Mulley wins Golden Spider
Grandad November 21st, 2008
So he has finally gone and done it.
Damien Mulley wins the Golden Spider for the second best blog in Ireland.
Congratulations Damien.
Very well deserved.
Second best?
I didn’t enter this year.
Archive for November, 2008
To sleep, perchance to hibernate
Grandad November 20th, 2008
I hope yiz are not sitting around waiting for some great pearl of wisdom from Grandad today?
I’m busy, and don’t have time for this kind of nonsense.
You see, I have a bit of a problem here.
Many years ago, a bloke built a computer for me. It was a huge yoke and for it’s time, it was top of the range. Of course, time has moved on and my laptop is more powerful than the old PC.
Nevertheless, the old desktop machine has its uses. It sits there in my office humming away. I leave the kettle on top of it to keep the water hot. I toast sandwiches in the CD drive occasionally.
I can’t switch it off, because the printer is attached to it. [They deny any kind of relationship, but I know they are very attached]. Also, I use it as file storage, because it has half a terrabyte of storage [or that’s what the bloke told me when he built it].
Like myself, it is getting old. It used to have a great sound system that could make dogs howl half a mile away, but the sound card went up in smoke. I can live with that.
Now it has started to do strange things.
For a start, I can’t put it to sleep.I’m not trying to euthanise it – I just want to be able to depower it without losing everything.
Normally, I would just click on Stand By or Hibernate, but those options don’t exist any more. I don’t know where they went. I looked on the floor underneath, but there is no sign of them anywhere.
I’m trying to fix it now.
I took a copy of the button on my laptop, and pasted it onto the screen of the old PC. That doesn’t work.
I have tried talking nicely to it.
I have tried being assertive with it.
I tried reading Winnie the Pooh to it, because that used to send our K8 to sleep.
I had a look in Google and it suggested something about restoring the PC to an earlier time, so I put the clock back by a year. Now it just complains that the time is wrong.
Frankly, I’m getting a bit annoyed with it.
And if I do get it fixed, I am having problems with my little network.
The network says Herself doesn’t exist.
Maybe I won’t bother fixing that?
Grandad’s greatest hits
Grandad November 19th, 2008
I don’t know what it is about some people but without even knowing them, I want to smash their faces in.
They have never done me any harm, yet when I see them, the bile rises and I reach for the nearest weapon.
Top of the list has to be Tony O’Donoghue.
There is something about him that drives me to a red rage. Is it the idiot look he permanently wears? Is it the cliché drenched way he talks about soccer? Or is it just that he is a sports commentator? I don’t know. Whatever it is, he is crying out for a 9lb lump hammer.
Then there is Jennifer Anniston.
I just cannot abide that girl. Again, it is totally irrational. The only reasoning I can come up with is that she was in Friends which is the epitome of everything I hate about American comedy.
Ant and Dec.
When I see those two on the television, I just have to switch it off. They look like a pair of lunatics that have escaped from a third rate childrens programme. I fail to see how they have reached their current level of popularity. Have television standards sunk this low?
Jamie Oliver.
This one is quite easy. He is such a smug little bollix. He must know about me because the bastard now features in an advertisement along with Ant and Dec.
Sonia O’Sullivan.
A harmless girl. I believe she was quite good at running. The sight of her worries me somehow. Maybe if she had eyes?
Andie McDowell.
OK. I can’t stand her accent either, but there is something about her that makes me cringe. She’s not worth it.
I have to stop there as I have used up my week’s supply of Prozac looking at those pictures.
I’m sure they wouldn’t hesitate before dropping me into a car crusher either, so all is fair.
But why do I hate them so much?
Am I alone in this?
Am I finally cracking?
How to blog?
Grandad November 18th, 2008
I received a mail recently from a bloke looking for advice about writing one of these sites.
Actually, I have received a few asking for general advice, so rather than answer them individually, I’m going to answer them here.
Now, I hate people purporting to be experts, and cluttering up the place with their weedy ideas on how to be a great success, so if you didn’t write to me, you can ignore this.
First of all, I am not an expert blogger. I just ramble away, and I am still not sure why anyone takes notice. As for tips on how to write a ‘successful’ blog, I would suggest you go somewhere else.
Anyhows, here is what I have learned, or deduced over the past couple of years.
Hosting
The first thing is to get somewhere to stick your site. This is not a crude invitation for some bad jokes, but you do need to put it somewhere.
There are free hosting places, such as Blogger and WordPress, but I would avoid the former. I just have a thing against them. They leave you little room for manoeuvre when it comes to design or individuality, and their comment areas suck.
The ideal, of course is to set up your own server. This doesn’t involve converting your back bedroom into a server farm and laying fibre optic to the nearest phone exchange; it merely means that you lease out some space from a reputable company. At this point I would suggest Blacknight, but I don’t see why I should as they don’t give a damn about me. Of course you can pay a little over the odds and lease a server plus someone with a little expertise who can help you with any problems you may have. The latter means you wouldn’t have to worry about software upgrades or any of that nonsense. Modesty forbids that I mention names here. *cough cough cough*.
The next thing you need is a design.
Design
If you go with a free hosting, you are stuck with whatever they provide. If you go with your own server, there are hundreds, nay thousands of templates available, especially if you use WordPress software.
The main thing about the design of your site is to make it readable. I am amazed at the number of designs I come across that use pale lettering on a white background. Make sure your text is easily readable, unless of course you don’t want anyone to read it.
The whole point of a blog is to publish material that people can read. Ergo, the most important aspect of any design is that the content is easily readable, and there are few distractions.
Try not to clutter your site with things that aren’t important. Too many sites have flashing things and strange graphics that don’t enhance the site, and are a distraction. One site I know of has a load of these things, and as a result I never visit – it takes too damn long to download, and if I do download, it gives me a headache!
Content
You wouldn’t think there was anything to watch out for here, but I have found that there is.
I have come across posts in the past there were interesting and very well written, but I couldn’t read them. Why? Because they were set out as if they were on the printed page with huge paragraphs. Reading off a small screen is not the same as reading a book. Long paragraphs are a strain. Break them up. Write short paragraphs and leave a bit of space lying around.
One of the problems with the Interweb and blogs is that there are so many of the damn things around. People flit from one to another, and unless your page is easy to read, they are going to flit on by to the next one.
Images are nice too. They can break up text and make the page easier to read, particularly if they illustrate a point. But keep them fairly small. Some people are still on dial-up.
Comments
Comments are the lifeblood of a blog. Without them, you might as well stick up an ordinary static site and be done with it.
Because they are so important, it is essential you make the process of commenting as easy as possible. Choose a template where the comment link is obvious. Avoid Captchas [those horrid yokes that ask you to type in random letters] – they are very irritating and occasionally don’t work. They are there to prevent spam, but any decent blog should be able to bang spam into moderation without any problems.
One question that frequently crops up is how often you should comment on your own blog. This is up to you, but if you don’t comment at all, you give the impression that you have written your piece and buggered off to the pub, leaving your readers to fend for themselves. On the other hand, if you comment too often, it becomes a very time consuming job. It’s up to you to strike a happy balance.
Add-ons
Most blogs come with add-ons or plug-ins. These are little enhancements you can add to your site that can do various weird and wonderful things.
The first and probably the most important one is a spam trap. ‘Akismet’ seems to be the standard one here and is available across several platforms.
Another addition I like is the ability to edit a comment after it has been posted. Usually you are given a set time in minutes to correct those little typos that always seem to creep in and look embarrassing.
One thing that happens to me a lot is that I comment on a blog and then forget a) which blog I commented on or b) that I commented at all. A very handy addition that all blogs should have is an email follow up selector, that will notify me of any follow up comments.
Most other add-ons are discretionary, but don’t add them if they distract, or slow down the blog in any way.
-oOo-
I could say a lot more, but my computer is running out of ink after this lot.
Joke of the year?
Grandad November 17th, 2008
Is the government having a laugh?
The more I think about it, the more I am convinced that we are the subject of a Dail Bar bet.
Picture the scene: The Dail Bar a few months ago……
Biffo: Hey lads! I have a great idea. Lets open a book on how low we can bring our ratings.
Martin: How do we go about it?
Biffo: For a start, we’ll hold an early budget. This sounds like a laugh, and I can’t wait until the end of the year.
Coughlan: You won’t lose many points on a budget. Those fuckers out there are used to budgets and rising taxes.
Ahern: I have an idea. Lets hit the elderly and the school kids? That should drop us a few points?
Biffo: Brilliant! Let’s take away the medical cards and increase class sizes. Any more ideas?
Harney: I could withdraw the cervical cancer vaccination? That should wind ‘em up good and proper?
Biffo: Good thinking. I like your style. We can leak out about a few more of your cancer diagnosis errors too.
Harney: Not all of them though. We want to keep a few in reserve.
Ahern: Let’s introduce a new income tax and hit everyone, even down to the lowest paid?
Biffo: Brilliant. Jesus, but this is going to be fucking class! I’m laying €500 we’ll be down to single figures by December.
A couple of months later….
Biffo: We’re doing real well, but we can do better. We rightly pissed ‘em off with the budget. Did you see those old wrinklies out there on their Zimmer frames? I haven’t laughed so much in years.
Coughlan: We are still in double figures though, and it’s only a couple of weeks until December.
Biffo: Shit! We have to come up with something else.
Martin: I was thinking about that. How about having another Lisbon referendum?
Biffo: That is a stroke of real genius! Set the ball rolling.
Coughlan: Hold on. This is a great laugh, but aren’t we going to lose the next election because of it?
Biffo: Are ya mad? A month before the election, we’ll suddenly ‘find’ those billions we salted away and give the fuckers a small tax break. They’ll forgive us and forget all about this game.
Harney: You’re right. I’m off to fuck up a few more hospitals.
Biffo: Good girl.
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