For the past few days I’ve been almost obsessively tweaking both my MT and WP sites. There is much, much more that I still want to do with WP which will keep me from switching over to it for at least awhile (if I ever do). At any rate, it’s nice to work with multiple systems and try to get a better feel for PHP.

Anyway, the only addition that might be of interest to my readers, and the only real visible one is that I have now included a “Currently Reading” section to my sidebar. This will hopefully keep me motivated to read more books, as well as give you all an idea of what I like.

I did also make the URLs on my Photolog prettier—they are now formed by archives/category/name_of_picture/ instead of /archives/000123.html which I think makes more logical sense and could be more helpful in searching them.

LOL I think I need to go outside more! :)

Oops!

It seems I managed to get my site banned by my web host for about an hour today. I was tweaking some of the setting on my Photolog site, and I guess I stuck in a tag that caused the server to overload. The load was so significant that they pulled the plug on me.

Anyway, at least now I’ve proven that this host is a lot better than my old one. They answered me back pretty quickly after I submitted my problem and restored my site after I explained what the problem was.

I will have to remember to be more careful in my MT tag selections so that this doesn’t happen again. Hopefully no one noticed this problem, but if you tried to visit during that time, you now know the reason for the weird error message you probably received.

Posted at 6:18 PM | (1)

I doubt I’ll ever be cool enough to make it to the front page of /., but yesterday I guess I got the next best thing—I am one of the predominant links of a page that is linked on the front of Slashdot.

The page contains a comparison chart for the various blogging systems that are available. I noticed that the author didn’t mention MT’s keyword capability (although this feature is NOT obvious), so I sent an email so that he could update his info. The author updated the info and put my page on there as an example of a site that uses MT.

By Slashdot standards I haven’t gotten many hits at all—only about 350—however, that’s 3 times more than I normally get in a day, so I guess that’s cool.

As for blogging programs, I’ve been testing out Wordpress to see if I can get it to do everything MT does. I probably won’t switch to it though unless I am able to incorporate my photolog the way I currently do with MT. Being that it is so easy to write plugins for it using PHP, this probably shouldn’t be a problem. Now I just need to actually learn PHP, so that I don’t have to hack away by trial and error like I did with a few of the plug-ins I used.

Posted at 8:13 AM | (2)

Yesterday I spent pretty much the whole day in a session of my Dreamweaver class. Even though we didn’t get to start working on our final projects, this class was good because it was the first one in which we REALLY used some of the functions the program offers, which I found useful. I even tried out some of these features on this site when I got home. It does make me wish that I start out more organized in my file structure, however.

Dreamweaver has a nice setup of file structure and the built-in FTP site manager. I do think that I’ll be using this program from now on, for any time I need to delve into code and web design.

Posted at 4:08 PM | (3)

I had seen the Burn It projects over at Neurotic Fishbowl in the past, but never did them because I just didn’t feel that I could think of enough songs for the chosen theme. This Spring, however, Kymberlie chose a theme I could definitely do—Cover Songs!!

I already had a bunch of cover songs in my collection, and it was a matter of downloading about 5 that I didn’t already have but liked. I just finished burning all the CDs and making the track listing insert. I plan on mailing them out today, if you are one of the people in my group and are wondering. I already got the first CD from one of my group members yesterday! :)

For those interested, here is my track listing:

1. Me First & the Gimme Gimmes - Mandy
2. Cake - I Will Survive
3. Blink 182 - Dancing With Myself
4. Lemonheads - Mrs. Robinson
5. The Ataris - Boys of Summer
6. Smash Mouth - I’m a Believer
7. Pearl Jam - Last Kiss
8. Sheryl Crow - The First Cut is the Deepest
9. Steve Nicks - Free Fallin’
10. Lagwagon - Brown Eyed Girl
11. Me First and the Gimme Gimmes - Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow
12. Richard Cheese - Buddy Holly
13. Frente - Bizarre Love Triangle
14. Blondie - The Tide is High
15. Guns ‘n Roses - Live and Let Die
16. John Mayer - Message in a Bottle
17. Save Ferris - Come on Eileen
18. The Offspring - I Wanna Be Sedated
19. Sixpence None the Richer - There She Goes
20. Tiffany - I Think We’re Alone Now
21. U2 - Paint it Black
22. Less Than Jake - I Think I Love You
23. Limp Bizkit - Faith
24. 311 - Love Song

Posted at 8:47 AM | (2)

In a bit of shameless self-promotion (as if having my own blog wasn’t enough), I am pleased to announce that someone has finally added me to their favorites on Photoblogs.org. I registered on Sunday, and someone liked me enough to add to favorites today. :)

Which of course leads me to the next natural progression of my statement: If you like my photos, go vote for me! Of course, you can also check out the other photoblogs on there—some of them are quite impressive.

It’s a good thing that I’m driving a bit slower on the 217 lately, because the CHP motorcyle unit has set up a bit of a speed trap on the Northbound section of the highway. For the past few days I have consistently seen at least 3 or 4 officers waiting off to the side of the road in the grass. I’ve also seen them find a speeder and go after them on more than one trip down this highway.

If it weren’t for that speeding ticket last month, I’d probably be getting one now. The only reason I probably see these cops is because when I was driving Southbound after work, I noticed them all parked on the side. When I drove north the next day, sure enough, there were a bunch of them waiting.

There are a lot of people who speed on this road, so I guess it’s not surprising that they’d want to stake it out. However, I can’t help but wonder if I’m one of the reasons that they started doing it NOW. How flattering would that be??

Blah, it’s Monday again and I don’t feel like I got enough done this weekend. I meant to clean my room, but that didn’t happen. I did, however, get all of the photos transferred over—including making new entries in MT for each of the entries in 26 Things and 26 Things:2.

The process of converting all the entries was a bit tedious, but I’m glad it’s finally done. I think my next project may be resizing the pics. I sized them at a width of 450, but the new template only allows 400, so in the resizing of the browser, some of the pictures look a little pixely.

I was also able to read a bit of the Bridget Jones sequel, which while interesting, isn’t as good as the first book. I’ll still want to see the movie though, because who doesn’t love a good Colin Firth movie?! :)

Posted at 1:24 PM | (1)

I’ve been busy the last 2 days putting together a photolog for my site. My current method of posting pictures for the photo memes was becoming too cumbersome and it wasn’t very friendly to browse in its list form.

Soooo….

I created a separate blog just for the photos. They are now indexed according to type/meme and you get a thumbnail view of all the pics. To accomplish this, I had to transfer all the entries over to the new blog and modify some of the content to fit the new format. This has been pretty time-consuming, to say the least, but I think that you will be pleased with the result.

Take a look and let me know what you think! Oh and don’t worry, the latest photos will still appear on my main homepage, so you don’t have to check multiple sites for updates (unless you really want to!) :)

Posted at 10:30 PM | (5)

When I went home last weekend, I took a few of my old books with me. A lot of them were ones I had used for my college English classes, but were ineligible for the Bookstore Buy-back program (gosh, what a surprise!). While I have read these books, and enjoyed many of them, I don’t necessarily deem them worthy of taking up shelf space in my cramped bedroom.

As a result, I’ve decided to release them into the wild, a la BookCrossing. The concept of this is pretty cool—you put an ID number on the book, register it, and set it free somewhere. Hopefully someone comes along, picks it up, reads it, and signs on to document their experience with the book before releasing it for someone else to find.

So far I’ve only released 4 books. The 2 I followed up on have since disappeared from their spots, which perhaps means someone took them home. I hope they didn’t get thrown away. I also hope that whoever took them signs on and lets me know that they have the books, so that this will be a more interesting endeavor.

I have 11 more books to release, and I’m trying to think of good places to release them. I think this method is much more fun than giving them away, as it provides an adventure, and perhaps introduces a particular book into someone’s life that they wouldn’t have read otherwise.

Posted at 1:43 PM | (1)

Well, I’m back from my visit home this weekend. Unfortunately I didn’t get to see my grandma—I assumed she would come to Mother’s Day dinner with us like usual, but I guess this year she had other plans.

Went to the Renaissance Faire on Saturday, which of course had the usual bevy of buxom girls dressed in peasant garb, spilling out their more than ample bosoms for all to see. There need to be more skinny chicks in those outfits—equal representation for all body types! Anyway, it was amusing, and I got some color being out in the sun for a few hours. It was probably only in the high 80s, so it wasn’t too bad, temperature-wise.

The majority of my time was spent trying to get my mom’s computer to work, since it spontaneously decided to corrupt main Windows files and not boot in ANY mode—not even Safe Mode. I think all that’s left is formatting and doing a clean install, but first my sister’s boyfriend has to try to remove some pictures from the hard drive. Hope it works!

I meant to wash and detail my car, but I ran out of time. Blah.

Posted at 8:25 AM | (4)

I am leaving soon for Whittier to visit my mom for Mother’s Day. My sister and I are going with her to the Renaissance Faire at Glen Helen tomorrow, and then of course a dinner on Sunday.

Not much else to say here, I just felt like making a post. Oh and who here is sad that Friends is over? I am, even though I hadn’t watched it too regularly for awhile. There were some funny moments. And then of course there’s the time I played cards in Vegas with Matthew Perry. ;)

Posted at 6:56 PM | (2)

Yesterday I acquired a sticker that says “I’m HOT, you’re not.” I thought it was cool, so I stuck it to my monitor. The sticker also listed a website, so I decided to check it out and see what it was all about.

It turns out that this place sells all kinds of things like pajamas, shirts, underwear, mousepads, etc. and some of the slogans and graphics are pretty cute and/or funny.

In my insanity, I might actually purchase a t-shirt because I think they are cute. Which do you think would make the better shirt choice for me?

or

Hehe, the Goodbye Kitty ones are pretty funny because they have a ton of different scenarios in which the kitty is disposed of.

Posted at 10:12 AM | (4)

Well, it’s only taken me about 3 years to pick up reading again. It’s not that I dislike it, mind you, but rather that I got a bit burnt out on it. Being an English major does that to you, I suppose—especially when each class has about 6 books assigned to it.

I already finished Bridget Jones’s Diary, and am now starting on the sequel. I even finally signed up for a library card at the local public library! Currently I have been checking books out of the University Library, but the public libraries are a little better for general fiction—the University tends to only have classic literature or extremely popular titles.

Anyone have any book suggestions? I was also thinking about trying the Harry Potter series as well as the Da Vinci code (just to see what the hype is all about with these). Let me know if you read any really good books lately! :)

Posted at 8:53 AM | (7)

Last night around midnight I heard a weird thumping at my window. It didn’t quite sound like someone knocking or anything, but it definitely wasn’t just the wind. I looked out my window but didn’t see anything.

Then I heard the thump again.

This time when I looked out I saw a black cat jump down onto the sidewalk and stare me down. It was kinda weird, actually. The cat just kept staring right at me. What was it doing? Where did it come from?

Maybe it was some evil demon coming to steal my soul or something. Whatever it was doing, it startled me in my half-asleep state and kept me awake longer than I intended. You suck, stupid demon cat!

Posted at 4:18 PM | (3)

It’s looking like it’s going to be a lazy weekend, so I probably won’t have much to write about. I’d like to take this time to wish my good friend Martin a very happy birthday. Today he turns a quarter of a century old! :) It also happens to be Josh’s birthday as well.

As far as belated anniversaries go, I totally forgot to acknowledge my 2 year blogiversary! It was on April 16th, if you were wondering. I think that perhaps the anniversary got overshadowed this year by the speeding ticket I received just the day before. Oh well.

I think I’ve come a long way with my site in the two years, and hopefully I will do more cool things with it in the future.

Posted at 12:13 PM | (4)