"If whatever, then whatever." - R Reichardt, October 2002.
The title's double entendre is intended, I suppose. Everything is blue here, almost, isn't it? I've been mucking through cascading style sheet code for hours, most of last night, until L&O:SUV (sic) came on, followed by Robbery Homicide Division. Then I went to bed, slept poorly as usual, woke up to snowfall (yes), then went to the U of A for the annual LISSA Breakfast, which is held the same day as the U of Alberta's Open House. I met my godson, Kellen, and his parents there, and gave him a short tour of the scitech library and some of the electronic resources available there.
There is still more I'd like to do. I'm impatient, it's my nature. Small things frustrate me. For example, the index.html file seems to be working so far, at least on screens with 1024 x 768 resolution. It looks like shyte on 800 x 600 screens. Also, when I copy and paste the index.html file into NoteTab Pro, then look at it in IE6, it looks like triple shyte - completely out of whack with how it looks to you now. Can't figure that one out. I ran the code through CSE HTML Validator Lite, and cleaned up the errors (other than the MT codes, which the Validator doesn't recognize). Ran it through NoteTab again, looks no different. WHY? I want my Mommy!
Bottom line is I must like doing this or else I wouldn't subject myself to such geek torture.
There is some frustration tonight. I've been examining my index files and comparing them against Geoff's, trying to determine how to make the file work from within NoteTab. What I mean is, when I copy Geoff's source file into NoteTab, I can open it as a temporary html file within Explorer, and see exactly how it looks. I'm thinking I should be able to do the same with my index files. However, when I try "view in browser" all I see is a lame template version.
I'm now experimenting with the pod bay door gif (and versions thereof), trying to move it into the banner portion of the page. It doesn't get much more exciting.
(Sidebar: apologies to any of you wishing I might comment on Real Life Stuff, rather than the headaches of editing Moveable Type indexes. But I need to vent my frustrations somewhere).
Thanks to Jen, I discovered another site with different MT templates. I really like this one, and may move in that direction. I'm partial to three columns for some reason. There is still more I want to do, there is more to learn, and these damn late nights are killing me.
So I was checking the log of referencing IP addresses to my site, and noticed this weird URL at the top of the page. It is a Google cache: "G o o g l e's cache is the snapshot that we took of the page as we crawled the web". It is the archive of my blog for the week of July 27th. Wild, wacky stuff.
A few minor changes added tonight. You can see the blog list to the right, and I added an "about" and a link to the original page. I'm beginning to understand, at a base level, what style sheets do. Sort of, kinda, a little bit. Thanks to Zuchris and Geoff for continued words of encouragement.
What is happening out in the world? I was happy to see the Twins win the first game of their series against Oakland. I've been a Twins fan since I was a widdo kid.
This additional text feature is rather cool. Instead of filling up space on the main page, you can hide text down here. Peekaboo. (Did I write that?)
This is Entry 2 in the new version of my blog. I have snowshovelled through the first eight pages of the MT user manual. By the time I reached Archive File Templates, I was weeping internally. I *know* it's not supposed to be this difficult. I *know* I want my site to look somewhat like Rebecca's, in that I want to preserve the link structure on my current site. But I'm beginning to think this won't be possible, at least not like her site works, which in my view is brilliant in its simplicity and functionality.
One of the features I like about her site is that when you choose one of the links, her weblog disappears, and the list of links in that category appears. I love that feature. I also know she built her site with NoteTab Pro only. At this point, I don't know even how to replace the title of my blog here with the gif on my existing site.
I don't know how to change fonts, colours, add links, change my user name, whatever... Wait a sec, I figured out how to change my user name. That's one. See over on the right there, where it sez "Add Your Links Here"? I weep quietly, knowing that changing stuff in the style sheet will solve some of this. Also, much thanks to Geoff for putting up with my questions and frustrations as I slowly migrate to MT - you are a scholar and a gentleman. (Now, can you show me how to add links like you have in the top right hand corner of your page? Pretty please?) ;-)
Ah, this will be so much frustrating fun...
