Hot on the heals of the initial release of my Grayplicity Wordpress theme, I’m presenting you with v1.1. I wanted to get this one out quickly to address a couple small issues, and improve the usability of the theme. 1.2 will be a little further out probably, as I’d like to do some more AJAX (Asynchronous Javascript And XML) work with it, which will take more time to build in (commenting, integrated ThickBox, search, etc).
Full details and a download link can be found on the Grayplicity project page. You can find it by clicking that link, or by hitting the button at the top of the sidebar, or by going through the Projects page link in the header. Some of the changes for this version include:
If you are using 1.0, I recommend upgrading to this version. You shouldn’t notice any breakage, and will find several things have been improved. If you have questions related to this release, feel free to leave a comment or e-mail me (though comments can benefit everyone and are encouraged). Also, I will try to answer questions regarding the theme as they come in. If something looks out of whack, or you want to know why something won’t display properly, I will attempt to help. Some tweaks were made for 1.1 based on these kinds of questions.
Addiction is an evil, nasty thing. It destroys relationships, eats away at your dignity, and leaves people helpless. It becomes a driving force in a person’s life, taking away a certain degree of free choice. And such is my curse. Forced to give in to unnatural desires and walk with an evil shadow over me.
I couldn’t help it. It’s hard when you have an enabler in your life. Especially one that offers a 40% off sale at your weakest moment (when you have 80 cool dollars burning a hole in your wallet). As a result, I walked out of Blockbuster today 11 movies heavier. Eleven. Only four of those were even on my current wishlist. At this rate, I will easily break 500 movies before the end of the year. That will be a dark day indeed.
This is nothing new. I’ve mentioned it many times, my collecting problem. I just never cease to amaze myself with how quickly I will just grab and pile up movies. I’m back to stacking them on the floor too, having ran out of shelf space yet again. I’m smart about it at least. I always buy previewed, and when there’s a sale. Using today’s sample as an example, I usually end up spend around $7.00 per movie, give or take. I have found that pretty true across the board. Based on that average, spanning 479 titles, that’s $3353.00 in movies, not counting tax (which would bring it up to nearly $3600). I wonder if I should itemize this stuff for insurance purposes…
And, much like a heroin junkie who needs increasing amounts to be satisfied, I keep buying more. I can stand at my shelves endlessly at times, not able to find anything that sounds like it is worth watching. That’s pretty insane when you consider how indiscriminately I purchase movies. Oh, and my wishlist is still about a hundred strong. In fact, it hasn’t shrank really at all over the past couple of years.
The only solution? Hollywood must stop making movies. Then I’d have nothing to buy. Simple, elegant.
In all seriousness, I look forward to having the opportunity to build a home theatre. I big one. My dad has built a few for people over the past couple years, and they’re awesome. You’d never want to watch a normal TV again. Can’t really do it here though, because my house doesn’t have room for it…yet…Just wait. I have…ideas.
Okay, the time has come. I am ready to release the first version of Grayplicity out into the wild. I even managed to release it right on time when I said I would, too! Grayplicity is the public release version of the theme that I am using on my blog here. I decided that I wanted to try my hand at making it into something everyone could use, if so inclined. This theme should have no problem working between Wordpress 2.3.3 and 2.5.
Feel free to leave me comments and feedback on it. Also please point out bugs. I will use all the feedback to improve and build a better theme. I’m sure a lot of you will be trying things I won’t have even thought of. I plan on adding support for a lot more of the more popular plugins, as well as building in some neat new features.
Also, if you download it and decide that it is something you’ll stick with, let me know. I’m curious how people will put it to use, and I’ll be sure to showcase the best ones on the theme’s page. You can get to it by clicking that big button on top of my sidebar or by going through the “Projects” page.
If you want to test it out, you might like to give it a run with my Wordpress Content Framework, which is designed to serve as a test bed for theme and site development. You can also use the WPCF when designing your own themes.
I don’t normally catch much news in the morning. Mostly, this is because I just never get around to turning the TV on. Today, I happened to catch it when Michaele went into the living room to watch. Then it reminded me why I like avoiding the news. It was The Early Show on CBS that was on this morning, and rather than starting the day with something nice and uplifting, they started it with this story from Florida.
There is nothing redeeming about that situation. It’s a terrible way to start the day, because it leaves you feeling like crap. I don’t care what, if anything, the victim girl said to or about these people; it didn’t deserve that. It’s sad and disgusting, and it just pisses me off. Especially when they had the mother of one of the attackers on, and she sounded like an ignorant…word I won’t use here. In so many words, she said it was the victim’s fault, like her precious little angel hadn’t done anything wrong. How unfit a parent must you be to do anything that would even remotely resemble supporting your child after something like this? Take responsibility. And never, ever, have another child, because you’re clearly too irresponsible a parent to raise them properly.
Let’s be clear, there are so many things wrong with this, on so many levels, that I’m not even sure I could cover it all in one blog. Luckily, I probably don’t have to, because I suspect that you’re with me when I say that stupid is an increasingly dangerous disease in this country. I take back what I said earlier, there is one redeeming fact: at least the children/criminals dumb enough to do this kind of stuff are also dumb enough to video tape it for YouTube. That should help a little bit, at least on the justice side. But what of the fact that they think exhibition of these acts not only okay, but something to strive for? What does that say about what they are being taught by society? And not just in this case. Follow along on Fark.com some time, and watch how often criminals are caught because of video, and how often they even put said video on places like MySpace and YouTube. It is a scary trend.
“When we had them in custody at the station, they were laughing about it, saying, ‘Well, I guess this spring break we won’t go to the beach,” Judd told The Early Show. “One of the suspects asked the detective, ‘Am I going to get to go to cheerleading practice tomorrow?”
“They showed absolutely no remorse at all,” Judd said.
Everyone in that room had the responsibility to stop what was taking place, without exception. Everyone there should have known better. Everyone there was also failed by both their parents and their community, by not giving them the tools needed to make the right choices.
How wrong do things need to get before people start owning up? Not just the kids. I actually only blame them for the actions that took place at that moment. There is a whole history of stupid that occurred prior to this that created them and their attitudes. Where are the parents? Where is the responsibility, the respect, that you are supposed to be instilling in your child? Did they just give up? Do they not care? I can’t express how deeply sad this makes me for them. The kids in this case must be punished, it is only right, but I still feel very bad that they weren’t given the environment and caring that they needed to be healthy people. Now their lives are started down a path that could turn into a quick downward spiral. I think I’m starting to learn this Buddhist thing more and more though. I am angry, yes, but I am sad and compassionate first. I feel bad that they don’t understand just how wrong it was, and why they shouldn’t attack people, like that or otherwise. I am sad that they are going to miss out on so many of the good things in life, because their support networks failed them. Ultimately, we have the power to make right choices in any circumstance, hopefully they can learn that.
I have to admit it. I cannot hide from it, so why try? I am an idiot child. There is no better analogy. Well, I guess that depending on how you look at it, it’s not really an analogy. But we’ll pretend it is, to be kind to my ego. Wait…what was I talking about?
I was looking for something to watch this evening as my seventh season of Deep Space Nine has not yet finished. I figured maybe Joost had added some new stuff that might be worth watching. Aside: if you haven’t checked out Joost, do. It’s basically a free TV service with a whole mess of different channels, some honestly worthwhile (others not). National Geographic has some of their old documentaries on there, which are cool to watch, and you can totally catch up on the last season of The Hills. If I wasn’t so tired right now (why am I actually writing this now?), I’d make a follow up joke about that. I can’t, so now you’ll just have to sit and wonder if I really watched The Hills or not.
Anyway, turns out Guitar World has started their own channel there, which has a bunch of great guitarists just sitting around talking music theory and playing out riffs based on it. Listening to Joe Satrini talk about modes, and watching John Petrucci run sequences just makes me feel like an amateur. Yes, I am one, but they just really drive the point home. I enjoy playing guitar, and I like to think that some day I’ll be a real boy, but simply put, I don’t know jack about music theory.
There was a day when I used to play violin. For six months or so. When I was about 10. Believe it or not, I haven’t retained much of what I learned about music during that time (the fact that the instruments don’t really have much anything in common notwithstanding. No frets on a violin? Insanity I say!), so I just download tabs, and see what I can copy. I’ve improved a lot the past couple years, but I’m not sure how much better I can get if I can’t find more time to devote to learning some actual theory about notes, scales, modes and other terms that I can say, but not use correctly.
You know, playing guitar is like doing math. With letters. And demon calculus. I’ve mastered 2+2 just fine. These guys are talking 
and string theory and crap.
So, I feel like an idiot child. Maybe I’ll understand it all after a good night’s sleep. I’ll awaken with perfect clarity. But probably not. I need the Matrix.
I know kung fu.
(whoa. Wild Stallions!)
More secure than passwords.
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