The FuzzyBlog!
Marketing 101. Consulting 101. PHP Consulting. Random geeky stuff. I Blog Therefore I Am.

Saturday, August 17, 2002

Business 101: Working From Home -- Keeping It Under Control My last day of "full time" work was something like September 19, 2000. That's when I lost my temper, left my dot com and re-entered the land of "Work at Home" people.  As you can tell from the quantity of output I produce here and other places, I'm probably the last person you'd think would be writing about keeping their work life under control.  Arguably my work life is not under control -- it fills my very being.  True.  But you should bear in mind that just because someone doesn't do something, that doesn't mean they don't know how to do it -- but, perhaps, they choose not to.  That's my situation.  I know how to work from home and maintain a balance between work and home.  I'm choosing not to.  For now.  Anyway ...   12 Tips for Working from Home But Keeping it Under Control ==> Read Story <== 7:22:34 AM  Google It!  comment []   IM Me About This

Why I'm Not Reading Your Blog and Why Others May Not Be Also I find myself more and more bookmarking blogs and never going back to them.  Or even for blogs I know I want to read, I find myself not reading them.  And that really bothers me.  As someone who blogs regularly, some with say compulsively, I should read more blogs.  Here are two of the main reasons I'm not reading your blog (and I do apologize): *&*### Font Size is Locked Down!!!!  Depending on how you setup your CSS sheet, people with certain browsers, say IE 5 - 6 on a PC, can't raise the font size of the main text.  I run 1600x1200 on a 19" monitor and that means that 10 point type is, well, just plain freaking teeny tiny.  Here's a blog I'd like to read regularly but I don't really since it's just too small (but it's good): http://www.englers.org/ So if you have this issue, and it's a LOT of you, please, please, please go to www.diveintomark.org and read his work on accessibility and fix your CSS sheet.  I did it for this blog.  Not everyone who reads blogs is 22 with perfect vision. I'm 34 and work on a screen like 16 to 18 hours per day.  That means huge eye strain.  Now, before you tell me "switch browsers", let me address that: Mozilla.  Yes it has better sizing over rides.  Doesn't work on my primary Windows 2K desktop.  Crashes it cold and has done so since the .98 or so build.  Locks it down so hard that I have to turn the power off and churns > 256 megs of real memory.  No idea why.  Don't care.  Won't try anymore since the last time I tried, I lost a bunch of work in the crash. Opera.  Better but not my primary browser and I won't switch browsers just to read a blog or 20.  Would you? Galeon or Mozilla on Linux.  Galeon is a damn good browser.  It proves that innovation can exist in even "done" products like browsers.  Still while Galeon is better, the less than good fonts on Linux just kills me.  Everything is jaggy and I haven't figured out how to move real true type fonts into an X font server so that the fonts actually look good.  If anyone has a pointer to a reference on this, it would be appreciated. Lynx.  Thinking about it.   Thinking about it seriously at times. Update Frequency.  Don't get me wrong.  I know that blogging daily is hard.  Still, in this Internet era of ours, we really, really like content that's updated regularly.  Think about blogging smaller things but more frequently.  Why?  It means that readers know to come to you daily.  And, I know that you'll probably say "Dude!!!! News Aggregator.  Learn It!  Use It!  Live It".  I know, I know.  But I like to read blogs in the way the author intended them to be presented.  So, daily, I run thru a list of links and when I suspect they won't be updated, I just skip over them. So there you have it.  2 reasons why I'm not reading your blog.  I apologize but the 1st one in particular makes it hard. 5:46:43 AM  Google It!  comment []   IM Me About This

It'll Probably Be a Slow Weekend Here I know I've said that before but I'm trying to pull a pretty hard core weekend coding.  It's too damn hot to do anything (it's 5 am in Boston and already hot) anyway since I lack air conditioning in my car which basically nukes the idea of going anywhere without either sweating thru my clothes or bringing new clothes where ever I go (which is a drag and people look funny at you when you show up a) wet and b) say immediately "where's the bathroom, I need to change").  I spent 2 hours in bumper to bumper traffic on Thursday, if you saw someone changing out of formal clothes into shorts in a Boston tunnel on Thursday between 5 and 7 -- that was me, sweating like I'd reached the 1st circle of Dante's inferno.  And, while I know that I need to replace my car with something with air conditioning, that seems like effort.  *Not a Fan of Shopping of Any Type When I'm By Myself* I'd rather work ... And, of course, I always say "It'll be a slow weekend and then that blogpulsion (i.e. compulsion to blog) hits and ... watch out!  So who knows.  My intention is to code.  But ... Heh!  I see that I've brought another person into the Radio fold and I spoke to her yesterday and she says she's moved to updating her blog daily.  Not a lot of content but some.  That's cool.  An old, old, old friend of mine, who's now doing a phd in bioinformatics of all things is at: http://radio.weblogs.com/0111188/ or: A Blonde on Bioinformatics and Aromatherapy A blonde babe's writings on bioinformatics, biotech, and (believe it or not) aromatherapy. Now that's a blog title.  *Beams with Pride*  I couched her on it, I'll admit it.  Sure.. It's sexist but it's also good "blog marketing".  With a serious background in biology (Hopkins Master), she knows her stuff.  Worth Reading: About our Favorite Drug, Caffeine: http://radio.weblogs.com/0111188/2002/08/15.html#a6 About Getting New Drugs to Market: http://radio.weblogs.com/0111188/2002/07/31.html#a4 5:14:22 AM  Google It!  comment []   IM Me About This