I wish all clients came to me having read this article on choosing a web designer.
A Gift For You
Mozilla released version 1.5 of the ever-free Firefox web browser two days ago. You probably know how excited about this.
My favorite things about this new release are:
- Faster page loading (the speeds are, like, two froghairs faster!)
- Improved rendering engine
- Improved Options menu
- Improved tab control
- Support for SVG and the new canvas tag
As for extensions, there are many new ones that do ultra-kewl things previously unavailable in Firefox. Here is what my standard extensions are (for now):
- Nuke Anything Enhanced – Allows you to right-click anything on a web page and hide it. Great for hiding annoying graphics.
- MeasureIt – Draw a box on the screen and get height/width measurements. Great for aligning page elements when designing.
- Web Developer Toolbar – The third most-used tool in my arsenal, only behind Dreamweaver and Photoshop.
- Bookmark Synchronizer – For keeping my 1200+ bookmarks the same between the office, home, and my laptop. Requires an FTP server to act as a go-between.
- Adblock – One of the best extensions ever. This reduces popups and ads on web sites you visit. Includes ability to block pesky Flash overlay ads. Did it miss something? Right-click it and choose “AdBlock This” and poof!
- Adblock Filterset.g Updater – A companion to Adblock, this keeps your list of blockable ads updated behind the scenes. I can’t remember the last time I got a popup ad.
- PDF Download – Lets you choose whether to open or download a PDF when clicked, rather than opening it automatically, which is Firefox’s default behavior.
- Viamatic foXpose – This must be seen to be believed, and is only available in Firefox 1.5. The extension sets up a button that instantly displays screen shots of all of your open tabs on one page, allowing you to click the one you want to jump to.
- Tab Preview – This one displays a little thumbnail of the tab contents when you hover your mouse over an inactive tab. Quite cool.
Know of any other good ones I missed?
Pics Are Up
I have posted some pics of the birth and Gray’s first visit with his new little brother in Gallery 11 – Dax is Born.
I came home to get Gray today and take him to see Dax and mommy. On the way there, I was telling Gray about his new brother, and he asked me, “Does he have feet? I want him to walk”.
Once we got there, Gray immediately took to Dax, wanting to hold him and giving him lots of hugs. It was great, as you will see in the pics.
Birthday
At 9:42 pm, Tuesday, November 15, 2005, baby William Dax Chatham was born!
Dax weighed a hefty 9lbs 12oz, and was 19.5 inches long. Alicia did it all naturally. How, I am still trying to figure out. But it was great!
Sorry, I have no pics yet. Stay tuned!
Progress
No news in the baby department yet. Alicia’s due date is this Saturday the 12th. You dear readers will be among the first to know. In fact, I am considering a live webcast from the delivery room, with a chatroom where you all can ask questions and comment on the proceedings. Ok now I have considered it.
I have still been busy on side web work, nearing completion on MikeSnipesForJudge.com and MiramarSeafood.com. Still working on my brother’s site for is political campaign, as well as the larger book store project. I have employed the help of June because of her Zen Cart expertise. And I just posted a link to her site so that she will feel the pressure to do something with it.
I bought a brand new drum set for the first time in my life. These suckers are baaaaaad. This is what they look like:
They are DW Pacific CX’s.
So if anyone is in the market, I have a 6-piece set of Pearl World Series drums from 1990. These are the same drums used to record Speed.
Why did I buy new drums? I have been playing music in a band again. More on that later.
Today
Blog Groupies
As I read through the Blogs of the Rich and Famous (aka the blogs of the ‘elite’ web designers and developers), I have discovered a recurring theme from site to site that relates to the people who post comments on said blogs.
I don’t know what to call it. It’s like a cult of blog groupies. Perhaps it is the “Bloggie” phenomenon. If you frequent any popular blog, you have seen it too. It goes something like this:
Blog Entry By Cool Blogster
Today I decided to clean my cat litter box, and boy, did it smell.
Response by Bloggie 1
Hey Cool Person! What a coincidence! I just blogged about the same thing! Check it out (www.wannabeblog.com).
Next comment by Bloggie 2
Oh hey Cool Person! How is it that you always nail it right on the head? I mean, who would have thought that cat litter boxes smell?
Next comment by Bloggie 3
LOL – keep it up Cool Person! lolroflmfao.
Next comment by Bloggie 4
I agree with you completely, Cool Person.
If you want to see some prime examples, look at a recent post on the web site of Matt Mulletsomething, the creator of WordPress:
http://photomatt.net/2005/10/31/paper-shredder/
Now are these people really on a first name basis with this guy? Is it their ultimate goal to get Matt Mulletsomething to actually click their link? Is this the modern day version of namedropping? Or is it just people searching to validate their existence (and their web log).
Granted, there are certainly plenty of worthy comments posted on these sites, but a bunch of them always stick out to me as “hey look at me, I wanna be cool too” types of posts.
I’m not claiming to be a Cool blogger or anything – the 8 people total who ever visit here should be evidence of that I am stuck on the level of Blog Mediocrity (Hi, mom). I’m just a little irked for whatever reason.
Pretty Fly
This is pretty cool. I have witnessed spiders being reanimated after being frozen in a styrofoam cup inside of a freezer (thanks to Chris Layton). I didn’t know you could do it with flies too.
In other news, I think we have decided upon a name for the new boy when he decides to come out of the womb.
What is it?
I will tell you what it is not:
- Bono
- Scrimshaw
- Adolph
- Katrina
- Brown
- Restrictive Fur
- Whimpy
- Fleg
That should pretty much narrow it down for ya.
The More You Know
Count the number of cricket chirps in 14 seconds and then add 40. The number will be very close to the air temperature. An alternate approach is to note that they chirp 72 times per minute at 60F. For every additional four chirps, add a degree to 60F, and for every four chirps less, subtract a degree for 60F.
Ahh, the things you learn working at the Air Force Combat Climatology Center, surrounded by meteorologists.
😉
Slacking off
I’ve slacked off here on the old blog lately. Sorry ’bout that.
So what’s been happening?
Well, I’ve rediscovered the joys of Winamp. I stopped using it a while back when iTunes came out because at the time, I thought iTunes was cooler. For a while it was. But I downloaded Winamp last week because I saw Chaaa using it and it looked like they had beefed it up. The amount of free TV, video, and radio they have added is great. Plus there is a free plugin that allows me to use my iPod with it, which was the key ingredient.
I broke 100 for the first time when playing golf on friday – I scored a 97, which on my 8th time ever out on the links was pretty exciting. My buddy Paul hooked me up with a set of clubs that are longer than most, and it had an immediate impact on my game. The problem I have is that because of my height, the clubs I was using were too short, and most of the time the ball would just go rolling across the grass. Now though, I am getting under the ball and driving it much better.
We went to the midwife today for Alicia’s appointment and things are looking good. We are about 4 weeks from the due date, still with no name chosen for the boy that will soon emerge. We do have some ideas, but nothing set in stone. Gray seems to think his name should be Ian. Gray also seems to think he has a baby in his belly too.
Other than that, I’ve been super-busy with side jobs, which is good. Need a web site?