I know Go Fug Yourself isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but really, you must go look at this outfit.

It’ll only take a second.

I often joke about not being able to tell if something is a belt or a skirt. But I didn’t think I’d ever really have to seriously ask that question.

Today was Derek’s last day. He started out working here as a work study, and then when he went to graduate school, became a graduate assistant with us. He’s worked her for longer than anyone but me, and I’m going to miss him, even if I am glad that he gets to go be an excellent physical therapist.

So congratulations Derek!

I walked by a computer in the open lab, and some guy was watching a frelling pr0n video!

With a LOT of detail.

(shudder)

I freaked out and ran away, and when my boss looked, creep boy was gone.

EW!

EW! EW! EW!

Anyone have some brain bleach I can use?

I’ve got a big project at work, and need to thoroughly clean the house when I get home.

Talk amongst yourselves.

Meanwhile, this is the wallpaper on one of my monitors at work. (It displaced Batman’s Tumbler.)

I’m going to be insanely busy at work for the next couple weeks. We’ve got a new software package, and I’ve got a month to learn it and write the documentation.

In theory, it’s interesting, but what I’ve noticed mostly is that it runs really slowly, which could be a problem. We’ll see.

But mostly, I’m all but counting the hours–it’s finals week, and students are already leaving, and so soon we’ll actually be able to drive around town. Woo!

Came home to discover that my new mixer had arrived!

It’s so shiny and pretty!

New mixer next to the old mixer. Poor old mixer.

Look at the beautiful color!

The mixer settled into it’s new space.

Now I feel like I should make cookies or something.

HA!

I just discovered something that makes my life much easier. Microsoft added “Conditional Comments” into their browsers, so I can do all the cool CSS stuff I want, and then just have a boring page that doesn’t use the cool stuff that IE (and only IE) doesn’t support.

Simply create a style sheet only for IE, that doesn’t have all the neat code supported by every other browser out there, then the following code (where IEsucks.css is the name of your less cool style sheet) to the head section of your HTML page:

<!–[if IE]>
<link rel=”stylesheet” href=”IEsucks.css” />
<![endif]–>

That’s it! I can now use fixed positioning with impunity! MUAHAHAHA!

(See here for what I can do if I get to ignore IE not following the rules.)

ADDENDUM the First:
Get comment code doesn’t show up when you post it. Funny that.

(sigh)

Code is now fixed and visible.

Got an e-mail “Statement from WVU President Mike Garrison” in response to the faculty senate vote last night.

He doesn’t address the vote or issues of the faculty senate at all, and if you read between the lines, he pretty much says, no way am I stepping down, I don’t care what you all say.

If he loves this university, then he should be considering what is best for the university, not what is best for him. And I didn’t get that from his e-mail.

Internet Explorer sucks.

I’ve been tweaking my site over the past couple days, and it has renewed my absolute hatred for Internet Explorer, and through it, Microsoft. Why? Because Microsoft can’t be bothered to follow the w3c‘s guidelines and standards.

I primarily write my code by hand. I’ll use Dreamweaver to simplify tasks involving content, but when it comes to layout I always work with the code, be it for HTML, CSS, or php. (Different web design languages.) Thus, I know that I am following web standards, because I’m writing the code myself (and, I admit, I have multiple reference books I check to make sure I’m writing things correctly.)

What ticks me off is when I write correct code, and IE ignores it.

Here is the front page for my website. I created pure CSS menus that appear when you place your mouse over an option. (Starting with the Cats option there are no menu options to appear, so it’s not broken.) This hover menu works in Firefox, Seamonkey, Netscape, Safari, and IE7. But not IE6. (I think they worked in Opera, but I no longer have Opera installed on any of my computers.) When I saw that this was fixed for IE7, I was delighted, thinking that Microsoft was finally going to follow web standards, especially when I discovered that IE7 also supports fixed positioning (see here for an example).

But no, I was wrong, IE7 still doesn’t follow all web standards. So the menus in all my book pages work in Safari, Netscape, Firefox, Seamonkey (and I think Opera) but not IE6 or IE7. Considering the amount of work I put into creating and maintaining those menus, this really irks me.

And, I discovered yesterday, that IE still screws up layout; I’m assuming it’s still rendering margins incorrectly. So I had to tweak a perfectly constructed layout, to fix the fact that IE was overlapping layers.

So it’s not the products per se that bug me, but Microsoft’s arrogance in refusing to follow the web standards used by every other web browser. So whoever is behind that monumentally bad idea has best stay out of my way, or I’ll kick them soundly in the shins.

Here’s the first flower pr0n for May.

Shocking as it seems, I already have a day lily blooming.

As mentioned previously, everyone around here has been in at tizzy over the Heather Bresch scandal, and the actions or inactions of WVU President Mike Garrison.

Michael and I are in disagreement over what should happen. He says that there’s no proof that Garrison did anything wrong, so he should resign or be censured. I say, of course there’s no evidence. He’s a lawyer; He would have first and foremost covered his tracks.

And I think that’s where much of the university–and even the state–stands as well. Split over whether Garrison did wrong or not, and what those actions or inactions mean for WVU.

Well, today is the faculty senate special meeting to vote on whether Garrison should be forced to resign or be censured.

Mind you , this time last year the faculty senate was debating a vote of no confidence, in response to what was seen as a rigged selection process, as well as Garrison’s ties with various politicians throughout the state.

There may be no evidence as to Garrison’s wrongdoing, but I’d like to point out two things. First, this was the kind of problem many faculty members were worried about when Garrison was selected. Second, whether Garrison took action action that was unethical or not, he is perceived as acting in an unethical manner, and is thus tarnishing the reputation of the University (WVU has lost at least $1 million in donations due to the scandal.)

Even if Garrison did not directly influence the committee that gave Bresch her unearned degree, he also did nothing to distance himself from the decision and to reduce the appearance of impropriety. And when you are president of the state flagship university, appearances are just as important as actions.

ADDENDUM the First:
Faculty Senate made a vote of no confidence, and recommended that Garrison resign.

It doesn’t matter in the slightest, since the faculty senate has no power, but apparently the faculty senate overwhelmingly disapproved of Garrison’s actions (77 to 19).

Several weeks ago, Michael and I learned about the existence of a product that I knew I definitely needed.

So to surprise Michael, I ordered one for each of us. Michael’s was too big, so we had to send it back, but he got the new size this week, and now we’re totally geeked out.

 
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I’ve had a Kitchen Aid Classic Mixer for more than ten years–it was a Christmas gift from my parents in 1996 I think. A couple years in I had problems with it, and they replaced it for free, which was exceedingly awesome.

When that mixer had problems, it was in the middle of making Christmas cookies, and that was ugly. It didn’t explode, it just wouldn’t shut off. So to stop it briefly I had to shove the switch back, and to turn it off I had to unplug it. They sent me a reconditioned one, no charge, and all has been good.

I use my mixer a lot (we got the shredder/slicer attachment, which I like better than my Cuisinart food processor for many tasks) so I have definitely gotten my use out of it. But it’s started making unpleasant noises while kneading pizza dough, in addition to getting warm and making an odd smell, so I decided that rather than have my mixer explode on me one day in the middle of a batch of pizza dough or cookies, it was time to look for a new mixer.

I went to Amazon, because that’s where I get everything (why venture into the mall if I don’t have to?) and then spent a good deal of time debating.

I knew I wanted the Artisan series, but wasn’t sure about the color. My current mixer is white, which is nice because it matches all the other appliances, and matches the kitchen no matter what. But I love the color cobalt blue, and cobalt blue was in stock.

So go with white, which goes with everything, no matter what color the kitchen is? (and right now my kitchen is green, white, and terra cotta) Or get the color that makes me happy?

Cobalt blue won out, so now I get to look forward to a new mixer, in shiny cobalt blue, and who the hell cares that it doesn’t match the rest of the kitchen?

Maybe I’ll repaint the kitchen to match my mixer…

HA!
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