Aaron Donohoe

It’s the Irish Syndrome to complain about a holiday when you get back to head straight for the nearest bar for ‘proper’ pint of Guinness - no more of that limp wristed fairy juice they pump you with over in Spain! But I will deviate slightly from expectations! So why am I showboating so much about the holiday well - forseeable this will be my last holiday away with the family and my last abroad holiday for atleast a year! So I’m savouring it!

Anyway, had a great flight over - Airline food was actually edible, got in on time and got bags nice and early before catching a coach to the appartment. Checked in and by that time it was 10 o’clock so went for Italian meal at a nearby restaurant.

The next few days were a blur of monotonus relaxation poolside of trapsing through the array of shops - all selling the same cheap tat. Although the only places where you could get quality goods was on the Spanish equivilant of Grafton Street. The only splurges which I had were on my obligatory Hugo Boss and a fancy Casio watch which set me back €130 - but as the sales woman said ‘you pay for quality’, to my response was I don’t want to pay that much! But she twisted my arm and I endulged!

Another source of tat is the numerous illegitimate stalls, which if you show any sign of interest will not let up until they part you with your money - I learned that hard way with a stall owner, when returning to the apartment I glanced at a stall with fake-poorly imitated watches and handbags. I displayed a morsel of interest in a watch to which the guy wanted €45, to which I responded I wasn’t interested. A mini-arguement ensued when I wanted to leave and he kept throwing prices at me for this watch. Eventually I gave him €20 for the watch - just to get him out of my face! And don’t just think this is an isolated business tactic, it’s plagued all around Spain - just bear in mind none of them are there to serve you, they’re there to rip you off!

Another thing which ripped me off was the amusement machines, such as grabbers, and various other point and shoot thingys. There was one which was a 3 pixel ’snake’ going across a line of 7 pixels. You initially stopped it and then another ’snake’ started above the one you just stopped and you had to match them. This went on until before the marker for ‘minimum prize’ when the snake reduced to 2 pixels and speeds increased. When you reached the mimimum prize mark you had the option of taking it or continueing for a maximum prize which was a Nintendo DS, Sony PSP, or iPod Touch. So I treid this 5 times and got to just before the maximum marker where just after the mimimum marker the snake reduced to 1 pixel. On the last line on many attempts when I hit the stop button the snake would stop momentarilty on the point (where I would have won a DS, PSP or iPod) but would suddenly skip so I would leave empty handed. I noticed this on the first attempt and four more later backed this up!

But aside from the local ‘Del Boy’ ripping you off, Spain is a great country - which I really enjoyed. The locals are warm and welcoming - it’s just a little intimidating when you’ve a guy screaming at you and you haven’t a fiddlers about what he’s talking about! We even met a few Irish & English people who we got on exceptionally well with. We even had a pet in the apartment - a Gecko I named Eddy!

All in all it was a fantastic holiday, it’s nice to get away, but it’s even better to be back home - with proper food, drink, a proper bed and more imporantly a propwer QWERTY keyboard!

The only downside was the fact I had to go in for a meeting in school on Tuesday morning, but I didn’t get back until 1am this morning which made me a day late! So I’m taking today to relax, recouperate and get some supplies before heading back to the grind on Thursday morning!

Just a quick Ola from Port d’Alcúdia here on the island of Malorca. Having a ball, spending a fortune and getting burnt to fuck - but that’s what a holiday is all about isn’t it?

Just trying to grasp the spanish keyboard layout\concept - completely fucking me over as it’s all confusing. The Irish layout is the superior in my opinion! I’m paying €1 for the privalige of 10 minutes so damn it I’m gonna use them!

It appears my pre-dated posts went to plan. Woo! And the blog is still online as well as my other sites which is a plus. Although I had no way of getting them back online should they had collapsed in a spectacular frenzy!

Anyway, whoever told me everything was cheaper in Spain is a lying fuck! Buying stuff here isn’t really as cheap as you’d think as most of it is fake! There are stalls everywhere selling the same rip off substance at an outrageous price. But I am thrilled with my purchase of a 100ml bottle of Hugo Boss which only set me back €40!

Anyway, I’ve been on this thing for going on 30 minutes and it’s costing me a poxy fortune! Only came onto ask my mates if they could collect my schedual from school which starts on Tuesday morning (but I’m not back until that night!). Ah well problems are there to give out about.

Off to basque in some sun and sip into some Sangria!

Au Revoir…

This is the first time I’ve used the dated post thing - if it’s worked hurray!

Anyway. Came across this and had the share it…I had to look at it twice!

Now that’s better than any Spiderman!

I went to see Wall-E the other day, and happened to noticed an uncanny similarity between Wall-E and Johnny 5 (from Short Circuit). Have a look for yourself:

Wall-E

Johnny Five

Am I the only one seeing this? Or can you see the laziness of Disney-Pixar’s animators?

Well tomorrow morning I will be jetsetting off to sunny Spain for a week of relaxation and getting the back burnt off me! Have been looking forward to this for ages as so much shite has been happening I really need to get away from it all and forget about everything back home in Ireland!

The dog has been enrolled in a kennel, the house and the goldfish will be looked after by my cousin, the rashers and sausages have been packed (as the Spanish stuff is crap!) and all I’ve to do is pack some clothes but save some room for the raid on duty free!

Great thing is the flight isn’t until 2pm tomorrow afternoon, although we’ve to check in at 12:00 - so I still get sort of a lie in! When we set down in Palma airport we’ve a hour and half coach journey ahead of us. But I’ve an iPod stacked full of my CD collection (and any other artists music I could ‘get’ from the net!)

So I’ll be seeing you all in a week, although I’ll be checking in every now and again to make sure the blog is still ticking over and to check my emails.

I’ve set a few posts to predefinded dates - so if I got it right it should post…but if I didn’t I suppose it won’t post!

Well after thousands of leaving cert students have been gnawing in anticipation at the bit in anticipation over getting their results all come to end this morning when the results were handed out. Some were ecstatic with their overly joyous outcome and I’m sure some slipped away quietly having not achieved what they wanted.

Although luckily everyone I know who patiently awaiting their results did exceptionally well. Some got way better results then they thought, especially Mark Walsh who got an astounding 510 points out of a maximum 600! Congrats Mark!

So I’ll expect to be invited into town this evening to share in the celebratory occasion - and rightly so, they should get absolutely ‘Gee-Eyed‘ (excuse the expression) as the stress in the run upto the exams as well as during them I’m sure is immense.

Unfortunately, I won’t be celebrating this year. I’ve to wait for another year before I can truly celebrate. Come September my epic journey to ‘The Leaving’ will begin - I’m not nervous, more eager. I kind of do and don’t want to leave school - I do want to get into college/work to start my life as I want, doing something I enjoy, I don’t want to leave so many friends (although remaining in contact and going for the obligatory pint in Doyles will suffice!), I like the childish, immature craic we have in class and I’ll really miss the teachers and tutors who have been great craic over the years - so come August 28th I’ll be savouring everything and anything!

Have a drink from me guys

Whilst I have been indoors due to the floodings in Dublin I have been improving the blog slightly:

• Plugins - adding, removing, upgrading, ‘improving’ (breaking)
• Style - I’ve modified the style slightly, fixing some errors and making more personal
• Categories - I’ve laid down base categories and divided all categories into sub-categories. Makes everything more tidy!
• Removals - I’ve removed any unused, or unnecessary plugins, themes, and files.
• Updated About Me & Contact Me Pages

I’ve intentions on the following:

• Re-upload the uploads folder *DONE*
• Install:
  • Gravatars on Comments *DONE*
  • Various plugins to secure my ACP *DONE*
  • Writing various time delayed posts for when I’m away *DONE*
  • Related Posts *DONE*
  • XML Sitemaps *DONE*
  • Whatever else takes my fancy over at the Plugin Directory
• New Background image *DONE*
• Code Random Header Image Script to Variate Header Image

It’s better to be doing something productive whilst I can do feck all at home. Nothing on telly bar Top Gear repeats…that I’ve already seen!

The obervent amongst you would have noticed that the blog has been offline for the past few days - basically we were subject to a hack effort which resulted in the blog being taken offline by the Datacentre (and they never bothered to notify me neither!).

So basically the hacker proceeded to upload malicious files onto the server, mainly phishing related - I noticed this a few days prior to being taken offline on one of my other websites hosted on the server and brought it to the notification of the server administrators - I thought they might beef up security, ban some IP’s, or do something. No, that costs money, and all the administrator is interest in is profit - letting his clients go way down the list of his priorities isn’t going to get him far! Remember what the doormouse said - feed your head (whatever that means).

I’ve been too busy lately to be dealing with the middle men who haven’t a clue what’s going on - the server admin hires anyone any 12 year old with access to a computer and basic English as a Support Rep! I’ve sent around 15 emails to various support reps, the datacentre, as well as the server administrator - none of the above have responded! That’s charming isn’t it? I pay THEM to host my websites and for the apparent 24/7 live support and 99.5% guaranteed uptime. Hmm there are countless times when my websites have been offline and the ‘live support’ is set to BUSY.

I think I will be hosting on Irish soil from now on - afterall support is only a phonecall away, and you’re talking to someone who knows what they’re on about. It’s a little more expensive but I think from here on in it’s worth the investment. I’m presently on an emergency hosting account which I have on Hosting365 until I get around to sorting out some permanent hosting - will get onto a few sites to see what deals there are

Until then please bear with me whilst I get the backup online. I’m having difficulty uploading the database at the moment as my internet is patchy to say the least and has been for the past two days - will be moving to Digiweb soon *hopefully*. IBB is doing my head in, every so often it gets stroppy and refuses to connect or will suddenly crash. And the Vodafone Mobile B/B isn’t much better neither - so Digiweb seems like a good alternative (a neighbour moved to them recently and is happy with them).

To top it all my car has cost me a fortune on parts - have’nt time to fit them neither. Have to send the cylinder head off to a specialist to get it refaced and ported before refitting with a new head gasket, and manifold. Fitting an alarm system I got off eBay has been a nightmare as it’s not earthing properly meaning it won’t arm! And a few bits and pieces I bought off eBay (mainly tools) have yet to arrive despite being ordered from the UK 14 days ago - and my paying for premium postage!

Roll on August 19th - off to Spain for a week of relaxation…

I’m looking for a host for a few turnover development websites, probably hosting for around 10-15 websites, mostly blogs.

I’m looking for hosting with the following specs:

• cPanel (reseller account with WHM preferred)
• Around 4GB space, and a suggestible amount of Bandwidth
• Decent Uptime, and Server Specs
• A Reasonable Monthly fee, I have few intentions of paying annually anymore as I’ve been burnt too many times with those ‘Fly by Night‘ hosts who take your annual fee and run after a month!
• Unlimited Databases and Email Aliases/Forwarding
• If Shared Hosting, Unlimited Addon Domains or atlease 15 addon domains
• Support not essential - I’ve enough experience with cPanel and WHM to be able to sort myself out unless it’s a server or backend problem

Can you suggest any hosts? I’m looking for personal experiences with such hosts, but bear in mind these websites will be turned over at a fast rate so I don’t want to be paying the earth for the monthly fees. Just simple shared (although reseller preferred) hosting with cPanel a must!

Any suggestions welcome :thumbsup:

I’d just like to point out, that this post is my personal opinion and experience and doesn’t reflect whatsoever on FireStats - just a disclaimer so the nice people at FireStats don’t go taking my house for my bad mouthing of them

Anyway, I’ve taken the decision to uninstall FireStats from my blogs, I’ve taken this decision after encountering numerous problems with the plugin, mainly with the load it puts on my database and subsequently my website.

Other errors included fatal errors resulting in having to reinstall the plugin - my idea of a stats plugin is it records information over a long period and emits graphs etc… However, it isn’t that effective when you’ve to often reinstall the bloody thing!

It also doesn’t record some visits, I’ve checked this out by logging on to the blog on a friends computer and upon returning home it hadn’t logged the visit - where it logs most actions from my IP and certainly others, it often fails to record some.

I’ve decided to resort back to the ol’ reliable Google Analytics - I’ve found over the time period it has performed well, as I’ve kept it active as I have with FireStats.

Don’t go flaming me saying I should have installed the latest version etc…, well infact I have tried the latest version as well as the BETA version and found them both to have the same problems. Don’t get me wrong, FireStats is a great concept, just needs to fix those bugs, and until then I’ll be sticking with Google Analytics!