rain-dance.org

Layout Changer Strikes Again

Posted on October 3rd, 2008 Tagged with Chip, Internet, School Preparations Comments 2 replies

Hide your websites or it’ll get you too!

Haha, nah, but I did change the theme around a bit. I like it better this way, even if it does have several subtle kinks in Internet Explorer 6 that I just can’t figure out. Any critiques? I’ll try to fix the Internet Explorer stuff later, but really, it’s passable and decent at least for the moment.

In other news, I have a job interview on Monday at an art store. It will be the first job interview I will ever have ever. Hopefully more interviews will be arranged with other stores I applied to soon, but really, if the art place offered me the job I would so take it. If anything, I’m a bit nervous because I’m not exactly sure what to expect, but it shouldn’t be so bad.

The SAT is tomorrow, so everything I have been studying for in the past month will come down to the fateful, dreadfully early hour at which it begins. Seriously, getting up at ten is a feat for me. Six o’clock in the morning is going to kill me, but I shall combat it with green eggs and ham.

Lastly, I just want to poke anyone who owns or has owned a guinea pig, because mine is having some serious problems. He drags his legs, which we are sure is not due to Vitamin C deficiency because there is a wide variety of food in his diet. He’s also chewing on his feet to the point where there’s a bone sticking out where one of his toes should be. We took him to the vet and he doesn’t have any broken bones or fractures; all they could do was give us some anti-inflammatory medicine. What is this pig’s problem?

Akismet Fails

Posted on August 28th, 2008 Tagged with Internet, Personal Comments 3 replies

Lately I have received several hilarious comments on the entry about Chip waddling on the floor. They were mixed in with my regular comments as awaiting moderation rather than spam, and they were just… wow. Off the top of my head, some were like this:

This is great and all, but what does this have to do with pointy forks in China? :)

I understand your opinion, but I don’t agree with it. I think it will take more time for me to ease into that view, but I’ll tolerate you for now.

Great review! Next time focus on something more awesome, like Transformers.

These are just what I remember and aren’t direct quotes, because I deleted them after the 20 minutes or so I spent laughing at them. I mean, really? Luckily, Akismet came out with an update today, so it should do its job better. Or at least, I hope so!

Otherwise, I’m on a major job hunt like woah. Also, this is the beginning of my college preparations here. I have my eye on a private university and, as I constantly pester friends about it, I feel like I have a good chance of getting in. Still intimidating as hell, but we’ll see. I have to make a portfolio and everything, so this should be interesting.

Things To Do Before I Kick The Bucket

Posted on May 6th, 2008 Tagged with Fun, Internet, Personal Comments 3 replies

I’m generally not afraid of death itself. I’m at peace with the fact that one day I won’t be here and eventually I will be forgotten, I will be nonexistent. According to Harry Potter, that makes me a master of death. If anything, I’m afraid that I will die too young and miss out on a whole bunch of stuff. Which would be sad. So, my list:

I’m sure there’s more. In fact I’m positive there’s more. But more importantly: what are yours?

Also, I’ve been designing a new look for rain-dance.org. Well, more of a new theme, since the current one will still be selectable. Please check out the dew theme and tell me what you think. There are still a lot of things I’ll be changing around since I don’t like it 100% yet, but I’d still love opinions. The navigation in particular bothers me. Any suggestions?

Trouble Checking Woes

Posted on April 29th, 2008 Tagged with Internet, Rants Comments 2 replies

I am a Trouble Checker for thefanlistings.org’s Games and Mythology/Religion categories. For those of you who are unaware, a trouble checker is someone who goes through the links and marks the fanlistings that are breaking the rules set by the network in some form. No no, don’t let the title of this entry fool you. I love being one, I love helping out, being a part, making a small difference, having a job. I always offer to help during emergencies.

BUT. But but but. My job would be a lot easier if people didn’t insist on writing rules. I find them to be unnecessary since it’s all the same generic stuff that you can easily put on other pages (you can say “hey don’t hotlink my stuff, you prick >:|” on your codes page and you can indicate the required fields on the join page/form if you really think it necessary) and it seems like pretty much everybody knows them. But no, the fact that the rules exist isn’t really the issue at all, because there are people who are new to fanlistings, so the rules can be helpful.

The reason I bring them up: I often can’t read them, because the nutjob who wrote them hasn’t taken the liberty to create a high contrast between background and content. So for us relatively normal people without super ninja vision, the text blends in with the rest of the page. This is the part where I go into my totally awesome Firefox web developer plugin and disable the CSS, but to my horror the colors can’t even be edited because they’re styled not with CSS but with deprecated <font> tags. You know, the ones that became invalid in 1997.

The other problem is that the line height doesn’t actually have much height; either the person doesn’t specify it or they make the text even more squished together than it is without any customized settings, meaning that when you select the text you can’t even see the words fully because the lines are overlapping.

Don’t even get me started on font size, do not. I will simply say that anything below 10px is ridiculous and leave it at that.

But, speaking of tiny things, it seems to be a fad now to create tiny image maps for navigation on the header. No, I’m not talking about small words, although those annoy me too. I’m talking about when people turn a few circles on the image into links and don’t actually mention it, so you sit there for a good five minutes looking for how you’re supposed to navigate. If I wasn’t trouble checking I’d leave any site like that 5 seconds after arriving, but alas it is my duty to root out rule breakers, and I won’t lie, I’m pretty dedicated to that. Why no, I don’t have a life, but I try to take the things I do seriously.

Anyway. I hate hovering over an image header for five minutes and finding out that I was supposed to click on a mysterious cloud or a sprite or an eyeball or something, because yeah, that’s sooo very obvious. I wouldn’t mind it so much if they were at least marked or mentioned in the introduction, but that would be logical.

I guess what I don’t understand is why someone would go to such great lengths to make something difficult to read. I would think that if you wanted to get as many fans listed as possible on your site, you’d want to make it accessible - easy to read, easy to navigate, and above all else, easy to join, so anyone can join it if they wish. You don’t have to be a web professional to make an easily navigable webpage.

So before you write “READ THE EFFING RULES ONE!!one!111” on your index page, make sure they’re actually legible, else you’ll look really silly. :p

Thank You For Your Friendship

Posted on April 25th, 2008 Tagged with Drama, Internet, Rants Comments 9 replies

So, apparently I’m a terribly selfish person who never does anything for anyone else, according to Devyn, a girl that I used to be friends with. She happened to be the original owner of the Amber fanlisting (now maintained by the lovely Larissa) too, but she later closed it because she was busy, which I understand. I have never held anything against her for it, though I admit I was a bit amused because she applied for a bunch of other fanlistings and managed to finish those up. But alas, I really didn’t mind it. When Larissa was approved and created the current fanlisting, I of course showered her with love and affection and plugged it all over the place, which is something that I also did for Devyn when she created the original.

Well. Apparently not, according to Devyn when she replied to my LiveJournal plug:

“Mmm… I’m really sorry I closed it. I didn’t have time to keep a lot of stuff going (I still don’t really). Anyway, sorry. :/ I didn’t mean to offend you or anything and it doesn’t mean I don’t care. I actually feel really bad because no one credited me or even thanked me for it (I feel like I’m a bad person?).”

Emphasis my own. Now, this is completely untrue. 100% false. I have thanked Devyn everywhere for everything, including the domain she bought me for Christmas, the domain she bought me as a reward for winning first place in her layout contest, hosting me for nearly a year, and all the small things, even including the tiny gift she sent her hostees for Easter. I have especially thanked her for the fanlisting she made me, shown as blatantly as I could possibly show you on the TFL Boards. I politely replied to her comment pointing these things out and mentioning that I have no idea where she’s getting these things from, because I have always appreciated what she has done for me. Really, she’s done a lot. We both know that.

Needless to say, my reply was not enough, because she then proceeded to post this on a filtered friends only entry on her LiveJournal so that I couldn’t see, but still know about because I have ~connections~:

“I don’t need a fanlisting to show her I am her friend… I did a shitload of things for her. Seriously. A shitload. And I don’t get so much as a “thank you for being my friend”. I feel used. I don’t care about wanating things in return except a simple “thank you for your friendship” which I got nothing of the sort from her. She even left my hosting because “she wanted her OWN space”. I gave her her own space and freedom. What more could you ask for? *sigh* sometimes I feel like I dont even know what I am talking about…”

You want to know why you feel like you don’t know what you’re talking about, dear? It’s because you don’t.

The both of us know that she’s done a lot for me, but I find it rude that she would go so far as to say I have never so much as given a simple “thank you for your friendship.” There are some things that don’t need to be said in a friendship. That kind of gratitude should be self-evident - you give them a little piece of you, you give a little of yourself back. You grow to appreciate each other, you talk to each other more. You get closer. But see, we must not have been close enough to begin with, because she hasn’t spoken to me at all on the matter besides in that tiny butt hurt comment that she left on my LiveJournal. Actually, our conversations have been nonexistent ever since she basically called me an idiot for sticking up for Windows operating systems. (”Well I do know more than you, sorry to tell you that.“). The pattern of not talking was only broken when she asked for help with identifying a spot on her siamese fighting fish; but not to worry, that doesn’t count as something I’ve done for her either.

I don’t know about other people, but I don’t identify people who write nasty things about me in their journal as friends, so I deleted her from my friends list. Since we were playing the “let’s do things and not talk to each other about how we’re feeling” game, I followed suit and said nothing. Because you know, I can be immature when I want to be.

Devyn did not like this and predictably posted more about me being an ungrateful bitch in her journal:

“Very funny lazulin. After all the shit I did for you. *AFTER ALL THE SHIT I DO FOR YOU*. You treat me this way? You completely used me up. I bought you domains for Christmas and your birthday HELL I GOT YOU STARTED BY BUYING YOU THAT FUCKING DOMAIN EVERYONE LIKES “LUSCINAE.NET”, I gave you a fucking home on my server, HELL I BOUGHT A SERVER SO WE COULD STAY, I made layouts for you, I WAS YOUR HOSTESS FOR A YEAR. I was there when you were upset. This is how you treat me?”

As you can see, she handled this very maturely.

So, first of all, let’s get a few things straight, shall we?

  1. I did not “use her up.” The only thing I have ever outright asked her for was anything related to the subdomain hosting on angelic-acid.com (how she originally hosted me), which I might add was a free “fill out the form and if I like your stuff I’ll host you” deal. Anyone was welcome to this offer so long as they were decent with graphics and coding. And by “anything related to subdomain hosting” I mean asking to know how much bandwidth I was using, if she could import some tables into my MySQL database, etc. If she didn’t like it she could’ve kicked me right the fuck out.
  2. Luscinae was a reward for coming in first place in her layout contest. Interestingly enough, the layout I made was never put up.
  3. I never asked her for the domain she bought me for Christmas (not my birthday, but Christmas), but I did want it. When I moved to my own host on Surpass she said that she’d look into forwarding the domain to my name. It never happened. Oh, and I IMed her thanking her right away as soon as I received the email about it.
  4. I was not aware that the reseller that she purchased on WebHostingBuzz had been for the both of our benefits. Obviously she hosted me on it so it *was* beneficial to me, but I was not outright told that this was for us. I assumed that it was because she wanted to host several of her friends’ domains there, not just me, because you know, that’s what she told me.
  5. Uh, I was there when you were upset too, which happened to be basically every goddamn day. Hello, is this thing on?
  6. What layouts? The only layout you ever made me was the Davy Jones design, so what’s with the plural?

Bottom line? Devyn likes attention, but the bad kind. You know, the kind where you want everyone to feel bad for you, but no one actually does because you’re fucking insane and don’t realize how much time you’ve spent digging your own grave. Ultimately Devyn here only appears to remember what she’s done for me and has neglected to remember anything that involves me being nice to her. All I’ve done is kick her in the ass and run off with her wallet, according to her. Who knows, maybe I stole her puppy too.

I’ll have you know that I am not the rampant, selfish bitch of whom Devyn paints such a vividly distorted picture. I was always there consoling her when she was down and standing up for her when people would drag her through the dirt when I had the slightest inkling of what was going on, of how she was feeling. I was supportive and caring and treated her with respect. I gave her small gifts that I’m sure she doesn’t remember, like the pixel art I made for her birthday of an Umbreon sitting on Lelouch Lamperouge’s head. I helped her with coding, I tolerated her open source format rants no matter how much I disagreed or didn’t actually care, just like any good friend would. When she asked me for layouts I plunked my ass down and made them for her, specifically The Pianist, Long Distance Relationships, stripthesoul.net, and even one for Battle Royale for her Christmas present. I made her those little code things for her Cole Turner and Battle Royale fanlistings.

And I most certainly appreciate what she’s done for me, and because of that I will always keep her link up as credit for hosting me, for luscinae.net regardless of whether or not it was a contest reward. But I don’t appreciate her writing shit that’s not even true about me in her journal. See, it’s her journal, she can write whatever she wants, really. I have no control over that. But if she really considered me a friend, perhaps she would have emailed me or IMed me explaining why she felt the way she did instead of burning me in effigy in secret. I didn’t do this for her when I found out about it because I lost all respect for her at that point. If you’re going to call me a selfish bitch, fine, but have some goddamn proof first.

I am generally not good with people and relationships of even the simplest form, but I do feel that I was reciprocating everything that she gave to me. No, it didn’t cost the same as a domain or hosting. Apparently with Devyn if it doesn’t cost money, it’s worthless rather than priceless. I can’t say I will miss the drama, but I will certainly miss the better of our days, when we talked from morning to night and made each other laugh. Even so, she’s still as fucking nutty as potpourri. The fact that she writes those entries about me and then complains about how she’s allegedly being treated is hypocritical in such an obvious way that someone who can’t even spell “hypocritical” would still know it. And before she started talking about how selfish and unappreciative I am, maybe she should have looked in the mirror. It’s rather obvious that she doesn’t appreciate what I’ve done for her and she acts like I’ve never done anything at all, that what I’ve done is absolutely nothing in comparison to what she has done. I’m not going to waste my time with someone like that, and if I change my mind I’ll just get married.

So why am I posting all of this here, when surely no one else really cares? Because if I’m going to criticize someone, I’ll do it in the open so they can find it on their own; because what she’s telling her friends isn’t true in the slightest; and lastly, because I can. What’s more, I don’t feel guilty at all. I’m not ashamed of myself; I have nothing to be ashamed of. So really Devyn, if you really feel that way, well: it is called Hell. I hear they are accepting all applicants, so you won’t be rejected this time! :D