Redesign in action

Over the next month or two, there are going to be some changes to d4d. I’m working on a semi-minor redesign (well, it’s coming up for d4d’s first birthday, so I might as well give it a present) taking the entire thing to a CSS design. Which is fun, in a geeky way. In fact, it’s also a complete nightmare – stripping out all the tables, maintaining the basics of the “design”, and all that gubbins.

The next bit will be moving from Easyspace to 34sp (which’ll hopefully stop Pat nagging me advertising their service in my comments boxes too *Grin*) – then I can re-do a couple of bits with PHP, and sort out things like comments systems, and possibly moving to Moveable Type. It’s going to be busy.

Gym

Not quite as depressing as it could’ve been – blood pressure of 130 over 85, respectable heart-rate (the instructor didn’t tell me exactly), and – depressingly – a BMI of 34. Still, that’ll soon be on the way down.

So, we’ve sorted out the exercise routine, trying out some of the machines, getting some proper training, My leg muscles in particular are slightly sore, but that’ll disppear before long.

It’s not over yet

Ah joy. My earlier optimism was obviously very mis-placed.

OK, I admit, some of it is my own fault – I didn’t read the paperwork properly. To operate legally in the UK, a limited company has to have insurance – liability insurance, employer’s insurance, and (ideally) professional indemnity insurance. Now, I work in IT – and god only knows why I ever trusted RBS to sort out the insurance, but I did – and when I finally read through the reams of gubbins that came with the insurance policy, Particularly the “bits that we don’t cover” part.

Yes, in a piece of true professionalism, RBS have managed to sell me professional liability insurance that doesn’t cover IT work, computers, programs, or information. And they can’t sell me any, because their underwriters don’t cover such a policy.

So I’ve got to shop around (again) for insurance, and fight the useless cunts to get back the money I’ve spent on an insurance policy that was useless, and that they knew was useless from day one.

Google Fun

Now, I know I’m probably the last person on the planet to know this (Sometimes I amaze myself with how little I look deeper into sites etc.) but – did you know you can make Google do all of it’s message in “Elmer Fudd” style? Hahahahahahahahahaha.

No, not through the Dialectiser, but within the actual Google preferences. Look in the drop-down list of languages, where you can tell Google how you want the messages to appear. In there there’s Elmer Fudd, Bork (Swedish Chef from the Muppets), Hacker, and several others. Select the language, save the preferences. Lo and behold, Google has been Elmerised. It’s not perfect, but it’s still fun. And yes, I’m a geek.

Spam 2

As a result of a recent explosion of spam coming to my main email address from here, anyone who has lyle@destruction-for-dummies.co.uk in their address books for me should be aware that the address is soon going to the great black hole in the email server. However, anything else at the same address will still get through to me.

Spam

Yes, Sarah Williams, I’m sure you visited my site and thought I wasn’t linked to enough search engines. Whoopee-Doo. But frankly, because of the six spams you sent to different domain names I own, there’s no fucking way I’d use your service, even if I was interested. And while I’m sure that www.trafficmagnet.com is a wonderful idea, so far as I’m concerned it’s a sack of shit that I wouldn’t touch with someone else’s weed-strewn bargepole.

Hardly a shock

Yet another study reveals that ‘young people’ prefer to send text messages rather than talking to people/friends. Texting (Lord, I h8 th@ word *Grin*) is now a ubiquitous activity – it’s hard to walk down the street without seeing someone sending a message. Or (as this morning) being walked into by some fucktard who’s concentrating more on how to type the message than they are on where they’re going.

In the same vein, over in Japan there’s now a “keyboard” that can be operated in much the same way (please note, the page is in Japanese, but a picture is worth a thousand words pictograms) and a US company has released a similar device for one-handed typing *insert wanking joke here*.