In my heart of hearts, ‘good’ is probably one word I wouldn’t use about myself. My dad says I’m prickly as a porcupine, my mum says I’m pretty much bitch all the time and my brother says I’m a grumpy person…all the time.

I wouldn’t say it’s like a ‘calling’ to me, but it’s like…I have to be there to help them because they don’t have the resources to even help themselves.

And uh…yeah. New layout. Ho ho ho, about time too, me thinks. This layout was good in that it requires only the most essential data to be shown. Off the top of my head, one of the non-essential data that did not make the cut is the “currently-playing” meta-data. I’ll miss it that’s for sure. But a big change with this layout is the addition of pages! I was pleased with that. Only the archives page is active at the moment but I’m hoping to complete the other pages soon.

And I love the font-size on this. Not tiny at all, no sir-ree!

As I’m typing this post, I’ve upgraded to WP 3.1 and testing a few things out, most notably the Math Comment Spam Protection plug-in which just basically tests your ninja-1337 mathematical skills to make sure you’re not some spam bot trying to spam the database. It’s been seriously problematic since I started Teacup, has been problematic, is still problematic, will always be problematic for me in the near future as well… *has lost all hope*

EDIT:
MCSP is working! One of the most silliest error contributing to MCSP’s failing is the ” symbol. But this plug-in makes it inconvenient when upgrading WP automatically as I’ll have to edit the comment.php file directly. Blurgh.

I’ve been toying with the idea of releasing the upcoming theme and this current old-as theme for the public under the Do What The Fuck You Want To Public License. I’m not too sure yet but I’ve got my reasons why but won’t ramble on about it until we have to cross that bridge.

In real life, I’m sure nearly everyone who doesn’t live under a rock has heard something of the Christchurch Earthquake which happened just last week. I don’t live anywhere near it but I have a relative that lives around there and they are safe. There was another earthquake last September, also in Christchurch but there were NO casualties as it happened in the early morning hours. This time, the quake happened during the LUNCH HOUR on a weekday so…casualties are expected.

If you know someone that lives in Christchurch, I hope they are safe and well.

There were a few times that I was so close to finish when I just deleted everything because it just wasn’t meant to be. A few things I’ve noticed about my design…skills/fetish is that I’m a mega-huge fan of Courier New or monospace font types. I’m not too sure what about it that just screams “put me in your layout!” — I just do. In every single layout I’ve made, I can guarantee you that monospace font types were included somewhere, be it the in-your-face header, or sneaky-and-subtle links.

I can’t guarantee that the next layout will not have monospace font types…but…I just feel a bit weird that I can’t deviate from that. It’s like…I’ve lost my flexibility, the feeling that I can’t give a different font type a chance to shine. I can almost say that I rely on the monospace font types to set the tone of the layout. Which is freaky.

Well, we’ll see how my next layout comes along. I don’t mind if it doesn’t have monospace font types. I just need it to look…like it belongs to where it is, and relates to what the content is. Maybe that’s hoping for too much at this stage.

On a similar note, I was looking for a micro-blogging software that was similar to Twitter, but without the social network component. Which led me to the P2 theme for WordPress. I don’t want to gush on and on about it, but I have to. It is sheer genius work! I think this theme highlights how flexible WP is that you can have it like a micro-blog, or a heavy CMS, or a photo gallery…or whatever you want it to be!

No…nope, Teacup is staying as a blog. Micro-blog for a side project. Put your fear to rest, my minions…

Rain (Bi) – Hip Song (Rough Lyrics & Translation)

Don’t know if I’ve mentioned this earlier but the first anniversary of Teacup went by a few weeks earlier (not too sure of exact date). I didn’t even realize it until I saw my earliest WP post was more than a year ago. I think it’s a milestone worth noting for myself as I never was able to keep a blog for more than six months. But Teacup has not only surpassed it’s one year anniversary, it’s still alive and kicking. I’m going to take this opportunity to once again, thank Modi for hosting this blogger who rants and rave more often than a psychotic clown on ecstasy.

To pile on some more good points in my life currently, I am officially employed again. Not temping, but an actual permanent position with ongoing hours and weeks. I think this is fantastic! I might be able to start as soon as next week as long as all the paperwork are finalized on-time. The location is a bit like out in the wop-wops but I think that’s a minor detail compared to what I’ll actually be doing right?

Well, I think that’s about it for now. I need to take the clothes in before it gets darker than it is.

Hmm, would you look at that. This post ID is exactly 999. Must mean something…?

It’s been about two and half weeks since first trimester ended and I still haven’t sat my first exam. It really is a drag when ¾ of the student population have finished all their exams, and then there’s me who hasn’t even sat one yet. Well, my first one is this coming Friday. I’m going to fail that one. I know it. Fuck.

The next and last(!) exam will be Chemistry on the coming Tuesday. I’m…unsure about that one. I’ve told everyone, and myself, a million times that I intend to just pass that paper. I hate Chemistry but it’s required, so I’m just going to pass it. I’ll be glad if I actually pass it though…

The Saturday straight after my last exam, I’ll be going on a little vacation with two of my friends for four days. It’ll be interesting, me thinks. Not stating where I’m going cause I’m paranoid about my privacy but I’ve never been to this city, hell, I’ve never been to 95% of this whole country (New Zealand). I’ve told my friends that it’ll be a first for me to visit this city, so excited!

I’ve been planning a Teacup 2.0 for the past few months now but I haven’t been happy with where the design ended up. I must have thrashed at least three designs. And I don’t know if other people follow this rule (highly unlikely), any designs that I thrashed are archived. Never to be used. Ever. Again. It feels…dirty to recycle layouts.

Next, my upcoming administrative role. My first ever office job. I’m so worried I’m going to make an ass of myself. I’ve got the clothings and shoes for it. I want this job so bad, I got it, now I just got to make sure I don’t bung it up. Seriously. I’ve cut down on cursing quite a bit. I’m trying to change my attitude, slightly. I really want to make sure that they are not dissapointed for hiring me. So nervous…

I hope this image gave you a bit of a laugh as it did for me.

Hope you all had a fantastic Christmas and have a happy New Year. ?

As you know, I do enjoy playing around with new things so I wanted to use another spam protection besides MCSP and Akismet(which I have never used in my whole WordPress life, don’t ask me why). I came across this plug-in which I really really really wanted to use just because it’s fun. XD

I didn’t download it though because it’s quite frustrating if you want to post a comment quickly instead of spending an extra 30 to 60 seconds tinkering with some puzzle. But hey, who knows, maybe I’d give it a try in the near future.

So back to MCSP, you’ll now see a simple math textbox in the comment form. Enter the right answer, access granted. Enter wrong answer or no answer, access denied.

My favorite part about this layout? The sidebar and the footer quotes. The sidebar was really enjoyable. And I admit that I cheated slightly with it as I used tables. I just can’t be fucked floating my DIVs. *serious face* The footer was a last minute addition. They aren’t exactly quotes. I just took a few lines from a few songs in my playlist and stuck it in a quote-randomizer plug-in. It’s a bit like the ‘Hello Dolly’ plug-in that comes with the default WordPress installation, but it’s not. Cause I only pull out one or two lines from a single song.

I think that’s about it, ladies and gentlemen.