Love le Widgets

Bonjour.

We had the swimming gala today, which we won, by a much more comfortable margin than last year - it was a 1 point difference last year, this year the difference was 30 points! Come on Temperley! I went as a reserve, and managed to get out of swimming, which was good because I havn't trained for ages. They say that if we win the house cricket, we'll be uncatchable...

I had a good drumming session earlier, and I've downloaded the Yahoo Widget Engine. It's a really good idea to come up with it, and I really like it. There seem to be lot's of good widgets, however, there arn't nearly as many interesting ones compared to the Apple selection. Ah well. My only reservation is that the widgets come up automatically on your desktop, which means they get in the way of whatever you have as your background.

I got recommended the site think vitamin by Sam at school and it's cool. Got lots of important people on it like the inventor of RoR. I got onto Danger Graphics through it which has some really rich photoshop imagery.

I havn't done any more work on the leaflet for Dave West-Mullen, although he said he would phone me and hasn't. I'll do some work over my 4 day weekend!

I designed a little widget for Tash...see below :D

Night

Hi. Been an ok day, well - it's actually been a very good day. I've had virtually no work to do which has been nice. A lot of our class are away at Ogwen Cottage for a P.E. trip - it's all the people that took P.E. thinking it would be a doss and have no sports that they're good at. It means our lessons are really good. I didn't have to do spanish oral today which was good, although it means that I may well go next week - which is questions on the whole section!

I've set up and been working on my friends website - Confederate Updates and I've designed it all (using the template from Blogger). I've created a new header on one of the pages, but I've got a few issues with it, which will be sorted tomorrow. I have no homework tomorrow, so yay!

I havn't gotten any further looking for the code like on Fish n Chips, and I havn't started designing any of the skins yet either. Hmmm. Perhaps the stylesheet is the first thing i'll do. Ah well.

Seeya around

Back to school

Hi. Can't speak for long. Got spanish oral to learn and english notes to make. It's been the first day back at school after Easter, and it hasn't been a bad day. I'm already bogged down with work which I know I should have done, but havn't. As I'm typing this now I've just realised I've got an Art still life to do. Great! I also have english notes to make and spanish oral to learn. Therefore this can't be long. Nothing interesting happened today anyway, went to worship group, it was ok, although Lois passed on a comment from someone who said that I was a really good drummer - it doesn't sound as good typing it now but it was really good then. Made me go all warm inside... :D

I know the picture is blurred, but it didn't look it on the camera screen, therefore I didn't take another one. I hate it!

Night

Design from an average day

Now I know I've done quite a lot to my blog since I first got it. It started off as a regular Minima template by Douglas Brown, provided by Blogger. Over the past (now nearly) two months, I've edited this to make it my own blog and, to be honest, I'm pleased with what I've done. I have never been taught about CSS and coding, but I've managed it myself, with perhaps one or two little internet tutorials helping along the way. Since I first started, I've created and put in my own banner, removed the Blogger button, removed the recent posts section, made a favicon, removed the Blogger Navbar, added more pages to my site - the contact me, about me and photo's page - edited the colour of my post titles, and generally I think, made the whole site better and I'm well chuffed with myself....but (and yes there's a but!) I still want to make it better. I don't know whether that's the designer in me, but I browse the web most days, and would regard myself as a compitent web user, and I go on all sorts of sites, blogs, design studios etc, and see inspiring designs that I'd LOVE to have on here.

I love so many different styles out there. I really like the grunge style, but I also really like a clean, simple and minimal style. I love vibrant colours, really bright, and I also like really calm, soothing designs. I love photography and good pictures, and I love the countryside and the city. The thing is, how do I show all that in one blog!? I saw the Fish n Chips site and it's got some code that randomly selects one out of around 4 skins they've designed. Now I really like that idea, it's cool. I could design a few sites that when someone logged on would randomly change, and each time they came back or refreshed, they'd see a new design. Not only would it be really cool, but it'd allow me to have all my different designs!

So far I'm thinking along these idea's for the skins:

- A minimal one like the current design. Simple, clean, fresh and with some sketch designs using my tablet.

- An underground, urban one, featuring pictures of the London underground I have, and maps of the underground. Could be either light or dark colours, I'm not sure yet. I saw this template, using the underground theme, and I liked some of the ideas.

- A grunge one. Something dark, dirty, maybe with a paper background which the text appears on - almost emo but not.

- A vibrant, colourful, interesting and abstract design, with really cool vector graphics

Now, that's all well and good but there are some problems - A) I have no idea how I'd design all of them, as I can't use Dreamweaver at all, and my CSS isn't good enough to make my own. B) I don't know the coding to randomly select a skin, and can't find on the Fish n Chips site how it does it.

A solution I've just thought of is that I could have thumbnails or bigger of samples of grunge/vibrant/minimal/urban etc and let the viewer choose which they want. Then, if they're inquisitive, they'll go back, and click on each one, and I'll get more page clicks! That could work, although a holding page for a blog doesn't quite sound right. The problem with having four options could be that I'd have to enter my blog entry four times into each section, although I'm sure there's a way you could just change the CSS but not the content. That's something to look up.

Wow, so much typed from such an average day! I guess it's just something I've been thinking about, and needed to write down so I could review it. I read through my last few entries today... I thought it made nice reading :)

Havn't done much today, as the title suggests. I've tried to work...the internet is just so distracting!

I've come back after tea to finish this, I had honey glazed chicken which was quite nice, a little too sweet for me. Also watched the end of Colateral Damage on C4 which looked good. Watched some of Match of the Day too and I've watched a few Joga Bonito videos. Amazing. What football should really be.

Anyway, seeya

London week

I do believe it has been a week since I last posted you with an update on my life! I don't think I can ever remember what I did a week ago, which is both sad and a shame, as something exciting must have gone on in the last few days! At least, I hope so...

I'll start with what I can remember. Which isn't much. Sunday - I played sax with Abby, I think it went well. Then, in the evening, I went round to Coz's house, watched a film of which I've forgotten the name and had popcorn (which I semi-burnt - you can't forget that ... 3 foot flame!) It was a good evening. I remember trying to write my blog but not being allowed, getting banned from the computer etc, but it's all a bit hazy. Anyway, that explains my lack of postage.

Then it was time for the trip to London! Now bear in mind, my sister and I believed that we were going to London for the day, but my parents had infact booked us into a "Quality Hotel" (that's the name of the hotel chain) for two nights! How great! Now I could definately do all the sightseeing things and museums I wanted to go to!

We got up early on the Tuesday, travelled down to St Albans, caught the train in, and used the tube to get to various places. We went on the London Eye which was really good - however, it's impossible to take good pictures on it because it's just grey - London is grey! We then went to Trafalgar Sqaure, ate in Garfunkels, looked around and came home. We had a swim in the hotel pool which was fun.

Second day - we went to the Cabinet War Rooms, and they're really good. I'd recommend them to anyone interested in history and World War 2. There's loads of stuff there which is really good and interesting. In the afternoon, we walked down to Buckingham Palace, saw the guards change, and got in the way of television camera's, who were there recording stuff for the Queens birthday. Apparently, she'd invited a load of people for lunch, and they were recording it. Ok... In the evening we ate at Jimmy's, a greek restaurant in Soho. We walked past dozens of sex shops and clubs to get there, and when we did the place was pretty dirty. However, the food was good, so it wasn't all bad. My sister didn't like what she'd ordered and refused to eat it, so when we left we caught the tube (something I love doing - it's just so easy!) to Leciester Square, got her a McDonalds. We then had a Ben & Jerry's ice cream, and made our way home.

Our last day was as good as a last day can be. We went to the Science Museum, and although I am no fan of science - at school at least - it was good. We saw an exhibition on Pixar Animation - amazing. The quality of the drawings there is incredible. Go on the Pixar site to see some previews of the new film, Cars. Looks to be amazing. Then, we looked for somewhere to eat. We were outside the Oxford Circus tube station, and a worker came up to us, and asked us if we needed any help with our journey, as dad was looking at his guide book. He said no, and I said to him that "we're just looking for a place to eat". He told us about this GREAT cafe just around the corner called The Lido - he said all the "lads"(underground workers to you and me), that it was really nice and extremely cheap. So we tried it out, and he was right! It's great! The quality of food is superb and it was really nice. It's been there 61 years! I'm not surprised, but they must make a good profit. It was great. Then, me and mum walked up and down Oxford Street, I bought a few clothes, and then we all went back to The Lido for tea! I had a really nice lasagne.

It was time to go home. We left, travelled back on the train and drove home. It was a good time, and I do really love London. It's just sooooo big, the underground is soooo cool, and it's just got so much going on. You could live there for a million years and not see everything*.

Today's been mums birthday. I've got her a novel and a photo frame. Hope she likes it. We've got a curry as well - my sister and I were going to cook a meal...it all went wrong. Ah well...curry!

Here are some of my favourite shots from London - I'm not particularly pleased, a lot of them are blurred, and I don't think I was particularly creative. Ah well. You'll see more when I post them as my daily picture.

Because I want Pierrot the Clown

Bonjour.

Today's been alright, nothing amazing. Did a little work, not really much revision to my shame. Went round to Fish's and borrowed around 24 CDs! I've got loads of them on the computer so far, and I'm loving listening to Placebo at the moment. It was rather weird - I left the inside cover out for the Placebo "Meds" CD, and my dad saw it, and later he said to me "hey Dave, you know that Placebo CD, rather kinky!". I semi-laughed/cringed. Love him really. I especially like off the album Infra-red, Because I Want You and Pierrot the Clown. Excellent.

Nothing else to say. Night

Just another day

Hi. Feeling ok, slightly down and worn at times today, but generally ok.

Compared to the huge post yesterday, this is going to be nothing. Today, I have tidied my room, done a revision session (only one I know, I must get better) and been on the computer. I've tried to experiment in Flash, and to an extent it's worked- I need to find the code to give the user multiple choices on the home page. It's been fun though. I've also cut out my logo for the gig leaflets, and given him an outen and inner glow - it's dark red and looks really cool. Should all be coming together soon.

Had chicken 'n' chips for tea. Was quite nice. Ok

Night

Good times

Well hello there. Havn't updated this for a while, and I can tell this is going to be a long post. Prepare yourselfs.

On Monday, I did nothing much - my working holiday just started. My parents took seriously a letter from my headmaster which said that most boys will have got a revision timetable sorted, and will have been revising for some time. Rubbish! The thing is, they believed it, and as a result this holiday is going to revolve around revision...and maybe one or two "enjoyable" activities. Anyway...Monday. I was due to meet Corinne and her friends, but my parents were idiots. They made me do work, and then as a result, left me with no choice to text Coz and say sorry, there's no point in me coming into town now because I'd have to come home soon. I was rather angry... Worship group was ok, but I had to play my sax....I'll let you make your own conclusions.

Tuesday - better than Monday anyway. I'm struggling now to remember what we did. You're in luck...I've just remembered. We started off the morning by visiting the dentist. My teeth were fine (yay!), and being the trendy dentist that he is, his dentist is amazingly cool. Very modern. He had these amazing canvases by theCanvasLounge, this one being a special favourite of mine - but they're all amazingly cool. Anyway - you can get your own ones printed by them - my photos are going to be hung in the dining room!

Then, we went onto Mitchels Art Centre - it's an old converted farm which I personally find very boring, overrated and expensive - but we had some cake and a drink there and my mother made a paticular note at the standards of food like she always does. There was a little studio there for acanvas, and the guy there was really nice. He knew his stuff (or so it seemed), and he did some photoshop editing which was quite impressive. The trouble is, being a future web designer, when I went on the websites for acanvas and thecanvaslounge, I compared them...and basically...thecanvaslounge won...by a considerable amount. It had a good use of Flash, was nicely set out, and fairly easy to use (even though one of the sidebar content boxes messed up in Opera). acanvas had a looping Flash intro, which had pretty poor quality images, which for an image reproduction/editing/printing company isn't exactly brilliant. Also, the use of grammar was a bit bad. Also, before moving on, I did visit this place in Sutton whilst we were trying to find thecanvaslounge - and it was cool - it was all graffiti orientated, with stuff done using aerosols. It was cool, just not what we need.

So, later on Tuesday, I did some work, messed around, generally felt reasonably happy.

Wednesday...today...has been an excellent day! Got up, did some R.E. revision, and then went to my Multimedia Magic course at Aston University (I havn't posted a link because I think soon enough it will be taken off their site). It was done by Dr Jo Smedley..she seemed really nice. However, the course was really for BEGINNERS. By that I mean...draw a cirle, then remove the stroke, then create a keyframe. It was good, just too simple. I understand Flash is an expensive program, and that not many people would be expected to have it (if any), but this was meant to be a gifted and talented trip. It was just too basic, and went really quickly. She had a slideshow, but after we'd done her little tasks, we basically had free run to mess around in Flash - she did say create an advert, but it was very loose. She also showed us this website all about colour - it's a brilliant demonstation of Flash and really useful. The course did however make me feel a bit chuffed that I was above the "beginner" stage.

Anyway, just before I left for the course, my mum spotted an Amazon box shoved under the back of her car! Yes! It had come! My beautiful tablet had arrived! It was however, extremely worrying. My sister said she saw a man when she was watching Tv, who came, wrote a note and just shoved the package under the car without knocking. Now that's bad - he didn't even knock, and just left it there. Admittedly it couldn't really be seen from the pavement, but still. It's £200 worth of beauty! Anyway, I got home from my course all exited to open it up and use it! It's BRILLIANT! I love it! It's really big, has a free mouse and stylus holder which is a bonus, and it just is COOL! To boot, my headset came as well, and the sound quality is brilliant, and it's really secure and comfortable, much better than my last headset which is now sitting ontop of the printer, looking dejected.

Sue Bant's come over this evening, we had a nice meal, and watched Grand Designs together. It was cool.

Wow this is long, and if you've bothered reading this far I award a medal for persistance. Hope you've enjoyed it! Been listening to DCFC a lot...it's brilliant!Oh, and here's a picture of some fruit I drew with the tablet :)

Death cab for a Party

Hi there.

Had quite a good day, got better in the evening. Church was ok, felt weird not to be playing, but it was good to watch Tim. Just reminded me how good he is. Then, in the afternoon, dropped Nanna off at the train station, came home and prepared for the party at ID. It was great! We had nice pizza and other things, and then played some cool games. Me and Carl also won the table football match between us, and Tim and Tom. It was a great evening.

Today, I found out about a gig church is doing, organised by Dave West-Mullen. He's got his son Ashleys band - Health and Safety Executives - and another local band - 7secondkill - and they're having a gig. He was going to design the leaflets, but as I expressed an interest, he's letting me do them! My second commission! I'm working on a grunge theme, black and heavy scenes as both are rock bands. He's going to print off around 400 of these. I'm coming up with a logo of sorts, and the only thing needed is to give the gig a name...hmm...Well, it's very exciting anyway, and I'll post the image up here when it's done.

Nothing left to say. I ordered the headset, and it was posted yesterday, so should be here by Tuesday/Wednesday hopefully, and the tablet may eventually arrive soon! Also downloaded Plans by Death Cab For Cutie today. Good so far.

Night

Trendy and Flash

Hi.

I'm out of rant mode today, so you can all be pleased about that. Instead, I'm back in web design world, or should I say now, graphic and web design world. I went into town today with Nanna and parents and sister and bought this. It's nice, another one to join the set. I spent my whole time in the Apple shop and in Waterstones. Waterstones has a really good design section, and I've taken note of one or two other good books I'd like to get.

I have other good news. Nanna is paying for my share in the tablet, which means I have loads of money to spend now! I've ordered a headset from Play, and my tablet seems to be decided to come soonish. I really can't wait.

Today's also been spent buying food for tomorrows party at ID. Should be really good fun.

I'm writing this after just watching "Just married" on Channel4. It was a good film, suprisingly enough. The name refers to the fact that I'm brushing up on my non-existant Flash skills in readiness for a course on April 12th. I'll tell you more when I've done it. The picture shows an old Belton can near the Custard Factory.

Well, I'd better go

Seeya around

Too popular

Hi. Schools broken up now, and it was all good. Went into town afterwards with Waheed and Max, Bob and Dave W tagged around a bit, then me and Waheed left, went to his house and played games. Fun.

That sounds really brief and short because that's what I want it to be, because I think I'm going to give a little rant. I don't mean to sound all grumpy about it, because I have had a good day - it's just this evening on the internet I've found out how annoying people of my age can be - especially the people who think they're going to make it big on the internet.

Take Dan Alani, someone who I vaguely know at the Gathering. He has a site, which is designed quite nicely, but is completely awful at advertising himself. A comment which really annoyed me on his site was "Great website Dan. Looks like you got yourself A nice little business here. I am looking to get into the same field, so maybe in the future we might be rivals!". That's just stupid. Another thing that annoys me is that the web design and graphic design links are just crossed out, and his photos, of which use an external site, are not even that good (in my opinion anyway). It really annoys me how people take photos of anything and everything. I'd like to think my photo's have a purpose, and actually look interesting.

I got to his site through the 2cools website, which sadly, doesn't live up to it's name. It's run by a guy at my school who has an ego bigger than 3 elephants. It just annoys me at how pathetic the forum is. (Sorry, this is really ranty and sad, but hey, I'm in the mood for it)

I got onto Greg Yates blog and found that all it is, is just a story. Boring really - nice guy, but boring blog.

Gah, this has been a complete rant, and I feel bad for doing so, but I guess writing it down makes me feel better. The thing is, I know I havn't got my own site, I havn't scripted it in PHP, I havn't got a phpbb forum, but the thing is...I think I know what looks GOOD. Half these people have NO sense of design, and it's all just boring, rubbish stuff that they think makes them look good. Oh well. Rant over.

Anyway, Nanna's here. Should be fun. Going into town...again...tomorrow.

Seeya

Reflective thoughts

Wilkommen to a snapshot of my life.

That just sounded silly, but I guess this actually is for someone who doesn't know me at all, a snapshot into my life. This blog has now, after nearly a month of writing, taken up it's own CSS - I say "hi", talk about my day, what I've looked at on the internet, and then anything interesting that's happened - which usually isn't much. I guess that interesting things don't really happen to me in the same way that many recommended blogs on blogger do. Then again, what can I do? I don't think I can really make myself any more interesting than I already am (which isn't very). Perhaps I'll have to wait until I'm older, in which case I may not be doing this blog, or I could still be going strong. Maybe my plan to take over Apple will happen, and my blog will be an insight for all Apple lovers into what's really going on "on the inside".

As for my day, it's been alright. My spanish oral didn't happen - the days changed - and I managed to get my History done at lunch. The evenings been good. I went out and played football with the same crowd as last night (except Ian and Soc who had returned home. Bad show) and had a small match with two other guys - who reminded us of how bad we are. At least we try, and do actually pass the ball. Something they didn't understand. I've then watched Grand Designs on channel4. It was cool, made me want to do architecture again, then I remembered the 7 year course, and immediately went back to web design.

I'm going to again interest myself in web design as a career by looking at my Web Design Studios book, which I really like the look of. Very inspiring indeed.

Well, I have spanish oral preparation to finish, and a big chemistry test to revise for. Better get going then

Byebye

15 years to the day, hour, minute, second

Well hello. I'm so dedicated to writing this I've taken time out from my amazingly busy birthday-day, to tell you how it's been. Well, it's been ok. The school day was ok, nothing interesting, but the action started after school. No, not concert band (even though we are starting Braveheart and I'm playing the solos with Solly). No, I'm talking about getting home to find no presents to open, nothing.

I was very sad, but things immediately got better. Mother told me "the lads" were playing football, so after watching Lizzie McGuire, I got a lift and spent 1-2 hours playing football with Sam, Fish, Dave, Ho, Soc,Meddings and Ian. It was great to see them all again doing what we do best (trying and failing to play football). I love them!

Then, I came home for the presents. Or rather, I came home, slobbed, and then had tea. Tea consisted of a curry from Juboraj! Mmm. It was nice. I then opened my presents. As you all want to know, I'll tell you. I got:

Web Design Studios, book
Tintin, Flight 714, book
Vic Firth 5A Drumsticks
Lots of deodorant and showergel
A Bench. jacket and t-shirt

I think that's it, my tablet is not yet dispatched...expected to come at the earliest by the 12th April. Ah well.

Well, it's been a goodish birthday. Thanks for all the cards also. All I'm doing now is my spanish translation, and I'm sooooo tired.

Night

Gaussian coursework

Well hello. Can't speak for long. Had a good day, it went quickly and it generally has been good. Hockey was fun, as was going in the schools video conferencing room for art. The yaer 11s were doing their exam - me in a years time.

I can't speak for long because I have a huge amount of drama coursework and maths coursework to do for tomorrow. Stupid drama teacher setting all of our coursework in one go. She really doesn't know what she's doing - I hate to say it but I won't be sad to see her go. I also missed out on going to worship group because of the coursework :(

At least it's my birthday tomorrow! My mums also stolen the latest verion of .net because she wants to give it to me as a present. She's just trampy.

Seeya

Signs and a funny day

Hi. It's been an interesting day. Good, and interesting.

Church was good. My frequent scurrying across the stage gave some members of the congregation some amusement. Glad it was fun for them. ID was good, playing "Signs". What an awesome game! Basically, everyone in the circle chooses a sign, and then it's a bit like wink murder, the person in the middle has to work out who "has it". You have to attempt to "pass it" without them seeing/realising. You do this by first making your sign eg. pat your head, and then the sign of the person you are sending it to eg. rub your stommach. Mine was ofcourse...disco stu, or disco dave as it's now called :D. It was such fun..and everytime I was in the middle (I volunteered), I caught the person. It's actually rather easy. Look at people's eyes. They all have to watch the person "with it" at some point, and then it's plain sailing.

Anyway, that's enough of me telling you how clever I think I am. I got a present from Mrs Corinne, Becky and Rosie (in Mexico), some new earphones, and a voucher for a clothes shop. Yay!, although I'm not sure whether they're trying to tell me something with the voucher...

We are also having a party two weeks on Sunday (the 9th), with food and a film and games etc. Should be good. Also, the invitations for Izzy's party which I designed (can be found here) were all handed out. Fun fun, and I watched an amazing table football match between James and Abby, Tim and Carl. Such speed...which reminds me - James Cordle played a prank on one of his uni mates, saying their stuff had been destroyed in a fire...and she believed him, and was travelling down to the uni! Poor J...

Done loads of work today - I've got drama and maths coursework both in for Tuesday (my birthday..YAY!). Ah well. Can't all be good.

I think that's about all from my parents wedding anniversary - my sister wanted to wake up early and cook them breakfast..she borrowed my alarm clock, set it, but then was woken up by my dad. Turns out I hadn't put the clock back...she was an hour too late :D

Oh it's been a funny old day

Blue line garden, circus, square

1st April. A new day for a whole new face (again) of wakingupsober. I'm rather pleased. In one day I've added the contact me page, a favicon, solved the problem of the banner and one or two other things I can't remember to tell you. I really like it too. I spent a while clicking on the next blog feature on the blogger bar - which reminds me to tell you I found the code to hide that - on the "competition", and well...there are some interesting and nice sites out there. Bottled-updreamz was one I found which I liked, and also factory of creations were two really nice ones, inspiring. Yet, for all my searching, I found countless blogs that were boring, nothing interetsing, and still with "Edit-me" links in the sidebar. I'd like to think that my own blog was really nice, cool and interesting, but I really don't know.

Today, I've done...jack all! Went to my tutors in the morning, and did a load of maths coursework, which I'm doing now as well as this. Listening to Feeder, and feeling in a different mood. The curtains are open and I can see the fairly quiet road, and it's all springy. Bring it on I say.

The picture is like an old friend, took it, and it was what started off a very special collection to me, and I really like it. Hope you do too. The Feeder guitar is so soft, it's gorgeous. "Growing old with you, it's what I want to do". Love 'em. Th e post title also refers to the London underground, Picadily Circus, Covent Garden, and Leciester Square. I have an urge to be there...which will be satisfied in the holidays.

Well, seems to be all for now. Enjoy.