FOR AN UPDATE WITH THE MOST RECENT NUMBERS AS OF JANUARY 2016, PLEASE FOLLOW THE LINK.

I promised I would write about how WordAds are working for me, so here is the promised post. I only discovered that WordPress was offering a program of its own instead of the dreadful and malicious Google AdSense recently. You don’t need to do anything to make the program work other than going on your Settings page and enabling WordAds.

The program counts your ad impressions based on a formula of its own. Ad impressions are not equal to hits or individual IPs. WordPress takes blog visits from some countries into account but not others. So if most of your readership is not in the US, this program might not work as well for you.

Under the fold, you can see my WordAds earnings for December 2013 and January 2014. Next to the ad impressions, I wrote the number of total hits for each month. Forgive the handwriting, but if you tried writing figures in a Windows snipping tool, you’ll understand.

You will see that a significantly larger number of hits translates into a smaller number of ad impressions.

The conclusion is that WordAds rocks, and I recommend it to anybody. Any amount you get after connecting WordAds is bigger than what you had without it, so it’s all good.

Continue reading “WordAds Earnings” →

Can anybody explain to me why Google Plus refers to me as “Clarissa Glock”? Also, a gmail account that I have under my real name also started sending out emails identifying me as “Clarissa Glock.” I understand where Clarissa comes from, even though I have no idea what it is doing on an email account that is not associated with this blog. But why “Glock”? It is in no way similar to my last name or the last names of anybody related to me in any way.

When I first saw “Clarissa Glock” at the top of my screen, I thought I’d accidentally accessed somebody else’s account. But it’s my account, with my emails, etc.

Does anybody know how this works and if I need to be concerned about being nicknamed after a firearm?

What is Google trying to tell me?

In terms of psychological health, there are healthy and unhealthy ways of drinkinh alcohol, eating, gaming, and even smoking. I’m not talking about physical health, mind you, only psychological.

Here is the way to decide if your drinking, smoking, eating, etc are psychologically healthy or not. If you do these things for the purposes of emotional healing, they are unhealthy. Say, you are stressed out, exhausted, anxious, nervous, overwhelmed, and your response to that is, “I need a drink /  a cigarette / an ice-cream”, this is not psychologically healthy.
If, however, you enjoy a good piece of cake, a cigar, or a glass of wine simply because you like their taste every once in a while, that’s completely healthy. In other words, all of these things are psychologically healthy when enjoyed for their own sake. The moment when they begin to serve secondary purposes, however, we have entered the area of mental issues.

On the subject of Switzerland’s recent cap on immigration, Germany’s Süddeutsche Zeitung says:

The non-member state Switzerland merely articulated what was already on the minds of many EU member states. The Swiss have opened a Pandora’s Box which other opponents of the free movement of peoples will now reach into as well. It will no longer suffice for Brussels to pout and point to the principle of freedom of movement to brush off criticisms. There are real problems, and citizens everywhere want to see them solved.

Nothing is more annoying than to see people dance around an issue, never saying what is really on their mind. No problem can be solved until its causes are named. There was never a “free movement of peoples” in the EU. For as long as I can remember, Western Europe was guarded better than Fort Knox. But, of course, when you start talking about a non-existent “free movement of peoples,” it sounds so noble and lofty. Who can possibly be against the freedom of peoples?

Let’s just state the painfully obvious: for a very long time, the rich countries of Europe were making every possible effort to ensure that the immigrants who come into their countries will never be able to assimilate. This was the only quality that was sought. “Free movement of peoples” was never of the slightest interest to anybody.

These two-layered Kleenex napkins that rustle in your hands when you try to use them. They make my skin crawl. Brrr.

And I bought a whole box without knowing what they would be like.