I had been dealing with some issues the for the past few weeks in regards to my name being linked to my blog (I know, the HORROR, eh!).  As you all know, I blog anonymously.  I share a lot of sensitive and personal information (down to the the last dime with my personal finance net worth calculations) on this blog, and I would be very upset if it was linked to me in any way.

Anyways, the story is that I was toying around with BF’s new Blackberry Bold 9700 to test out its user friendliness, specifically in terms of the web browser.  So yes, as we all do, I googled myself.  Then I saw the search engine results and my eyes widened in disbelief.

Technorati had linked my full name to my blog.  And I do not know how long it had been there (probably and very likely all summer) because I don’t even remember the last time I googled myself.

To make a long story short, I ended up trying to delete the cache with Google’s webmaster tools, which worked to an extent, but somehow Technorati still linked my full name to my blog or user name.  The search engines take a “picture” of a website as it looked say, two months ago.  When you search for something, it will still show the excerpt in the search results of the “picture” that was taken two months ago, even if the actual website has changed.  Then I contacted Technorati to delete my account.  Thankfully they did it relatively quickly (took about two emails and a few days).  I just hope that no one Googled me (hey, you never know, people might be really bored??).

I’m not sure why Technorati goes so public with this information- I think there have been a lot of complaints about it.  It seems like a breach of privacy to me.  Don’t get me wrong, the Technorati index is a great tool for us bloggers, but I feel that they should respect the privacy of bloggers who don’t want to be known publicly.

So, my fellow blogging friends, do you blog anonymously? If so, what are your reasons for staying covert?  Would you ever go “public”?

Readers, do you Google yourself?

PF Blog Love:

• Wealth Pilgrim has an excellent write up on Disability Insurance for the Self Employed- the Ultimate Guide
• Canadian Finance Blog lets you know the secret on how to Save Money on Groceries
• Budgeting the Fun Stuff talks about how some people go too far to save money (er.. like me? lol)
• Frugal Zeitgeist shares the basics of buying a used car
• Monevator gives five reasons why you’ll love Index Investing (I know I do!)
• Len Penzo has a fun post (as always) on 21 reasons why corner lots are for suckers (hint- it doesn’t have anything to do with the extra yard you have to mow)
• Financial Samurai rounds up all the free stuff going down these days (contests galore from the Yakezie!)
• The Passive Income Investor is DRIPing his lunch money (sounds good to me! I should do the same)
• Tiny Potato talks about financial products that shouldn’t exist

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I’m sorry for the excitement, but I think I have FINALLY FINALLY fixed something (thanks to professional help) that was bothering my blog for the past four months.  Being computer, wordpress, AND html illiterate, I had a heck of a time trying to figure out why my comments were getting allocated to the wrong posts (and I’m sure you all had to deal with it too, thank you for your unwavering patience!).  Thanks to my favourite wise Kiwi, Derry, who suggested that I use this website called elance.  You can hire professional computer programming help for cheap!

After getting more and more frazzled with seemingly more and more wrongly allocated posts with the new wordpress edition (and frantic copying and pasting and getting booted off comment luv for too much copying and pasting), I thought, “okay, enough is enough!”  So I took the plunge with elance and after a few days, the problem was fixed!  Turns out I have too many plug ins that are making each other confused, hence making my blog confused.  It was like taking my blog to the doctor, lol.

I thought I would celebrate with some Bob Marley- I can see clearly now!  It’s gonna be a bright, bright, sunshin-y day!

In other EXCITING news this week, I watched Eat Pray Love and loved it.  It made me have wanderlust again, when I thought I had quelched this feeling from the recent interest in buying a place (home buying update too- waiting for the prices to come down down down…).

But MOST exciting, is the launch of the official site, Yakezie.com.  It’s very exciting- it’s going to be huge (and viral, just like that Old Spice commercial)

Onto some great reads for the weekend.  Hope everyone has a great weekend!

PF Blog Love:

• Early Retirement Extreme asks what is happening to the middle class?
• Canadian Finance Blog has five frugal tips on reducing your food bill.
• Eliminate the Muda has some tips on how to set up a garage sale (this was on my personal to do list for the past four weeks. FAIL.)
• Money Beagle gives us five ways to save at the beach
• Couple Money shares with you how to graduate with money in your pocket
• Little House has these really fun personal finance quizzes (reminiscent of my YM and Seventeen magazine days)
• The Financial Blogger has a very interesting post on how schools show you how to be poor
• Million Dollar Journey pits ING Direct with PC Financial (who gets KO’d?)
• Len Penzo shares a simple trick to get your credit card interest waived
• Invest it Wisely shows you how to own your own restaurant (and pack it with you)
• 27 and Frugal talks about how one goes about managing a savings account
• Coupon Sherpa shares with us how to make sure you’re not getting scammed by coupons (yes there’s such a thing!)
• Boomer and Echo tells you how you can save money by meal planning
• Jenn @Paying Myself speaking of escapism and travel, Jenn shares pictures from her Mexico trip and tallies up how much she spent on it.

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