robglazebrook.com

I don’t think I’ve mentioned it here ever before, but I have a second blog these days. Don’t worry – it’s not the place where I talk about all of you behind your backs or anything. That’s my third bl… well, I don’t do that there, is my point. No, this is my blog where I explain CSS tricks and tips for people who don’t have a lot of experience with CSS. It’s called, aptly enough, CSSnewbie.

I hadn’t yet mentioned it here for two reasons. First, I’m not sure how many people here would be interested in a blog about a specific facet of web design. And second, it wasn’t quite ready for the limelight yet. I wasn’t posting all that frequently, and I wasn’t sure the direction I wanted to take the site. But now I feel like I have some direction – I need a healthy mix of beginner level and more advanced CSS tricks to keep both me and readers happy and learning, and I can use the blog to test out ideas I might want to use in my classes this spring. And that sense of where I’m going has encouraged me to start posting more frequently. So now it’s ready for some attention.

I’m not much of a beggar, so I won’t do any of that here. But what I will say is this: I’m really hopeful that CSSnewbie can do well. I have high hopes for the longevity and usefulness of the site. So if you’re at all into CSS and web design, please check it out. And if you have a website of your own, please consider linking to the site, so more people can find it. And if anyone ever asks you for a CSS resource, please consider adding it to your already resplendent list. I’m no Cederholm or Zeldman, but I have a decent sense of humor and much better hair. And that should really count for something.

I remember when I first started teaching composition in Grad School, one of the toughest problems I wrestled with was what to have my students call me.

Mr. Glazebrook sounded a little stodgy and artificial to me – at that point in my life, the only people who called me “Mr. Glazebrook” were telemarketers, and they usually didn’t even get my last name right. And while I was perfectly content to just let my students call me “Rob” (you know, like the rest of the world did), my colleagues warned me it would be more difficult to appear as an authority figure if I just went by my first name. Note that we weren’t interested in actually being authority figures, just appearing as such.

So what did I settle on? I didn’t. I essentially gave up on the whole thing. On the first day of class, I told my students, “You can call me Sir, Rob, Mr. Glazebrook, Instructor, or any derivation thereof that isn’t somehow naughty. I’ll even respond to hey-you for the first couple of weeks.” You can just hear the authority oozing out of that cop-out, no?

And what was the result? Well, for whatever reason, most of my students ended up calling me “Mr. Rob.” Which I found fairly awesome. A thoroughly authoritative prefix rendered entirely ironic by the completely casual name following. Right up my alley.

So why do I bring this up now? After a few weeks of talks with the Program Coordinator for the Des Moines Public Schools (DMPS) Community Education department, it looks like I’ll be teaching again starting this spring. Mr. Rob is making a glorious comeback!

I’ll be teaching two classes, both about web design. I’m titling the first one “Intro to Modern Web Design.” It will meet twice a week, for two hours a night (6-8pm, probably), for three weeks. I’ll cover the basics of contemporary XHTML – what it is and what to do with it, essentially. I’ll also touch on some rudimentary CSS. As much as I can cover in three weeks.

Then, I’m going to Europe for two weeks.

But when I get back I’ll start in on my second class, the aptly-named “Modern Web Design II,” which will meet on the same nights and times, but for four weeks instead of three. Here, I’ll teach more in-depth CSS techniques for layout and whatnot. What “whatnot” entails has yet to be planned, but it will undoubtedly be cool.

I’m really looking forward to the class. Ever since I left ISU, I’ve really missed teaching. This gives me the opportunity to start teaching again, on a subject I know and love, without having to quit my day job. And while the pay will by no means make me independently wealthy, it will give me a little extra money for a couple of months with which to make ends meet. In short, it’s all-around great.

As promised, I’ve got a few big announcements to make today. Here they go:

Big announcement #1: Changing webhosts.

I’ve been hosting with Linksky since some time in 2002, whenever it was that I finally got fed up with Iowa State’s stipped-down servers. However, that’s about to change. CollegeBuddy Quinn and I are going in together on a (mt) Media Temple account. I have no major gripes with Linksky… I just feel like I’ve outgrown them. I need more databases, and faster servers. I have ambitions, you know.

How this affects me: I’m going to have a lot of work to do.

How this affects you: hardly at all, really. Just thought I’d let you know.

Big announcement #2: Rootarcana go bye-bye.

As part of this change, I’ve come to the decision that it’s time to drop the Rootarcana name. Rootarcana rocked as a name when I came up with it, five or six years ago. Since then, it has grown progressively less cool with each passing year. For the last few years, I’ve had a crises of conscience every time it came up for renewal, and I always ended up renewing because I didn’t have time to get anything else together. This time, no excuses. I’m dropping rootarcana.

However, I’m not dropping the blogging thing. Not at all. Instead, my Blog Of The Future will be hosted on robglazebrook.com.

How this affects me: I’ll no longer have to explain what the hell my domain name means to every well-meaning techie out there.

How this affects you: If you have me bookmarked, you’ll have to update that. If you have me set as your home page, that’ll need to change. If you’re subscribed to my RSS feed… well, you get the idea. Changes will need to be made. I’ll let you know when that happens.

Big announcement #3: New design time.

A new webhost and a new domain means it’s time for a new design. This has been a stumbling block for me in the past: I don’t have a lot of time to invest in my personal website just now, which means no new design, which means no moving to a new host, et cetera. This time I’m planning on just sucking it up and using Someone Else’s Design for a couple of months until I have time to make my own. There are plenty of good designs out there for the taking… I’ll just have to silence that designer-side of me that will inevitably scream, “but… this isn’t exactly what I wanted!” I’ll live, I’m sure.

How this affects me: See above whining.

How this affects you: The site will look different for the first time in a couple of years. Of course, it’ll be a new site, so maybe it won’t bother you at all.

Big announcement #4: Amanda is pregnant!

Just kidding. You should’ve seen the look on your face, though.

How this affects me: I don’t need to find a new apartment in a new state just yet.

How this affects you: Think of all those calories you burned in that adrenaline rush!

Big announcement #5: Switching blogging software.

I’ve been using Movable Type for years now. However, I’ve become disenchanted with their software, and am looking to move away. I’ve decided to move to Wordpress instead. Why? Because I do a fair bit of Wordpress design at work, so it’s what I’m good with at the moment. Two years ago, I probably would have went with Drupal because I was doing so much ISUComm and Habitat for Humanity work. So it goes.

How this affects me: I have to figure out how to convert nearly five years of posts and comments from one platform to another. It won’t be easy. It would have been even tougher had I not lost all my posts from 2000 - 2002 or so, I guess.

How this affects you: Things in old posts will probably look hinky. These things happen.

That’s all for now! Questions and comments are appreciated (if you can get Movable Type’s damn comment thinger to work).

That dialogue box yonder haunted me all day yesterday. It popped up at least half a dozen times while I was otherwise happily coding away in Dreamweaver. In a sense, I suppose, it’s the best error message one could ever get, along the same lines as “WARNING: S’all Good,” “DANGER: Is Far Away,” or even “System Report: Everything is fine. Nothing is Ruined.” But still, after a while, the popup got annoying. Did I really have to be updated every ten minutes or so that nothing critical had really taken place? I mean, I was present and awake for the duration. I noticed bad things not happening.

But otherwise (or similarly), life is good in Robbyville. Amanda and I spent Saturday gardening. We aerated the lawn, got grass seed planted in the back yard, cut back the privet along the back of the property (with a chainsaw! (no error occurred)), planted some herbs and vegetables, and planted some flowers beneath the pirate flag. We have a few more things to plant yet, but they required shade, so we decided to wait for the tree in the backyard to generate more of it before we risked our little seedlings.

Sunday, we did nothing, or at least as close as humans can get. We woke up shortly before noon, ordered pizza, downed the ‘za with beer, watched a couple of movies, and took a nap. It was pretty awesome. No error occurred.

Yesterday, I had dinner with Dana in Ames. We hadn’t seen each other in a couple of months, she’s moving back to Colorado in a few weeks, and I’m going to be missing graduation, so we decided we’d better get together for one last goodbye before she headed off. It went really well, for those curious. No error occurred. We ate at Hickory Park, had nummy ice cream for dessert, and talked up a storm for a good hour and a half. It was good to catch up.

And now, it is time to leave you all. It’s time to head home through the thunderstorm outside. Let’s hope my lack-of-errors trend continues.

Did you know? This is my 9th entry this month! That makes this the most posts I’ve managed to mash together since… well, around this time last year. And that got me reading my old posts over again, and you know what? Yeah. I’m still always funnier in the past tense. Why is that? I’m worried that I’m going to end up a humorless, bitter old man, because no matter when now is, I was always funnier then.

End unhumorous rant. ;)

So the ‘zinger made it back from Los Angeles just fine. She saw many celebs (e.g. Bruce Willis) and pseudo-celebs (e.g. Chyna), and seemed to have a great time with lots of excitement and very little sleep. They made it in to a taping of The Price is Right, but they did not get the opportunity to either win an RV or molest an aging gentleman. Well, not Bob Barker, anyways.

Otherwise, life marches on. The catalogue at Extra Life has somewhere around 175 titles now, so it’s not doing half bad. Amanda’s planning on spending this weekend in Minneapolis, too, so I’ll probably have more time to work on it then. The new guy at work is settling in, but it hasn’t really seemed to affect my work load just yet. So far, all it has ~really~ meant in terms of directly affecting me is we have to get a slightly larger table when we go out for lunch. But time heals all wounds. And whiny moanings, I hope.

Nine Effing Posts. Ah yeah! I’m back, y’all.