Dying of Curiosity?

Remember I mentioned a new site format? The preview is ready, although the page has been completed in an entirely different style, at great expense and at the last minute. (Haha!) If you want to catch the preview of the new format, you can see the sample page here. Please note that this is not a final page, so it is still subject to change and many of the links are not yet live. In addition you may notice that although there is a thumbnail for the Scarlet Macaw, there is as of yet no page: I’m working on it. On the other hand, I’m quite pleased with the layout (it doesn’t break, even when I view it on my laptop’s tiny screen). You’d have to shrink your browser window by a lot to mess it up, but it expands gracefully to fill even quite a large monitor. The pop-out menu should allow for quicker and more useful pattern browsing. I also did some fantastically complicated (for me) SQL/PHP, of which I am ridiculously proud. (Psst, Dad – the thumbnails in the main section are completely echoed! I won’t ever have to rewrite my pages just because I added patterns!)

All in all, I’m well pleased with the improved functionality the redesign offers, the increased flexibility the SQL provides, the more subdued color scheme (plus it’s green – I love green even more than autumn leaves) and the fluid layout. I’m not 100% on a few things – the box at the bottom of the center column, for one thing. I feel like something should be there, but I’m not sure what yet. Same goes for the blog excerpt. I want to put something there (besides more ads, although of course I could) but I’m still iffy on what belongs. I would value feedback, opinions and ideas from anyone – whether you like what I’ve done with the place or not – because totally redoing the all of the pages on the site is going to be a long and involved process and I want to make it the best I can.

Now, for something completely different:

The boys were digging around in a bucket of stuffed animals today and pulled out my old teddy bear! I remember when I was a child (I’m not sure how old), I realized that I didn’t have any stuffed animals. For some reason this disturbed me, and I raised the issue with my parents. They bought me this bear in response. When I went to college, I decided he needed a sweater, and realized he had no name! I named him Sam (for the LotR character) and I made him his sweater. Since I’ve been married he’s gotten stuffed in with the kids’ toys and buried, but I thought I’d document him while he’s up for air.

Who knows? He may stay out a while. Charlie really seemed to like him.