Welcome to silencia.net, a personal blog and professional portfolio website. I am Ang, a 26 yr old web designer and kickboxer from northern Minnesota. I have a full-time job, a car, a house, 3 cats, and a moderate phobia of taxidermy. I enjoy stand-up comedy, movies, books, technology, genetic anomalies, history, Dave Attell, Dexter, money, and pizza. What more do you need to know?!
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Archive for the 'General' Category
Hi, my life went from zero to sixty.
Before this week, every day of my life was pretty fucking lame. Weekdays, I get up and go to work, then go home at 5pm and watch movies or TV by myself until it was bedtime. Wake up, repeat. Weekends I would typically do not much more than watch more movies at home. Sounds relaxing, right? Mostly it was just boring.
This week I started kickboxing again. I kickboxed for a little more than a year, then stopped in May of 2007, to try to save some money to buy a house. Thirty pounds gained and much strength lost later (I used to be able to do 43 pushups in a minute - now I can do 17), I decided it was high time to get my jiggly fatass back to the gym.
I also started a business planning workshop. This is only once a week for the next month, and there’s also homework (writing the business plan, doing research).
And while I was living my lame sedentary life of doing mindless stuff alone, I started laying the groundwork for being more social. Which consisted of watching wrestling on Monday nights with a group of friends. I don’t like wrestling, it’s just an excuse to get together with people. And I started a game night with another group of friends, where we play Scrabble and make fun of each other.
So. This past Sunday night was the start of the kickboxing fitness program. Monday after work I kickboxed for an hour and then attended the wrestling gathering. Tuesday night was 2 hours of working out. Wednesday was an hour of kickboxing and an hour or so of helping my mom’s friend figure out how to make the iPod she just bought work. Tonight I had a 3 hour business planning workshop session. Friday night I will be playing Scrabble and making fun of my friends. Saturday I will work out for 2 hours, go to some medical fair thing with my mom and her friend, visit my 1 year old niece for awhile, and then go to a birthday party in the evening at a casino/hotel. Sunday I will do my laundry, wash my dishes, clean up my house, and basically take care of everything else I’ve had no time for this week. And try to put in some time on starting my business plan and figure out what I need to research for it.
Makes me kinda miss just watching movies and TV. But it’s a good thing I guess.
I fell down the stairs.
Yep. That’s some excitement I could gladly do without. Just minding my own business, going down the stairs after getting ready for work, bringing my cereal bowl down to the kitchen. Next thing I know I’m flying through the air and then crashing down on my back onto my wood stairs. Shards of broken bowl everywhere. Me trying to get on my feet so I can reach around the corner into the kitchen for my purse before laying down on the floor and trying to BREATHE. The wind got knocked out of me pretty bad. Got my phone out of my purse and called mom, called the office since I didn’t figure I’d be feeling too great once the adrenaline subsided and the pain really kicked in. It was not a graceful fall.
I don’t think there was any serious injury. My insurance has changed as of January 1 and I don’t have any of the info (numbers, etc) for my new insurance to even go to urgent care or anything. I’m not paralyzed, so I think I’ll be ok anyway. My back just hurts when I walk, bend, sit, turn. And just hurts in general.
I’m partaking of the Advil and just trying to take it easy. After calling into work while laying on the kitchen floor, I got up to clean the broken bowl before the cats got into it (or clearly clumsy Ang steps on anything sharp). Discovered that using the broom and bending down to pick things up did not feel good. I knew those ballet pliés would be useful someday. So I laid on the couch and watched Rocky 3, then took a nap. Got up not long ago to have some lunch and try sitting at the computer for awhile to see how sitting feels. For the record, not fantastic. I’m not in any excruciating pain, but it definitely hurts.
I hate xmas gifts.
Two to three years ago, after a typical shitty Christmas, I declared a personal boycott on Christmas gifts. I now buy gifts only for children, and I buy them books. There are only three children in my life right now (my niece, goddaughter, and godson), so that’s a lucky break for me. I buy them books because I loved books as a kid and they’re all spoiled children who get too many toys and clothes from everyone else.
I hate buying gifts for people, in general. If I see “the perfect thing” for someone at any time of year, I’m more likely to get it for them just because. I don’t need a holiday to do that. And most people don’t need anything. If anyone actually in fact needs anything, they need something like groceries or clothes for children who’ve grown out of what they have and can’t afford anything new. I hate crowds at stores, I hate the bombardment of advertising and BUY BUY BUY OR DIE mentality that happens from September-December. It all just makes me cranky and resentful of a holiday that’s suppose to be enjoyable.
I hate receiving gifts. If I ever need anything for myself, I buy it when I need it. If I can’t afford it, chances are good that no one I know can (or would) afford it for me either. Because of this, people buy me shit I don’t want or need. If I get another scented bath set or candles, I will scream. I do not take baths or light candles (after the cat lit herself on fire one year), and I hate scented things. It is not the thought that counts. If someone gives you something you don’t want or need, they didn’t think of you, they checked you off an obligatory list. I find that more insulting than receiving nothing. Clearly the gift-giver was not thinking of me if s/he bought me a scented bath set. And most people I know don’t have much money. Save your money and buy necessities for yourself, I do not want anything.
Even though I have declared a boycott on gifts and let everyone know this, I still get some gifts from my parents and brother at Christmas. What did I get this year?
A cat calendar. I love my cats, yes. I do not like cat stuff. Cat figurines, funny cat decor, cats on rugs, cats on clothing. I hate all that. Hate it. Why my mother got me a cat calendar, I cannot begin to imagine. I have no cat decor in my house. Calendars are a typical thing I used to get every year, and in the past I’d show my mom what calendars in the store I kind of liked, and she’d pick one to give me. Usually it was something with nature scenes, or Buddhas, or tao sayings. Never, ever a cat calendar.
A CD of slow music for yoga. I don’t do yoga. I don’t listen to CDs. A shitty cheap glass angel figurine. I don’t like knick knacks. Thanks for taking that trip to the dollar store and buying a piece of crap that I’m going to give to Goodwill. Pretty sure my brother’s wife picked that one out.
A deluxe turntable edition of Scrabble. Now this, I really like. I’ve always wanted it. The problem is, I have no one to play Scrabble with. So even though I could have easily bought that game for myself at any time, I never bought it because it’s just going to sit on a shelf and collect dust. Unless I play it against myself, which I might a time or two. So yes I like this gift, but it’s not something I needed.
The gift I got that I did really like is a framed photo of my niece. This is displayed proudly on my tv in the living room. Quite frankly, I would have been quite happy if this was the only gift I got. I love it.
So I’m sure you’re all thinking, what a selfish grinchy bitch. Well, you’re probably right. But I’d rather spend the holidays eating good food and having some good laughs with my family. Not trudging angrily from store to store trying to find something to check someone off a list. Not feigning happiness over a piece of junk I’m going to end up giving to Goodwill. I know some people out there like STUFF, but I do not. Give me food and laughs.
Sometimes things work out nicely.
So a few weeks ago, my beloved iPod died. I thought it was all over, the angels had sung. But it miraculously resurrected itself from the dead a day or two later when I checked on it. Then last Thursday it died again. So I plugged it in for a couple days thinking it might resurrect itself again. Nay. It had kicked the bucket. So it was time to go to Best Buy to see if the replacement plan I purchased for my iPod would come to good use.
What I had was a silver 4GB iPod nano that was $199.99 when I bought it. I guess it was the “2nd generation”. The tall skinny one. And apparently the iPod nano that goes for that price now is one of those new little 8GB iPods that also have video capability. So I exchanged my old one for a new black shiny 8GB iPod nano. Yay for me!
I had to buy a new replacement plan for the new iPod, but I got the iPod itself for free. The replacement plan was $30. AND the guy tells me it’s “$20 off an iPod day”, so I got a $20 gift card. So it was like I got a brand new iPod that had twice the capacity of my old one for $10. Hell yeah. A new iPod once a year for $30? I’ll take that deal.
It’s so sexy. That’s my new baby now. I listen to my iPod when I’m driving and all day at work. So it gets used a lot. I missed it dearly those days it was deceased and I hadn’t gotten the new one. But now I can be happy and my ears filled with music. Believe me, I need it to drown out annoying coworker voices.
And you know the reason #46841 why Pay-Per-Post spamblogs suck? I actually hesitated writing about my new iPod experience because I was worried it might look like a spammy sponsored post and people might turn away from this site, much like I do anytime I come across a blog that looks like it has sponsored posts. Rest assured, there are no links in this post, no one paid me anything, and I was simply writing about my experience of losing my beloved old iPod and replacing it with a newer sexier model. There are actually several instances where I’ve wanted to talk about a purchase or product I enjoyed, and I don’t because PPP spamblogs have ruined my desire to give personal testimonials about things, for fear it’ll look like a spamblog. So here’s a big fuck you to those spammers who have ruined blogging for the rest of us.
I thought I was a nerd…
I have been making websites since 2001/2002 or so. I was in the Web Developer program at a community college for a couple years, though I didn’t finish. I’ve worked as a web designer for a web company for the last three years. I work on websites just about every day of my life, even if I’m not at work. I would say I am fairly in-the-know with web design and development.
I do not know what “Web 2.0″ is.
I even read the Wikipedia entry for it, and I still don’t know what it is. When reading the “Technology Overview” of Web 2.0, it doesn’t even sound like it’s a new thing… to me. Am I wrong?
Web 2.0 websites typically include some of the following features/techniques:
* rich Internet application techniques, often Ajax-based
* semantically valid XHTML and HTML markup
* microformats extending pages with additional semantics
* folksonomies (in the form of tags or tagclouds, for example)
* Cascading Style Sheets to aid in the separation of presentation and content
* REST and/or XML- and/or JSON-based APIs
* syndication, aggregation and notification of data in RSS or Atom feeds
* mashups, merging content from different sources, client- and server-side
* weblog-publishing tools
* wiki or forum software, etc., to support user-generated content
I’ve also read that it’s more of a design thing - particularly the use of gradients in the design. I like gradients, they can add a smoothness and flow to a design, instead of being visually bluntly chopped into parts. Again, that doesn’t seem like a new concept. Usually when I read about someone who hates Web 2.0, they mention the shiny graphics and gradients. If the entire backlash is people who hate “o0o shiny” designs, I think you’re expressing your hate using the wrong term.
My guess is the things involved in Web 2.0 are simply not as new as the term itself, at least in how it is being thrown about now. O’Reilley actually compares Web 1.0 being Netscape and Web 2.0 being Google. Has anyone used Netscape since like 1997? The little chart here is kind of a nice way to compare 1.0 and 2.0, but it has Napster listed under Web 2.0. Napster? Is that still out there? And everything listed under the Web 2.0 column, again, does not seem all that new to me.
I’m not saying Web 2.0 does not exist, I’m just saying I don’t know what the hell it is. I recognized that the times have changed and things advance, but there are people advocating and abhorring this “Web 2.0″ thing, and I can’t for the life of me figure out why. If it is advancing technology, I’m not understanding why there is some backlash against it, or that anyone needs to speak for it. This is the internet. Isn’t the whole essence of the internet to advance and expand and improve?
If anyone has any further insight, I’d love to hear it.
Comments fixed. Bad Behavior plug-in isn’t as useful as I had hoped. Bless Akismet.