Merill Fernando lives in Sri Lanka, a country that was very hard hit by the tsunamis, and he exchanged emails with me this evening after he took the time to send a few kind words in response to the little bit of help this weblog has provided. He has also posted on his weblog about what even a small contribution can do to help people in need. You should read it, especially if you think you can’t afford to give enough to help others. Even if all you have to give is a five bucks, Amazon.com will let you easily donate whatever you can afford. Merill’s site will show you how much just $1 will buy.

Again, we are calling on all bloggers who use AdSense to pledge to donate your AdSense revenues for December or whatever time you wish to the relief and aid effort. Merill pointed the idea out on his weblog and agrees that it is a great idea – so please contribute and contact Google to let them know you would like them to help make this happen by providing an AdSense administrative option to donate funds at the end of this month. Whether or not Google participates in this effort, I am donating my revenue check. Please consider doing the same.

Together we can make things happen – that’s part of the power of the blogosphere. Give now, post your thoughts and plans to your blog, and contact others that can make a difference and ask them to help.

If you’re looking for places to give, just go here. And thank your for doing your part.

I have an idea, and a burning need to do something more to help those in need. I’ll email Google with this request, but I’m going to post it here, and encourage you to do the same thing on your site.

UPDATE: Google AdSense Support responded to this idea, and it’s at least possible!

I want all my AdSense revenue pending at the end of the year to go to help relief efforts in South Asia where the earthquakes and tsunamis have caused such devastation. If you use AdSense, I want you to pledge to do the same thing.

I think Google should make this an easy option for anyone with an AdSense account, and that they should do it in time for all of us to make our donations now, before the end of the year. It would be so easy for me to give that money to those in need, and Google can help many others do the same thing. Put a simple checkbox on the AdSense admin site that lets me choose to donate my AdSense funds. Do it for everyone.

Are you willing to donate your AdSense revenues? Comment here. Or post it on your blog or web site. Email Google and make it happen.

Scott Hanselman gave me this idea when he said he was thinking about donating his AdSense revenues. I had been thinking the same thing. Scott’s a good, kind person and I am willing to bet there are thousands more like him out there that would like to be able to do the same thing.

Hey Google people - call me if I can help make this happen. Seriously. My phone number is 503–419–6495. I have lots of time right now, as well as a little AdSense revenue to share. So, I hope you’ll help me help someone else. Anyone else who wants to help can call me, too. Make my phone ring.

Update – Several bloggers have already posted and signed on to pledge their earnings to recovery efforts. I'll donate mine whether Google makes it easy to do through them or not - but it would be awfully cool if they can make it possible. Making it easy for people will mean more people will participate.

Also – Turns out there’s no better way to mark one year of blogging at greghughes.net than doing something to help others. Just realized it was one year of blogging here on the 27th… People, please contact Google and ask them to make this happen, and then post a link on your blog, and if you use adsense, I encourage you to join us in donating!

From the land of good things and small packages:

If you’re like me, you find yourself regularly fighting goofy formatting problems with text copied from web browsers and pasted into email (Outlook, Thunderbird) and blog posting (BlogJet) clients. Well, if you’re a Firefox user, here’s a solution:

http://jgillick.nettripper.com/copyplaintext/

PlainText is a browser extension that adds a context menu to Firefox (or the Mozilla browser) that allows you to copy a selection as plain text, sans markup. So simple, yet so freakin’ valuable!

Hallelujah! Thanks to Marc Orchant for the link…

NobodyHere.com is, without a doubt, one of the more interestingly funny and random sites I have seen in some time. It kept me clicking around for some time…

http://www.nobodyhere.com/justme/me.here

When Chris Pirillo started sending me images of rings and dogs and other things on IM the other day, I knew what was up – and his method of asking Ponzi The Question was pretty darn cool. I congratulated him privately then, but today I want to do so in front of the world, so here you go.

Chris and Ponzi, two fine people whom I am glad and proud to know, are engaged to be married – They formally made it known in public on their blogs today.

Congrats you two!

MSN has a special web site dedicated to educating people about online safety and security:

http://safety.msn.com/

It’s a decent resource for the average user, and provides easy-to-understand facts and answers to common questions and issues people face on the Internet.

In particular, information about protecting kids online and how to recognize and avoid falling victim to phishing schemes are among the topics addressed.

Around my place we say “Merry Christmas.” But whatever holiday you celebrate in your life, I hope it’s a good one for you and yours.

Today at home it’s a fire in the fireplace, with posole** cooking on top of the stove, and over the next couple of days it’ll be wrapping presents, going to church, spending time with friends, and remembering what the holiday is all about.

“Now I commit you to God and to the word of his grace, which can build you up and give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified. I have not coveted anyone's silver or gold or clothing. You yourselves know that these hands of mine have supplied my own needs and the needs of my companions. In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ”

The guy who spoke those words was a good and decent man, and he was taught them buy another guy – who was also a good and decent man, and whose birthday we just happen to celebrate this weekend.

Merry Christmas, everyone.

** Here’s my Posole recipe, archived here for myself so I won’t lose it, and for anyone else who’s interested. This way I won’t have to call mom and ask (again) next time, heh:

• One #10 can (108oz) Hominy (Mexican style preferred, white is also ok)
• Two large yellow onions, sliced and cut
• One tablespoon (or so) minced garlic
• One teaspoon dry oregano (Mexican oregano if you can get it)
• One quart (or less if you prefer) of frozen or canned green chiles, diced, preferably hot or medium strength (not jalapenos – use real green chiles)
• Salt (plenty)
• Pepper (plenty)
• One pork tenderloin, about 5 pounds
• Olive oil

In a large stock pot, combine the hominy, onions, garlic, oregano, and green chile. Fill with water to cover the ingredients, plus some more (don’t get to worried about the water – just make sure it’s pretty full). Salt and popper the heck out of it. Turn on the heat and bring to a boil. Once it boils, turn the heat back to simmer the stuff.

Cut the pork into small cubes or similar shape pieces (like you can cut pork into cubes, yeah…).In a frying pan, heat some olive oil and brown the pork slowly, add some salt and pepper.

After browning the pork, add it to the stock pot contents, and stir the meat in.

Now comes the hard part – leave it alone until the cows come home. That translates to anywhere between say six hours and overnight. Trust me – let it cook down. Add some water as needed.

And don’t be stingy with the salt and pepper – you’ll need it.

I have four invitations for GMAIL accounts available. This time I am offering them only to military personnel. So, if you happen to be serving or know someone who is, send me an email from your .mil email account (or have the military person you know send it). Address the email to greg(at)greghughes.net and I’ll hook ‘em right up.

Note: Non-military requests will not be answered this time around – thanks.

Omar Shahine has been working on dasBlog v1.7, and on his weblog he says he’s working to release the new version by the end of the year. Nice!

Lots of cool new features, some of which I am running here that were built up by Scott Hanselman. Check out Omar’s progress announcement, Scott’s changes, and the v1.7 wiki page for more info.

Can’t wait!

Well, it’s a done deal. I had my back surgery today, and now I am resting at home.

And – miraculously – most of the pain in my legs and lower back is gone!

You never really know how much pain you’re in, I think. until it goes away. Then you realize what you were missing out on. I am pinching myself every few minutes just to make sure this is all real and that I am not just dreaming… It’s truly amazing.

I’m not a proponent of surgery unless it’s absolutely needed. As testament to that fact, I have been dealing with back pain for several years, trying to deal with it in a variety of ways. As I said yesterday, it was time.

And so today I can stand on my own two feet without much pain at all, I can balance better, and I feel just great.

Really, it’s incredible. With any luck, as I heal things will stay this way.

The most amazing Christmas gift I could possibly get this year came early. My doctor (Dr. Olson) and my friend/neighbor (Mike, who spent the whole day driving me to Salem for the surgery, waited around for several hours and then drove me back home, all while making sure I was doing okay) really and truly provided me with something I needed today.

I have an attitude of gratitude, as they say – and am happy beyond belief.

The Microsoft TechNet crew has posted their Best of 2004 list.

Best content, best resources, best webcasts, best tools… Nice selection of stuff.

“We asked the TechNet team and customers like you to name the best features, pages and sections published on TechNet during 2004. Here they are!”

From a technet email recieved this morning…

Microsoft Anti-Spyware Tool Coming Soon

As you might have heard, Microsoft recently acquired Giant Software, Inc., the maker of a well-regarded anti-spyware tool. Although we'd hoped to be able to provide you with a link to a beta release of a Microsoft-branded version of this tool, it isn't quite ready yet. We're told the beta software will be freely downloadable from the Download Center sometime in the next few weeks. Until then, here's the press release outlining the capabilities of this spyware blocking and removal tool, and another statement explaining some little-known facts surrounding a legal agreement between Sunbelt and Giant that preceded the Microsoft purchase of the Giant technology.

Not the same way one New Hampshire UPS truck driver does. I bet his last name is Murphy – It almost has to be.

CLICK HERE for the story...

John Dvorak posts a great little article for people new to the blogosphere: Understanding and Reading a Blog (for Newcomers).

(via BlogWrite for CEOs)

Mid-day Wednesday I’ll be getting drugged up and surgically repaired. The time’s come for a microdiscectomy for my back problems (which I have written about here at a high level in the past). After trying exercise (ouch), stretching, medications, therapy, hanging upside down, chiropractors, you name it… Well, it’s just time.

What many people don’t realize is how incredibly debilitating back pain can be. My condition is a herniated disc at the L5–S1 joint, which is in the lower part of the small of your back. The disc is that flexible shock-absorber that sits between your vertebrae. The herniated part is bulging out and pressing on the roots of two nerves that go all the way down my legs and into my feet. When I have back pain, it’s not just in my back – It’s shooting from my back, down my legs, and out the tips of my feet. At times it’s the kind of pain that keeps me from being able to get up off the floor, or even from being able to move without screaming. At other times the symptoms are clumsy legs and twinges of shooting pain. Other times my back just aches.

Anyhow – after nearly 10 years off-and-on of real pain and discomfort, I am looking forward to the decent possibility of lessening the pain and related problems.

People have been asking me if I am nervous. Truth be told, I’m really not. I trust my doctor and have confidence there. It’s not complicated surgery, and I will be home under my own power the same evening. I won’t be able to drive myself because of the medications they use for surgery, but hey, that’s why God made friends, to drive you back and forth when you’re in bad shape, right?

So, with any luck, by this time tomorrow night I’ll be feeling less pain than I am now.

If that should come to pass, it will be the best Christmas present I could possibly wish for. I’ve been good this year, so I hope I get my wish.

 – gh