Normal America

Ok, since I have been trying to get the hang of CSS for other projects I got going on (somewhat including this website) I figured I'd post up a good website involving use of CSS.

MeyerWeb
http://www.meyerweb.com/

Basically this is a site run more or less by Eric Meyer. Meyer has written a ton of CSS books in the past, and basically on this site you can find all kinds of neat things involving CSS. For simplicity sake go to: http://www.meyerweb.com/eric/css/ , this is the portion of the site that illustrates different effects that one can implement using CSS.

Got a part-time job in edition to my full-time job, so updates are gonna be even less for the next month or two. The part-time job will mostly be nights and weekends, really I just got it for a lot of financial reasons (pay off car quicker, be able to buy computer books/hardware/software/hosting/etc.).

Eventually when I get enough money from my part-time job the first thing I am buying is a new laptop. The laptop I just need for practical reasons, as my old one is pretty kaputt as is...I mean when you can't actually run it decently with or without a battery that's a problem. Still debating about what type of laptop to get though as it is so far the contenders are: Dell, Alienware, and Apple. Normally I would never consider getting an Apple laptop but, for what I need a laptop for an Apple would be fine, plus with the recent innovation of the BootCamp project, if worse came to worse I could always run Windows on a Macbook.

So that's what pretty much is going on at the moment, not a whole lot else to report. Oh if you see X-Men: The Last Stand stay till the very end of the credits....NOT just to the Magneto scene.

So not much has happened really. I have been working my butt off with both my full-time & part-time job. I never thought I could spend five hours straight pulling stuff up to the edge of shelves. Apparently "fronting" merchandise is an art not to be taken likely, lol. Last night really wasn't too bad despite working till 11pm. I am still gonna look for a better part-time job, 30 hrs a week is just too much when I could work 16 hrs elsewhere and likely get the same amount of pay, who knows, I guess whatever happens, happens. Trying to write down a couple of ideas, and thoughts for new CSS designs. I have been reading some stuff on the net and in a book or two, it's still not enough for my taste. I want a book where a person just builds a CSS website from the ground up. They draw out a concept for the site then go, ok here's how to do it; something like that. Been trying to read Prestige when I can, so far it's starting out alright, though mind you I haven't even finished Chapter 1 yet. Finished the Watchmen graphic novel by Alan Moore, last week, if you haven't had a chance and you like the occasional comic book, read it. Alan Moore is just one of those authors that is hard to peg down. I am not gonna say V for Vendetta was great nor will I say it was horrible it was in that weird purgatory of sorts, it's not bad or great it's so so. The Watchmen was better then V for Vendetta, that I can say for sure, though the ending was a tad bittersweet; I won't spoil the ending though. Well that's about all for now, like I said site updates are gonna be in small amounts, least til I manage my time a little better and get a little more motivated with certain things. Hasta

I am planning something. I wanted to be sure about the legalities surrounding it but, as long as I don't make money doing what I plan to do, I should be alright. I'll post more later.

As you may have noticed the colors on this site have been changing back and forth, that's just me messing with the settings, learning the CSS of this preformatted code, I'll be doing it a lot. I am gonna try to figure out the opacity effect on here without using PNG imgs but, unless IE is updated to utilize PNG imgs it's kinda pointless unless your using Firefox, either way I am gonna try it out and see how it flies.

Yeah, yeah. You may have noticed to the right an image added saying Some Rights Reserved. Ok what the heck is this? Basically it's a copyright, not a real strict one though. You can still copy code from this site if I ever put it on here, along with anything else, just don't make money on it, or in general misuse it, I could explain the whole thing but, your just better off clicking on the image to see what you can and can't do. Like I said, it's not real restrictive though.

Well it's official, I am going to Wizard World Chicago in August, I already asked for the 3rd and 4th off here at work & the ticket, if not already bought, will be bought soon. Among other things going on recently I got hosting updated for this site and a couple of other .com's I have had in the works. Pretty much I am gonna be working to implement a lot of those changes today as Ezoshosting sent me some info on what to do, though I am sure I will still be bugging the crap out of them every once and awhile. Will post more later. Hasta.

Well I FINALLY got all the changes made to the other .com's. With the new hosting plan I got, I was able to add about five other .com's to my actual hosting, so comicoverload.com and a couple of others will be up whenever I get the chance to start uploading stuff (which might be awhile with K-Mart & walking, taking center stage for awhile). Still trying to figure out this CSS code. CSS would be a whole lot easier to learn if better books were written on it. Right now I have been reading a book by Eric Meyer which is a good tutorial of sorts but, not comprehensive enough for my taste. Sometime I need to tweak the code on this site more, I have found that the lightbox javascript app has problems when old journal entries get moved off the main page. Well back to the grindstone, so to speak. Hasta

6/28/06 2:40PM - Edit: Lightbox javascript errors now fixed.

You know more and more the way technology is moving we are getting closer to having a Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. For those that have no clue what I am talking about Douglas Adams' has written a series of books based around "the guide" as it is sometimes referred to. The guide essentially was like having the sum of all human/alien knowledge in the palm of your hand, it updating as new information came in, marketed for those traveling the galaxy I guess I sort of realized the possible reality of the guide after reading CNN's Business 2.0 on the 50 Fifty People Who Matter. One of Google's founders Sergey Brin's long term strategies being, "organizing all that information into a database that will act as a kind of global brain for all human knowledge". Then I read this statement about Flickr an it's co-founders: " means finding new ways to emphasize human-powered keyword tagging and filtering, on everything from your own search results to travel itineraries and restaurant reviews. Incorporating the subjective nuances of human judgment into its search results". Given Flickr's photograph/social site combined with the technlogical info/gathering power that is Google, it would seem natural to assume that in a couple of years such a thing as depicted in Douglas Adam's books will become a reality. A wireless electronic pad/book that when asked can display bus schedules/air flight times/resturants available in the nearby area/directions/culture & customs of the area/helpful tips/etc, etc. As it is now, the framework for such a massive guide has already been laid. The key to all of this is the technology in itself and the reliability of the information ( which even in Adam's books the reliability of the information in the guide was said to be iffy at times). Given recent technological advances (wireless computing, portable battery power lengthening, etc) it makes me wonder how much longer before something like "the guide" is marketed and sold to the general public. Something to think about.