I have put this picture up named "Aaron Burke" in a shameless ploy at increasing my google ranking for my name.

When I started this site, it began as an experiment for me: I wanted to register the name Aaron Burke, put up a WordPress web site, and mess around with finally having some sort of web presence. I called it Aaron Speaks! because, frankly, having no idea about what I wanted to talk about I figured that name would just about cover any potential topics.

I had no intention of having the website be anything that anyone outside of my close friends would discover. In fact, I didn’t use my last name, refrained from posting any pictures of myself, and avoided putting up anything that could directly link the site back to me. I even registered the domain name www.aaronburke.net anonymously.

But, things change…

This site is now the hub that connects all things me. (Or at least it’s moving that way. I have too many damn accounts all over the internets to connect them all. There are a lot of internets, you know.)

And as the site began to be connected to me, I discovered that I wanted people to be able to find this place, and by extension, find me. Somewhere in the last few months, I noticed that when you google “Aaron Burke” this site was coming up pretty high in the rankings. Of course, being competitive, I decided that I needed to be #1. I hovered up at #2 for while (behind a pesky UCLA law professor), and then last week I noticed “tada!” I was #1. Sweet!

It lasted 1 day.

And then aaronburke.org took the top spot, and we’ve been switching back and forth since then, in a little google rankings dance. Now, I don’t mind dancing, but I like doing it with women, so aaronburke.org, you are going to have to take a seat. I want my top spot back. I figure I will try to put some of my learnings regarding keyword optimization to good use and see if I can more permanantly get #1.

Wish me luck.

It should be pretty obvious I’m not hury, otherwise I would a) be in the hospital and b) not be so nonchalant about the whole thing. Other than a bloodied knee and a couple sore places on me, I’m totally fine. And I voluntarily get myself more beat up than this when I spar with people and get punched in the face.

So yeah, no big deal physically.

I was pretty pissed about my bike though. I’m taking it in tomorrow to see whether the frame is cracked, which would mean the whole bike needs to get replaced. Luckily I got all the guy’s info so he can pay for it in that eventuality. But I totally don’t want that to happen, because it would be a complete pain in the ass to deal with. I’m already annoyed about having to take my bike in a be without it for a week or so while it gets looked at.

What totally amuses me is that yesterday I bought a new pair of motorcycle pants to protect myself when riding my motorcycle. Then today I decide to ride my bike into work instead, and I get plowed into. Grr.

I run and I bike ride, but I don’t swim much on a regular basis, and that needs to change. So I purchased a season pass to the community pool near where I live and went there for a swim of about 2/3 of a mile today.

It felt great and left me feeling a really good sore. After the swim I rewarded myself by lounging by the pool on a deck chair and reading for a bit. That’s where the dumbness comes in.

See, I have fairly pale skin, and I burn easily. I had no sunscreen on. But somehow I thought laying out in the sun at 1pm and reading for a while would be a good idea. Then I went home and sat in the sun some more.

And now I have lobstered myself.

Why do I get older, yet still repeat the same behaviors that cause me pain and discomfort? Like drinking too much, or rolling around in Poison Oak, for instance. Dumb dumb Aaron.

What I discoverd is that 3 hours a day sitting in the same position can mess you up if you don’t deal with it correctly.  After a few months on the job, I started experiencing tingling down my right leg, and this eventually progressed into discomfort and then pain. Basically, I was getting sciatica from the pressure on my spine. A job-related injury. In the scheme of things, having leg pain from sitting too much seems like a really lame thing to complain about.  I mean, I worked construction years ago, and that’s a job you could feel good about bitching about, you know?  It’s like “aww damn, the blisters on my hand just popped open from hammering too much, and my back is all messed up from carrying big heavy pieces of stuff all over the place.”  Yeah, that’s the kind of thing I could really sink my teeth into complaining about.

So leg pain from sitting?  Yeah, no so happy about having to deal with that.  Even so, it was a reality, and I figured out how to deal with it.

Well, now I have a new occupation, and it involves starting at a screen for many hours a day.  I’m sure most of you know what happens, and I bet many of you have expreienced what comes next – your eyes start to get worse. So new I need to figure out how to add more hours of not looking at a screen into my daily activities.  I guess I could do something fun.  You know, outdoors.  I hear there’s cool things to do out there.

Maybe I’m just getting old(er).  I hear things start to break down, and don’t work so well anymore.  Or maybe it’s just always something. Ahhh, life

Plus I’m sick.  My throat hurts.  And my head too.  Some sympathy would be nice.  Honestly, sometimes I feel like I give and I give here and don’t get anything back.  This relationship is far too one-sided.

Ok, I’m sorry, you’re right.  You do a lot for me.  Really.

…

(Here’s hoping that our regularly scheduled Aaron will actually show up again tomorrow.  This post was written by a doppelganger.  Please disregard anything said as it is clearly the work of someone dangerously close to lunacy.)

That’s not to say there is no downside, however.

What do you say to the person on the other end of the phone line when you are on a business call and the gardener starts up the leafblower 2 feet from your open window?

If you have a good answer, please, by all means, comment and let me know.  It would help.

Not so much anymore.

I have escaped the 9-5.  Now I have to deal with the 12-12.  And the Monday-Sunday.  Because when inspiration hits me, I can either grab it and ride it for all it’s worth regardless of the time and day, or I can ignore it – possibly to lose that idea or thought forever.

So right now it’s Friday night.  Back to work.