I’ve changed a setting. I tried showing off my messy desk last time. This time here’s a picture of one of the Townsville weirs (Aplins Weir) from this week.
Tag: blog
Dear subscribers
I’m moving my feed over to feedburner. This appears to have broken the old feed.
But here’s a nice little link for you to use to update your feeds.
Not a subscriber? Maybe you should be, try Google Reader. It’s awesome.
Thanks for your patience.
White noise
There’s an odd white space appearing at the top of my blog at the moment. Can anyone else see it, or is it just me. Seem’s it’s working ok in Explorer. It’s just a Firefox thing.
Fixed. Hooray. Now all I need to do is figure out the Livewriter issue.
Now coming to you from Windows, Live
Nope, didn’t work. Let’s try again.
600
I passed 600 posts four posts ago. That’s a milestone of sorts. My posting rate growth is probably not sustainable – 346 of these posts came since October 2008. The other 258 were spread over a two and a half year period.
Spam, spam, spam, bacon, and spam please
My blog is drowning in a sea of spam comments – 140 of them in the last day or so, most promoting wonder drugs and most posted on the garage sailing liveblog post.
Don’t worry, be happy
All is now fixed. I can log in again. Hooray.
Soup
I like Soup. I’ve only just discovered it. That is to say, I knew it existed, but I’ve only just created myself on it – oh, and on tumblr. Nothing really exciting happening there yet. Soup on the other hand aggregates all my bookmarks, google reader shared items, blog posts, Twitter tweets (I think I’ve posted 18 in 2 months…) and will have any picasa photos I choose to put there.
Dull
I find this blog incredibly amusing. It claims to be the dullest blog in the world and it is.
It has been defunct for two years but still enjoys some popularity. Here’s a sample. They are all this good.
Putting a piece of junk mail into the waste paper basket…
February 2nd, 2004I discovered a piece of junk mail on my door mat. I carried the item away from the front door and held it above the waste paper basket. I opened my hand, thereby allowing the piece of junk mail to fall into the basket.
Milestones
Interesting fact – while importing my blog into WordPress (I’m still toying with making the move but am thinking it needs to be done properly to a wordpress.org site rather than a wordpress.com blog) I noticed that today I hit 300 posts, and 2000 comments. My comment to post ratio is still reasonably good – but most of them are from posts a while ago. That seems worthy of some sort of celebration. I think I’ll go home and play some Bomberman on the N64 which arrived in the mail today from eBay.
Word up
I’m seriously considering moving this blog to wordpress. So, my five loyal readers, I am humbly seeking your advice.
While I enjoy being part of the google family (ie blogger, gmail, picasa, reader etc…) WordPress just seems so much nicer, cleaner, more functional… but to get some of the real functionality I’m after I may have to pay some money.
Incidently, I have been playing with WordPress and imported this blog to a WordPress account – I average about 4 comments per post – I seem to be pretty down on comments in the last six months though, I guess that’s what a long lay off will do. Or maybe I’m now boring.
Here are my pros and cons so far:
Blogger:
Pros
1. Allows me to email posts to my blog using a special, secret email address – but from anywhere – this is handy because it means I can appear to be working but actually blogging.
2. Allows Ben to receive my posts by email – I’m not sure he’d be able to get them so passively if I made the switch.
3. It’s what I’ve always known so the status quo bias probably plays some part in making me stay here.
4. It allows me to easily edit the layout CSS – which gives me freedom to significantly change things up if I so desired.
Cons
1. (Big one) Blogger doesn’t have all the functionality that I like in WordPress (ie creating pages that aren’t posts, other nice layout things, the ability to post delicious bookmark lists as a post quickly and easily)
WordPress
Pros
1. It looks nicer
2. It has a better user interface
3. It’s a properly dedicated blogging service – not part of a huge, all powerful global conglomerate.
4. It has developed some really nice little tools – and the third party plug in developments don’t all look like stupid games created by stupid people – seriously, check out the list of add ons for Blogger some time…
5. You can have extra pages, better tag sorting (not that I use tags much, but I think I should), it is very functional while still being stylish.
6. I only have about 5 readers anyway – I reckon most of you would make the move with me (other than Ben).
Cons
1. I’m scared of/resistant to change.
2. Ben would have to use a browser or RSS reader to access my rambling posts.
So there you have it. Comments? Here’s the wordpress version with a default template that I’d play with…
The problem with this resurrection
Unlike the other more significant resurrection – which is massively more significant, and you should investigate it for yourself… I’m finding it hard to find inspiring topics.
I would happily write about coffee – roasting it, drinking it, tinkering with my massive machine (that incidently is up and running since last mentioned here)… but I don’t think it interests that many of my current readers.
I would happily write about the problems with the Catholic Church and World Youth Day – but that would just be a vehicle for my intolerance.
I would happily write about a Christian response to the “arts” – particularly in the context of the nude photo frenzy recently… but that would be slightly too far in the past to be edgy and current…
I would happily write about the new Batman movie – which I saw last night, which was excellent – but really, there are better film critics out there than me.
I would happily write about how the GST should be used to control inflation rather than interest rates – but I feel grossly unqualified to make the necessary economic arguments.
I would happily write about the Cristiano Ronaldo saga, and what I’d do with the 85 million pounds Manchester United would get for him.
I would happily write about how Manly sit atop the NRL table and are looking pretty good this year… but neither of those topics are all that interesting to anyone but me.
I would happily write about all the topics I could possibly write about but don’t feel inclined to – which I guess I’ve actually done.
I would happily write about how I could have simplified this post by using a colon.
I would happily write about coffee – roasting it, drinking it, tinkering with my massive machine (that incidently is up and running since last mentioned here)… but I don’t think it interests that many of my current readers.
I would happily write about the problems with the Catholic Church and World Youth Day – but that would just be a vehicle for my intolerance.
I would happily write about a Christian response to the “arts” – particularly in the context of the nude photo frenzy recently… but that would be slightly too far in the past to be edgy and current…
I would happily write about the new Batman movie – which I saw last night, which was excellent – but really, there are better film critics out there than me.
I would happily write about how the GST should be used to control inflation rather than interest rates – but I feel grossly unqualified to make the necessary economic arguments.
I would happily write about the Cristiano Ronaldo saga, and what I’d do with the 85 million pounds Manchester United would get for him.
I would happily write about how Manly sit atop the NRL table and are looking pretty good this year… but neither of those topics are all that interesting to anyone but me.
I would happily write about all the topics I could possibly write about but don’t feel inclined to – which I guess I’ve actually done.
I would happily write about how I could have simplified this post by using a colon.
So, in conclusion – I’m looking for inspiration, topic requests, things people like to read about that are consistent with what I like to write about…
Untitled
Tim “I blog once a month, and I vote” Canavan obviously has no patience and ignored the time frame I gave for resurrecting this blog. His comment served as a prompter though – and I do plan to provide some new and interesting content in my inimitable style (although you’re welcome to try copying it Tim). I’m still toying with some ideas. I’d like to actually provide a rationale for reading my blog – not just have it as a forum for my rants and raves.
I probably won’t be as verbose as Mr Canavan, nor will I explore the serious theological issues he discusses – although, again, that is something under consideration – but probably in another context or forum.
I have spent a bit of time reading blogs recently and have decided I most appreciate those that offer actual advice, “how tos” and the like… especially food and coffee blogs – so some new posts will have that flavour. If you have any suggestions for topics I can throw my “investigative journalism” skills at let me know and I’ll probably do it.
On Message
I’m planning a more comprehensive resurrection of this blog in coming weeks. But for now – two pieces of multimedia of particular relevance to me today.
Firstly, the boys in blue pulled me over and fined me $225 for “pausing” at a stop sign rather than stopping. Since when is a pause not a stop? It reminded me of this TISM song. Which I have tried to embed – not sure if it will work.
Secondly, wordle.net is a cool web tool for creating funky tag cloud things – I used it to analyse how good I’ve been at staying on message in every media release I’ve sent out in my 2.5 years in my job.
Check it out.
Then, just for fun, I used it to analyse this blog…
No comment
Dear Readers,
I don’t like to beg. Really. It is so unbecoming. Desperate even.
I’m getting more visitors than ever before to this blog. And less comments.
Why don’t you comment? Don’t you love me? Am I boring you?
It’s really not that hard to comment. Is it? You don’t even have to have anything useful to say. Is it because I used to insult commenters I disagreed with? I’m a changed man. Promise. Try me.
I do get a lot of comments from people trying to sell Xanax and viagra. But that’s no good for the self esteem.
It makes me sad.
Is there a topic that would evoke more comments? Something that would generate a “buzz” or some controversy maybe?
That’s enough grovelling for now. And pandering. Don’t make me use my sad eyes.
January 30, 2009