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Newer Entries »Win a safetygoat!
Wednesday, January 21st, 2009
Hello all you safetygoat fans. Some of you out there have told me that you would like one of my handmade creations. I’ve sent some out already to my favourite people, but I thought I’d give people a fairer chance at getting their little paws on one. SOOOO, I’m holding a little mini contest…
If you add a safetygoat haiku to my site, and I judge it as one of the top 3, I will send you your very own safetygoat.
Hell, the top person, you can even specify the colour! (traditional white is popular, but black goat is quickly becoming a favourite, and the bright pink and lime green are both awesome as well!).
How to win:
1. Add your haiku as a comment to this post, or by using the form on my homepage
2. Entries should be in before midnight friday (January 23) (I’m very impatient and want to send you your goats!)
3. Looking for inspiration? Check out my homepage. You can scroll through a few of the safetygoat haikus I’ve already got there on the left hand side.
For all of you haiku newbies, a haiku is a short 3 line poem. The only rules are that the first line should be 5 syllables, the second 7 syllables, and the final line 5 syllables.
Good luck kiddies!
Safetygoat’s 2009 hopes and dreams
Tuesday, January 6th, 2009
Everyone is writing new year’s resolutions, making predictions, and looking back, and at first I wasn’t going to join in the party, because most of these dreams fade come February 1st. But let’s face it– I’m an annoyingly cheerful individual and I can’t help but be excited about 2009. So, in no particular order, here’s my 2009 resolutions.
1. Rework, rework, rework safetygoat
This is actually a cheating one– I’ve been working on this for the past few months (speeding it up in the past few weeks), and my grasp of wordpress is slightly above dunce level now. Sure, putting a plug-in (that’s not a widget) seems to take me 3 hours to configure, something that would take someone even remotely proficient a few minutes, but I’ve depended on other people too much to get this site up, so now it’s time for me to do it myself, with all the optimistic bells and whistles.
2. Launch apps I’ve been working on for ages
Let’s face it. It’s sad having to go edit your portfolio page to change the launch date, which you set to November, thinking you were leaving lots of room for contingencies, way back until march. BUT I WILL ACTUALLY FINISH THEM! (I hope, soon).
3. Get a vinyl toy designed and made
I’ve made my own plastic safetygoats this past year (if you want one, email me and I might just send you one) and it’s been fun hand painting them and giving them out to people, but I think it’s time to do this properly. This means a) doing the sketch/3-d model b) finding someone who will do a short run. No problem!
4. Make more custom things
I’ve made some dresses, but they haven’t been perfect. BUT I got a dressmaking mannequin for Christmas from olliekav, and have already made my first dress, which I wore to new years. 2009 should see more dresses, but I also want to make some custom shoes, maybe some bags… you know, stuff with drawing on them!
5. Learn learn learn
I’m amazed how far I’ve come in the past 2 years. I mean, I made my first real website with css then (I don’t think html tables in high school really count, do they?). I’m thinking I’m very good at css now, and have gotten great working in the java environment, but I would like to master styling in ruby and flex as well as getting the hang of some of the more advanced jquery stuff. As I get better, I will be able to try out more experimentative webdesign, and use a lot of the css3 selectors well and properly.
6. Write more
I used to keep a diary in high school and uni and used to write in it every night. Of course, it was just hormonal teenage rage, but it’s so interesting to reflect on things and then have a paper trail to actually see where and, more importantly, who you’ve been. So, writing, yes, but maybe writing more blog posts too. I’ve learned a lot while redoing safetygoat this past while, so I will definitely be sharing some of the stuff I’ve learned.
7. Talk to my best friends more
I live in the UK. My best friends are in Canada. We will always love each other, but I’m rubbish at keeping in touch. This is unacceptable!
8. Get into shape
I know, I know, this is everyone’s resolution, but lord I’ve packed it on over the holidays. It would be nice to at least get back to where I started.
9. Spraypaint
I did a bit of work practicing this past year, but I’m frankly rubbish. It’s fun, so I will be doing more. This is definitely not a chore!
10. Have an adventure
Pretty sure I know what this will be, but I’m going to keep it on the down-low for now. Stay tuned for my crazy times!
Designing for the web: Don’t forget about newish browsers
Wednesday, December 3rd, 2008
The other day I found out about 24ways.org, a design-style advent calendar, which gives us 24 articles until christmas for the month of December. Imagine my surprise to see the site design…. First thought was, “Um, is it finished?” I was looking at it at work in firefox 2 (maintained on my machine for testing purposes), and it looked a mess. Take a look at what I was seeing….
People were RAVING about it on twitter, and I just didn’t get it. It looked like garbage to me, and I was a bit upset, because max voltar is one of my favourite designers, and I have been wearing his made by elephant button with pride ever since I got it down at dConstruct. So yesterday I was deathly ill, but still on board for my daily december design dose, and looked at the site in firefox 3. It looked very nice. It was very unique, very clean.
Now, back at work today, and I’m reading my dose in safari to get away from the non-pretty version. Question is, shouldn’t web designers make sure that their sites look kind of similar in firefox 2, which is a fairly new browser? I mean, firefox 3 only came out about 6 months ago! For kicks, I checked the site in ie7 and ie6, and while ie6 had a few issues, it at least looked mostly like the design is supposed to look.
I don’t propose to be a front-end genius, and I don’t think that designs need to look pixel perfect across browsers (heck, safetygoat looks like CRAP in ie6, but that’s another story) but there should be a standard for browser support, especially amongst web designers. They are obviously using all the cool new css tools that are just coming out, but for those browsers like firefox 2 that doesn’t have support, it looks like they’ve just forgotten about it. If we don’t abide by our own rules, how do we expect the rest of the world to do it? This is disappointing, as this is supposed to be a drool-worthy site which pushes boundaries. It just makes the whole lovely thing slightly bittersweet… not that I won’t be gagging to read the articles first thing every morning until christmas!
Safetygoat up to his old tricks again!
Thursday, September 18th, 2008
I sent a little safetygoat to Joy, a prize winner from my bview “take the cake” competition I’m running at work, and boy did he get up to some mischief! She sent me some photos of his shenanigans and I thought I’d share them with you.
P.S. if you happen to see a safetygoat around causing trouble, take a picture and send it over to me!
(more…)
The goat wants to go for gold.
Monday, September 15th, 2008
The very nice people at carsonified are putting on a competition to win a golden ticket to one of their events. Of course, the goat would love to go to their events, not only because it would mean hanging out with nerds, but also because I probably wouldn’t get to go otherwise.
*sniff*
I’d appreciate all your help in getting me there… all you have to do is comment on this post… I need 25 to enter. If you could include a haiku about goats, I would be sooo excited!
Here’s my haiku:
I need your comments
To become a golden goat
Give me some sweet love
Sorry, that was terrible.
Goats arrested in DR Congo!
Wednesday, September 10th, 2008
They have arrested the whole herd. Charged with what? Being illegally sold. Those goats are tricky.
To read the whole story, go here.
the goat faces potatoes… and conquers!
Tuesday, September 2nd, 2008
These naughty potatoes up in Cambridge saw the little goat and thought they could intimidate him. Initially safetygoat was a bit scared…
But those spuds were no match for the safety skills! Woot!
Murder in the night
Monday, May 19th, 2008
After working all weekend, more than anything I wanted to get my portfolio up and then get a good night’s sleep. I “sort of” got my portfolio up (I’m still no jquery expert, so some tweaking needs to be done), and settled down to sleep. After an hour of “Ring my bell” in my head (catchy dance tune, not a great sleeping song), I finally got my eyes closed.
I was jolted awake in the middle of the night by an animal being murdered outside the window. It sounded like a fox, maybe a baby fox, being attacked. It was desperate to get away, moaning and screaming. This continued for about 10 minutes. Should I do something? What could I do? It would take me 3 minutes to get downstairs and outside. And then it got worse, and I could hear the moment it died. You don’t actually often get to listen to an animal being slaughtered, and it made me unsettled to realize that I didn’t do anything. Should I have?
Update: Someone told me that this could have just been the female fox during the mating process…. scary!
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