Archive for September, 2007

Twenty-five

September 30th, 2007

I started watching Ken Burns’ “The War” on PBS last night. (I know it started last Sunday, but I recorded it and started watching last night.) World War II is about the only piece of history that I’ve ever been interested in, probably because my parents lived through it and I grew up with stories and pictures from the era.

The show reminded me of a thought I’d had many years ago. I had graduated from college and grad school and was working my first real job. (I made $15,000 a year, which was pretty good for a first job in those days.) It was the first time I was living on my own, without a roommate. I had a studio apartment with a large walk-in closet, full kitchen with a separate eating area, and a private entrance.

Because the apartment had parquet floors, I bought a large remnant from a carpet store, and had its edges bound. It worked very nicely as an area rug and warmed up the cold floor. I’d bought a sewing machine with my very first income tax refund and made drapes for the large windows in the dining and living areas. During the day, I made up my twin bed with large bolster pillows so that it could function as a sofa. I bought a very nice folding table & chairs to use as my dining set. And I purchased a bent-wood rocker from a K-mart type store that I put together myself.

Everything in the apartment was mine. I’d either purchased it myself or made it with materials I’d bought on my own. Nothing was a cast-off from my parents or other relatives. Nothing was really “make do” until something better comes along. It was the year I turned 25 and I marveled at how autonomous I’d become. I felt very grown up.

Then I reflected back on where my father had been at that age.

My father was in his first year of law school when WWII  broke out. He signed up for the Navy, and because he already had a college degree, he became an officer. By the time he was 25, he was far off in the Pacific, operating a ship, responsible for the feed and caring of a group of men at war. And while his environment was absolute luxury compared to the Marines on Guadalcanal or the Army survivors of Bataan; he was still far from home, with an enormous responsibility, and the threat of attack never far from his mind.

There is just no comparison that can be made.

Posted in Family | Comments (0)

Ok, this theme is really starting to tick me off!

September 27th, 2007

I’ve been working on my fall theme for a couple of weeks and was getting pretty frustrated with how the HTML lists were behaving. I know I’d mentioned my irritation with the lists of the base theme I’m using previously, and moving to a new theme was getting me all riled up again. Then I had the brilliant idea of deleting all the list code in the CSS file and start fresh. And lo & behold, it worked! For the main page only.

So, I finally looked into the actual source code to see what was going on and discovered I’d styled a class that didn’t appear on the single post page. So I fixed it. I even started a post called “Hallelujah!” but that, too, was premature.

Once I got the single post page fixed, I went to look at the other multi-post pages. And there was nothing denoting the lists. Nothing! So, once again, I went in to look at the source code, and the lists aren’t even coded as lists! They’re coded as paragraphs! What the hell? I can’t believe that’s something that WordPress does in general, but I suppose it could be. I’ll have to check it out using a better another theme.

Oh, and the sidebar crap still exists. (I figured I ought to tackle one problem at a time.)

Posted in Blogging | Comments (0)

Lists redux

September 25th, 2007

I brought this over from my sandbox because it has a couple of lists that aren’t totally nonsensical. This time I need to include nested lists.

So, here is a list of possible goals for me, in no particular order.

  • Eat better
  • Move more
  • Get organized
    • Kitchen
    • Bedroom
  • Be happy

And now for something ordered. Chores I need to do:

  1. Get my tire fixed
  2. Clean up the kitchen
  3. Finish the laundry
  4. Buy groceries
    1. Milk
    2. Cat litter
    3. Cat treats
  5. Iron

(The only reason I’m doing this is to see how the lists come out in my various themes, so that I can find one that has all the things I want.)

Posted in Blogging | Comments (0)

Where’s the stream for fall?

September 24th, 2007

I spent the better part of yesterday afternoon trying to change over to my new fall theme. First came the picture for the header. Not a problem, although I did try 4 different cropped sizes. Turns out the smallest looked the best. Yay!

Next came the graphics. I desperately tried to change the colors on the default graphics, but it looked really awful. I suppose I could try the color change with Photoshop rather then Paint Shop Pro, but I’m really unfamiliar with Ps, so didn’t attempt it. I ended up going with graphics that really have no bearing on leaves. But I guess they do have a very loose connection with streams.

And lastly, I tried to fix the unordered list. There is definitely something wrong with the code, because I tried some new styling and forgot to close the “rule” and the damn thing worked. Problem was, when I corrected the css (by closing the bracket “}” ), it reverted to its current state. (This is why there’s that nonsensical post below. I need something to check the ol, ul and nested lists. It’s definitely not pretty.)

I thought about totally deleting all the list styles and starting from scratch. I may do that, but cripes, it’s nearly 7 p.m. and I just got home. Stupid work.

Posted in Blogging | Comments (0)

What I want to be when I grow up

September 14th, 2007

I found this site via one of my sources at LiveJournal. I’ve taken Myers-Briggs and career aptitude tests several times before, but I never tire of taking a new one. This one was perfect! So, without further ado, this is what I should be when I grow up:

  1. Multimedia developer — yeah, baby!
  2. Website designer — damn straight!
  3. Special effects technician — think Supernatural would hire me?
  4. Industrial designer — I might like this if I knew what the hell it was
  5. Computer programmer — meh
  6. Desktop publisher — hmmm
  7. Technical writer — ok, I can see that
  8. Fashion designer — better pull out the ol’ sewing machine
  9. Sign maker — wtf??
  10. Cartoonist/Comic illustrator — too bad I can’t draw worth a damn

Considering the fact that I want to be a web developer more than anything else (which only took me 45 years to figure out), I like these results. I also thought about technical writing at one time.

Here’s some other things on the list of 40 that I found interesting:

11. Interior designer — this came up #1 on a different career test, which really surprises me because this is so not my forte. #3 on that list was fung shui designer. Bwahah! But I did buy a book about it.
12. Actor — this is what I REALLY wanted to be when I grew up, when I still had growing up to do. Alas, don’t have the personality or looks for the job. (Altho stage work might have been possible—and I think I’d like that better than film work.)
23. Set designer — Supernatural dudes, are you reading this??
26. Webmaster — how is this different than #1 and 2? Don’t answer, I actually know.

And perhaps my favorite:

29. Comedian — when I was instructor in the Navy, one of my students commented after one of my antics, “Good grief. One of our instructors is a [don't remember] and the other is a comedian.” *hee*

Posted in Musings | Comments (0)

I’m just a ticking fool!

September 12th, 2007

All right, Natalie, I think you know by now that I have a fairly obsessive personality. Once again, I am ticking my life away.


Even tho’ this is the date I can retire, I most likely won’t, because I’d have to take a serious cut in retirement pay. And I just learned last week that my retirement calculator has a serious flaw in it. (Thank goodness no one other than me has used it!) Turns out I can’t retire with full pension for another 4 years. (I thought it was 3. Waaah!)

Posted in Work | Comments (3)

The countdown begins!

September 9th, 2007

Thank you, nuj! I now have my very own Supernatural Season 3 countdown ticker, aka, cute sidebar thingie. Except mine isn’t in my sidebar. :) (Geez, I guess that means I better get crackin’ with my Supernatural episode summaries!)


Posted in Supernatural | Comments (1)