I just realized WordPress supports Gravatars out of the box. I didn’t realize it until I started noticing other blogs with user’s images posted on the comments whenever they make any comments. Apparently it is like a universal photo badge that you can use whenever you comment on sites that are gravatar enabled. It is tied to your email address. You can even configure different avatars for each email account. It’s pretty cool to see your mug on each comment you give out on either your blog or even the blogs that you read. Sign-up for yours if you want one! It’s FREE.
Finally! All the image uploads is complete and all the tagging is done. I’m so happy. Only thing left to do is create my own custom banners. I do like what this theme comes with but I need some images that represents my own personal touch. One thing I found interesting was that I had alot of posts about finance and poker. Priorities now are so much different than before.
Hopefully this will encourage me to blog more often. At least the Twitter hook is helpful for people to see that I’m still alive.
This past weekend, I celebrated another birthday. It was good to spend time with family and friends. Ever since I bought my house, I’ve been very conscious of every penny I’ve spent. Because of this, I’ve opted to stay home more often. Don’t get me wrong. Staying at home and doing absolutely nothing is enjoyable to me but I realize I need to be around friends and family.
I celebrated by having various different meals. I had the guys over for a much needed poker game. I walked away being the big winner of the night. I still think it was the fact that it was for my birthday. This broke my losing streaks at 2 levels: (1) this was the first time I won with my own poker chips and (2) this was the first time I won at my own house. There’s still one more streak that hasn’t been broken yet and that’s winning with my infamous “Poker Pimp” shirt. I never win wearing that shirt. Maybe next time.
I took time off on Monday to go to Disneyland and California Adventure. I have to say I really like CA Adventure. Maybe it was because it was an entirely new experience. Either way, I really like that park and wouldn’t mind going back again. Only regret is I didn’t get to go on the “Tower of Terror” ride. Disneyland was good too. Enjoyed the interactive Toy Story ride. It’s like being in a video game during the ride. Saw updates on Small World and Pirates of the Caribbean. It was crowded, hot, and humid but I enjoyed every minute of it. Love that “Fast Pass” system.
As usual, I’m still going through the rigor off uploading my photos on Flickr. I’m probably at 80% complete. I’m hoping to get this done by end of this week (fingers crossed). Then I can upload some newer pictures from this year. Till then, I’ll keep chugging away.
A brief status update on the site reconstruction.
- Started on retagging all the past post. It’s going to take awhile to get through close to 200 posts. I love the Tag of Popularity cloud. So neat to see what my writing is focused on.
- Removed calendar widget and added a Flickr Badge and a Live Update via Twitter widget.
- Upgraded my Flickr account to Pro so I can add and create previous albums.
- Removed the Comment RSS feed. Kind of silly if you ask me.
- Installed a cool plug-in so that I can display photos on my post easier with my Flickr photos.
Here’s one for the road!
I like Flocks of Seagull. And no. That’s NOT a wig!
So if you haven’t noticed things have changed around here. Really it’s not because I wanted to but due to some unusual circumstances, I am forced to. Not that it’s a bad change. I really enjoy the new look and feel as well as the cool blogging software. For those who have visited around the neighborhood, you’ll notice a few things missing:
- Albums and Pictures
- Ad banners
- Header images (those are not my pictures but rather part of the cool theme)
I even hired a guy to help me migrate my old content over from the previous blog to this one so that I still have a good archive. I’ll be spending the next few days/weeks/months adding images to my Flickr account so that I can get all the images on here. I’ll be creating my own header images as well. Finally, I’m going to implement some way to put some Ad Sense stuff in as well as affiliates banners (not that I’m even close to capitalizing on that).
I also need to start tagging my posts so that I can get my tag map working right. Let me know what you think so far. I encourage you to come back when the dust settles or while everything is under construction.
Found a way around to upload pictures again. Here are the albums that was missed since Chicago.
This is the final week of a 2 year project that I have been working on at work. We are scheduled to be in production by Friday, November 18, 2005. The events of the next couple of days will be critical so that we make sure this milestone is realized. In a way I feel excited about this final stage. This was only the 2nd project I have been on since working at NBC Universal and also the longest. The burden of launching has been with us since the end of last year, but unfortunately due to circumstances beyond any of our control, we were delayed for another year. So as you can assume, we have alot riding on this launch and alot of people waiting for this to be completed, including myself.
Hopefully after this project I can finally do things I need to do. This includes working-out consistently, finding more time to work on some side projects that I’ve been neglecting, and continuing to move forward in my career path with the same company. I’m hoping that from next week on, life at work should be less stressful. As you can assume, I will be limiting my frequency of posts here. So don’t hold your breathe because I may not be back on until next weekend. Wish me luck!
Note: I also want to wish Shon some luck as he receives news about his bar results on the same day that we launch.
I decided to cease my activities over at Xanga and begin my new chapter here. Xanga was a good site to get my feet wet and help me maintain several relationships I had with people all around the world. Nevertheless, this was the natural progression. This should be a good tie in with a photo album. WordPress rocks! Thanks Alex for the recommendation of using WordPress and for planting the idea of hosting my own blog.
My very own private blog with integrated photo album. WordPress, Gallery 2, Random-Image Theme and the WPG2 Plug-in are the technologies that made this site possible.
Comments (0) 
Ambiguous, Technology
| 
blog, geeky, gravatar 
Themocracy