I always welcome feedback, so feel free to email me
(Saturday 22nd March)Decided to demote Harley's quotes to the bottom of my index page! I would like to replace them, but have to acknowledge that they're are quite good and the javascript is actually quite complex, so it remains rather satisfying when they work.
Very busy right now, but will definitely archive this index page tomorrow - it's long overdue. Still trying to get my broadband changed to another phone line, still waiting for my Easyjet refund, still waiting for AOL to send my MP3 player. Apparently the person dealing with this is on holiday until Monday, so they can't be despatched until then. How pathetic is that!
(Friday 7th March)Well, my computer upgrades aren't usually problem free, but tonight has proved a remarkable exception. Not only is my new DDR RAM running at 266 instead of the 200 I was expecting from a Duron processor, but the second machine I put the spare 256 SD RAM into is telling me (on System Information) that I have 768 MB physical memory, of which 359 MB is available. Not bad, when you think I only added 256 to the 256 which was already there!
I also appear to have won an MP3 player for being a diligent AOL 8 beta tester! Among other things, my bug reports were of "superior quality" (sending nasty emails when their software wouldn't do what I thought it ought to) and they were impressed by the number of builds I had downloaded and tested (no choice in the matter when they "sunset" the earlier versions eventually).
(Friday 28th February)Hooray! At last I've got a semi-decent, respectable picture and only 11k - thanks Nick!
(Thursday 27th February)Just read a line from an old course module which states under the section "Good HTML" that a web page "should not be any larger than an A4 sheet of paper". Having just scrolled right down to the bottom of this page, I'm reminded that some archiving is overdue.
I never want to see the photopage again! However, it does look a little better.
(Wednesday 26th February)I've finally replaced the main photo on the site, having become rather tired of some of the feedback associated with the original one, which is also a bit out of date now. As it's a good one of Lucy, I intend putting it, and another from our Oxford trip, on the photopage, probably replacing a couple of others (as anyone with a dial-up connection would probably get bored waiting for them all to load).
I've decided websites are a PAIN!!! I had to find a new colour for my edits (the pink clashing with my red suit) and now the links look the wrong shade of blue .... And many thanks to John, for resizing and reducing the number of pixels in the photo, as I was too lazy to do it! It's too much effort to think about displaying the photo in anything other than exactly the previous height/width etc. I have a horror of trying to do tables by hand!
Just spent the last HOUR trying to reorganise the Photopage! The pictures just seem to be displayed in a chaotic jumble and I'm sick of guessing height and width and getting it wrong, resulting in photos looking like something out of the hall of mirrors at a fairground! And why do the two bottom pictures REFUSE to line themselves up together?
(Monday 24th February) HAPPY BIRTHDAY ASHLEY!
I've been experimenting with input boxes. Try this:
Add your name to the first box and a password to the second and see what happens! I just need a way to collect the information now - I've already tried cgi-bin mailer or whatever it's called, but I don't think it works with Geocities.
(Thursday 20th February)I have an appointment with Emily's "Individual Learning Plan Manager" in a fortnight's time. Whatever happened to teachers???? For this 15 minute occasion, the whole timetable is cancelled, and the kids get the day off.
To continue from yesterday's theme, GoByCoach obviously don't worry about security risks, as they were perfectly happy to alter the ticket I'd booked.
Yet another beta copy of AOL 8 to install!!!
(Wednesday 19th February)Well, we eventually got our ill-fated weekend in Oxford and enjoyed it very much. However, I do think the government might as well stop trying to persuade people to leave their cars at home and use public transport until they've put an affordable, user-friendly, real alternative in place. This applies just as much to short journeys into the city centre as well as from one end of the country to the other.
I'm not blaming anyone but myself for having booked the wrong Monday for the flight home, but the hassle surrounding this particular weekend is a good illustration of why we normally just drive. Like everyone else, I was delighted when Easyjet started operating low cost flights from Newcastle to Stansted, and keen to try out a new stress free way of tackling the long, tedious journey when we weren't carrying Louise's luggage.
Easyjet can't be blamed for the weather, but that Friday started a chain of events which eventually resulted in the weekend costing a whole lot more than I would ever have agreed to initially, and doesn't do a lot to persuade me that public transport offers any advantage over taking the car. The last straw was the attitude of British Airways when I tried to salvage something out of the cock-up of a booking I'd made. It must be their experience that most people have a sheep like mentality and happily accept totally illogical statements.
For instance, where's the "security risk" in giving us a credit for another flight at some future date? And it's funny how the "security risk" of changing the name of one of the passengers/issuing another ticket (even with 10 days notice), disappears when a payment of £175 is made to book another flight! If they were honest and said "it's your mistake which gives us permission to rip you off as much as we can, because we're mean and greedy", rather than insulting your intelligence by offering the excuse of a "security risk" to everything suggested, I think I'd have more respect for them.
(Friday 14th February)I'm feeling a bit jittery about our journey to Oxford tomorrow afternoon, having heard that terminal 2 at LHR has just reopened after some terrorist alarm and Gatwick was closed yesterday when a live grenade was found in someone's luggage.
What kind of person packs a live grenade in their bag???? Would this have even been discovered without the heightened security? Maybe people have been routinely putting live grenades in their luggage for some time ...
(Tuesday 11th February)I'm beginning to think an attempt to celebrate our wedding anniversary with a pampered weekend in Oxford is jinxed! Watching the news just now, we don't seem to have picked the best time to fly to Heathrow ..... it's like a battle zone, with thousands of troops and police officers stepping up the security in response to an apparent terrorist threat to shoot at planes on take-off and landing.
The airport is inundated with tanks and armed soldiers, with security as tight as possible. I heard a spokesman for the army saying he believed their presence would be reassuring for travellers .... like, about as reassuring as watching workmen hammering nails into a white knuckle roller coaster ride you've just bought tickets for!
Our last attempt was a nightmare as Stansted was cut off by snow - are we just destined to never have our much longed for weekend?
CuteFTP, you have met your match! However, you have the last laugh as none of my FTP sites are accessible right now. Anybody know why Betaone is down?
(Sunday 9th February)This has been a frustrating day, computer wise! As so often seems to be the case, I've spent many hours achieving nothing very much. Originally intending to start the Excel module of my Learndirect course, I got sidetracked into reading posts on the ADSL forums, as I'm STILL trying to share an AOL BB connection. An interesting piece of software was recommended as a way of downloading AOL mail via an email client like Eudora or Outlook, so I decided to investigate eNetBot.com.
So as not to interrupt Emily's seemingly current mission to fill up the hard drive with downloaded videos, I used her logon to download and set up the program. It worked a treat, downloading all my AOL mail into Eudora, and I thought - great! Then set about finding a serial number or patch to extend the program beyond the 30 day trial period. For some reason, Bulletproof refused to connect to ANY of my FTP sites and a quick IM to Michael revealed he was experiencing the same difficulties using another FTP client, CuteFTP.
Abandoning this for the time being, I decided that Final Destination would have to be put on hold, as I couldn't even reply to the ADSL posts from Emily's login, not having access to the cached password/username information from her desktop. Switching to my desktop, I was immediately greeted by a message from eNetBot that my trial period had expired! No amount of fiddling with the configuration settings could persuade the program that in fact, I had 30 days left. It was working well for Emily, who'll never want to access her mail from anywhere except AOL, but would it hell cooperate with me!
In the end, I was forced to redownload and reconfigure the settings from my login, but what a waste of time! As a last ditch attempt to find a serial number, I asked Michael to email across CuteFTP with patch, in the hope I could access FTP sites where he'd failed, but no chance! Worse, the serial number refused to register CuteFTP, although it did seem to accept the key as a valid one, and promises to keep trying.
I'm getting more and more disillusioned with AOL as a BB provider. Not only does it seem to call for degree level networking knowledge to attempt to share a connection across a two computer home network, or download mail through a different mail client, but they're really dragging their heels over tranferring my broadband line to another phone number. When you think about it, there's no reason why either BT or AOL should have any motivation to move this along. BT are quite happy with the extra line rental, and AOL would have to do all the organising for no gain to themselves. I've been onsidering changing ISPs, simply cancelling the direct debit with AOL and to hell with the 12 month contract! Then I think through the steps I would have to take to switch ISPs:
Last week's cancelled weekend away did at least provide me with an opportunity to do some much needed work on the site. I'm less than satisfied with it at the moment - other sites put together with Frontpage/Dreamweaver or other web authoring software look so much more professional and are a lot less laborious to update. Having to manually put in every link, and write the HTML myself is a pain, to put it mildly. Actually, I'm going to have to learn Frontpage during this Learndirect course, so possibly one day I'll have a site which doesn't have a naff sitemeter I can only hide by putting it beneath an animated gif, the only merit of which is the amount of white space surrounding it, which makes it ideal for the purpose. Or a photopage with pictures laid out in a tidy pattern, rather than the any old how jumble currently displayed. I MUST organise a good quality photograph for the index page, as I'm getting a bit tired of looking at the current one.
One last comment - mailing list, I'm pleased to be back, even if my listmail address is filled to the brim every day with messages! At least you're a communiative, loyal group and I know where I stand. I'm through with intricate personalities playing complicated games ....
And I never did get round to starting the Learndirect course! Never mind, tomorrow is also another day.
(Sunday 2nd February)What a horrible weekend! First, our abortive attempt to go to Oxford, then the shocking news of the space shuttle disaster. Then, to top it off, some tragic news about a friend that reached me today. The last two events certainly force you to focus on getting your priorities right .... what previously seemed a disastrous turn of events, pales into insignificance when you realise what awful tragedies other people are having to try and cope with just now.
AOL have certainly scored a victory for their customers, with the excellent pop-up stopper incorporated into their latest version. It runs in the background, offering a user friendly interface, and will automatically re-enable pop-ups if a site (like Geocities) requires them to work for what you happen to be doing.
(Saturday 1st February)There's nothing easy about flying Easyjet. Admittedly, it wasn't entirely their fault that Stansted airport was closed due to snow, but their practice of checking in passengers for a plane that hasn't a cat in hell's chance of taking off, is both frustrating and time wasting! Read about our futile attempt to celebrate a wedding anniversary this weekend!
Finally got round to archiving a page of edits and had the bright idea (why didn't I think of this before?) of leaving some of the old updates to get round the problem of aligning text next to the photo.
(Saturday 25th January)I've been putting off updating the site, knowing the index page really needs archiving, but I haven't got time. I realise I haven't put in a link to CISV yet. This is the organisation I'm now working for on a part-time basis. Soon, the project I'm working on, a new website aimed at tracing and bringing together past participants, will be up and running and I'll be able to put in a link.
This AOL/BT business gets worse. I've discovered my fax went to Ireland. Ireland! I'm hard pushed to believe that transferring a broadband line to another number necessitates sending a fax to Ireland! I can't be the only customer to have ever changed phone numbers - and I really would have expected more than complete silence on this issue from two companies who are supposed to be at the cutting edge of communications technology.
I'm looking forward to next weekend, which ought to be a relaxing and enjoyable break in Oxford. I remember last year when I suddenly found myself working more hours than I could cope with, writing about how stressful life had become. I seem to be once again incredibly time poor, with so many different people wanting bits of me until there's nothing left to give, leaving me desperate for some time in the house without commitments and deadlines.
I found AOL's new self expressions, recently released in their latest beta version, unexpectedly amusing. Wouldn't it be nice to have nothing better to do than play with toys like this?
To read more archive weblogs, click here which will take you to the previous archive, which in turn contains a link to the one before that.