I'm on a mission

So, I haven't posted anything in a while because quite honestly - I wasn't sure anyone was reading this at all. But this all changed today...

My friends and I talked about another blog the other day - like a lot - and I got a bit jealous. So I tried to (not completely serious) lure my friends onto this blog to get more traffic ;-)
One of my friends - well I wouldn't really call him a friend, more like an acquaintance - made it pretty clear that hell would freeze over before he'd ever come to this site. This lead me to making it my mission for the rest of this year to get him to visit my blog.

My ideas so far to get to achieve this are:

1. Social Engineering - I will try to get him through one of the channels (e.g. Whatsapp) through which we already communicate to click on a link to my blog (I have already tried with url shortening, but he is smarter than he looks)
2. Phishing - Once I have his EMail-Address I will try sending him great offers that he can't refuse - all leading to this page (I know a certain Nigerian prince who wants to give away some of his money - maybe he is willing to help)
3. XSS - this one will be a bit harder to pull of because a lot of the web sites that he visits on a regular basis already prevent XSS attacks - and I would probably have to purchase advertising space there which could cost me quite a bit (but hey, it is probably worth it)
4. Seduction - I will produce so much great content here that he won't be able to resist anymore at one point. I am still collecting ideas on topics but I think one of the following should work:

• Going Vegan - I could become a vegan and not only that - a raw fruit and vegetable vegan
• Starting Cross Fit - I'm suspecting him having a secret crush on me which is why he teases me that much - starting to do Cross Fit and sharing my amazing body transformations is a honey pot he won't be able to resist
• Explaining why flying is good for the environment - He is a frequent flyer (due to business reasons - or so he claims) and he might regret some of that due to the current climate change debate - if I can provide scientific "proof" that flying is actually good for the environment he might stumble upon this page by accident
• Become a soccer expert - this one might actually be too easy to achieve but he is an enthusiastic soccer fan and if I invest 30-60 minute per week I should be able to provide thoughtful and helpful player analytics in a week or two. That is what he needs to win his fantasy soccer league for maybe the first time ever.
• Something about nipples - the idea is really at a very early stage but this might actually be the trojan horse he let's into his city

So, the rough plan is defined - let's get to work!

Some Updates

It has been a while since my last post so I think it is time to give some updates:

• TV - I did not get a TV during the Black Friday sale on the various shops because none had the TV I was after on offer. Luckily, the week after christmas a large tech store chain did some early shopping - insane rebates activity - and even though they did not have the exact model I wanted they had a reasonably close one for a good 250€ below the average price - so I had to get it. Consequently I grabbed my father in the early morning hours and we drove to the store - waited in line with like 50 other people (remember, this is december 27th at 8am) - we got in relatively quickly and got the TV. It is a Samsung QLED (THIS ONE). I paid in cash since we had been saving up to it in our piggy bank and I am really satisfied with it. Great picture quality, good sound for built in speakers and all relevant features that I wanted (it even gets support for apple's air play in spring - so everything is golden there.
• Open Source Software governance - the scans of our software revealed some duplicate and outdated libraries - we updated what we could and got that out of the way - overall way less effort than anticipated.
• Basketball practice - I got back in the saddle really slowly. The orthopedist recommended not to play basketball like every again. But I love this sport and I need to do some kind of workout that I don't need to force myself to. I got a nice lower back bandage (prescription) and that makes it bearable even though it limits my flexibility and puts quite a bit of weight on my hip muscles - so I tire much quicker than before my back problems. But that should all sort itself out with more practice. I also started running (well, "running" - my pace isn't close to what it used to be) again to bring the weight down and get more fit. You can follow the results here. The first run was good and helped a lot with the back. Lazy as I am it lead to me reducing the back workout routine (because of reasons) and then the second run was not nice and set me back a bit - back wise. I have taken up the exercise part again and am looking forward to doing some running in todays lunch break. This is all part of my new years resolution (more on those later).
• In unrelated news - my oldest daughter turned 4 on Friday - what a party that was. We prepared for almost a week - she wanted an unicorn-themed party so we gave it our best:
  
  Decorated the house with unicorns, I even created some unicorn heads (made of plywood) - as part of the party entertainment the kids coloured those and I will finish them up with some varnish and glue sticks to them to create hobbyhorses. Here how they look in their raw form: