This blog is being discontinued until further notice.

I’ve never done a really good job of keeping it up, and I think the problem is only going to get worse next year when I start college. It’s also fairly pointless, as so few people read it. Few readers means few comments, and little motivation to update. I have a livejournal that I am much better about updating, and that will continue. My books page will also be updated, and the blog archives will be here. The website isn’t going away, it’s just going to sleep for the most part.

I’m trying to streamline my life in preparation for college in order to leave maximum time for schoolwork and friends. I don’t want to be spending tons of time on my computer next year. I want to be out talking to people and doing things.

I’ve enjoyed writing and designing for this site, but it just feels like it’s over. The reason this design is still up is that every time I try to work on a new one, I lose motivation and can’t seem to create anything I’m happy with. I don’t believe in continuing hobbies after they’ve ceased to be enjoyable, which this has.

So, goodbye. It’s been cool.

Everything’s been going well with the new computer. I’m having a bit of a web design block, maybe brought on by the lethargy of summer. That’s why this site hasn’t been redone yet. I need a design that doesn’t need to be pixel-perfect. I want it to be decent-looking in all browsers, and this one definitely isn’t. I’m working on it.

Anyway, here are some programs nice programs I’m using on my PowerBook:

• Chat Client - Adium: I used Trillian on my old Windows computer, and this almost seems like Trillian for Mac. It’s a very nice multi-protocal (AIM/Yahoo/MSN/whatever you want) that has some extra features. I haven’t actually tried iChat, the Mac chat client that comes packaged with OS X, so I can’t compare, but I like Adium very much.
• FTP Client - Cyberduck: I originally downloaded Fugu, but never got it to connect to my FTP server. Cyberduck connected just fine, so Cyberduck it is! I don’t do a lot of fancy FTP stuff, I just need something that’ll let me upload things and fool around with CHMOD.
• Image/Photo Editing - The GIMP: The GIMP is the open source equivalent of Adobe Photoshop. It’s available for OS X, Windows, and Linux. Documentation for OS X users isn’t very good, but I’ve managed. It’s a great program, I’ve barely scratched the surface of what it can do.
• Color Chooser - iColors: I LOVE THIS PROGRAM. Maybe it’s that I’ve never used a decent color picker before, or maybe this program really is as cool as I think it is. It can grab colors from anywhere on your screen, and save them in a menu over to the side. And it’s very, very simple and easy to use. No bloat at all. If you need a color picker, I definitely recommend it.
• Text Editor - SubEthaEdit: A basic text editor that I use for coding CSS and HTML and such. It’s very simple, but has automatic tabbing and syntax highlighting for about a million different languages. While I would appreciated CSS auto-completion, I dont need it. SubEthaEdit also has a lot of features intended for files that are being edited by more than over person.

I’ve been thinking about scrapping this blog and starting a new one. I no longer want all the entries dating back to 2003. I’m about to graduate high school and start a new life. New life = new blog? What think you?

Part of the reason I say this is because I constantly struggle with the website/livejournal balance. I have a livejournal that I update regularly- much more often than this. I like it because it’s a good way to meet peole and stay in touch. I’ve met a whole group of friends that I’ll be going to school with next year through livejournal. There’s a also the fact that my livejournal is more widely-read than this website. Thus, I get much more feedback. And I love feedback just as much as everyone else.

I’m not willing to give up my livejournal for the reasons mentioned above, and I’m not willing to stop updating my website because it’s something I really enjoy working on. Plus, I write more formally in here, and I think it’s a good idea to do at least semi-regular pseudo-formal writing. The problem is that I can’t seem to update both on a regular basis. I tend to write daily life things in my livejournal and more idea-realated things here. It’s much more difficult to write here- often I’ll have something I want to say, but I get so frustrated with trying to find the right words that I give up. For instance, I’ve been trying for a while to write a post on how I want to be a scientist, but I don’t agree with a lot of the methods I might be using or the goals I might be working toward.

The most logical course of action would be to give up one altogether and commit to the other, but I can’t. And the problem may get even worse next year, when I will have less time in which to update things. I’m not sure what to do. I’ll have to think about it.

Because of recent spam, I am now moderating comments. When you leave a comment I will get an email, and I will approve it. Thus, there will be a while between the time of posting and the time of other people being able to see the comment on the site. Sorry.

I promise to approve all comments from real people.

A while ago I posted a note on the info page of my photoblog telling loyal Opera users to email me and explain why they chose the browser they did. About a week ago, Jason became the first to do so. I thought people might be interested to read some of what he said.

I don’t pretend to sit here like some would and preach that my browser of choice is better than yours (Unless you happen to be an Internet Explorer user, in which case I’d find it almost impossible not to after I’d stopped laughing at you). Firefox is, as far as I’m concerned, a brilliant browser, and one that I happily and regularly recommend to friends, family, and colleagues. It’s raised the game for browsers, and really thrust its way into the market as a viable alternative to IE, and because of that you can’t help but respect it.

Firefox is superb, but I’ll always prefer Opera. From the first day I sat down and decided to try it I knew I’d found the interface that I wanted to use to browse the web. I don’t use Opera or indeed any browser because I want to “Rediscover the web”, I use it because I want to surf the web, and I want the tool that allows me to do that easily,
and efficiently.

Mouse Gestures, Customisation (But quickly! No Options menu, just one button press), the Wand (Opera’s Password Manager - All I need to do is go to a page that requires me to log in, and gesture forwards. If I’ve got multiple usernames, it’ll ask me which I want to use, if I haven’t it’ll log me in), they all work together to allow me to surf without thinking about how I’m doing it (That’s me personally, I’m not saying anyone else would have the same success using Opera as I do).

The whole point is though, that I think it comes down to personal preference. Right now I’m sat in front of a little Powerbook using Safari (A Mozilla based browser), and though I’ve tried Opera on it, it didn’t click like it did on my PC. It doesn’t bother me though. When I do surf on the Powerbook, I can surf almost as well as I can with Opera on the PC, and with time, I’ll probably be able to match it (Held back only by the touch-pad and screen size, one reason I use a USB mouse andexternal screen when I’m at home!)

“….in my experience, it is the best one out there for Windows.”

People say exactly the same for Opera too, and they’re right. It all comes down to personal preference, provided you don’t use IE, then it’s just blind ignorance. (Or you happen to be updating windows…)

I was very happy to get this email from Jason. It was exactly what I wanted: the opinion of someone who gave up on IE but ended up with Opera instead of Firefox or some other browser.

I guess my dislike if Opera is a personal preference. Honestly, I haven’t used it that much, but to me it seems ugly and bulky. Maybe that’s just my inherent distrust of feature-heavy programs coming out, though.

I am completely fine with browser partisanship. I am okay with people designing for certain browsers. I do it myself. I don’t care too much if your website doesn’t display correctly in my browser of choice. But I can’t stand it when someone creates a personal site that is only functional in a certain browser. I think that’s just irresponsible.

The site I’m thinking of has since changed its itself to something less offensive, but a few months ago I visited it to find that the navigation could only be accessed by IE users because of a fancy and completely unnecessary javascript trick. The owner had a note about it on the main page and everything.

And, come on, IE? None of the cool kids use IE anymore. Psh.*

*Author acknowledges that there may be a cool kid somewhere using IE right this very minute. But there shouldn’t be. She also acknowedges that her unconditional hatred for Internet Explorer may be more than a little immature. But she doesn’t care too much.

I never have any idea what to write on my About page, so this time I’m trying something different. Wordpress 1.5 lets me run my additional pages as part of my blog, with comments and everything. I’m leaving comments open on the About page so that people can ask me questions. I’ll answer virtually anything. Then you can only get the information about me that you want, without any of the annoying stuff I would put in because I don’t know any better. I love answering questions (can I be a professional interviewee?), and you know you have something you’ve been dying to ask me. With this system, everyone wins!

So I’d appreciate it if you would go to the About page and do your part. Your country needs you, and so do I.

I am currently updating the site and setting up the new design. Please excuse the temporary mess and breakage.

Edit @ 1:06 AM: Am going to bed. Will finish tomorrow. Site has basic functionality.

Edit @ 11:30 PM the next night: Functionality complete, except for the Old Layouts page. That can wait. Also, not everything is formatted as it should be. Some of the static pages are funny-looking.

Tonight I’m going to try to upgrade to Wordpress 1.5. Because I’m also going to try to implement a new design (soon, if not now), the site might be pretty weird over the next few days. Bear with me for a while.

…

Okay, fifteen minutes later, everything went beautifully. I think 1.5 is going to be great. It shipped with this clean, beatiful, technologically-advanced theme that I could never come close to. But it won’t stick around for more than a few days, because I would feel really weird using someone else’s design when I can do my own. Plus, everyone else has one just like this, and it’s kind of plain-looking. So over the next few days, as I get the hang of the new template system, my more cluttered, much less stunning layout will take over. Appreciate Kubrick while it lasts.

Also, my static pages (books, about, etc) will be strange while Kubrick is here.

Lodenocity.com: The Photoblog is officially open!

Looks much better in Firefox than IE because I got so frustrated with trying to get things to display correctly in IE that I gave up. Sorry.

For more stuff, see the photoblog’s info page.