10 - 2001 | ***Dave Does the Blog

And all will be well, and all will be well

Fixed the style sheet problem. Well, patched around it by reinstating all the HTML that I’d taken out because, Hey, the style sheet should take care of it, right, and…

Fixed the style sheet problem. Well, patched around it by reinstating all the HTML that I’d taken out because, Hey, the style sheet should take care of it, right, and by no means would it leave me with hideously unreadable blues and purples as the default link colors, right?

So next time I’ll RTFM. Or at least look a bit more thoroughly before I leap.

Given my upcoming travel schedule, I don’t anticipate returning to that particular project for a few weeks. You can return to your normal routines now.

And the kewpie doll goes to …

And the kewpie doll goes to … … Doyce Testerman, who figured out the lines-between-cells problem by (d’oh!) doing a View Source, where it was relatively obvious, vs. my having…

And the kewpie doll goes to …

… Doyce Testerman, who figured out the lines-between-cells problem by (d’oh!) doing a View Source, where it was relatively obvious, vs. my having just looked at the Template.

(“Stupid, stupid rat creature!”)

Wait — I’m sure I left my head screwed in here somewhere …

I managed to walk out the door today without my cell phone. And without my wristwatch. It’s going to be one of those days. Which would, of course, explain the…

I managed to walk out the door today without my cell phone.

And without my wristwatch.

It’s going to be one of those days.

Which would, of course, explain the problems I’m having with style sheets here on this page.

*Sigh*

Is this an opportunist I see before me?

Ordinarily during Farscape we get treated to commercials for “commemorative mint edition” coins of various sorts. Cheap, cheesy, and, frankly, ugly. This evening — Now you, too, can order this…

Ordinarily during Farscape we get treated to commercials for “commemorative mint edition” coins of various sorts. Cheap, cheesy, and, frankly, ugly.

This evening — Now you, too, can order this special AMERICAN FLAG collection! You get an AMERICAN FLAG for your car! Another flag that has an AMERICAN FLAG and the words “God Bless America!” An AMERICAN FLAG lapel pin! And some AMERICAN FLAG stickers!

Operators are standing by!

They sure are.

The future is now

After discussing Things I Might Do With My Blog Page earlier today, I’ve done at least one of them — the removal of the separate table cell for the time-of-day…

After discussing Things I Might Do With My Blog Page earlier today, I’ve done at least one of them — the removal of the separate table cell for the time-of-day and comments. As a result, the page loads in approximately a third of the time (as far as I can tell here).

Such are the joys of being on an interminably long and dreary phonecon.

My biggest problem right now is that I seem to be ending up with a horizontal line/border between each of the cells. I don’t see any tags causing this, all the borders are turned off, etc., but the line still remains.

A free mention here in my blog for anyone who can View Source and figure it out.

Aside from that, I’m generally happy with the format change, but need to do some other minor tweaking during the next dreary phonecon.

Not in the face! Not in the face!

Not in the face! Not in the face! Face recognition software evidently sucks chunks, to put it mildly. Not in terms of threats to privacy, but in terms of actual…

Not in the face! Not in the face!

Face recognition software evidently sucks chunks, to put it mildly. Not in terms of threats to privacy, but in terms of actual ability to do the job. It’s not a threat to our civil liberties (yet), just a threat to our pocketbooks and our safety. The Register tells all.

A fun game

In the comments to a post on Doyce’s blog, secret AsIAN man mentioned in passing that his “stock value” (based on the ticker “IAN”) was plunging. What a fun game….

In the comments to a post on Doyce’s blog, secret AsIAN man mentioned in passing that his “stock value” (based on the ticker “IAN”) was plunging.

What a fun game.

I could choose “DAVE,” but that’s the rather prosaic “Famous Dave’s BBQ Restaurant” chain. Not very interesting (though doing well).

Nah. I’ll be “DCH,” which are both my initials and an AMEX stock ticker for Diversified Commercial Hydrogen Technology, Inc., who “manufactures unique, state-of-the-art hydrogen sensors used for critical applications in today’s food processing, semiconductor, petrochemical, metals processing, automotive, and nuclear power industries. DCH also manufactures hydrogen-based (PEM) fuel cells and is a global provider of hydrogen safety services.” Neat.

Too bad it’s tanking, too.

Hmmm. Maybe we could have a pool or something.

More on how to have good ideas when you blog

“The best way to have a good idea is to have lots of ideas.” — Linus Pauling (1901-1994)…

“The best way to have a good idea is to have lots of ideas.”
— Linus Pauling (1901-1994)

Previews

Previews As I was sitting in an oh-so-interesting Engineering meeting this a.m., I was busy organizing what I planned to do with my blog into a to-do list on my…

Previews

As I was sitting in an oh-so-interesting Engineering meeting this a.m., I was busy organizing what I planned to do with my blog into a to-do list on my Palm.

(That’s one of the geekier sentences I’ve written recently.)

In the coming days/weeks/months, I want to ….

Add some of that font size plus/minus code. I often end up changing font size when I pull up my blog. Maybe I should just revisit the whole font size scheme in and of itself.
Reduce the nested table stuff. That will probably mean dropping a separate column for the time-of-day/comments stuff, and putting it in-stream of the messages, like Doyce does. That will, hopefully, speed loading.
Research Greymatter. That’s an alternative blogging tool to Blogger that everyone seems to think is superior. I can run CGI on my site, so I should be able to do it. It’s just a matter of researching it. Then doing it. If it seems the thing to do. The biggest advantage seems to be that it’s all hosted on my site, rather than having to rely on Blogger.com to be functioning properly (which, for an hour or two yesterday afternoon, whilst I was trying to post, it was not).

Actually, all things considered, I should probably do those in the reverse order of what they are listed.

Anyway, you’ve been warned. Geek At Work.

We get archives

Automagically the archive stuff seems to be working (see right-hand column). I now have three months in archive (though the blog is just over a month old). Neat….

Automagically the archive stuff seems to be working (see right-hand column). I now have three months in archive (though the blog is just over a month old). Neat.

Nice to see the Mayor is back to his old tricks

Rudy Giuliani did a hell of a job during the last two weeks. He’s shown more class, more leadership, more … more of what a mayor should be doing during…

Rudy Giuliani did a hell of a job during the last two weeks. He’s shown more class, more leadership, more … more of what a mayor should be doing during a crisis than anyone else in such a role has in my memory.

Thus, it’s a bit discouraging to see that he’s back to his old jackbooted “We’ll make this city the way I want it to be if I have to bust the head of every street vendor out there” ways. But nice, too, because it makes me less inclined to support him (moral support, since I have nothing to do with the law in New York) in his nascent efforts to extend his limited term another few months during the crisis.

I’d like to remember Rudy for the tears in his eyes and the resolve in his voice. Not for this sort of things. Sheesh.

(via Adam)

Shine on, shine on Harvest Moon

One of the minor benefits of getting up and going to work as early as I do is that I get to see the moon, often as not, as I…

One of the minor benefits of getting up and going to work as early as I do is that I get to see the moon, often as not, as I begin my commute in.

This morning it hovered there, just setting, a huge, orange pumpkin of a Harvest Moon.

Neat.

Whenver I see a full moon (which, if this wasn’t, it was close), I end up hearing this chant in my head. Something from Enya, I think. Big and bold and primal and pagan.

It serves as a bit of reminder to me of the glory of this world, and the power it has.

I smelled a bit of smoke in the air. That might have accounted for the color. Who cares?

It was a very fine way to start my day.