2004 March

You can use Typepad, Blogger, LiveJournal, or any kind of service your blogging heart desires. After years of lying dormant, we're finally doing sometihng with one of our domain names. If you'd like to be a part of Lockergnome.net, we're accepting registrations as of today. The system is running on Blogware, and Daze.net is handling any account support issues that might crop up. My hope is to provide instant promotion and interconnected tools for everyone who signs up under the LG label. Naturally, as the community grows, so will our ability to make it function and communicate better. Get your preferred subdomain before someone else snaps it up!

Read more on Lockergnome.net…

I noticed a small flood of Gnomedex registrations over the past couple of days, and I figured I was missing something. That seems to be the case, as we are moving the price up from $99 to $199 on April 15th (Tax Day)! It'll be $249 at the door, FWIW. If you're hungry for more information about the conference, the site should be up by April 5th. No real word on who's presenting and sponsoring yet, though. We're still taking suggestions.

Read more on Twice the Price…

I can't believe we're finally doing our own blogs. Well, kinda.

It's 'badonkadonk,' not 'gadunkadunk.'

I can't believe I just discovered the live music section of the Internet Archive today. Through their feed, I was notified of a new Glen Phillips recording. Boom! Live concerts are mere megabytes away from my media player. Even satellite radio can't touch this kind of convenience.

Read more on Lead Electric Triangle…

I've been helping da man debug code for the past couple of days. We're getting closer to rolling out a sitewide overhaul. With any luck, new Gnomedex information will be posted before next Monday, too. Pre-registration will most likely be going up at some point in April, so you might care to decide soon. Plenty of Gnomedexers from year's past have already signed up (if that's any indication). I was asked to craft a 404 page yesterday, but since I haven't yet been able to shake this head cold, I gave him a Shakespearean sonnet (in full iambic pentameter):

Alas, the page once here has gone astray;
there's nothing more that I can do or say.
Did you type it wrong or did it move?
The document is prob'ly at the Louvre.
A wicked pox on those who are to blame;
without a doubt, their heads are hung in shame.
Perhaps another link would aid your quest,
or would you rather stare at Chris's chest?
Our site is filled with fun from stem to stern -
so stick around, there's plenty more to learn.
With help abound since nineteen ninety-six,
the Gnomies have a knack for wicked picks.
My sonnet, thus, was crafted just for you;
There's nothing more that I can say or do.

Read more on Debuggery…

I don’t care how you read my content; I just want you to read my content. If you want to read on the web, fine. If you want to read it through email, fine. If you want to read it through RSS, fine. It doesn't matter! I'm not here to sell a delivery vehicle; I'm just here to tell people, “Hey, this is what’s going on in the world.” When syndication just so happens to be one of those ways, a stronger way, a better way, of getting information out there, then, yeah, I’m going to have to proselytize because no one else is really doing it. They’re getting caught up in the politics or they’re just talking about RSS as kind of, like, you know “Oh, well, we’re doing this,” but they’re not really evangelizing it, and there are very few RSS evangelists out there.

Read more on I don’t care how you…

The oogies were creeping into my body last night, but I seemed to have staved off the attack successfully with a non-drug I can barely pronounce. Veronica told me about Oscillococcinum a few months ago, but I didn't have the opportunity to use it. My sweetheart got the sicky-poos before I did (thanks to Mr. Myszka, who inherited it from our other friend, Mr. Class Ring). These homeopathic remedies aren't too bad. I definitely need to creep to the store to pick up more this afternoon. Why not now? Because Mr. UPS Man delivered Mr. Unreal Tournament 2004 DVD Special Edition a few minutes ago. I may never see the light of day again.

Read more on Sneezing and Wheezing…

Boo-yah! I'm going to keep nagging Jason until he applies this weekend's test code site-wide. No legacy tags, beyotch! Oh, and… “This Page Is Valid XHTML 1.0 Transitional!” I'm not sure if I wanna play with a fixed-width or stick with the variable. Doesn't look great on anything less than 1024×768, but those folks are in the minority. Hey, I got it to look fantastic in all the major browsers on all the major platforms – that's gotta count for something. Props to glish for the guidance. So, what did I use for my editor? Notepad, baby. Metapad, actually (the best clone around). Thanks to everyone else for the virtual ass-kicking; you accelerated the inevitable.

Read more on Boo-yah! I'm going to keep…

Ready for a re-redesign? I am. A long time ago (in a galaxy quite close to ours), Stephen and I were working on a very basic shell for Lockergnome. I took that code and started tweaking it this morning. The elements are falling into place, but it's far from clean. Meryl's helping me tweak it this weekend, but my hope is to lay something into the official site before next weekend. My aim is to stay clean, fast, and efficient. You may wonder why we even bothered to roll out the (current) White Album? A new backend, pure and simple. We're dev'ing our own CMS that'll help us create newsletters, syndicated feeds, Web pages, etc. In order for other processes to begin, we had to put something different online. The result was a bit… dirty. But hey – this is the f*cking Internet. Just have a little patience, eh? The results will be well worth it. If you'd like to collaborate, just let me know; I'll be cracking code for the next X days.

Read more on RIP: Lockergnome's Ugly Baby…

There are quite a few conspiracy theories flying around the Net regarding Lockergnome's most recent “White Album” redesign. Blogger reaction? Overwhelmingly negative. Gnomie reaction? Overwhelmingly positive. Bottom line? We're still working on it – as well as a billion other things. I'm not asking for slack, but jumping Jesus on a pogo stick – there are only so many hours in the day. We're doing our best here, and appreciate the constructive criticism and code suggestions. Hell, maybe we should “open source” the SOB.

Read more on Hate-pertext Markup Language…

I'm a little embarrased to admit it, but… I've been rasterbating for the past twenty-four hours. Perhaps it's the Freeze Pops talking, but I think I'm addicted. Doing so has definitely given me black balls. All seriousness aside, I'm pretty darn happy with my Samsung i700. I should've upgraded a year ago when it first came out. Congrats to Sean (who's the to-be proud owner of my previous PDA).

Read more on Bad Habits, Good Hardware…

I completed the entire set – sans Bonus pack card(s) like Paintball Paul – without opening a single pack. I stumbled upon this auction the other day and was the only bidder. The guy gets a thumbs up from me. $50 spent on a complete (non-bonused) set and NO duplicates. That has to be a first. I'll probably wait to see just how many “bonus” cards Topps decides to spill before paying an arm and a leg for any or all of 'em. Seems really lame for them to do this to collectors, especially given how much we've supported them over the years. Anyway, THIS is the only way to collect cards (IMHO). Instead of wasting my time driving all around town, I can pick up an entire set without any of the headaches and disappointments. Buy the full set if you can (if you're a fan); you won't regret it, and you won't be wasting your money on individual packs and billions of untradeable / unsellable dupes. Was your name included this time? What about last time? If your name wasn't included, what would you choose for yourself?

Read more on Crusty Chris (27b)…

I'm dropping Palm and going back to the Pocket PC. I miss it too much. Before I place my excellent-condition Sony Clue UX50 with a 256MB Lexar Memory Stick on eBay (and all the nifty PC software I picked up along the way), anybody care to send me a serious offer or two?

Read more on Switching. Again….