PigPog

Red-eye reducing flash is getting old. the next step is eliminating blinking.

I have my own method, but people tend to struggle when I apply the duct tape.

Goldfinch in Our Back Garden
Originally uploaded by pigpogm.

A goldfinch in our back garden. Only cost us £5 to get the whole back garden chopped flat, and this little critter got to eat the proceeds. Bargain.

After spending too much time this morning clearing up spam in our Wiki, I’ve reluctantly made it so only people who sign in can edit.

I noticed a while ago that Merlin did the same thing to the 43 Folders wiki, and wondered at the time if it would come to that here too. Anyone can sign up, and it only takes a minute, so if you want to edit, please don’t let this stop you. I was just wasting too much time clearing away the spam.

If anyone has a bit more insight in running a Wiki, and has any advice on this, I’d be happy to hear it – just post a comment below.

Update: Thanks to ‘SpamKiller’ for picking off a bit I missed, and to ‘Segfault’ for doing some cleaning up for us recently. Looks like some people are still willing to sign up and help us out – thanks!

Just finished upgrading PigPog’s WordPress installation to the latest version, 1.5.1.1. All went pretty smoothly. Took a bit longer than intended, as I forgot about the ‘files’ folder, so all the images got broken, but even over dial up it only took a few minutes to replace it.

No work at all to migrate everything across – it does it all for you. You just enter your config info into the wp-config.php file (four lines to change), then point a browser at the upgrade.php file. You get a message headed ‘Step 1′, that explains that there only was one step, and you just did it. Very easy – nice work, Matt.

The Journalized Sand theme we’re using seems to work fine – had to add a ‘size’ argument to the ‘input’ tag for the search box to limit the width, as that seemed to be overflowing the left column in Internet Explorer (fine in FireFox).

Frank Clarke’s Simply Painting

I found this site after googling for more info on painting with acrylics and his system for getting into painting is so simple just about anyone can pick up a brush and get cracking. He offers courses on CD and DVD, and has taster lessons online. As I spent a fair amount of cash on an acrylics kit last week I decided to give the “Cheese, Apple and Grapes” painting a try.

The free taster had easy to follow sections, and I was quite impressed with the results. I’ll probably be buying the full course in the not-too-distance future (i.e. after pay day), and I’ll post a full review with more pics in the Wiki when I do.

I’ve seen this blogged a few places recently, but JWZ gets the link because he puts together the pictures. That’s one funky bubble building – for sale, if you’ve got the money.

Fans of the Cheapster PDA (the greener, leaner, meaner analog productivity device) who have had their appetite whetted by all the fun foldyness of it all might enjoy this course offered by Rufford Craft Centre:

Handcrafted books, albums or journals using simple or complex folding techniques. More than one book can be completed in the day, each with decorative covers using simple stitching and printing to make them completely individual

Fee £30 (cons £27)

Next week is Adult Learners’ Week, a “festival and celebration of adult learning”. Up and down the UK, Further Education colleges are having open days and offering taster sessions, awards presentations are taking place for successful adult learners, and demonstrations of all sorts of fun creative activities will be available for free to anyone who fancies a go.

It’s a great reminder that education doesn’t have to stop with leaving school, college or university. It’s also a great reminder that the path you choose in your youth doesn’t have to be the path you stay on. Thank God.

Check out the Adult Learners’ Week event calendar to see what’s going on in your area.

If you’re old enough to remember when the height of sophistamacated computer graphics thingymmies was a wireframe teapot rotating, check out this Commodore CBM 3032, featuring real wireframe teapot.

Moorhen Chick
Originally uploaded by pigpogm.