Linkin Blogs

A good article on how to make a niche minisite with little startup money and use it to generate nice, passive income.

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“He who wrongs a Jew or a Christian will have me as his accuser on the Day of Judgment.” — Prophet Muhammad. Contrary to the popular belief that the West is under siege from Muslim terrorists, it is Muslims who have become the biggest victims of the attacks of 9/11, as inconceivable as that would have seemed in the aftermath of global bloodshed.

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SOLAR DEATH RAY (for hot dogs). Bask in the fiery power of the sun! Eat questionable meat products afterwards! Warning: Do not look into beam with remaining eye.

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Ars Technica takes us on a photo-tour of New York City’s “cathedrals of consumer electronics”, Nintendo World and The Apple Store.

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The makers of MQA have decided to make it open source, and free. Feel free to download it now!

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Is it just me or has the NFL lost its charm? I don’t care for the opening night music acts, arrogant players (me, me and me!) and the occasional greedy owners threatening to move or moving because he wants a new stadium at the city’s expense? No team even captures my interest anymore. I fall asleep during games or channel surf for something better. I think my time is better spent elsewhere. I can always read about it in the local paper or at NFL.com after the fact. Kill your television.

I went to ADAMS center on August 20th to attend a 2-day seminar entitled “Agenda To Change our Condition” by Hamza Yusuf and Zaid Shakir. The event was sold out for the women and there were a few seats available for the men. I got a seat for my Dad (i (I preregistered online). There must have been 500 people in attendance. They crux of the problem with the Muslims today can be attributed to impure hearts (metaphysical, not literal). The program to change ourselves is presented in a binder handout consisting of self-paced tasks which require one to keep oneself in check with regards to prayer, fasting, charity, guarding one’s tongue, community involvement, etc. Photos of the event can be seen here. Click on the August 2005 pull down at the top to see the event. I need to start working on those tasks..

I love to watch Duncan, Ginobli and Parker. I hope the Spurs crush the Pistons and sweep them as well. Who would have thought a Virgin Islander, an Italian living in Argentina and a Frenchman would be leading the Spurs to a championship in the NBA. The NBA can truly be called an international game with so many immigrant players. I digress. I hope Rasheed Wallace goes back to the 70’s where he looks like he belongs…and what’s with David Stern (the John Gotti of pro sports) putting Alanis Morisette and Will Smith on before the finals game 1? This ain’t no stinkin’ Super Bowl. Leave it to hoops purists to watch. No music videos, pop stars or Spike Lee. And air games on Saturday. Who cares if no one is watching and kids don’t have to stay up late Sunday night (most schools aren’t out for the summer yet). Besides, Will Smith’s brother is already playing on the Spurs (Robert Horry). Seriously, I love Horry’s play..with the Rockets and the Spurs..hated him with the Lakers (cause of Kobe and Shaq, both who are chillin’ out now adays O yeah, Nazr Mohammed is playing well 2…all for now…Go Spurs…

I mowed my lawn today. I had to do it with a weedwacker because was left out in the rain last year and won’t start. The grass was 8 inches tall. It was toughon my forearms swing that weedwacker around and took 10 times longer but overall it’s pretty level. I also prepared my yard for my yearly vegetable garden. Gotta get some plants. My bike is rusting and my fishing rod needs usage. Abu Garcia needs to meet Abu Saliha. See more of my work today.

Today I went to Vision Works for 2 pair of glasses for $99 and $39 for the eye exam. Or so they say. When I got my eyes examined, the optician said that they doctor recommended anti-reflective coating and special polycarbonate lenses. The doctor said my prescription went up by a quarter of a power, hardy discernable. The optician said it should only cost slightly more and estimated it to be “less than $200″. She then calculates the total and its $328. “That’s only slightly more”, she said. I’d say that’s a lot more. Either her math skills are suspect, or she’s just part of the 2 pairs for $99 scam. I asked her to price the glasses for no coating, regular polycarbonate, and it came down to $216. Fair enough..about $78 more than I had expected to walk out paying, but I’ll took it..I already spent too much time getting the exam and picking out the frames.
Its just like when you go to Jiffy Lube for an oil change, and they guy takes you out to your car and says “you need this and you need this” and a $29 oil change becomes a few hundred dollars.

I’m currently reading an excellent book on Astronomy. Its called Astronomy Today. I’m borrowing it from the NASA/GSFC library, but I might buy it. Its very easy to follow, has great pictures and even links to animations and other extras to help you understand astronomy better.

Last night, I had a nightmare that I told my sysadmin at work (as I watched over his shoulder) to delete my hard drives, C, D, E and maybe F. Then I told him I needed the C drive. I told him to stop and then he said it was too late. My work for the last 2 years was wiped out and there was no way to recover. I awoke at 4:20am and thought it was a dream. Then I dreamed I went to work to see if it was okay and it was wiped out. Then I woke again, not sure what is the truth. Then, I thought, when I get to work, I’m gonna back up my work directories and see if I can get it done automatically (if possible) on a weekly basis. Whew!! I couldn’t imagine trying to recreate all my work from scratch, if that data got lost. Yikes!!! Something to lose sleep over.

For your new home computer, here are some FREE suggestions from me, a friend, so you don’t end up paying for the same thing.

Openoffice.org (OpenOffice) - A great replacement for M$ Office, can read Docs, Excel and powerpoint files.

Ad-aware (Ad-Aware) - Ad-Aware is designed to provide advanced protection from known Data-mining, aggressive advertising, Parasites, Scumware, selected traditional Trojans, Dialers, Malware, Browser hijackers, and tracking components.

Firefox - Firefox 1.0 empowers you to browse faster, more safely and more efficiently than with any other browser.

Thunderbird - Mozilla’s next generation e-mail client. Thunderbird makes emailing safer, faster, and easier than ever before with the industry’s best implementations of features such as intelligent spam filters, saved search folders, builtin RSS support, privacy protection and much more.

Spybot Search and Destroy - can detect and remove spyware of different kinds from your computer.

AVG Anti-Virus - AVG Free Edition is the well-known anti-virus protection tool.

Gaim - A free AOL, Yahoo, MSN, Jabber, etc. instant messaging tool.

7-Zip - is a program for creating or unpacking archived and compressed files. It can unpack 7zip, ZIP, CAB, RAR, ARJ, GZIP, BZIP2, TAR, CPIO, RPM and DEB files, or create file archives in these formats.

CDex Use CDex to convert tracks on a CD to various standard computer sound files, such as WAV, MP3, or OGG.

TuxPaint is a great drawing program for young children, it’s simple, easy to use interface, fun sound effects and tips offered by Tux, help to make the creative process as engaging and entertaining as possible.

Thanks to Abu Zoe for the info above.

Its now called Linkin Blogs.

I had not received my Dad’s 1099R (W-2 for retired persons) because it was sent to Adnaans’ old address. I tried to call the Office of Personnel Management to change it and they said my dad would need to call them from Pakistan or fax them a signed statement to change it. I said I had power of attorney. They said no matter. Rules are rules. So, I called them up again today, got a lady with a Spanish accent and I made an Apu Nahasapeemapetilon (of the Simpsons fame) accent thru the whole conversation (I also made my voice a little hoarse sounding) and guess what, the 1099R is in the mail . Thank God. And thank you Apoo for helping me perfect my accent!!!!

I went to Kingston, Ontario in Canada yesterday. 500 miles on Saturday morning (7 hours almost non-stop) and 500 miles back (8 hours). Rented a Taurus. Drove thru some snow going up (north of Syracuse). It was clear skys all the way back (except the custom agent asking me why I went to the “Islamic Republic of Pakistan” in 2002. Adnaan’s wedding you know. Whew!!! You should see my passport photo. The year was 1997. Hajj. Big beard…looks suspicious. 3 Arozullahs, one Sheikh and a baby in the car…what’s up with that Sheikh fellow?) We were attending a wedding reception for Mona Rahman and Michael Brewster Photo Albums. Heard Dawud Wharnsby sing a song. Dr. Ahsan Arozullah also gave a moving talk also. Back home. tired. Need Sleep…………..zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz……snore…….zzzzzzzzzzzzz……snore……

Zaytuna Institute - promotes Islamic Learning

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