my web site is now completely pointing over to the service provided by Google. In other words, my web site will be completely hosted by Google, which means that at any moment, Google can completely cut me off if for some reason it doesn't like my content.

Unfortunately, Google has been known to do that. Oh, they don't advertise it, but I know a number of controversial people who have had their Google GMAIL accounts completely deleted on them for no reason they can fathom, other than someone didn't like who they were and what they were saying. Or it could be a technical glitch. Either way, that's not the kind of organization I want to entrust my daily writings to.

Unfortunately, this leaves me with two options. Go to another service, or pay more money to my own service provider to add a blogger service from it. Pair.com, which is my provider, uses Moveable Type, and I'm not really all that enamored with it. It has a bit of a learning curve I really don't want to try to figure out any time soon. I then looked at Word Press, but the only service they really offer that I would want is almost as bad as going to Moveable Type. So, I may end up just using their free service, which I've established already some months back at http://sarbonn.wordpress.com. It's not really a solution to my problem, but I don't really trust Google all that much, so I'm going to be moving my blog over to Word Press's free service and see if that works out for me.

I might change things as I look further at Moveable Type. I just don't feel like spending hours learning and configuring something that might just not be worth the expense.

For the most part, those who follow my blog on Facebook shouldn't see any difference. I'm pretty sure I can use the same linkage anyway. But for those who follow the site itself, it might be more difficult. The fortunate thing is that The Adventures of Stickman and the Legospaceman comic is hosted directly on my server, so it doesn't need a blog service in order to make it work.

Either way, I'll keep you informed.

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Stickman Will Be Returning Soon!

My comic strip, The Adventures of Stickman and the Unemployed Lego Spaceman, will be returning soon. I just finished the conception story and art for the first few new entries. As soon as I can hook up a scanner, I will be producing these and adding them to the site. The new stories will begin with the introduction of Stickman's new pets, and then I'll be slowly integrating the introduction of the third main character, the lego spaceman.

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School is back in swing

This was the first week of school, and it was an extremely busy week. The first part of the week was spent stressing over financial aid, but that may finally be solved, and hopefully by next week I'll actually get money. I probably don't have to repeat how sucky this whole summer has been money-wise.

So far, it looks like my Tuesdays and Thursdays are nightmare days. My Wednesday has a few things happening, like debate practice at 6pm until about 9 or 10pm, but so far, I've managed to keep Monday and Friday free, although that might not be the case on weekends when I have to attend tournaments, of course.

Haven't had much time to do any Stickman over the last few days. It's hard to find any time to do anything these days, but as the semester is starting to settle in, I'm hoping to add more curricular activities to my life.

This semester I'm taking Documentary Film in Political Communication and Mass Communication as my two grad courses. I'm teaching interpersonal communication and acting as the senior TA for public speaking. I taught my first interpersonal class today, and the students seemed okay. They laughed at the appropriate times. Well, most of the appropriate times, at least. I also have to start to get in gear for taking my comprehensive exams in November. It's amazing how fast grad school can go.

As for my writing, I sent out a ton of short stories the other day. I have to keep convincing myself to keep trying, or I'll just blow it off and then get nothing done.

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A prototype of the new legospaceman character

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Writing woes, school financing and, of course, Stickman!

I spent a good portion of today just getting a bunch of short stories ready for sending out. I've been kind of trying to occupy my mind because my financial aid may be seriously screwed up due to some error that was overlooked on my part because I didn't even realize it was a situation. As such, if this doesn't get fixed, I may have to drop out of school. The person who may be able to help me fix it doesn't answer her phone and is located at San Francisco State University. I've left a LOT of messages for her, and I can't get through to her or to anyone that can help me any further. My fate is left in the hands of one person who doesn't actually answer her phone (it goes to her message stating she's on the phone instead).

But regardless of that, here's Monday's Stickman.

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The first Sunday Stickman!

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Saturday's Stickman

For the main page of The Adventures of Stickman & the Unemployed Legospaceman, click here.

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Stickman Is Back! (Stickman #8)

The Adventures of Stickman and the Unemployed Legospaceman can be found here.

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New Stickman in the pipeline & some theory stuff that may just create peace in the world for real

I have a few new adventures of Stickman completed. I just now need to get them scanned, and then hopefully they'll be up later on today.

Also, I woke up about 5am this morning in a bizarre fashion. I had gone to bed thinking about Axelrod's Cultural Adaptation Theory, but I woke up with a synthesis of that theory and several others that I've been working on for a few years now, to the point of where I actually believe I can mathematically explain how to create peace between two hostile nations (or people) through consistent dialog where neither side is required to give in to the other. It involves the Interpersonal Communication/marketing theory of "foot in the door", mixed with the game theoretic/mathematical "tit for tat", Axelrod's Cultural Adaptation Theory, and my own Strategic vs. tactical processing theory from one of my earlier papers. It was a truly bizarre feeling because I woke up and it suddenly all made sense. But much like my neutramatter theory some years ago when I was studying physics, I now find myself questioning how it can be so obvious when no one else has come up with it before me. My neutramatter theory makes complete sense of the universe, yet no one's ever gone that way, and they're still struggling over such simplistic concepts that this theory actually explains away. I'm left with that same feeling concerning this "discovery" I just had. With great names like Dahl, Easton, Putnam and Huntington working on these types of things, why is some unknown grad student in Stockton figuring out this crap instead?

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The Stickman Hiatus

People keep asking me when there will be new Stickman comics. I've been kind of swamped lately with the before school crap/stuff, which kind of sucks because I feel like I've been working full time, and I'm still not getting paid yet. My goal is to work on a few more of the adventures over the next few days, as I've been wanting to move to the next part of the story, which is the actual introduction of Stickman, which kind of got introduced, but not to the level that he deserves. Plus, there will be the new characters added, which will be the Legospaceman, and my favorite Bigfoot Gumby. Yeah, it'll make sense when the story moves on.

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Updates

Well, those were the first 7 episodes of Stickman. I'm taking a bit of time off to generate some more, and then I should be posting them some time next week. It also takes a bit of time for me to do this because I do not own a scanner, so I have to use the one on campus.

The job hunting is still going, and I've been interviewed more times than anyone should ever have to be interviewed without actually getting a job. From temp agencies to government jobs to regular jobs, I just can't seem to get a lucky break. I ran out of money last week, so things are getting kind of tough. I rationed the food I had into halves, and while I love the fact that I've been losing a lot of weight very fast over the last few weeks, I'm pretty sure this wasn't the way one is supposed to go about doing it. I have over a month and a half to make it, and to be honest, I'm not sure I will.

I wish I had better news to report, but this summer has really sucked. And it's getting kind of worse. I've pretty much run out of options, so it's now an exercise in watching the rest of the world crumble around me.

I'm beyond complaining and feeling sorry for myself. Now, I'm starting to find bizarre humor in the stupidest things. Like health insurance, for instance. School cut my last five paychecks in half to pay for my Kaiser health coverage through the summer, which took away the money I had actually planned to use to survive this summer. Irony is such a fun little animal. My shoulder has been in massive pain all summer long, but I can't afford the $20 co-pay with my insurance in order to get an MRI and then yet another payment probably to get some surgery. So, losing half my income managed to allow me access to my insurance, but losing half my income means I can't afford to access my insurance. It's like paying auto insurance for a car that sits in a garage to which you don't have the key.

Anyway, it's survival of the fittest in this country. I wasn't the fittest.

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Stickman #7

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Stickman #6

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Stickman #5

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Stickman #4

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The whole Stickman thing

I managed to get the comics started. Now, it's just a matter of getting people to be able to see it. At first, one of the feedback problems was that the comics were too small. I've tried to correct that on the main page. We'll see how it works from there. I also added biographies to the first few characters that will be part of the comic strip.

I'm still working hard trying to find a job. I kind of ran out of money, and that really sucks, so I'm not sure what to do until I find an actual job. I guess starving and dying are an option, but I'm hoping for a bit more than that.

I have some processing to do with the National Guard tomorrow evening and Tuesday. I'm much older than when I first served, so I have a strong feeling I'm not going to be able to go that direction.

I also have an interview on Wednesday morning. Actually, I have an interview and a test both at the exact same time on Wednesday morning, so I have decided to choose the job I'd much rather have and attend that interview instead.

Other than that, things are still kind of crappy. My shoulder has been killing me lately, and there are times when I've just thought of giving up completely because after a night of no sleep because my shoulder is throbbing, well, it doesn't leave you a happy camper.

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Stickman #3

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Stickman #2

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The start of the adventure

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The Adventures of Stickman and the Unemployed Lego Spaceman

This is my latest project. As you can see from the banner above, I am creating something new. It is going to be a comic strip. I already have 7 episodes of 3-panels completed. Now, I just need to find some way to scan them so that I can place each episode on my computer.

The story is about two main characters: Stickman (a 2-dimensional character) and his friend the unemployed lego spaceman (look at the picture on this web site, and you'll see what he generally looks like). The story begins with the creation of the universe from a single point to the invention of Stickman and then it will evolve to the integration of the lego spaceman.

It may not make a lot of sense yet, but it will when I can get the episodes scanned and put online. For quite some time now, I have been looking for an outlet to use my humor to its best ability, and I've been having a lot of trouble just getting published with my latest novel, a humorous Greek epic, so this is something new for me. And I'm actually pretty happy with the direction this is going.

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