Monday, October 16, 2006

Say NaBloPoMo five times fast

I may have agreed to do something foolish, and certainly unnecessary. See that cute button over there on the side bar? The one with Yoda looking crankily over his shoulder at you? I have agreed to write at least one post every day in November. This is a spin off of the successful sit com known as NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). But this one is called NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month).

This is the brain child of Mrs. Kennedy over at Fussy. I copied the code for the button from De's blog (Hi De :)) , because i was pretty sure that she wouldn't mind, and because while i know enough about programming to make some guesses, and huge mistakes, i don't know beans about html, other than what the lettters stand for. (Did you know that Mrs. Kennedy has left comments on my blog twice now? I will never wash those posts again. She was my first, so i kind of have a soft spot for her, and she must also be a pretty nice person to leave comments for blogger wannabes.)

IN LIEU OF DIALING 1-800 I NEED A GEEK: Does anyone know of a good beginning html book? I would like to play with my template more than i already have, and to know what all those weird little angle bracket thingies mean.

Update on my car: My car is cursed. Over 2 months ago, the Mister was hit by a person who ran a stop sign . My car is still in the shop. At first it was to be done at the end of September. But, the man who was the technician had a heart attack, and selfishly needed some time off to recover. Ok, things happen. That moves the date out to Oct 6. Next, my insurance company (who is paying for all this because Mr. Pinhead, the driver of the other car, has NO INSURANCE) halted work on the car for a week because costs were going higher than the original estimate by 4k. Okay, now the end date is Oct 12. I just got a call from the body shop. The company that replaces the airbags broke the windshield whilst they were working on the car. So now it will maybe be ready on the 20th. I'll believe when i see it.

This is ceasing to be amusing (Hi amusing :)).

Update: Look, i managed to make it into a real button! I'm so proud. :)

21 comments:

Dick said...

On HTML I like "Head First HTMO with CSS & XHTML" by Elisabeth & Eric Freeman. It is published by O Reilly & I bought my copy from Amazon.com. It is only 650 pages long. At the top of the cover it says, "A Brain-Friendly Guide to HTML & CSS" and it pretty much is.

Car repair problems are a pain. I am waiting on Mazda to re-write their code in the new computer that controls EVERYTHING in my car that they wanted to replace on a re-call. The old one seemed to be working fine but this one keeps kicking out a code that says the camshaft timing system is sticking. I already paid once to have that replaced ($600) and I really think there is no problem other than the Mazda software.

Anonymous said...

I threw my hat in the NaBloPoNo ring, too. Shouldn't be too difficult, given my verbosity and all. Ha!

Sorry about your car. :-(

Lucia said...

I'm all for NaBloPoMo, but I simply can't put that weapon on my site. Yikes!

Did something strange and extraordinary happen to the car that it's taking a blue moon to fix? It seems like if it's taking this long, perhaps the insurance company should have totalled it?

amusing said...

1) I got "Blog On" from the library but have not had time to look at it to see whether it would be worth recommending to you. It is not an HTML book. (If you find a good one, please share. I figure it will all get easier when they figure how we can upgrade to Beta Blogger)

2) When I'm not being Amusing, I have an excellent list of curse words, plus not one but two voodoo dolls (his n' hers). I'd be happy to employ all of it on behalf of your nightmarish car story!

3) I'll try and post everyday, but a) don't know how to load those buttons and b) wouldn't anyway because I don't want to point a gun at people. It's just too scary.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, actually, I already went back and got the Yoda shirt design and put that up in place of the gun. I didn't like it pointing at me! And I do like Yoda.

I have been thinking about you and your car. I just got mine back after a just bit over a week, and I'm so appreciative, so I know you must be really sick of the whole thing. Hope the 20th really happens!

Bobealia... said...

I kind of want to sign up, but I'm scared.

Mignon said...

Yikes about your car, dude! You didn't used to call her Carrie, did you??

I'll sign up when there's a NaNoBloMe button (perhaps depending on what I have to do every day of November...)

Lynnea said...

Mostly I've always surfed the web for HTML help. Lots and lots of free stuff. Like Googling "basic html tags" or "html basics" should give you a ton of great stuff. But having a reference lying around handy is sometimes more appealing.

As for the car. 2 months. Fack. That's really all there can be to say.

meno said...

dick, thanks for the recommendation! I'm off to Amazon... (Stupid cars!)

jennifer, yeah, i also post almost daily, so it shouldn't be much different. Although sneaking posts in on the weekends is harder for me because the Mister is around, and this is a secret.

lucia, i think i'll change mine to the friendlier sign with yoda, or the plain one. It is rather startling. About the car, i'm guessing that the insurance company wishes they had totalled it. The car is worth maybe 24k, the repairs are over 16k, and the rental car is another 2k, plus i have hit them up for diminished value, as the car will not sell for the same price as one that hasn't had major body work. I don't know what the rules are for totalling though.

amusing, let me know about the book. And i will be changing my button which is not really a button in a few minutes.

de, i am sick of it, and thanks for the code.

bo, what the hell, do it and then quit if you hate it, there really aren't any consequences. The reason that i can do it without qualms is that i am both mouthy and retired.

mignon, ha ha, nope, not carrie. NaNoBloMe! That's worth a button. I love it.

maggie, aren't you smart? I never thought of that. I did a little search and found a beginning tutorial. I'll be a genius by next week.

Anonymous said...

I'm having fun saying Nah-Blow-POE-Moe out loud. Mrs. K's a genius.

That sucks about your car. Hope you get it back soon.

Anonymous said...

When I see someone else with some sort of pretty html I would like to have, I usually open the page in question, go up to the file bar, under View there is "view source."

Then you have to sort of scroll through until you get to blog text. Look for the opening side carrot, and closing side carrot and copy the stuff in between.

Personally I liked the comment about the Ewoks, but I prefer the gun image :) That's just me, I need that kind of pressure to work.

karmic said...

I might do the post a day in Nov. As it is I do poast pretty much 5 days a week.
What Maggie said about HTML, lots of stuff on the web.

Sorry about the car, hope you see it back to where you want it to be on the the 20th.

Bob said...

mignon, you cracked me up! NaNoBloMe made me spit coffee.

My dad once had to wait 6 months for his car to be fixed. It was a fiat and this was in the 70's. parts had to be shipped from italy.

lotsa luck with HTML. I think you'll do fine.

Josephine said...

So sorry to hear about your car. That really is a pain to be without your car and waiting to get it fixed at the shop. But I don't think it's cursed, because everyone I've ever known who has had to put their car in the shop to get it fixed from an accident has had to wait ungodly amounts of time to finally get it back in working condition.

Hang in there!! Here's hoping for Friday :)

Carolie said...

"View source" is invaluable! I am not much of a "read a book to learn how to do something" person...I'm more of a "jump in there and get stuck and frustrated and figure it the hell out with the help button and maybe a tutorial" person.

I was hired by a company ten years ago that hoped I'd be able to work on their website. I didn't know the first thing about HTML. The 25-year-old head of sales patted me on the head (literally, his palm on the crown of my head!) and said "oh, HTML is too hard for you to learn very fast."

He went on vacation for a week.

When he came back, the company had a new site. So there. It was either that or bite his hand off when he patted my head.

I used a program called Homesite, and learned very, very fast just by using it. Feel free to contact me if you want to learn more about it -- carolie (at) wordmagix (dot) com.

LazyLazyMe said...

It all smacks of effort.

Note my name.

Anonymous said...

I threw my hat in for both challenges. Crazy.

I think Yoda wielding the gun would make a fun button, but I lack the skills so went with a tiny plain 'participant' button.

Just browsing the other people who were nuts enough to make the commitment.

Good luck!

Girlplustwo said...

I, for one, was greatly amused. i can't believe something like a heart attack can get in the way.

And on the other (good stuff!)

meno said...

elizabeth, thanks for stopping by. We'll see if i ever see the car again.

kerewin, i have copied a bit of stuff from other sites. But i need to have a bit more knowledge before can become a more successful thief.

sanjay, just do it!

bob, that mignon IS a funny girl. An Italian car i can understand taking 6 months. :) But hey, mine's German.

josephine, you know, it really is all kind of funny. Although it will be funnier as a story than it is while living it.

carolie, great story. Glad you were able to put the little shit in his place. Thanks for the offer, if i get stuck i will contact you.

lazy, and it means that there will be tons of drivel out there in November. You are both wise and lazy.

karrie, i am looking forward to it! Although that might be short-lived. Thanks for stopping by!

jen,, I KNOW! How rude.

Mother of Invention said...

Well, you are ambitious...I couldn't possibly blog every day...and I don't know what the heck you are talking about with all the blogger lingo! Don't know what you're searching for html! Yikes am I a non-techy! I'm just lucky if I get blogger to work! Can't do a friend's Wordless Wednesday since I just don't get how you put some code on your template! I'm way out of my league even having a blog some days. I just wanted a place to put my writing and someone started one for me.

Anyway, good for you for taking up the challenge! You'll do well.

Teri M. said...

I'm totally impressed. I know I couldn't do it, sad, bad blogger that I am.
I bought an HTML for Dummies book but have yet to crack it. I'd just like to to a new header!
Sorry to hear about the crappy car/insurance situation. :(