My packet went out on time, so I’ve decided to take part of tomorrow to install Drupal.

Until I get to it, the main site is down, and all you’ll get is a picture. See for yourself.

Because I moderate comments, you haven’t been seeing the half dozen a day bits of comment spam I’ve been receiving and having to clear out. I’m tired of it, so I’ve turned off unregistered comments. If you want to comment, get a TypeKey account. It takes two minutes and doesn’t require any hoop jumping to get it to work.

You just click the “Sign In” link in the comments section, log in, and it’ll automatically redirect you back to that page so you can comment. Furthermore, you’ll remain logged in as long as that window is open, so if you go to other sites that use Typekey, you won’t even have to log in again. Considering Typekey is developed by Six Apart (makers of Movable Type), who also just bought LiveJournal, chances are good that LJ will start supporting Typekey (and possibly vice versa), so just do it now and get it over with.

or, 200 Posts About Nothing.
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I’m still not happy with my website. I feel half-assed with my Nucleus/MT setup, and continue to feel that there’s got to be a better (for me) solution, one that actually makes me happy.

Apple is adding a slightly tweaked version of Blojsom to Mac OS X 10.4 Server, so I took a look at that. It’s very pretty, and feature rich. It also requires programs my current web hosting provider doesn’t carry (namely, Tomcat). Additionally, some of the syntax is counter-intuitive, and I’m unhappy with the documentation.

Then, while looking into ecto, I noticed their current poll listed a slew of blogging solutions and communities that I’d never heard of. At last, hope for a system I like! I clicked through several, and came across Drupal, a content manager that I REALLY like the look of. The built in featureset is robust, it is under active development, it has an extensive and feature rich plugin library, and (important), it will run handily on my current web host. Worth noting in particular is the plugin that allows LiveJournal users to participate/comment without having to re-register. There is also basic migration support for importing MT entries into their system.
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My G5 has arrived and is set up. So far, I’ve upgraded to iLife ‘05 (came in the box, just not installed), and installed iWork ‘05, MySQL 4.1.9, CocoaMySQL (GUI frontend for MySQL), MenuMeters 1.2, and iChatStatus 1.2.1. I also did all the software updates, and installed and updated the developer tools.

It feels really good to have a “clean” machine, and before I do TOO much more than, say, my schoolwork, I’m going to sit down and figure out a really good file organization system, to make sure it STAYS organized and clean.
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For those of you not reading this on a feed, you’ve probably noticed a significant site revision. The design I created for Critical Games has been growing on me, so I decided to implement it on my main blog. One nice aspect of this is if I ever do switch to an entirely Nucleus setup (or other), the transition will be essentially seamless for the viewer. That’s not any time soon, though, if ever (probably never).

In either case, I like having the uniform design between sites under the Critical Games aegis. Once Gallery 2 hits a stable beta (or better, stable final), I’ll probably look into effective ways to integrate the gallery into the rest of the site (a random image block, for instance, which is a built in module in Gallery 2). There is still some work that needs to be done before the transition is complete, however. (The main page is done, and so is the Credits page, but the rest of the site still needs to be transitioned.) This will be happening over the next several days; I could have plowed through and done it all at once, but I DO have other things I need to be working on.
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Just wanted to wish my mother a very very Happy Birthday today.

Wish I could be there to celebrate with you, but at least we got to spend last week together. :)

Before I get into it, I just wanted to stop and say HELLO to whoever it was that made a syndicated feed of this website on LiveJournal. I kinda wish you’d told me, so we could better keep it updated (it hadn’t updated since the site restructure 3 months ago), but I futzed with some redirects and got it working again.

On to the real updates. My parents flew out last Wednesday to spend a week visiting us. It’s been good fun, and I’m glad to see them. They got to meet our puppy, and we’ve done some basic touristy stuff (Science Fiction Museum, went out to Port Townsend and Port Angeles, etc), and in general have had a pretty laid back week. It’s amusing, since they get up before Mickey does, and generally by the time I come downstairs, they are sitting in the green chairs Mickey found on Craigslist for free, reading. We’re meeting with Uri for dim sum this afternoon, which I’m sure he’ll appreciate, since he’s unfortunately shouldered most of the driving burden in coming down here to visit us rather than us drive up to visit him. (As a side note, Freya LOVES Uri. Initially we were unsure how she’d handle him, since he’s A: male, and B: 6′8″. We needn’t have worried, she thinks he’s the best thing since doggie treats.)
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After mucho deliberation, I’ve decided on a new computer and will be purchasing it tomorrow. Tentative final specs: 2.0GHz dual processor Power Mac G5, 1gb of PC3200 DDR RAM, 250gb hard drive, Radeon 9600 XT, wireless card and bluetooth module.

I also plan to get iWork, and it’ll be coming with iLife ‘05 built in. I also picked up a 250gb external FireWire and FireWire800 drive for backup and archiving (you lose all your data ONCE and you’re a die-hard archivist for life), and a LaCie ElectronBlue IV 22″ monitor (factory reconditioned… $300 off retail that way, which is why I decided to splurge on the larger monitor).

Total cost: more than we have, and let’s leave it at that. That said, my trust pitched in just under $1.7k, which helps a lot, and the hope is that I’ll have a job soon (two separate prospects have shown up on my doorstep around the same time… an internship locally, writing content for a MMORPG which could potentially turn into a full time job, and the other is a full time job writing content for a MMORPG… in Australia. Strangely, the Australia one is more concrete, since I’ve actually already made it onto their shortlist. I know I was talking about moving out of the country, but I honestly wasn’t expecting so soon, and am now kind of squeamish now that there’s even a potential real prospect.)

Anyway, as the title says, this is just a geekpost. I’ll post more real stuff later. Thanks so much to all of you who’ve commented recently, and I hope to get back to all of you in one way or another soon.

The puppy is on the floor behind me, lying under the light asleep. The first day of 2005 is winding down, and I’m alright with that. I just turned on “Float On” by Modest Mouse (off “Good News for People Who Love Bad News” if you care to know). I turned it up, and I don’t really give a shit if anyone thinks it’s too loud. For some reason, this is absolutely a song that must be played loud. It must. It absolutely is a part of the song, the decibels themselves are an instrument. Another case in point would be The Who’s “Love Reign O’er Me” off Quadrophenia.

What it comes down to is this: sometimes you’ve just got to turn it up until you feel it in your spine, and sing along at the top of your lungs, who gives a fuck who is looking, and fuck you if you laugh.
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