Only tennis now

I have set up a new blog at my site. It is Word Press.
Click the link in the title.

However I will be using this blog mainly for tennis now.

Pain and age

Just before I begin my tale of woe, I just looked at Technorati. I have quite a few links there already.


Just got back to the computer after days of pain. It started out as a stiff and sore neck. I don't know what I did. Probably just moved. Then the pain began to shoot up the back of my head. Ooh! Brain haemorrhage? Stroke? Brain tumour? Just a tad on the anxious side. My Nurofen and my Panadiene just weren't doing anything to ease these stabs of sharp pain which occured every 3 seconds or so.
And it's the weekend now. No doctors on duty. Perhaps the Emergency department? No, I can't go there and say I have a headache. But it wasn't a headache as such. Just shots of pure pain out of one spot on the head.

So I rang my dear cousin in Sydney who happens to be a doctor and she told me not to worry too much, it was pain being referred from the neck strain.

Monday morning, after basically being an invalid and 'in a coma' again for 2 days, found me at the docs. Same diagnosis. But got a script for Panadiene Forte and bought Nurofen Plus. Now I can say there's no pain. I bought myself some beautiful chocolate to celebrate.

It will last maybe a few weeks and I have to do neck exercises. It's age. The doc said we start to wear out our something. I always tune out immediately as soon as someone says 'as we get older'

So there you are. I'm okay now hopefully but very drugged up and not quite with it.

Turn your PC into a website

This is a fairly useful little application.
What it does is have on your desktop a list of all your files in order as in a web site. I can't test it myself as I am running out of virtual memory. Help!!!

give aways

On the left you will see an image of Give away of the day: a useful site where you could be lucky in getting some software which you would normally pay for, for free. I've added their feed also.

Northern Territory aborigines imprisoned

This post is not to do with web design but with the indigenous population of Australia (aborigines).
It is an issue which I have been involved with all my life as my parents were also.
Today, the Federal Government has made an announcement that it will legislate to overtake Northern Territory laws and Land Acts concerning aborigines, in order to act on a report which has recently come out about the sexual abuse of Aboriginal children in the NT and alcohol abuse.
In Australia, territories are still run by the Federal Government. The ACT is another territory. They have Chief Ministers rather than State premiers.
The new laws include alcohol restrictions on all aboriginal people in the NT.
Those receiving welfare will have 50 % of their cheques held to ensure that children go to school and get meals. Presumably if that doesn't happen, the welfare recipients will lose those benefits (great).
There will be compulsory health checks of all children for signs of sexual abuse.
All X rated films, and porn on computers will be banned with all computers checked for porn (only for aborigines)
In the remote communities people who work for the dole will clean them up!

Well, well, does it sound authoritarian to you? Or just paternalistic. It certainly sounds like we are going back to the fifties.
Don't all ethnic groups suffer from child abuse? Alcohol abuse?
Is there an assumption there that alcohol and porn causes sexual child abuse?
Our Prime Minister, John Howard, announced these changes today. Already aborigines are saying this is genocide in that more stresses on aborigines will kill them.

I haven't gone into the state of health or quality of life of Australian aborigines. I'm sure most of you know how appalling that is.
So what do you think?

Snap shots and other widgets

I have just discovered Snapshots
You can't put them on blogger.com without a lot of trouble, but I have placed them on one page of my site. What they do is show the web page of the external link you have provided. You just move the mouse over the link. Each link also has a logo so it brings the eye to the link.
People don't need to click out of your site unless they see a site they really want to go to.

It doesn't take too long before the links are showing up in a popup box as you move the mouse over. Click the title link and give me some feedback on what you think about these.

You can also improve the look of your RSS feed by making a widget box like you see on the left. Very easy to install in Blogger and acts as an RSS feed too.

Meebo and Talkr

I've just given Meebo and Talkr a run through and don't really recommend either.
Meebo is a widget one can place on a blog or web site which allows visitors to talk to you and others in the 'room'. Trouble is you have to be connected to Meebo and stay on Meebo's page in order for you to be online on your web site or blog. You can use Google Talk, AIM, MSN or Yahoo.
It's a bit like other products which have proved a little useless. Maybe Sitepal is better.
You need to be able to be offline for people to still message you. Meebo doesn't allow that.

Talkr sounds like a good idea. It says it will reproduce the feed on your web site or blog into a podcast. That sounds useful, but I found it difficult to configure. Blogspot ( this sort of blog) doesn't allow for its automatic configuration. One has to add css selectors for widgets and so on in the right palce in the template. If you can do that it might be useful.

Italian web sites hacked

I've just heard on the BBC news that Italian web sites (mostly Tourist sites) have been attacked by malware. This is in order to find the user names and passwords for bank account details.
The Italians are trying to find all domains affected and informing clients.

Another way to protect detection of keyword strokes is to download a keyboard which sits on your computer.

You should look at my keeping your computer secure from malware and viruses.

Okay so here's the new template

Not too sure about this template. I like the colours, but I'd prefer my profile and other elements not permitted to go down the left side.

Today I got up, which, as I'm usually in a coma, is a feat in itself. I checked how many came to my web site after sending out a newsletter. Then I got on a roll, cleaning up: washing, dishes, floors.

I was inspired by a TV program last night which was about an Australian runner who, at the age of 60, is the fastest runner in the world for his age. I decided I was going to walk up to the shop to buy my fags, my only vice. The blood started to move round the body and as it was cold, and I wore warm jumpers and a coat, when I got back to my heated house I had to strip off for the rest of the night.

That's it for now. I'm going to have to find some links before I post, since one cannot navigate away from this post.

Wow! Am I the last to know

So Google has taken over Blogger.com. Okay, I've got 3 google accounts. No worries.
I've just been there wondering why my sitemap wasn't being verified. The site map for another site I mean. I had been using another sitemap generator which google doesn't like. I think it is more for a blog than a web site.
Anyway, I searched for how to make a google sitemap and found another generator which said it was a google sitemap generator. It does look different.
I've been looking for a web gallery maker for a friend too. There don't seem to be too many good free ones. I'm loathe to spend money for my web site as it concentrates on free software and tutorials.

I have just found out about Firefox add-ons though.
I've listed the add-ons which assist web designers.
Firefox add-ons

I've used them myself too. Quite useful.

I like the little addition of 'labels for post'
And I've added the bookmark widget to my blog. It allows users to add to many social network sites and gives you statistics. However, the statistics are being offered free only for now. That might change in the future.

You should see the bookmark widget on the right.


My son and his girlfriend have been living together for 4 months now.
My son also has a 6 hour exam tomorrow (today) for Physics Honours. Poor thing.
That's what he needs from us for still. Help to soothe his nerves and our devoted interest in his academic progress.