Finally, with some help from Small Potato, I’ve completed my very minimalist theme and have applied it to this blog. Ever since I got hold of this hosting account, I’ve been very keen on design and have always been on the lookout for simple, clean layouts. So far, I haven’t found exactly what I was looking for, and I couldn’t afford to hire someone to create a theme for me—so I took the matter into my own hands. I call this theme “DeanLozarie.com Theme”. Simple as that.

Oh, and although the theme is named “DeanLozarie.com Theme”, I’ve renamed the blog [...] [Read More]

[Editor's note: this was first published in Thoughts from Dean on April 25, 2008.]

High school, they say, is the most enjoyable part of the education process. Well, if acne, armpit odor, newfound pubic hair, and insecurity appeal to you. Of course, we’ve all encountered this precarious stage. For me to be able to blog about it as I’m actually going through the process is exhilarating (as weird as that may sound).
High school is also where most people meet their first love. Many will argue that they met theirs in elementary. I maintain that love is improbable to find in [...] [Read More]

[Editor's note: this write-up was originally published in QWERTY Confessions on April 5, 2008. It is a work of fiction, written by me.]
Gunshots.
I heard them in the distance. The consistent rattling of machine guns and explosion of cannons filled my heart with trepidation, but I knew I had no other choice. I took the earthen jar in the kitchen and started on my way, knowing that this day could be my last.
I heard an explosion from afar. The suicide bombers must have struck again. I whispered a prayer to Allah. Guide me. Don’t let me die. I continued to [...] [Read More]

[Editor's note: this was first published in one of my Wordpress-hosted blogs, "QWERTY Confessions", on April 4, 2008. I am republishing it here because school is taking up too much of my time I will try to write a new post every once in a while (hopefully, multiple times a week).]
In the darkness, the girl stands sobbing. Her immaculate face is drenched in her own tears. She looks haggard, like she hasn’t gotten rest in days. On her nightstand, three or four handkerchiefs lay dripping wet. The depression has taken its toll. She is tired and has nearly [...] [Read More]

Hi, guys. As I said before, the silence of this blog is too loud to bear, so here’s a post to fill the empty void and break the awkward hush.

So I thought I’d take you guys through a timeline-style tour of how a day in the life of Dean usually goes, just so you see how crazy the world I live in is. Let’s begin after the jump.
4:40
My day starts when Mom’s cell phone rings. It sounds like someone’s calling, so my still-groggy mother picks up the phone and says, “Hello? Hello?” into the mouthpiece. I wait for her [...] [Read More]

I’ve been really swamped with school stuff lately. Physics is like the most difficult subject ever conceived, and jumping Jupiters, Mathematics ain’t a piece of cake either.

So this is third-year life. I guess I was too busy thinking about next-only-to-seniors-superiority and prom to remember the darker side of Junior Year.

The turmoil has resulted in an eerie silence of the blog—a silence I despise. If you don’t know, I’m a chatty person in real life, and not being able to talk about things on my blog creeps me out. Actually, throughout the day I’ve been trying to write about [...] [Read More]

Daniel Scocco, the genius behind the Daily network (Daily Blog Tips, Daily Writing Tips, and Daily Bits) has concocted a brilliant plan: an international bloggers network.

Daniel says that a bunch of bloggers had thought about a bloggers union a few years back, but in a totally different way: they were concerned about healthcare, insurance, etc.—you know, like writers or labor unions. Of course, it would be difficult to form, much more manage, such a union which is heavily Web-based.

Scocco is thinking of a totally different bloggers union—one that would protect its members from such problems as content-scraping, online scams, [...] [Read More]

An email from Firefox Download Day hit my inbox today. Firefox 3’s final release is going to be made available for download on June 17. As I’ve blogged before, Mozilla will try to set a world record for most software downloads in one day with their latest version of the famed web browser. If you haven’t pledged to participate in “Download Day” (as the record-setting attempt has been dubbed) yet, go to their page now and pledge to participate! It’s fun, fun, fun!

Today, I hesitatingly put Disqus back up on my site to ease the load up a bit on my server. Reactivating Disqus will hide all comments posted on the default comment form, but on the plus side, all the comments made when I first installed Disqus are back. This includes the 12 comments on my post about atheism, which was the most commented post in all of my three years in blogging.

Bear with me, fellas, as I continue to find out how to make the blog more worthy of your computer monitors and feed readers. Thanks!

I don’t know if you guys have heard of IndieBloggers. It’s a blog run by Anastacia Campbell (who also has a photoblog) where creative writers can submit their works—fictional or otherwise—and get them published, offering free visibility for you and your blog (if you have one).

I first sent a submission to IB in the last week of March 2008, and my work, “The Novelist Path”, was published on March 31. I think I received a little traffic from that, and it was thrilling to have my post read by many, many people. It was a great way to receive [...] [Read More]

When America elects its next president come November, it will have to decide between two starkly different candidates—the seasoned John McCain, who believes in spending billions of dollars on the war in Iraq, but thinks twice about spending millions of dollars in education, or Barack Obama, who, in his charismatic speeches promises of a new direction for his country, for change we can believe in, but who many people believe does not have enough expertise to deliver his promises.

That is, in my opinion, perhaps the biggest dilemma voters face. Should they entrust the future of the world’s single largest [...] [Read More]

Twitter’s been down lately. Anyone with an account at the service will know that. The Web’s been abuzz with rants about the downtime, and while Pownce and Jaiku users have taken this opportunity to invite people to switch, Twitterers still can’t find a better service.

Until Plurk came along.

Yes, Plurk. It’s taking the Interwebs by storm and becoming a serious alternative to Twitter. How can it not be, what with its name (Plurk! Plurk! Plurk! I could say it all day), the funny headless pig cartoon, and the cool features that come with it. Many Plurkers (I guess that’s what [...] [Read More]

As you probably know, there has been an email going around about Barack Obama, the first-ever African American to be nominated by a party for the presidency. A friend of mine posted this bulletin on Friendster, and Imma post my simple rebuttal. Hit the jump to proceed.
Why you should not vote for BARACK OBAMA.
Barack Huseein Obama’s dad Kenyan Muslim, stepdad was Indonesian Muslim, his mother was atheist
Obama’s supporters are religious demagogues who are anti-Christian in ideals—racist Rev. Wright, Rev. Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Nation of Islam leader Farrakhan and many other sinister people… Rev. Wright was shown on [...] [Read More]

I watched Hillary Clinton address her supporters in New York just minutes ago, and just like everyone predicted, she refused to concede to rival Barack Obama. She says she “won’t make any decisions tonight”, and will consult with party leaders and supporters on what to do next.

How about raise the white flag and face the music? Is that a good suggestion? CNN, among other news organizations, has predicted that Obama has acquired the number of delegates needed to clinch the nomination. He now has more than 2,130 delegates on his side, well more than the 2,118 needed to nominate.

Yet, [...] [Read More]

When I first heard about Ubuntu and was told about its features—safe from viruses, open-source, and easily accessible, community-provided support, among others—my interest in it was quickly piqued. I rushed to the neighborhood computer store and bought myself a CD-RW so I could begin burning the ISO onto the CD and then install Ubuntu’s latest release, 8.04.

Unfortunately, Ubuntu wouldn’t boot from the CD, so I decided to request a free CD from the Ubuntu website. I requested for one about a month ago and the CD arrived yesterday, about two weeks earlier than expected. Needless to say, I put [...] [Read More]