Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

Someone was googling Corey Feldman and I think this time they were actually looking for me, or at least my Facebook page. I’m relatively hard to Google due to the a certain 80’s actor with whom I share a name. But I do have a big enough online presence that with certain key bits of information I’m actually pretty easy to find. Simply add DC (as in Washington) to a Corey Feldman search string e.g. “Corey Feldman DC” and my Facebook page is top of the list. Add my middle initial, even with out the DC – “Corey J Feldman” and you get my little website as the top hit, at least at the time of writing this post. Anyway, I was looking though my logs the other night and I found a google referral from the search string “Corey J Feldman DC Facebook”.

Clearly whoever was looking for my FB page knew enough about me to add my middle initial and hometown, yet they were not already a Facebook “Friend”. This eliminates a large percentage of people I know, personally at any rate. I don’t have any current coworkers, not for any particular reason, there are no embarrassing photos or status updates, I guess being in HR I tend error on the side of maintaining professional boundaries. I suppose it could be a Twitter “follower”, but I have not exactly been particularly active as of late. I’m also surprised that they googled it versus searched from within Facebook, although it is possible they don’t have a Facebook profile – I do actually know a couple people not on FB.

I am not sure why this caught my interest other than I find it fascinating and surprising when anyone actually looks for me. Though I am the consummate Leo (for the record I do not put any stock in Astrology, just using it here as a shortcut description of my personality) and I am drawn to center stage, I’m not always conformable being there. Yet I keep tweeting, blogging and facebooking and I occasionally read my site logs to see what my visitors are reading and what brought them here. So maybe I doth protest to much, or maybe like everyone else I am slightly messy and have conflicting personalty traits.

Are you ever surprised to find out someone has googled you? Or if you have a small/smallish blog, do you look at your site stats.

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

I did not have a good night sleep. Lots of tossing, turning and coughing(stupid chest cold). I finally gave up at 5:30. I flicked through email and facebook on my iPhone but decided if I was up I’d might as well get in a workout. With the chest cold I wasn’t up for a run but figured I would do some strength training in the basement. As I mentioned, I had my iPhone which apparently in an otherwise dark room reflects nicely off the bedroom door, providing the illusion that it is open. Yes, I walked into the door, which was actually partially open, slamming it closed and knocking me on my backside. The slamming door woke up Melissa and Joshua. I tried to convince Joshua that it wasn’t morning yet. He was not convinced and was loud enough in his disagreement to wake up Elijah. Both kids are up and clearly still tired. Of course I have to go to work, so I won’t be the one dealing with the results of my klutziness. Sorry Honey!

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

Josh – Who is that stading on the moon (looking at a picture above my desk)
Me – Edwin Aldrin
Josh- How did they get there
Me- A rocket ship
Josh – OH
Josh- Can I go to the moon
Me- Maybe some day

Josh – Where Megan lives ( A friend of Melissa who visited last weekend)
Me – Vermont
Josh -How did she get here
Me – An Airplane and a taxi
Josh – No Just a taxi
Me – Both. She took a Airplane to DC and a Taxi to our house
Josh – OH

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

Not too long after I bought my first Condo I started getting calls for a Winifred Feldman. I would politely explain that my last name is Feldman, but I am not related to nor do I know anyone by the name of Winifred. I have moved twice since then and it would seem she is still following me. Today I was not so polite when someone called my cell phone for the umpteenth time. I reminder her that I was pretty sure I spoke to her last week – same number and same voice, and that is is not OK that she keeps calling my cell phone. Take me off your list. I am not not now nor have I ever been a Winifred, an 80’s actor and I do not wear my sun glasses at night, so I can, so I can… Vent/Rant Over.

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

Elijah’s first shopping cart ride.

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

I finally did it, I joined Netflix.  We had been using Blockbuster’s netflix copycat service but dropped it a couple years ago after we did the math. We figured it was coming out to about $20 per rental; we just weren’t watching enough to justify it. We signed up for the service BK (before kids) and choose it over Netflix because of the in store option.  If there was a movie we wanted to see, we didn’t have to wait for delivery, just bring one of the old DVDs back to a local blockbuster and take home what we wanted.  Eventually we realized considering how few movies we watch it was cheaper to just rent from Apple/ITunes or Comcast On Demand and there was no need to leave the house to watch what we wanted, when we wanted.

Not that anything in our lives has changed.  With 2 little ones we don’t have much in the way of popcorn time, and when we do there is enough TV the wife and I actually have in common that we are far more likely to fire up the DVR.  There are no time limits on the DVR like there is with Comcast and Apple rentals.  We often don’t have the time for a 1.5/2 hour  movie but might be able to squeeze in an hour of Grey’s or Glee or even a 1/2 of HIMYM.

So why join Netflix? Impulse I suppose but he selling point was the unlimited streaming.  You can stream as much as you want for no additional cost. You don’t like what you are watching stop it and stream something else.  No extra cost and this is above and beyond the DVD rental.  The video quality was only OK, but I am not sure if that was an impact by yesterday’s integration of Netflix into Microsoft’s Media Center; i’m sure Netflix’s bandwith was being put to the test last night.

I choose the $9 dollar a month – 1 DVD and unlimited streaming plan. I basically need to watch 2 movies a month to justify the cost. I think that is pretty doable.

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

I’m sorry 7 you’re just not what I am looking for in an OS.  Don’t get me wrong, you’re a definite improvement over the 1 step forward 2 steps backwards that was  Vista.  You got some pretty new bells and whistles and you may even be as stable as Grandma XP (which is good compared to its far past but far from good). While  your Apple charm school lessons have done much to enhance your overall elegance- well it is still so much lipstick on a pig.  When we first got together I knew you were a beta but you have been in release candidate for months now and your still giving me way too many blue screens of death. I know it doesn’t help to point fingers or compare you to other OSs but you have crashed more times in the last month then my trusty macbook has in 2 years.  I’m not saying its over since BeyondTV/Snapstream doesn’t make DVR software for OS X, you will still have a place at the core of my DVR Box. But I have to tell you, if you can’t get your act together I might have to consider MythTV on Linux.  I know crazy Uncle Walt (not really  my Uncle) Mossberg thinks your almost as good as OS X. But your not.  Oh you can still do a few things for me that no other OS can.  But I don’t have to work in Access as much these days and I am getting pretty comfy with MYSQL and as I said, if things don’t improve I might seriously consider Linux/MythTV for the one box (quad core Intel w/ 4 TVtuners and 2 terabytes of HDTV goodness) really keeping you with me at home.

Don’t worry, we can still be work buddies. I’m not planning any moves and I can’t imagine the paradigm shift that would have to happen for our office to go Mac, its just not even possible with our current HRIS software. And its not like I won’t ever see you outside of the office. As I said there are certain things you do very well, and I am willing to keep you around in Virtual Machine form. I will  call on you when I need some quick and dirty MS Office project that can’t be done in Office for Mac or Google Docs.  And when I am done, I can just shut down the VM software and forget about you until our next month boot up call.

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

Friday at sunset begins Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year and the first of the High Holidays. As a child it was one of my favorite* Jewish Holidays. It was an extra day off school, we got apples & honey, they would blow the Shofar** at Synagogue, and there was my Mom’s brisket*** – may we do it some justice.

Traditionally Rosh Hashanah is the day of judgment. This is the day that our sins are measured and God decides if we should live another year. I suppose in that way, God is like the US Government, contracts run in one year increments. In theory, if you are righteous, you are given an automatic pass. If your wicked your fate is sealed. For the other 99.99999%**** you have 10 days until Yum Kippur, the Day of Atonement, to get your act together and repent. I personally don’t believe God works that way. For one thing I doubt there is such a thing as the truly righteous or truly wicked and for another I have never found Death to be particularly discriminating; horrible people live and good people die.

Judaism has a different concept of hell than Christianity. There is no eternal damnation, the closest concept is Gehenna, but even that comes with an annual review and opportunity for release. One of the things I find beautiful about religion is that is can work on so many levels. Let’s face it, many people do need a punishment/reward system. It is not a bad thing, it is just where they are at in their own development. This is one of the ways the Jewish religion motivates righteous behavior. While not eternal damnation, if you truly believe you are going to die in the next year if you don’t change your ways, that can be a pretty powerful motivator. But as I said, I don’t believe that is how life really works. In fact on a basic level, righteousness committed in the name of self preservation is inherently selfish. But that is actually OK because it is more than just controlling the masses; “walking the walk” and “talking the talk” helps people internalize change. It helps them to grow and become the kind of people who do good not because of a religious mandate, but because it is an essential part of who they have become.

Shana Tova

* not counting Chanukah

** Ram’s Horn

*** My mom was not known for her cooking but man could she make a brisket.

**** Just made that % up

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

My wonderful wife and Yoga teacher will be holding monthly workshops for the remanded of the year. I have not had a chance to update her website; I know shocking considering how I have maintained my own website as of late. Though technically this is three posts in as many weeks!

She is truly a wonderful teacher so if you have any interest, drop her line at melissa@melissafeldman.com to reserve a spot. I am re-posting her email with all of the details below.
__________________________________________________________

Hello, everybody! Hope you had a wonderful summer.

I know I previously sent out this email at a time when you may have been in and out of town and/or not yet thinking about fall yet, so I wanted to remind you of my exciting workshops coming up! So here is the schedule again. Please let me know if you have questions.

~~~

Dear past, present, and future yogis,

I am very happy to announce my new workshop schedule!

Starting in September I will be offering one workshop each month but I will hold that workshop twice – once on a Saturday and once on a Sunday, and on different weekends. This is in effort to accommodate preferences of which day of the weekend you are available to attend, any travels you may have planned, and I am also aiming to avoid holidays.

Here are the topics and dates for 2009:

MEDITATION & BREATH
Sunday, September 13
and
Saturday, September 26

BALANCE
Sunday, October 18
and
Saturday, October 24

HIPS & TWISTS
Saturday, November 7
and
Sunday, November 15

CORE
Saturday, December 12
and
Sunday, December 6

PLEASE NOTE:
All workshops will be held at my house, 12299 Greenleaf Avenue, Potomac, MD 20854.

All workshops will be held in the morning, roughly 9am-12pm, but I will firm up the time for each individual workshop as the date approaches.

You do not need any experience to take part in these workshops; While some intermediate-advanced poses/techniques may be presented, so are the very basics. Workshops are for dissecting our practice and taking time to talk about and understand what we are doing and why. Everyone finds their own edge and works at their own pace.

Space is limited, so please register early!

The fee for each workshop is $50 per person.

TO REGISTER:
1. Please send me an email that you want to come to a particular workshop – don’t forget to indicate the topic AND date. This will temporarily reserve your space.
2. Then, send me a check for the appropriate amount. (My address is listed above.)
3. Once your payment has been received, I will send you a confirmation email and there are no refunds.

Please forward this information to any friends or family who may be interested in and benefit from these teachings.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

I look forward to seeing you!

Namaste,
Melissa

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

I am not ready for this. Melissa, she is ready. Josh, he is ready. I am sure even Elijah is ready for the more one on one time he will get with Mommy once Josh starts preschool (though Eli obviously has no idea). I am not ready, not even close. I know I fall slightly on the overprotective side of the parenting fence, but that is really only part of the issue. Sure I have thought about randomly swinging by the school to make sure the doors are locked. And I hate that we live in a world were a synagogue/preschool feels the need to line the border of the property with “decorative” boulders. But much of my trepidation isn’t really about security. It is a good school, we checked it out thoroughly and have many neighbors/friends with kids there. What I think really bothers me most is just how fast time is moving.

I decided to not work through lunch today. I took some time to read some blogs and write this post. One of the blogs I read belongs to my friend Jodi. Her current (at least at the time of this draft – she is a far more prolific writer then I) blog post has a picture of her little boy when he was an infant. Her next post down shows him just the other day. The difference was startlingly. I haven’t asked her, but I would be shocked if she said that time has done anything but flown by. After I read her post, I browsed though some of my favorite pictures of the kids on my iPhone. I can’t believe how much Josh has changed over the course of his 2 1/2 years and Elijah over his 7 months. Every day I come home from work to find one or both of them have learned some new thing or have done something for the very first time.

I enjoy my job; I work for a good company and the reality is I can’t be there the way I would like. But I do feel like a missing so much. It makes these milestones bittersweet, but I supposed that is the taste of life.

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

I have the privilege of knowing some incredible people, people who had the misfortune of being victims of child abuse. They took their very personal horrors and used it to fashion unimaginable internal strength. They have become incredible parents, teachers, counselors and productive members of society. I am inspired and awed that such good came out of such pain.

Here is where I am going to over share. Well, I don’t think of it as over sharing, some might, but I don’t and it is my life so WTF. I have nothing to be embarrassed about and I think it will do me some good to get this out there. As a child I was exposed to an abusive extended family member. I am not going to name names, but anyone who knows my family can probably take an educated guess. If anyone wants to know who, I will be happy to share offline. For the record, the type of abuse I was exposed to was mostly emotional. I also don’t want to suggest that a handful of incidents can in anyway compare the horrors faced by those exposed to chronic and pervasive abuse. But I have recently come to realize what a lifelong impact that even these comparatively minor incidents have had on my life.

Today I am going to share one such incident. When I was a child I was at my grandparents who lived in a high rise in North Bethesda. Interestingly enough the same high rise I bought my first condo in. This “relative”, not my Grandfather (not that he was model parental figure either) thought it would be funny to hang me from the 10th story balcony. He swung me back and forth, and then he actually threw me up in the air, fortunately catching me.

It was shortly after this I started climbing things – trees, poles, houses, etc. I realize now I was attempting to get back control he took from me. I would decide how high I climbed and the higher the better. I was never going to allow myself to be afraid like that again. By the time I was 10 years old, I was doing cartwheels and handstands on railings and rooftop edges. I have no doubt that much if not all of my often reckless thrill-seeking behaviors stemmed from this one event.

For a long time I held on to more anger from the incident that I care to admit. I do however wonder, who would I be today had that not occurred. I am likely a better parent then I might otherwise have been, but I am sure I could/would have developed those same protective skills – your a parent, your job is to keep your children safe.

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

Here is a little idiosyncrasy from my childhood. Somewhere around age 6 I got in my head the notion that it was possible that I could die and keep on keeping on in some sort of heaven/hell of my own creation. So every time the thought popped into my head I had to check my pulse to see if I was still alive. Even at 6 I understood that it was a little silly to assume that God/The Universe would create a reality for me compete with sight, sound, smell, taste and touch and miss such a minor detail as providing me with a pulse. With the aid of cognitive dissonance I eventually reasoned that God/The Universe might want me to figure out that I was not actually “living” in the real world and the lack of a pulse would surely be the path to my enlightenment. For the record by the time I was 10 I had given up on that theory. I actually hadn’t thought of this little ritual in some time but was reminded of it while reading Tim Pratt’s Dead Reign from his Marla Mason Series. One of the characters suffers from Cotard delusion, a psychological disorder in which the afflicted believes that they are dead. Please note I am not suggesting I suffered from this disorder, I was simply a child grappling with the nature of consciousness and reality.

So on to the dream… Last night I had what started off as a fairly mundane dream. Not really spectacular, vivid, creative or particularly enlightening. Other than some normal inconsistencies/dream logic, it was actually a pretty boring dream. There was, as I mentioned, some odd inconsistencies. Occasionally when dreaming I notice the dream logic and say – hey wait a second, that’s not possible I must be dreaming… Then I either go with the flow or take control of the lucid dream. Not this time. In what I am sure was some sort of synergistic reaction to Tim Pratt’s book along with the impact of my Mother’s sudden passing I was sure I was dead, I even checked my pulse. When I couldn’t find one, I had the sudden recollection of an impact and I just “knew” that I had died in a car accident. I woke up with such a fright that it was a good hour before my adrenaline was overwhelmed by the Lunesta and I was able to get back to sleep.

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

Let me begin by thanking everyone for the many wishes of congratulations, condolences and offers of help. As most of you are aware Melissa and I have a wonderful new addition to our family. Elijah Benjamin Feldman, AKA Eli, AKA The Grasshopper, was born on February 5, 2009. He was 6 lbs 7 oz, happy and healthy. Unfortunately our wonderful news was tempered by the loss of my Mother. My parents had been on a long planned vacation to Puerto Rico. They were scheduled to return prior to Melissa and Eli being released from the hospital. The night Eli was born my mother was playing blackjack and according to our cousins who were vacationing with my parents, repeatedly looking at the the photo of Eli I had emailed them. She was having the time of her life when she had a massive aneurysm at the tables and was officially pronounced brain dead and removed from life support about 36 hours later. My mother was a huge part of our lives and I do not have the words to describe the combination of one of my highest highs with my lowest low. I am still trying to figure out how to embrace the joys of having a newborn and grieve for my mother but if there is one lesson she taught me it is you put your children first. So for now that is all I can do.

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

I was tagged and completed one of those “25 random things about me” and true to #25 I decided to repost to my blog.

1. Someday I will finish and publish a novel.

2. I have finished many shorts stories over the years and have never attempted to have any of them published.

3. I have an irrational fear of birds.

4. That said very few things in this world truly frighten me. I have driven a buck twenty bumper to bumper on a tortuous road, gone bungee jumping, cliff diving, skydiving and countless other youthful indiscretions.

5. And that said I have been terrified on a couple of occasions. The first was a month before Josh was born and we were driving to Holly Cross to do a tour of the maternity ward. We were stopped in traffic on 495 near magical kingdom AKA the Mormon Temple. Melissa stated screaming as a SVU plowed into us at highway speeds. The accident put her into early labor and it was hours before they were able to stop the labor and give us any assurance that she and the baby would be OK. The second time in recent memory was when I held my son for the first time.

6. Even though I am pro-science and highly critical of religious dogma, I am surprisingly religious. I have never doubted in G-d, only humanity’s ability to understand.

7. Most of my life I preferred to read what Academics call literature and now I prefer speculative fiction. I can even admit to truly loving some urban/dark fantasy that could just as easily be housed in the romance isle.

8. I am a terrible insomniac and Lunesta has changed my life.

9. I have been contemplating giving up meat on moral grounds but am not sure I have the will power to make it happen.

10. I’m a Mac, and a PC and a LINUX

11. As a kid I used to take things apart to to figure out how they worked, I still do.

12. I used to build PCs before it was considered easy.

12. I am very mechanically inclined but have never changed my own oil, mostly because I don’t like getting dirty.

13. I love to garden. I know that sounds contradictory but I don’t mind dirt dirt. It is the greasy and/or sticky things I don’t love.

14. I have studied Christianity more in depth than Judaism.

15. I hated being Jewish as a child but happily identify with Judaism as an adult.

16. My favorite game is Gin provided I am playing with my wife. She is a knocker!

17. My mind works best when I am multitasking.

18. I can listen to an audio book or watch TV while reading and follow both. I know this makes me a little odd but I was a multitasker before modern communication necessitated it.

19. My wife never ceases to amaze me.

20. On any given day Lifeguarding was my favorite job. Bar-tending was the most fun, and Teaching the most rewarding.

21. Even though I don’t LOVE it I am very good at HR an assume I will keep doing it forever unless I do #1 more than once and really really really well.

22. I am terrible with names.

23. Having a child (soon to be children) has changed my life in unbelievable and indescribable ways.

24. Yes I do get asked about the other Corey Feldman all to often and how funny is it that my best friend’s name is Tony Orlando.

25. Most of my life I have shared easily but with few. With Social media (blogging, facebook, twitter) I now share with many but no longer with ease.

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

Happy New Years everyone! Annoying resolutions post most likely follow.

In the mean time here are some interesting search phrases that brought people to my site. What are the key phrases that bring people to your sites?

corey s diaper

i hate mornings

baltimore harbor boats

port discovery baltimore human resources

port discovery hr

could this day get any slower

i hate the coreys

favia coffee machine comparison

what is wrong with house

i hate mornings help

free ebook download mike carey vicious circle

man bag backpack

back ground corey check

corey feldman – where is he now – dec 2008

wrong

free tor ebooks

did cory feldman have a baby

melissa and corey Feldman

health clubs

i think still the fundamentals of our economy are strong hurt

kidville Rockville

kidville blogs

suck water from flat roof

looking for a job or need a job or job search or job hunting or unemployed or got fired or layed off

mike carey vicious circle lit

american economy is strong

corey feldman and obama

corey feldman religion

how do u ping someone with an iphone?

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

The always funny and insightful Laurie Ruettimann AKA Punk Rock HR and I are having a slight disagreement regarding internet use at work. Laurie was blogging about Signs You Need to Start Your Job Search. Basically Laurie is saying never stop looking. I couldn’t agree more – network, grow or die. However she ended her post with “This is the sign you’ve been waiting for, yo. Start your job search today. Look for a job from the comfort of your warm cubicle with free, company-sponsored high-speed internet and your cushy Aeron® chair.” Here is where I disagree. My response “Agreed except for the part of doing it from your cubicle/office over company internet. While you have those things sure, but not on or with company property. Never know who in IT or otherwise is watching.”

This of course lead to Laurie’s latest blog post Using The Internets on Company Time in it she asks HR professionals and Managerial types if you have or would fire an employee for browsing Monster.com at work. For me it is simple, your company most likely has a policy against it, you are most likely an employee at will and Job Hunters are not a protected class. Don’t do it at work.

What do you all think, post here or there.

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

Last night sometime – Showered, change into fresh and clean workout clothes, took sleeping pill and read until I fell asleep
5:30 am – Alarm, hit sleep timer
5:41 am – Alarm, got up. (Already dressed in gym clothes sans shoes)
6:15 am – brewed double shot espresso
6:20 am – Deiced windshield and made my way to gym
6:35 am – Started treadmill and last night’s Daily show on my iPhone

I seem to be missing 34 minutes between getting out of bed and brewing my espresso. I did check my email, deleted a few junk mails that slipped through the filter and confirmed one person on facebook. Total computer time 3 minutes – no more. Maybe another minute to put on and tie my running shoes. I didn’t blackout or fall back asleep, yet I have 30 minutes I simply cannot account for?

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

Vicious Circle is book two in Mike Carey’s urban fantasy/detective noir series which chronicles the adventures and challenges of Felix Castor, reluctant exorcist.  In the London of Carey’s envisioning, the supernatural world has bled into our reality.  There are ghosts, lugaru (French equivalent of a were), demons, and other things that go bump in the night.  Most people can see ghosts but a few special people can exercise a certain amount of control over dead and undead.     At a young age Castor stumbled into his abilities by unintentionally exorcizing the ghost of his late sister.  Castor is a fascinating protagonist.  He is not a fighter, a lover or preternaturally powerful.  He is a wisecracking reluctant hero just a minute or so off the egg timer from hardboiled.  Carey paints a vivid picture of London and draws some fascinating supporting characters.  You have an old friend Rafi, inextricably bound to a powerful demon after Castor tried and failed to free him from possession.  Nicky the zombie, a computer hacker and conspiracy nut… and Juliet a succubus that I can’t say too much about without unnecessary spoilage for book 1, The Devil You Know.    

I thoroughly enjoyed book 1 but Vicious Circle is certainly a more polished product.  In this installment Castor is hired by a couple to find their kidnapped daughter.  While not an actual detective, Felix takes the case due to one very unusual circumstance; the girl was already dead when abducted. Along the way he will run into a powerful religious sect, a rash of apparent demonic possessions, an exorcist with abilities that seem to significantly outclass his own.  The book is fast paced, funny and does a fantastic job of blending the fantasy and detective genres.  While not completely necessary to read The Devil You Know first, it is entertaining in its own right and does help with the back story.

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

I have never been more proud to be an American. 

Originally published at Corey J Feldman. Please leave any comments there.

If this turns out to be legitimate I seriously question Joe McCain’s commons sense. While I don’t expect the Senator to be his brother’s keeper, I am left wondering what sort of urgent family political business he is attending to. I hope Joe McCain is at the very least fined for his audacity.