My PB Wiki

I created my first Wiki at a site called Peanut Butter Wiki or PB Wiki.com.

A Wiki is public page that anyone can edit. As the Wiki says it is as easy to make as a peanut butter sandwich. It is very quick to do with some already made templates to use. The reason I did this is my 40th Birthday is approaching in January and I often get asked what would you like for a gift? To be honest I have everything that I ever wanted besides a few more dollars in my wallet. I have a wonderful family and great friends! So I used one of the Templates that Wiki offers and created a Birthday wish list Wiki. What I like about the page is it is open to the public. You can view the list, modify the page, and make comments.

Check out my Birthday wish list Wiki when you have a moment. It will contain any items that I can think of. Also feel free to make comments. It is always good to know that I am still loved!

my first tournament

I went to the TAJ Casino in Atlantic City last night to play in the midnight tournament. It was my first big tournament at a casino. The buy in was $50.00 - $38+12. They had a great turn out of 150 players. I am sorry to report I dont have good news. I was just happy I wasnt the first one to bust out of my table. These players were very good. You can tell they make a living from this. I was impressed with the tournament. It was run very professional for having 150 players. The tables and the seating is random when you register. I usually go to the Borgata to play. It is much nicer. The Poker room is very bright and clean. The TAJ needs plenty of work. It looks like a poker room that has been around for 20 years. I only went to the TAJ as it is hard to find a buy in for as low as $50 bucks.

Good news for my friend Jan who runs the site http://pokertourneyschedules.com/. They had signs and pamphlets all of over the TAJ Poker Room that said to check out the latest poker schedule go to http://pokertourneyschedules.com/. If you haven't done so already go check it out. It is a great site for Poker schedules at many of the Casinos across the country.

And yes Jann I wore my pokertourneyschedules tee shirt last night.

PC Tune Up

I read a great article on the Yahoo Technology Web site from Robin Raskin. Robin writes about the10 important things you should do to keep your PC updated and running at full speed. You can read the complete article here - A PC Tune-up. Here are the top 10 items from the article:

Step One: Install Windows Service Pack for protection against spam, viruses, and intruders.

Step Two: Set them up with Windows Automatic Updates: To do this, open My Computer and select System Properties. Click on the Automatic Update tab and select Automatic Updates.

Step Three: Verify that Windows firewall is on by clicking on the Control Panel, then Security Center and Firewall.

Step Four: Scan for disk errors. To do this, open My Computer and select the drive to be checked. On the File menu, click Properties. On the Tools tab, under Error-checking, click Check Now. Under Check disk options, select Scan.

Step Five: You can also run defrag (though it's not as critical), which puts files that have been chopped up into discontinuous locations on the hard disk back together into a single contiguous file. This will increase performance and reliability. You can find the Disk Defragmenter by clicking the Start button, then All Programs, selecting Accessories, then System Tools, and then click Disk Defragmenter.

Step 6: Uninstall unused applications by clicking on the Control Panel and selecting Add or Remove Programs. A list of programs and how often they've been used will pop up. Remove the ones they'll never use.

Step 7: Add anti-spyware utilities, such as Microsoft's Windows Defender (available as a free download until December 31).

Step 8: Add an overall Internet security package that includes virus and anti-spam protection such as AVG Anti-virus, which is free, or Norton Internet Security ($69). If they already use a program, make sure that the updates are current.

Step 9: Upgrade Internet Explorer to Version 7.0. This is controversial advice because some of you prefer Mozilla, but I would not put it on my parents' machine because it's still not the standard and they won't understand how to toggle between browsers.

Step 10: Create desktop icons for their most-often-used programs. Right-click the desktop (that's the opening Windows screen before you run any applications), select New, and then click Shortcut. Enter the location of the program. To add, click Browse to look for the file name and then click Next. Type the name that you want to appear under the icon, and then click Finish.

Great Eagles Win

I ususally don't blog about sports. America Football is different then European Football. However today the Eagles had an amazing win. They were huge under dogs going up the New Jersey Turnpike to play the Giants. They hung in the whole game and managed to pull out to win. Jeff Garcia is playing great! I hope they can keep it up. It makes the NFL more exciting when the team you root for is in playoff contention.

Resuts from the game - Eagles Win!

The deal is done

It is now official. Reuters has sold its stake of Factiva to Dow Jones. Factiva is now 100% A Dow Jones Company. I am very excited to be fully integrated into the Dow Jones Family. 2007 will be an exciting year! You can read more about the purchase here - Dow Jones takes over Factiva.

Thanks Jason!

Thanks Jason for the offer! My friend Jason who I work with at Factiva was very high on the waiting list at Sony to receive the Sony PlayStation 3. Jason is very smart man. When he received the PS3 in the mail he took his brand new unopened PS3 and placed it on ebay for the highest bidder.

If you are interested here it is to view. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=160057854736&ssPageName=ADME:B:EF:US:11

You can get it right now for the low low price of $1600.00

Tale of the tape

CNET has written an article that gives a round by round comparison to Microsoft IE 7 v. Mozilla Firefox 2. If you click through my archive you will see my views already on the two browsers. I am huge FireFox fan for reasons that range from security to simplicity of use. Now you can read what CNET says about the two browsers. The article is here CNET Browser Review.

Changes

I made some changes to the blog. First and most obvious is the Template. Second is I changed the about me section. Factiva is now owned by Dow Jones. It is no longer a joint venture between Dow Jones and Reuters. It will be official on Jan 1st. You can read more about by doing an internet search. Here is one of many articles --- Click Here

Also with this new template the Wishnick Family Photos are not appearing. I will look at that later.

Walmart group

I am not sure if this changes where you shop this holiday season? This is a blog about an organization against Walmart. The site is called Wakeup Wal-Mart. I think it is interesting what they stand for. I admire how they are looking out for the worker so Walmart does not take advantage of them. I do admit they have an uphill battle. Read the blog and decide for yourself.

http://pokertourneyschedules.com

Most of you who read my blog share my love for Technology, Sports, and of course Gambling. I want to share with you a great site I found out about last week. I went to the Hilton in Atlantic City to play a $2 $4 table and they were giving out pamphlets about the Tournament Schedule. On the pamphelet was the site http://pokertourneyschedules.com/. When I went home that evening I checked out the site. I was very pleased to see that they have update poker tournament schedules daily for my favorite Casinos in Atlantic City. The site included schedules for the Tropicana, Hilton, and my favorite the Borgata. Also the site has a great blog on it about playing at different Casinos across the country.

Let me know what you think of the site.

Free Security and Spyware software

It has been a while since I have updated my blog. I know you have all been waiting with anticipation for the next post. Life has been very hectic lately. Work has been busy and my wife and I recently spent some time in Vegas for our 10th wedding anniversary. More to come about the time we spent in Vegas in another post.

In today's scary world security for your PC is vital! With out the right software protection you are open to a numerous amount of problems. They could range from a simple virus to losing all your data. So remember no glove no love. No wait that is advice given for another topic. So you say you want protection, but don't have the money to spend. Well CNET has put together a great page on the best FREE security and spyware software available. I encourage all of you to check it out! Even if you are confident that your PC is protected better then a teenage boy with a condom stuck in his wallet. I confused topics again. My desktop is using the Zone Alarm package with Firewall, virus, and spyware installed. It is rated one of the best security software applications to use and even with ZA installed I will still use one of the free spyware software applications mentioned for due dilligance.

Please check it out and give one these security applications a try. You will never regret it.

Click Here - Free Security and Spyware software

best

Mike

Topix.net

I like to read my local news on the web. The day of getting the Newspaper delivered to my house is over for me. News is free I am not paying for it. One of the web sites I like to use for my local news is Topix.net. I have found the web page easy to navigate. All you have to do is type in the zip code of where you live and the local news appears. What I like about Topix
is the page has global news, forums, blogs, entertainment, sports, - I think you get the idea. In my opinion it is better then Yahoo local news or any Newspaper online like NYTimes or LATimes.
Give it a try and let me know what you think.

Mike

Phillies drive pointing North

I have decided to start rooting for the Yankees. This is not to say that I am still not a Phillies fan. In fact I am very excited about watching all the youngsters play that the Phillies called up. The fact is the Phil's are 14 games out of first place from the Muts. So unless a minor miracle happens the Phillies are not making the playoffs. My thinking is why not root for the Yanks? You can rename the Team Phillies North after recently acquiring Bobby Abreu, Cory Lidle, Sal Fasano, and of course the 3rd base coach for the Yankees Larry Bowa.

So as Bobby Abreu would say go Jankees!

Automatic Delivery of Internet Explorer 7

The new version of Internet Explorer 7 will be installed as an automatic upgrade using Windows Update after the browser moves from Beta to Production. I haved tested IE7 and thought the browser was very clunky to use. It was not fairly intitutive to add RSS feeds. Also something as simple as adding your favorites took way to many clicks for me. So knowing that many web sites are not working correctly in IE 7 you have to wonder why is Microsoft making this an automatic update? To read more about Microsofts spin on this click on the link below to read about it on Microsoft Technet.

Read more at www.microsoft.com/techn...

My Favorite Extensions

As I have mentioned in the past I am big fan of using Mozilla Firefox to search the Internet. It is much better the Micosoft Internet Explorer. Why you ask? Here are a few of many reasons.

• The browser takes up half size of disk space and memory to run the Explorer and is twice as fast.
• It is less of a security threat then Explorer by hackers.
• The benefits is a tremondous amount of add-ons available because the browser is open source.

The add ons in FireFox are called extensions. I use a few extensions that are amazing. This includes writing to my blog from any web site, RSS Ticker that scrolls headlines across my screen, and a tool that will quickly create a hyper link from any word highlighted. I am not the only one who is a fan of extensions. Above is a screenshot of PC Magazines favorite extensions for Firefox.

V Foundation for Cancer Research

This Sunday the ESPY awards are on ESPN. It is an annual event where voters get to vote for their favorite althlete. Every year the ESPY is on I think back to 1993 and the fabulous speech given by Jim Valvano. The speech he gave was given two months before his death. It was amazing talk about familyand courage. You can read the transcripts of the speech by click the URL below. Please read it and send it to others.

Read more at jimmyv.org/rememberingj...

Mike and Jess video

This is a test video of Jessica and me. I used my webcam. Their was not much lighting in the room so the quality is poor. I am sure this is much better with a digital camera or camcorder. Let me know what everyone thinks? Isn't Jessica a ham!

Mike Wish

Was the Wicked Witch really Wicked?

Until Thursday I thought so. I went to see Wicked the Musical. I went to the show knowing very little about the music and the story. The only thing I knew is that the story took place before the little girl from Kansas landed her house in Oz. The first and remaining thought that has been stuck in my head since I saw the show is that their is always more then one way to look at almost anything. Seems cliche I know, but the show really explains the motives behind the actions of the Wicked Witch of the West. I don't want to give to much away for those of you who have not read the book or seen the show. If you do won't to learn more I recommend these sites. The official site at http://www.wickedthemusical.com/ and also the Wiki on Wicked found here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicked_(musical).

I have been on vacation this week and didn't do much. The plan was small family adventures as money is tight. Jessica and I went crabbing a few times at the shore. She really loves it. The second time we went we caught 18 crabs. They were nice size crabs around 5-6 inches long. Also thanks to my buddy Frank we got invited to the party deck at the LakeWood Blueclaws. The BlueClaws are the single A minor league team of the Philadelphia Phillies. If you have not been to a minor league game it is plenty fun. General admisson tickets are around $5.00 and always a good seat in the house.

We also went to Great Adventure. I am not a big fan of GA. It is over crowded and the people can be interesting at times. They do have a great selection of kids rides. So I guess I shouldn't complain since Jess loves it and GA is only 10 minutes away.

I have great news about Rachel. She has officially began walking! I call it the Frankenstein walk. She holds her hands out in front as she walks. I can't believe how time just goes by. It seems like just recently she was born. Well I am off from work until Tuesday then back on Wednesday. Vacations are always way to short.

Mike Wish

McAfee SiteAdvisor

I found today a great FREE software for you to download. I read about it in article by Tech expert/guru Walt Mossberg in the WSJ. Walt writes great colums on Personal Technology. If you haven't read them I suggest you start. The software is called site advisor. The software will stop spyware infections, identity theft scams, and warn you of sites which send excessive e-mail. Their is a few items about the software that jump out at me immediately. The software downloads very easy on either Microsoft Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox. Their is no registration form to fill out. The software will catch sites that have scams for charging users software that could be free. It will also notify you of potential harmful sites by placing a red, yellow or green X. The X is placed in search results received from the search engine. For example doing a search on FREE Software will bring back results that show a few sites that the advisor software suggests you use caution when click the link for the site. This is pretty cool. You know ahead of time if a web site is malicious before going to the web page. Give it a try and let me know your experience.

Read more at www.siteadvisor.com/

Mike

At the game

Take me out to the ball game... So last night I went to see the Phillies v. Yankees in Philadelphia. It was a great game. Not just because the Phils won, but it was great to be out at Citizen Bank Ball Park. If you haven't gone I highly recommend it! It is one of the most beautiful stadiums you will see. It is a smaller stadium with really no bad seat in the house. We sat in pretty good seats for the first 4 innings and then decided just to walk around the ballpark. You can even purchase standing room only tickets and stand in the back right next to the bullpen. Their is nothing like a cold beer and hot dog and watching your team play. Click the link below to see more pictures of the stadium.

Read more at www.ballparks.com/baseb...