Busby SEO Challenge by Benj

There’s so much work to do. I get task from everywhere and meetings to attend, presentations to finish and at our office, we maximize the use of MS Outlook. We share calendars. We set our meetings well and invite people and update them through our calendars.

And today I receive this calendar notice: Read the rest of this entry �

While working on my computer at the 17th floor of a building in Downtown San Diego, I felt the tremors right away and looked outside the window. Since all other buildings were not in close proximity, you cannot see that much the strenght of the sway but my window blind were moving to show that this was undeniably an earthquake in San Diego.

Some group of employees ended up going down the stairs from the 17th floor just to safe just in case there were any after effects. We went to a deli about 3 blocks away and stayed there for a while.

After coming back, I checked the epicenter right away. It was at 33.955 degress North and 117.765 degrees West that registered 5.4 on the Ritcher scale detected by Seismographs from USGS, Caltech, CGS, UCB, UCSD and UNR. The location was about 46 kilimeters away from the LA Civic Center. Read the rest of this entry �

I join contest in the past mainly to test what I know and in the process learn more. And after doing about 2 or 3 of them, my attitude changed into I am joining SEO Challenges because I want to win! I liked these SEO competitions and worked a great deal into them trying my best to win and so far it paid off. Now it seems that after winning the previous SEO contest I have joined, it has helped promote myself, market myself to the Internet community mainly in the Philippines and other countries outside the US. Then I have seen more and more blog post talking about me (but not linking to me grrrr *LOL*) and I guess with the information out there I have seen a good mash up of information and is pretty accurate with the information about me but this site never contacted me about it. I have a professional profile on the Philippine Government’s National Computer Center. Listed in their Consultants / IT Professionals List. But there is nothing really special about that since they have a pretty long list of Filipino IT Professionals. I am just surprised with the length of info i have that is accurate. But again I am also not surprised since after reading the profile, I know where the information came from, interview blog post, other people I know that blogged about me, I blogged about myself, from my social media profiles, mainly LinkedIn and other stuff. (Wala man lang link papunta sa akin. *LOL*) Read the rest of this entry �

The past few weeks has been up and down for my servers. Somehow, it was also up and down for me. I was sick since May 30. Started with some simple soar throat, which I did not mind at first since everything seemed tolerable and just did my best to get rid of any germs with antiseptic. But colds and cough started settling in as well and by Sunday, June 1, 2008 I was already not feeling well. June 1 was also the start of the Busby SEO Challenge which I have barely worked on yet. The following week, I was not able to go to work. for the next 3 days. Read the rest of this entry �

Sometimes I make suicidal decisions. I call them suicidal because they are like decisions that are more bound to fail but I still go for them always thinking I can overcome all odds. For some reason I always had this kind of attitude. I do not really call them stupid decisions but really challenging and if every it can be called to have calculated risk, it is really a tough calculation.

I decided to buy a piece of land

Ok, that even sounds good right? Land is always a good investment. Problem is I am not really the person that has a super deep pocket that can buy anything I want to. Last month, near the end of April, I went on a trip to take a look at some piece of land some one has offer me and wife. With the high cost of real estate and me having a full time job in an expensive city, and my wife who is less than a year in the US without a job yet, and us running a small business to make ends meet is not really the type of occupational situation we would want to have in investing in real estate. We have 2 daughters with us in the US as well. But why did I still decide to buy a piece of land? Read the rest of this entry �

It’s now Day two of the fire storm in San Diego. We spent the night at Mira Mesa at Uncle Totoy and Auntie Linda’s place. Thank you very much for accommodating us all including two noisy kids that ran all over the place. Added challenges was we had my Sis-in-law’s new born 1 month premature baby Anica with us whom we picked up at Sharp Mary Birth Hospital.

I tried going to work on Tuesday, day 3 of the wild fire but my wife and in-laws needed me for several important errands going back and forth to the pharmacy getting their medicines. With no computer to use and my phone, a Palm 750 mysteriously kept rebooting all day, I was offline most of the day. Read the rest of this entry �

Just an update for friends and family. If your not aware, probably just watch CNN or FoxNews or BBCNews and check the San Diego Fire. Starting last Sunday, there we big fires in Southern California. Some in LA, Orange County and San Diego.

Fire was due to low humidity causing super dry air with high temperature and high speed winds reaching 65MPH. Heat helps burn more. Wind gives more oxygen for combustion and blows it in directions that make it spread more and super dry conditions makes the fire keep going on. Read the rest of this entry �

When I was at the Park and Ride parking lot at Mira Mesa, San Diego, I was with my wife and daughters and with my Sis-in-law and nephew as we waited for the shuttle bus to arrive. When it came Jamie started to cry knowing that I will be away for a week.

Going back the old-fashioned way

While on the plane, heading to Paradise Philippines, I was preparing my presentation for the SEMCon 2007, using my wife’s laptop since mine did not have the latest software and I barely had time updating mine as I was preparing to leave. On the plane, the laptop died since it was not fully charged. So I then decided to organize my thoughts on my cellphone running Windows Mobile, but it too was nearly drained and I needed what ever charge it may have for emergency calls once I land in Manila. So I prepared the outline of my presentation with a pen and paper. Read the rest of this entry �

My life right now runs in the online world. An internet marketing related job that makes me always online at work, and a business at home doing the same thing. Since I do a lot of work online, I know I need the computer most of the time and I also know my family needs computers for leisure as well. So each family member had a laptop

Read the rest of this entry �

I have always introduced my wife as my wife since 2002. But technically, we were not really married yet since there were several legal matters that needed to get ironed out then. And during this period, I left for the US in 2004 since my work in the Philippines was not really supporting my family well. And I was away from my family for long periods and would go home every 6 months or so to be with them again in the Philippines. Getting vacations in my jobs are usually not permitted within certain time frames but I used to go back during certain IT events where I am invited and I go on vacation without pay. Although plane tickets are quite expensive, and considering that I even get no salary for two weeks work, I am way broke and sometimes with over due bills after my vacation but nothing beats being with them again. 6 months was too long, even 1 week was too long and some of my friends just seem so puzzled asking me how do I do it? I myself don’t know how I did but I just kept myself preoccupied with work so I don’t feel the loneliness. Read the rest of this entry �

Past few days I’ve been so busy finishing a bunch of projects. That I often burn the midnight oil finishing all these sites. I only pay attention to this and I don’t even think about anything else. So my room is often a mess that my room floor looks like tons of junk and seems like a snake could probably be living already in my room jungle.

This is my work area, and once I work, I don’t pay attention to anything else. Read the rest of this entry �