I purchased a pic from the Monster by Mail project. Here’s the time-lapse of mine being painted. I also got a swell t-shirt: “Hear no evil, see no evil, eat brains”. Nice.
Ninja Nate
May 26, 2007 – 3:05 pm
Nate’s only benchmark for ninjas is an episode of Mythbusters. Nate does an imitation of Adam imitating a ninja.
Nora loves otters
May 5, 2007 – 9:05 am
Took the kids to the NC Zoo this week. My camera lets me do some limited video recording. I shot this at the end of the day, so the camera’s memory was full… but I think it’s enough to get the idea.
Tired Templates
April 25, 2007 – 10:04 am
I recently helped judge a competition for the best law firm Web site, sponsored by North Carolina Lawyers Weekly. In looking over the several dozen sites that entered the competition, it was hard to miss the fact that a large portion of the sites were created by one firm — a vendor that specializes in building sites for law firms. The sites created by this vendor were really similar. If I were in the market for a lawyer and decided to do my research online (and who wouldn’t?), I’d have a hard time discerning any difference between competitors.
My point isn’t that templated sites are bad, or that employing this type of vendor is a bad thing. The lesson here is that if you work with any vendor that’s building a site for you, and they offer some sort of canned template service, don’t use it. Hire your own designer. Pay a photographer for some custom shots. Stand out.
Happily, there were firms that entered the competition that “got it”. These sites were good sites, but they stood out all the more when contrasted with their template-bound competition.
MS150 2006
September 15, 2006 – 7:09 pm
On Sept 9th and the 10th, I rode a total of 175 miles in the 2006 North Carolina MS150. 100 the first day, 75 more on the second. It was exhausting, but great fun.
Over 1500 riders turned out and raised over $1million for the Eastern NC MS Society. It was a great event — well organized, well-marked routes and lots of friendly volunteers. The weather was awesome. Our team did a great job of working together to finish as a group.
Over the course of two days, I spent about 10 hours in the saddle, plus another 2-3 hours worth of breaks mixed in. The roads were REALLY flat, so I averaged about a mile and hour faster than I usually do at home. The only downside of “really flat” is *no coasting*.
Above is a pic of me and some of my teammates (I’m on the right).
Day 1:
98.73mi
Total time: 7:39
Moving time: 5:41
Average speed: 17.4 mph
Day 2:
74.83mi
Total time: 5:08
Moving time: 4:12
Average speed: 17.8 mph
I didn't mean to turn you on
June 7, 2006 – 10:06 am
Hey, now why should I feel guilty ‘cuz I won’t give, guilty ‘cuz I won’t give in?
The Bridges of Why Am I Reading This Crap
June 1, 2006 – 2:06 pm
So, I’ve got this little disorder. Just this one: Once I begin reading a book, I am compelled to finish it. Regardless of how much I dislike it, I continue to pick up the book… continue to read.
After finishing Brett Easton Ellis’ excellent Lunar Park (see previous post), I wanted to read something by Jay Mcinerny. Jay is a character in Lunar Park and is best known for his breakthrough novel Bright Lights, Big City. Not sure what posessed me, but rather than going for the easy bet and reading BL, BC, I made the error of picking out The Good Life, Jay’s latest.
Bleh.
The Good Life reads like Bridges of Madison County for the middle-aged urbanite. Set in NY, NY around the time of 9/11, the novel tells the story of a couple of priveledged New Yorkers too lazy to work at their own marriages that fall easily into illicit love amongst the Ground Zero soup kitchens. If “illicit love” makes you think “Harlequin Romance”, then you’ve got the right idea: there’s enough trashy bodice-ripping in there to satisfy the requirements of the genre.
There’s also a large helping of grief porn if you’re into that sort of thing. The jumpers, the flee-ers, the diggers and the body bags… Jay’s got it covered.
Learn from my mistake. Read Bright Lights, Big City. It really is as good as you’ve heard.
Brett Easton Ellis eats his own tail
April 7, 2006 – 4:04 pm
You first heard about him in conjunction with Less Than Zero. Your curiosity was piqued by the buzz around American Psycho and you were secretly horrified that you enjoyed it (despite its violent excess). You may even have picked up Glamorama and been surprised to find that it had a plot… sorta.
Well, you’re in for a treat. You’ve been putting it off, but it’s time to read Lunar Park. Buy it now. I’ll wait.
OK… I used the verb ‘read’. ‘Listen’ is fine, too. More on that later.
BEE’s latest book is a great stew of genres. Meta memoir? Reverse Roman à clef? Supernatural haunted house story? Retelling of Hamlet? Lunar Park is at times each of these things, but simultaneously deconstructs them. It’s complicated, sometimes confusing and often wonderful.
Just for fun, before reading it, reread Breakfast of Champions. The scenes where Vonnegut intrudes into his own narrative? Great, right? You’re going to enjoy how ‘writer Ellis’ steps in to interfere with the fictional ‘narrator Ellis’ and how it makes you consider how these fictional worlds take on lives of their own.
Oh, yes… the ‘listen thing’. Over the last year or so, I’ve started listening to a lot of audio books. My brain seems to be able to cope with listening to one story while reading another (not simultaneously, mind you) without twisting together the plots too much. I guess I process and store stuff I hear differently from stuff I read. Well, anyway, a good narrator can really make an audio book something special. James Van Der Beek (who starred in the movie adaptation of Ellis’ Rules of Attraction) does a wonderful reading of Lunar Park. If you’re so inclined, I recommend checking it out in audiobook format. Join Audible.com – you’ll be glad you did.
Do yourself a favor: read (listen to) Lunar Park. Then invite me out for coffee and tell me what you think the deal is with that crazy furr-ball monster thing and the demonically possessed toy.
What is validation?
March 26, 2006 – 7:03 pm
Validating your site is a good way to see how your site compares against THE SPEC as handed down by the W3C. Validation isn’t the end-all be-all, but a site that validates will likely be “future-proof” and ready for that new buzz-word-approved technology that you’ve never heard of but will become vitally important next week.
Validation essentially makes sure that your site follows the rules. Theoretically, if everyone plays by the rules, then your site should look good in any browser that embraces the rules – even browsers that have yet to be released.
Check your site… Pick a page, the homepage is a good start, and run it through the form at:
http://validator.w3.org/
If you have no errors, then congrats. Your Web developer did you right. If you have just a few errors, then you’re probably fine, too. If you have 578 (give or take) errors, you may want to seek professional help.
"Taking aim at Target"
February 17, 2006 – 12:02 pm
Target has been under fire recently for accessibility issues with their Web site. The US National Federation of the Blind (NFB) filed suit against them because their site is not accessible.
A fun wrinkle is that Target.com is powered by Amazon.com… Wonder where the accessibility faults lie?
It will be interesting to see what this issue does to raise awareness of site accessibility/508 compliancy and CSS in general. Many of the problems cited by the NFB are basic and easily avoided.
Continuing coverage on webstandards.org.