[d] enclosed in brackets chaotic perfectionist for hire

lists are good things.

I'm getting back into Listal again. If you haven't been there, it's a site where you can keep track of all of the movie, DVD, books, and game collections that you have seen, read, and/or own. When I first went there almost a year ago, it was pretty simple and not too feature-rich, but useful. Now, however... it's a whole different site. It seems a lot more filled out (and thought out), and I feel like there's more reason to start filling in all of my media information. It can be exported too, so there's no worry about them keeping everything locked away... You can tag all of the media too, including actors and directors, as well as write reviews for all of it. There's a point system in place to help motivate people to contribute. As of right now there's no real reason for it, but there are plans (according to the forums). It's not perfect though... I'd also like to be able to tag multiple items at the same time, which is tough as it is now, especially if you have a large collection. That's not a huge issue, but worth mentioning. If you want to sign up (and add me as your friend while you're at it), click here to do it. Yes, that's a shameless referral, but it's all good. No, I don't get any money for it, and no, I don't work for them. I just like using the site.

it's not what you think.

It stands for How'd I Get Here, and it's great for people who want to follow their train of thought when searching for something. I even know how I found it:

• follow link trail firefox - Google Search
• Damien Mulley » Blog Archive » Keeping Track of my link trail - Thanks BoingBoing
• How'd I Get Here (Firefox extension)

Yes, it would be easy enough to write it all down, but this is good for tangents (which I always seem to end up on) and times when you don't think to write it down until it would be too late. I'm not entirely sure of the details, but I think it pretty much just takes the referrer from the page you're on and links to that. It even follows between tabs and windows too.

That's how I got on the tangent from the other day, and how I figured out how I got there.

yes, I am easily distracted.

While doing a Google Search for a xonex rü journal, I started on a path that led me to something pretty cool (for anyone who likes pens and paper). It went like this:

• My Moleskine to
• this much is true: Moleskine Love to
• moleskine hacks - Google Search to
• Mike's Moleskine Hacks to
• E-motion to
• Graf von Faber-Castell to

That last one is the kicker. Actually, all of the links are worth checking out, but that last one is great to look through. It's a bunch of high-end pens and writing implements, none of which I can afford to get right now... plus the fact that I don't *need* them.

Oh, and I'll tell you how I followed my trail back there in my next post... not that it's always all that tough.

...and a question.

Been busy around here, but that's no excuse, right?

I have a couple of ideas to write about, and I'm going to try to get them up on here soon. In the meantime, a question...

When do you write?

At home, at work, at a park, in your car? Is it at night or first thing in the morning? Is it in public with crowds, or a room where it's quiet?

more hu-man than... uh...

Win XP: Desktop: Theme: Human

There is a way to change your Windows XP desktop without having to super-hack it up. I found out about this the other day, and I wish I'd had it a few years ago... it makes Windows more bearable, instead of a couple of defaults, we can actually customize it.

First, you can go to this link, which will show you how to get the first component to changing your theme. After you install that and restart your system, you can go out there and get a new theme (or two). The one I'm using (called Human) is from here.

Do the following to get them in place (thanks go to Sean, 'cause I ripped this from our chat about this):

• Save the theme(s) to C:\windows\Resources\Themes
• Make a folder in there with the same name as the msstyles file (like "Human")
• then unpack the style into that folder

also from Sean: It should then show up in the list on the Appearance tab on desktop properties. A lot of these custom styles have 'compact' schemes - that refers to the start menu, comapct means the stuff in the right column is icons-only.

After using it for about a week... I like it, and I feel like I have more space available. Combine that with something like TaskSwitchXP which lets you minimize any app to the tray (more on that later), and you've got a nice setup for your Windows system.

Great.

Help and Support Center Error

I came back to my system the other day and found this little gem waiting for me (after seeing that I was at the initial login screen, not the "locked" screen):

wtf. That's not cool at all. This is one more reason that I need to get a new system, and yet another reason I'd like to start using some form of *nix in the near future (for work as well as home).

Any suggestions? Yes, that means the sarcastic ones as well...

A group of familiars...

...and another list of things I would like to get.

I found out about this site a while ago, and I've kept it open in my tabs since. Although I haven't had the chance to go through the site in depth, I've read through the first page (which updates regularly). There's been great items like a tracing paper book, development of handwriting, and even aromatherapy pens.

Now, for example, they have information on NaNoWriMo, which is a great idea, and kind of like an idea I had for marathon writing... write about 50,000 words in a month, and end up with something that's close to a novel. Check out the site for more...

...back to the site though, I like the content. A lot. As much as I'm a techno-geeky-web-guy, I like paper and pens and writing, and this site fulfills something about it.

Getting this pen is going to be a problem... but in a good way.

I saw this on 43 Folders (specifically on the wiki) first, which referred me to a couple of other places, after describing these seemingly wonderful pens. They come in .25mm, .3mm, .4mm and .5mm sizes. With the exception of the .5mm, this is a lot smaller than the pens I normally use, and those that I normally get... but the ink is very permanent, and is good for a lot of things.

The first place mentioned was Jet Pens. I only looked for a little while, but it looks like they have just what I was looking for. You can even order 10-packs of some of the pens (black only, I think).

Site number two came up on a google search for these pens, and is the moleskinerie (the Moleskine is something I'll cover another time - excellent notbooks). The page on the Hi-Tec-C pens actually refers to Jet Pens, and how great these pens are.

If anyone ever wanted to get these for me, I'd be more than willing to accept them as a gift. Ooh, maybe I can put that on my wishlist for the holidays...

...there were others I would use to describe spam as well.

Yes, we get it. You can shotgun your garbage all over the place for almost free, so when that one person who doesn't get it falls for the trick and buys something, it's all worth it. There are plenty of places to get that done, but please don't do that here.

For anyone who's using Drupal, there's a great module to add called Spam module v2. Check it out and add it, even if you're not planning on allowing trackbacks...

I've been playing with Drupal for a couple of months (read my first couple of posts for more info), and ran into a problem with spam trackbacks. There are patches to fix the issue I was having (I couldn't select all, then delete all), but I wanted to try and prevent the issue as well. This did it all, and then some.

I now have the ability to filter the spam out, clean out my trackbacks and comments in one fell swoop, and make sure that I actually see the postings that I want to see. I'll probably post more in a few weeks once I've used it more and see how it's holding up. This will definitely be added to the other sites that I'm using Drupal on.