Sunday, November 20, 2005

"Time, you old gypsy man .. "

" ..will you not stay.
Put up your caravan, just for one day?"

Comes from a poem by Ralph Hodgson

Was up at 6am this morning and just thought ' oh, will just check out the blogs and see what everybody is up to.' These things are addictive, and a bit like endless chain letters. 'Oh, that's an interesting comment, will just see who wrote it." Or 'that's an interesting name for a blog', so click on a link in the sidebar, then another link which leads to...

Five hours and four cups of coffee later..
The walls of my stomach are hammering on the backbone, and the cat is ripping the furniture to pieces wanting to be fed.

I really only have one day (Sunday) "off" and have been trying to build a website from scratch during that time as well - so the dust, dishes and dirty clothes have been busy multiplying like wire coathangers or plastic bags.

Building (creating?) a website - a "proper" one, not a "blogger" one - is a fascinating exercise when one has no idea whatsoever how to do it apart from a $5.00 "Teach yourself HTML" magazine from a newsagent.

It's a bit like trying to write "War and Peace" in Chinese, and learning chinese at the same time. For the past six months there has been much hair pulling, teeth grinding, and throwing things at walls. Consequently, have no hair, no teeth, and sit on a packing crate for a chair. (well, not really)

And yes, I know there are WYSIWYG "web page builders", have tried four or five different ones. Perhaps am particularly Dim, but when I put "what I see" up on the WebHost .. it definitely ain't "what I get", so it's an endless exercise in 'trial and error', editing and revision (mostly error). The main problem is that if there is a colon or 'caret' missing the whole thing comes out askew.

"Ah," I hear someone say, "why don't you hire someone who knows what they are doing?"
Hardy Har. I live in a condition of penurious poverty. My 'day job' requires battling with heavy loads, heat, dust, flies, rain , sleet. At the end of the day find have been working for approx $8/hr. There is NO WAY am going to pay some beautifully groomed, manicured smart alec half my age $100/hr to sit in air-conditioned comfort.

Petty? .. probably, but it's been a lot of fun.

5 comments:

JahTeh said...

I did comment but it's in the wrong place, see indigenious. Blog illiterate tart.

Peter said...

Hi Davo, "a proper one, not a blogger one!!! I think that comment might have been better on a web-site than a blog!

Davoh said...

Heh heh, Peter, thought that might get a rise out of someone. What I meant was "one that I paid for and had to start from nothing, as distinct from a free one with all the templates, buttons bells and whistles, that one just fills in".

JT, are you calling ME a blog illiterate tart? Keep that up an' I'll throw a custard Pi at ya.

JahTeh said...

After three tries of posting on my own blog, it's definitely me who's the BIT.

Davoh said...

email me, the AT represents @. Or click on "profile" then click the link that says "Email". Promise I won't tell anyone what yr email address is.

(sheesh, nice to know someone else who is battling with this cybernetic beast.)