As I Xi It

For a while now (in fact, since I got back from South Africa in April ’09), I’ve been meaning to update the “Portfolio” and “Projects” section of the site. I still haven’t but will do at some point in the near future. The thing is, life just kinda plods along and there are all these small bits and pieces to do which simply slip through the cracks or are just left to the side as a “I’ll do it later” task but you never really get round to it. You just leave it there, other stuff takes priority and you shift it back. OK, so its not essential to update my site, but I just feel that I should while at the same time, I don’t really have a compulsion to do so. It’s become another task in my ever lengthening to-do list to do.

These days, I really don’t know what to write and this applies to work too. I have all the materials in front of me but I can’t seem to make it all fit into coherant paragraphs.

I really can’t think of anything fascinating to blog. There’s only so much cat and fish stories to tell. Cici has found a way to get to the roof of the extension and the other day I picked up three rather nice clown loaches for my small tank. They’re still a bit shy and sit in the corner most of the time under my CO2 curly whurly laddery thingy.

For some weeks now, I tend to spend my day and nights reading papers and writing. That’s all I seem to do now. I wake up, switch on the computer, look for papers, write, eat lunch, read more papers, write some more, dinner, shower, write even more, sleep and the whole cycle starts again. If I’m going to work, then its wake up, go to work, switch on computer, read, write, lunch, read, write, switch off computer, home, switch on computer, eat, shower, read, write, sleep and so on. It’s pretty much the same on the weekends. Downtime is somewhat of a rarity. I even go to sleep thinking about work, but strangely, I haven’t dremt about work…well, not yet anyway.

I can’t remember where it was that I read that the quickest way to kill a blog is to stop blogging.

I suppose I ought to blog more then.

Some updated offline scans -

Aquarium Update

Habits

New for 2009, pen and paper blog posts!

Gosh, its 2009 already.

Well, with the last few days of 2008 left, I thought it’d be appropriate to write a retrospective blog post. I don’t particularly like writing these things since they make me feel a little sad having to think about the good times and bad over the last twelve months.

Like most years, this has been a rather interesting year. This was the year that Xiao and I managed to finally visit Anja and her cows!! It was a great weekend spent in Cologne/Bonn where were did some of the touristy things and met Anja’s cows. It wasn’t all plain sailing travel-wise since when Jac, Kamil, Vincent and I travelled all the way to Wales in search of puffins were only turned away because the sea was too choppy. I guess there’s always next year.

Another interesting thing of note this year was the arrival of Cici, my black and white tuxedo patterned male cat with a girly name! He settled in fairly quickly and really has become of the family. In his spare time he enjoys catching birds, sleeping, eating, watching bad Chinese soaps with my parents in the evenings and attention seeking, especially when I’m on the computer and am actually doing something constructive!!

In terms of blogging, I’ve switched from a photoblog to a more conventional blog. I prefer the current style since I reckon it’s more visually interesting. I’ve also become more willing to experiment with the various bits of WordPress and have found some very useful plug-ins which I wished I’d found sooner!

This year I also became reacquainted with customizing the themes/visual styles for my computer(s). The last time I did anything of the sort was briefly back in 1999 when I was using Windows ’98 SE. Now all my computers have desktops to match their purpose.  Also this year, I added a netbook to my family of computers. Not really a necessity, but I like its portability and its a surprisingly capable machine despite its miniaturisation.

Work-wise it has been fairly sedate. Research and writing a series of reports. Then there was a bit of a lull period and then I found out I’d been booted off!! Economic recession and jobless. Great. It didn’t last long though, I managed to find a PhD which should engage me intellectually for the next couple of years. That has lead to the greatest change for me this year – leaving leafy South Kensington where I’ve become so familiar with for the past four years for the hustle and bustle of Bloomsbury for the next three years. A part of me doesn’t really want to go, I was quite comfortable where I was. I suppose change is good once in a while.

As an individual, I’m not entirely sure if I’ve grown. I might have, but its been so subtle that I haven’t realised. It’s often difficult to be objective about one self.

Photography-wise I haven’t shot as much as I had in previous years, but I belive that I’ve got some pretty good images. It might finally be time for me to select my panel of photos for my LRPS. Gosh, I’ve been saying that for the past two/three years, I might finally get round to it in 2009! With that note, I’ll leave you with a series of 12 photos from the last 12 months.

When I was changing the the blog name to As I Xi It 2.0, I started to wonder if perhaps it should be 2.3. It’s not exactly a major change like from my old photoblog to this, all I’ve done is changed the theme.

Hmn… I guess I’ll be changing the name again then. If you have any objections, leave it in the comments.

Most people tend to think one should make changes in the New Year. If you intend to change or improve on something, why not just do it there and then when you think about it? What’s the point in waiting for the calendar to tick over to January? Surely it makes more sense that in this fast paced modern world that we should make changes and improvements as and when we conjure them up?

I for one will be making changes to the blog now, in December, before Christmas which I guess traditionally is when everything winds down. Well, work wise it does. Offices shut for the holidays, things slow down and its work as normal come after New Year where everyone will be making their resolutions.

Site updates includes, more obviously, the new theme! For the more observant of you, I’ve renamed As I Xi It…Again to As I Xi It 2.0 for more techiness. I’ve included a screenshot taken from my netbook of the old site below for nostalgia and archival purposes.

I used to use Peter’s Custom Anti-Spam plug-in with my WordPress blog, but when I tried to upgrade WordPress, it messed up the plug-in. So I stopped using it and then upgraded that when it was available and it was still messed up. In the end, I quit using it altogether and now use reCAPTCHA.

The concept’s more or less the same, it shows a word which is obscurified (sp?!) and you’ve got to type it into the box for your comment to be accepted on the blog. If you get it right, you get a cookie. Only kidding, in both the edible and computer type. What I ment to say was that if you get it right, your comment gets accepted.

reCAPTCHA looks the business and does the job. No complaints here. I quite like how you can change the way it looks.