Arsbars.comThe Real Arleigh Jenkins

My main job within various websites for the past few years has been to analyze data. Data that was found within the analytics of visitors, trends and audiences. From this data it was my job to than manipulate or “milk” the website to create more audience and visitors.

In all that backend development and crunching I lost the feel and excitement for content. Nightly I would spend time filtering spam, checking plugin updates, and compatibility issues. Content became something that needed to go up, not something that was exciting for me. I haven’t been excited to sit down and write in a while because it became a job to talk but to talk the way the search engines would read – not how I would write.

RSS Readers or Real World WWW

Recently I’ve spent sometime reading my favorite websites outside the standard RSS feeders and back on the world wide web.

I was, pleasantly, surprised that some of the most creative and entertaining sites were well designed, but designed to catch your eye and then allow the content to do the speaking.

You Don’t Have to Be Best in Class

For the past few years I’ve been so worried about having the best in class in everything I do, I stopped cold-turkey in many of the things I love. Writing to write, taking a photo for the joy and recording podcast for the love of talking to others. I was left learning all the trends for social media, social marketing, analytics and SEO, which benefits me to know but was never my goal when creating my own websites.

September Goals

My goal for September is to create content.

It may end up crappy content but my hope is two fold. 1. Get used to creating more content over directly associating content with SEO or targeted audience. 2. Somewhere in the crap there should be a gem or two.

Podcast will be posted.
Photos taken
Reviews wrote
Miles ridden
Journals filled

Content is Still King

Once I kick this content goal, the next step is creative content. The articles, photos and thoughts I am known for.

This morning I rode my daily bus, the 77X from Davidson, NC to Uptown Charlotte.  The ride started pretty average, I put my bike on the front of the bus and off we went.  The bus route goes through Cornelius, and then to Huntersville.  Huntersville is the big bus stop that we pick up most the riders that fill up the coach bus, so we sit there for a few moments to gather all our little riders.

After everyone is loaded up, the bus driver goes to drive away and the bus shuts down.  It sounded like someone pulled the power plug on the Death Star.   A look of panic swept across the business attire bus and then silence.

The lovely bus driver started up the bus, the bus’s voice talked through the basics of driving a bus (really?) and we went on our merry way.

Then the horrid ringing began.  A horrible, high pierced ringing from the bus driver console.  As we merged on to 77 southbound, the noise was miserable to all on board and the bus driver must of been popping a blood vessel!  Well it must of been distracting her, as 5 minutes into the ride on 77 we came to a screeching (literally screeching) halt with my poor bicycle on the front of the bus within hairs of rear ending a vehicle.

HOLY SHIT.  Whiplash, bike almost sacrificed and everyone on the bus in terror.  Oh, and the noise is still screeching.

The rest of the trip was pretty average, but there was a stir of whispers and cell phone texting for the remaining 15 minutes as well.

Dear Charlotte Area Transit System

Please check over your buses better, and maybe put the bikes somewhere other than on the front????
I’m sorry, I don’t plan on rereading this post and it is fully a rant, but jeebus.

My life hasn’t been one of hardships, even thought I have done much in my short lived life so far.   I grew up, <12 years old, north of Baltimore, MD in a 2 bedroom apartment with my mother, Sabrina, and mother’s mother, Gina.  Most of my life I went to a small catholic school, and went to mass every Sunday.

Unfortunately, I have selective memory and my childhood was one that I only remember tidbits from.  I can tell you exactly how our apartment was laid out, what the large hill off our porch felt like when riding my bike or sled down, but I can’t tell you many other child hood memories.  Woah, that made it sound like I had a horrid childhood, which I did not. I played sports, and rode horses most of my young life.  I cleaned stalls to afford my riding lessons and knew a horse’s body better than my own by the time I was 9.  Certain memories of those hobbies are ingrained for life in my head, but that’s for another time.

One memory that I’ll never be able to shake from my head was that my mom was always working

She worked full time at a university and then part time either coaching, a local department store or I think (in a grey memory) FedEx.  Even as I grew, the way she spent time with me for the most part was coaching whatever sport I was playing at the time.    The rest of my memories involve my grandmother carting me to horse riding lessons or school.

I’m sure none of this is making sense, but I can’t shake the feeling that I am my mother’s daughter.   Since I moved out at 18 I think we have grown closer, we don’t talk as much as I would like, nor do we talk about mother/daughter types of things, but we talk weekly and I understand now where she was my whole childhood – making ends meet.

You see, when I was very young my grandmother had breast cancer and was in and out of the hospital as long as I can remember.  My mom had to work, to make everything else stay a float.  Looking back we didn’t go on many “vacations” like kids do these days unless it involved visiting a relative.  My summers included spending most of the time at the pool, or riding my bike.  I didn’t go to Disney World until I was 15 and that was probably my second time on a plane as well.  Even to date, I’ve never been on a cruise or a tropical island.

My life hasn’t been hard, I’ve worked for what I’ve received and I can say I enjoy things more due to how I was raised.  I didn’t get away with anything in my house, nor did I try to push my limits due to my grandmother being sick and mother working.  I have a high work ethic due to my mom, and give my job and career everything I have.   A vacation to me is sitting down with my feet up, or going for a hike.  Traveling a long distance for this (with limited amount of time) is a waste of money in my mind, and a mute point in my household as my girlfriend feels the opposite about tropical islands.

I would say I’m frugal, but trendy.  If I’m going to spend my money, its on something nice that will last, not something temporary. We never ate out, I think I ate oatmeal or Cheerios every morning of my life.  I have no idea how to cook and can’t bring up a memory of my mom cooking before I was 14.

I never had those hard talks with my mom, simply because I learned somehow from what she did in life.  There never needed to be a “sex” talk, as without her even saying a word I knew my birth was an accident.

I am my mother’s daughter

Not because I followed in her footsteps but she has been an amazing role model without trying to be.   To date she is there for me when I need, even without asking as she has the sixth sense.  She makes me proud in the things she does and says in everyday life.  In some odd way I’ve felt I’ve gone through life with her on my shoulder, not weighing me down but instead whispering to believe in myself even when times are hard or life is down.

Where has the words “customer service” gone?  Or better yet, where has positive interaction between strangers gone?

As my daily commute utilizes the Charlotte Transportation System in various forms I have the ability for extreme people watching.  The Queen City, as Charlotte, NC is often referred to, is supposedly in the south where people have better manners and raised to a different “southern way.”  Maybe it is due to the melting pot of people from all over the country and world that end up in Charlotte, but I haven’t been seeing many manners as of late.

Lack of Manners

• Women is running for the bus, everyone on the bus stares at her and doesn’t say anything to the bus driver.
• Doors not being held
• Long stream of swearing in front of children of all ages

Are We That Busy, Not to Care?

Has our cultural lead us to this fail of public concern, feelings for our neighbors and lack of goodwill?  As a society there are moments that we succeed, beyond our goals and hopes, we give instead of taking and think about those around us.  Those moments are rare but how do we encourage kindness to be more common, to be the way to react instead of a rare moment?

How is this okay with everyone, do they just have so many other things on their plate not to care?