So I followed Lisa B.'s advice and got a super-cheap web hosting account at 8-95.com. In spite of the site name, my hosting package was only $3.95/month, and I paid for a few months, which is very nice and fits my budget. I've got the pages for the site almost done, but trying to figure out all this web hosting crap has my brain in knots. Particularly the domain name server crap, which is something I haven't had to deal with in my limited web authoring experience.
I did some reading about web servers and whatnot at howstuffworks.com, and I feel like I have at least a better conceptual grasp of how the innernet works, what with their calming tone and hand-holding. The DNS stuff is still a mystery to me. My main question is: if my domain name (elsasname.com [not actually the domain name]) is registered with one company, and my web hosting is done with another company, do I need to change the DNS settings with one and/or both of those companies? Or is everything ok, and do the web hosting and the domain name just know how to talk to each other automatically?
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Monday, October 23, 2006
state fair
Dick and I went to the state fair on Saturday. We experienced the demolition derby, fluffy baby animals, a 664 pound pumpkin, copulating chickens, and a delicious soft shell crab sandwich. We also had the pleasure of getting there via mass transit: Our Fair City's bus line ran shuttles every hour to the fairgrounds. At $4 round trip, it was well worth avoiding the traffic and parking nightmare.
In honor of our trip to the fair, carnival strippers! (warning: some boobies)
In honor of our trip to the fair, carnival strippers! (warning: some boobies)
Thursday, October 19, 2006
wanted: web hosting
In case you haven't picket up on this, I'm applying to grad school in fine arts. For the sake of having a go-to portfolio, I've been working on a website to showcase my art, and now I need a place to host it. Any suggestions? I've been paying this company for email and a to own a domain name for my last name (i.e. elsa'slastname.com), and their cheapest web package, with 5GB disk space and 250GB bandwidth is about $5 a month. I have no idea if that's a good price or not. I'm thinking 5GB should be enough to hold the several dozen image files I'm going to need to store, since web pics are delightfully low res and I'm not making them particularly big. There are also various other perks - free domains, and, I think, email, that would mean I wouldn't have to pay for that other stuff.
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
in need of $
Man, I am broke. Moving (which I did a couple of months ago) will do it, but mostly my own poor budgeting and profligate spending is to blame. Now I'm feeling the need to get a little side job to help rebuild my savings, especially in light of looming grad school application fees and Christmas gifts.
I'm looking for something that would only be a few hours a week (3-5ish), doesn't require long-term commitment, and isn't in food service or retail. Unless that involves, I dunno, wine or fancy cheese or something. I don't do children, either.
Thus far I've come up with the following:
-prostitute. Nice in theory; licking the asshole of some nasty guy not so nice in practice. Also, STDs. Also, very displeased boyfriend. Also, potential of transvestite/transexual Michael Caine trying to kill you.
-ticket-taker at local arty theater. Very close by, dickumbrage connections, but potentially mind-numbing.
-GRE prep course teacher. Actually, I already have this job, but the only class available to teach right now is at a college almost two hours away. Also, I'm kind of tired of it because it requires a lot of effort to, you know, teach people stuff, and it requires a certain amount of out of classroom time.
Hm, not much a list, is it? Any ideas?
I'm looking for something that would only be a few hours a week (3-5ish), doesn't require long-term commitment, and isn't in food service or retail. Unless that involves, I dunno, wine or fancy cheese or something. I don't do children, either.
Thus far I've come up with the following:
-prostitute. Nice in theory; licking the asshole of some nasty guy not so nice in practice. Also, STDs. Also, very displeased boyfriend. Also, potential of transvestite/transexual Michael Caine trying to kill you.
-ticket-taker at local arty theater. Very close by, dickumbrage connections, but potentially mind-numbing.
-GRE prep course teacher. Actually, I already have this job, but the only class available to teach right now is at a college almost two hours away. Also, I'm kind of tired of it because it requires a lot of effort to, you know, teach people stuff, and it requires a certain amount of out of classroom time.
Hm, not much a list, is it? Any ideas?
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
get out of my life, american pornparrel!
Dear American Apparel,
Please stop invading my life with your pseudo/actual pornographic internet ads, especially the one with that 14-year old girl in cotton thing that looks like a bathing suit from a Bo Derek movie except not shiny and not a bathing suit, that is essentially a leotard not made for dancing. What the hell does one do with a leotard not made for dancing, anyway? You sell at least a dozen different ones, including one that is completely mesh. A mesh leotard folks. The only other time I've seen a mesh leotard was at a store that also sold sex toys. And that's fine. I've got nothing against mesh leotards in theory. But this mesh leotard isn't even in your "Intimates" section. Do you mean to suggest that this is somehow clothing? Mr. Charney, I know in your dirty old man fantasy world this is, in fact, what young attractive women walk around in all day. That still doesn't make it clothing.
And while 95% of the ads I can't avoid every time I try to read a freaking blog or about sports in the Village Voice or whatever feature women being scantily clad and harsly lit whilst they do hipstery provocative thing ("Oh, look at the hair fall in my face over my head in a totally unnatural way!"), the one man you put in the ad made me want to vomit. Please do not subject us to the horrid vision of a scruffy unbathed hipster man in tighty whities (all-be-them tighty burgundies). I see that picture, and I can smell the nasty B.O., feel the oil oozing from his clogged pores. There is only one woman attractetd to a man like that, and that is Lindsay Lohan. I, for one, fall on the underpants-wearing side of the spectrum.
Please stop invading my life with your pseudo/actual pornographic internet ads, especially the one with that 14-year old girl in cotton thing that looks like a bathing suit from a Bo Derek movie except not shiny and not a bathing suit, that is essentially a leotard not made for dancing. What the hell does one do with a leotard not made for dancing, anyway? You sell at least a dozen different ones, including one that is completely mesh. A mesh leotard folks. The only other time I've seen a mesh leotard was at a store that also sold sex toys. And that's fine. I've got nothing against mesh leotards in theory. But this mesh leotard isn't even in your "Intimates" section. Do you mean to suggest that this is somehow clothing? Mr. Charney, I know in your dirty old man fantasy world this is, in fact, what young attractive women walk around in all day. That still doesn't make it clothing.
And while 95% of the ads I can't avoid every time I try to read a freaking blog or about sports in the Village Voice or whatever feature women being scantily clad and harsly lit whilst they do hipstery provocative thing ("Oh, look at the hair fall in my face over my head in a totally unnatural way!"), the one man you put in the ad made me want to vomit. Please do not subject us to the horrid vision of a scruffy unbathed hipster man in tighty whities (all-be-them tighty burgundies). I see that picture, and I can smell the nasty B.O., feel the oil oozing from his clogged pores. There is only one woman attractetd to a man like that, and that is Lindsay Lohan. I, for one, fall on the underpants-wearing side of the spectrum.
Monday, October 09, 2006
mod MF dress
The sewing bug has bitten again, and although the room where the sewing is supposed to take place is still the room where all the crap we don't know what to do with gets stashed, I bought this pattern on ebay. It's mod! It's a-line! It's "E-Z"!
I chose this pattern because it seems like it will be really versatile (and because it claims to be E-Z to make). I could make it out of lightweight gray wool, or hot pink boucle, or iridescent silk, or an elaborate velvet print, and all versions would look great. I love the possibility of the contrast sleeve bands too: I think my first version might be some black and white houndstooth with red sleeve bands. Maybe even something in a contrasting print, to be all crazy like that. Another idea would be to use some sort of trim along the sleeves and/or bottom of the dress. Or put a giant button at the neckline. The possibilities. are. endless.
Because I cannot contain my obsession with a project in the early stages, tonight I am planning on doing some fabric shopping. Even though the patttern hasn't even arrived yet. OBSESSED.
Friday, October 06, 2006
shelter in place, fools
News of last night's explosions and chemical fires that released a cloud of poisonous chlorine gas into the air in Apex, NC (watch the video. it's impressive) reminds me of my childhood. No, really. I grew up in the "chemical valley" of West Virginia, in a town where a slow river cuts through the hills of the western edge of the Appalachians. Chemical plants line the river for several miles, including a town called Nitro, named for the nitroglycerine plant located there during WWII. I don't know how the area became dominated by the chemical industry, though maybe its because there's a lot of space and not a lot of people, and plenty of people who find a chemical plant a more comfortable place to work than a coal mine. Especially when all the coal mines are closing.
Kids in the midwest practice tornado drills at school (get under a desk, crouch into a ball, cover your head with your arms), but kids in the chemical valley practice Shelter-In-Place. Shelter-In-Place involves closing yourself into a room and sealing up windows, doors, etc. with duct tape. Every Friday at noon a test siren would sound throughout the valley. To those of us at school, it meant it was almost time for lunch.
There's even a Shelter-In-Place mascot. Meet Wally Wise:
He's a turtle. They hide in their homes. Get it? He even has a paunch to, um, help those rural Appalachian types identify with him better, I guess.
My dad has worked on the management end of the chemical industry since I was a kid, and I once had a tshirt with Wally Wise on it. I wonder what happened to it...
Oddly, Apex doesn't seem to have had any Shelter-In-Place plans in place (schools, places of work, etc. are required to in places like Chemical Valley, WV). That may be because most of the Research Triangle Park area is, natch, research-oriented rather than production-oriented, and there are few plants to speak of. But dude. A warehouse for hazardous chemicals? Don't you think you might want to warn people about that?
Kids in the midwest practice tornado drills at school (get under a desk, crouch into a ball, cover your head with your arms), but kids in the chemical valley practice Shelter-In-Place. Shelter-In-Place involves closing yourself into a room and sealing up windows, doors, etc. with duct tape. Every Friday at noon a test siren would sound throughout the valley. To those of us at school, it meant it was almost time for lunch.
There's even a Shelter-In-Place mascot. Meet Wally Wise:
He's a turtle. They hide in their homes. Get it? He even has a paunch to, um, help those rural Appalachian types identify with him better, I guess.
My dad has worked on the management end of the chemical industry since I was a kid, and I once had a tshirt with Wally Wise on it. I wonder what happened to it...
Oddly, Apex doesn't seem to have had any Shelter-In-Place plans in place (schools, places of work, etc. are required to in places like Chemical Valley, WV). That may be because most of the Research Triangle Park area is, natch, research-oriented rather than production-oriented, and there are few plants to speak of. But dude. A warehouse for hazardous chemicals? Don't you think you might want to warn people about that?
Thursday, October 05, 2006
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