Illinois has banned composing, sending or receiving text messages while driving.

This headline on the subject made me laugh a little bit, though.

Some distractions now eliminated.

It’s like “Thank you .gov for taking these distractions off our hands!”.  The law is enacted, therefore 100% compliance ensues.

We didn’t like people getting murdered, so we made it illegal.  And Boom. Now nobody gets murdered anymore.

Handguns are illegal in Chicago.  So now no one in the city of Chicago gets shot by or even owns a handgun.

It’s a fact.

It’s that easy.

All we need is more and more laws to make the shitty state of Illinois, a Utopia.

The other part of this new law makes it illegal to talk on your cell phone in a school zone without a hands-free device.

How exactly are you supposed to end conversations that quickly without knowing where all the school zones are?

Are people with one arm banned from driving?  Because I never have two hands on the steering wheel when driving anyways, on the phone or not.

I can eat, change the radio stations, roll the windows up and down, mess with climate control, slide my seat forward and back, flip people off, pick my nose, drive with my knees, etc. But, I can’t be holding a connected cell phone while my car is near a school zone, where we’ve already been slowed down to 20mph anyways.

Does outlawing a cell phone in our hand really make us more cautious or aware?  I think there is a logical fallacy in there somewhere.

They could have just said, don’t run over little kids.

• Pizza (three times)
• Potato casserole (twice)
• Cheese cubes and deer sausage (I’m from the sticks)
• Candy
• Chocolate
• Beer
• 4 oz of Mountain Dew (because its gross and I poured out the rest)
• Chocolate chip cookies
• Lasagna
• Lotsa other shit that’s on the list of not good for you

I have zero will power.  I could be 900lb in a few months time if I were ever left unsupervised.

I was scared to death to get on the scale after that fiasco.

It’s been about 2-3 weeks since I weighed in last.

I lost 1lb.

World champion!

I like reading posts from other St Louis web people.

Some are really knowledgeable and straight forward like Erin Eschen.

Others are slightly shady seo people like Will Hanke.

They are all fun reads for me, regardless.

In any case, Will pointed out recent news about Google removing the Local search results for web design and seo firms for related searches.

He states:

No longer will 6 incompetent SEOs be listed alongside my name

This got me curious.

I searched Google for St Louis SEO.

Will ranks #1. Hm…

How competitive is this niche?

www.seostlouis.com and www.stlouis-seo.com both are listed on the first SERP page.

Why is that an interesting barometer for the competitiveness of the St Louis SEO niche?

They are both WordPress installations with no content.

If its really that wide open, I’m tempted to freelance.

Free money.

2010 is going to be a crazy year.

January is officially surgery month.

Septoplasty and wisdom teeth.

February, braces.

Sucks to be my insurance company.

Hopefully I get to play a World Series of Poker event in June/July in Vegas.  Last year I didn’t get to go because I started the new gig.

I plan on competing in some jiu jitsu tournaments for the first time.

I want to contribute to an open source project of some sort, preferably related to the php community.  We’ll see.

I have a few other surprises to be discussed at a later date.

It shall be a fun one.

Keep the haters away.

Rashad Evans  vs. Thiago Silva

I don’t really like watching Rashad fight.  His fights are typically very boring.  He always comes with a good game plan and his wrestling is typically better than anyone he faces.  He can uncoil and explode with powerful strikes, but he’d rather just outpoint his opponents.  I like finishers.  Evans isn’t aggressive enough to fit that mold.

Thiago Silva might bring out the interestingness in Rashad’s game.  Thiago is a finisher.  He is very aggressive with a brutal striking game.

I think Rashad is really well rounded and I know that the edge in wrestling is a big factor in all fights.  The better wrestling determines where the fight takes place.  Rashad will take him down often.

This is a good matchup, but Rashad will spend most of his energy tying up Thiago.  If it goes to a decision, Evans will be the victor. But,

Thiago Silva, Round 1, TKO Referee stoppage

Paul Daley vs. Dustin Hazelett

Hazelett is a cool dude with a very interesting submission game

Paul Daley is a machine with crazy power.

I’d love to see Dustin come out and flying armbar Daley in 8 seconds, but I think Daley is going to smother him.

Daley, Round 2 TKO (ground and pound)

Joe Lauzon vs. Sam Stout

It’s been a long time since we’ve seen J-Lo.

This is an awesome matchup. Sam Stout has tons of experience against tough guys.

Lauzon fights a suffocating style that I love to watch.

I’m a homer.

Lauzon by Decision

Jim Miller vs. Duane Ludwig

I remember Duane Bang Ludwig when he first got into mma.  He was a Muay Thai bad ass learning the mixed martial arts game from one of my favorites, Bas Rutten.  Ludwig was devastating people.  He seemed to fall off the map for a while.  Then, he won a decision over my favorite fighter, Yves Edwards.

Jim Miller is an unknown to me.  He wins most of his fights by submission.

I’ll bite.

Ludwig, KO, Round 2.

Junior dos Santos vs. Gilbert Yvel

Martin Kampmann vs. Jacob Volkmann

Dan Lauzon vs. Cole Miller

Mark Munoz vs. Ryan Jensen

Mike Pyle vs. Jake Ellenberger

John Gunderson vs. Rafaello Oliveira

Looks like a quality card.  I really want to see some of the undercard matchups, so hopefully all the main card fights end in the first round.

Looking back at my last 365 days, I’d admit I’ve had a great year.

I got a great job just before my previous employer cut wages and benefits.

I went on a fun vacation to New Orleans.

I sat on an island with little to no internet or phone for 3 days, eating tons of shrimp the entire stay.

I started swimming again for the first time in a decade.  Learning Total Immersion.

I joined a jiu jitsu school.

I went to my first open source software conference, Zendcon.

I traveled further west than I’ve ever been before, San Jose, CA.  Previously it was Vegas (2006-09) and before that, Kansas City, MO (1994-2006).

I discovered Thai food.

I tried sushi for the first time and became an addict.

I paid off a huge chunk of my student loan debt.

I got organized using Google Calendar.

Healthy. Happy. Employed.

Thanks 2009.

For the first time in my life, I saw a movie in 3D.

It was amazing.

The glasses were really rockin’, ala Ronald Jenkees or Harry Carey.

The movie was… 2 hours 45 minutes long. I was admiring the various elements of 3D for nearly that entire period of time.

In order to give the movie a proper review, I would need to rewatch the film a time or two. At $12.50 a pop, I send in your donations now.

3D is insane.

I want to create something in 3D, but what.

Every personal blog I have ever followed has a period of inactivity, usually followed by an apology and a promise.

Wow, it has been a long time since I updated this thing, they typically explain.

This phenomenon occurs everywhere in life. as additional daily requirements and habits enter the mix, the least natural hops of the routine die off.

For me, I went from athlete playing 3 sports to zero. I quit preparing to compete and replaced that effort with other activities, like playing video games and drinking.

When one aspect of a routine changes, we must re-evaluate all the links in the chain.

Being away from the computer for a week has been a significant change. However temporary, it is a part of this challenge I didn’t initially consider.

Fortunately, I like this writing thing. Maybe I’ll take a hiatus and apologize and promise, but it will have to be after January 13, 2010.

I have four fans depending on me.

The Earth completes its trek through space around the sun, we reset our calendar and then proclaim that we will undo all the wrongs of the previous year.

I would wager a guess that somewhere in the 95% range of new years resolutions fail.

It is kind of cool to have a scheduled date to reflect and reconsider ourselves, yes.

I argue that we should schedule that reflection everyday, not once annually.

For the sake of ritual, my new years resolution is to pick up the guitar more than 5 times in 2010.

After a couple years of procrastinating joining a jiu-jitsu school, I finally did a few months ago.

I’ve been going a couple times a week in between random injuries, the most painful of which was a bruised rib.

I wrestled for a decade and feel comfortable on a mat.

But, Brazilian jiu-jitsu is not wrestling.  That reality took me a few months to realize.

My parents snagged an item off my Amazon wishlist, “Jiu-Jitsu University” by Saulo Ribeiro.  It has about 2000+ photos and is organized in an interesting way that I am going to take to heart.

Essentially, Saulo’s idea is that a white belt’s goal is to learn to survive in all positions.  That is a concept that I really needed to hear.  I feel comfortable when we are drilling, but as soon as I get put in an unfamiliar position, I’m a fish out of water.

I dug into Saulo’s book and one rolling session later, I already know it has made me so much more aware in those out of position moments I frequently find myself in.

When rolling, I’m going to be the most frustrating, surviving bjj player I can be.  That’s the plan anyways.

The book has been eye opening to me.  There is a decade of learning material in one $25 book.

Thanks mom and dad.

Chalk another win up to the use of Amazon Wishlists.