Zibblog

Occasionally, I start to feel like I’ve overloaded myself with information in the general sense. Everything from blog feeds that I’m attempting to read to books on my shelf to projects in my head. Sometimes it feels like I’m about to explode. That’s why, sometimes, it just feels good to watch some Stargate Atlantis. Oh yeah, Stargate Atlantis. You know you love it.

Hopefully, I’ll have something more insightful to post tomorrow. Maybe I’ll just write about how my Chicago Bears kicked some 49er ass on Sunday. Um … actually, I just wrote that. Guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

A while back, I purchased an issue of Make magazine. What’s odd is that it is something by O’Reilly without an animal on the cover. However, what it lacks in cover animals, it makes up with general geekiness. Anyway, when I purchased a subscription online, I selected to receive the next issue rather than the current issue since I already owned it. However, the current issue proceeded to arrive on my doorstep. Being busy with more important things, I decided to simply give away the extra issue, which ended up in the hands of Charlie. Figuring I was just going live with not getting an issue of my subscription, I suddenly got the following email today.

Thank you for subscribing to MAKE. In reviewing our files we realized that we began your subscription with the current issue (VOL 3). You requested that we start it with VOL 4 (which mails in October 2005).

To make up for our error we have added an additional issue to the end of your current subscription. As far as the VOL 3 that you received, please keep it with our compliments.

Thank you again for your support. We appreciate your readership.

It isn’t often that one of these things works out without some sort of long phone conversation or email exchange.

In my search for the domain name that screams “Zibbler!!!!”, I’ve settled on CoveringDistance.com. It works as a running reference and it embodies some of my opinions on life and the zen of running. It will be the final home of the zibblog and all things zibbler. I’ve got some ideas for non-blog content that I’ve been wanting to put up for awhile, so we’ll see how it goes. Thanks to all of the suggestions from friends of mine that included

• s.az
• shawnoftheneb.com
• ilikepastries.com
• zellerziggurat.com (based on a random joke about my opening up Zeller’s Ziggurat Bar & Casino some day in Korea)

I figured I’d post a couple of pics of the business card that Rus was kind enough to work on. The one to the right was one of the examples that he put together to get a read on what I was looking for. I have the other couple of cards somewhere, but didn’t feel like looking for them because I liked this one much more. Anyway, I threw at him some of the original text listed here with the idea that my dad’s name should feature somewhat prominently in the design to differentiate it from anything involving my extended family members. I showed this to my parents and got some comments from a couple of friends, which brings us to what ended up being the final design for the front.

We played around with the image until we got to the card pictured here. In the end, I think this one has a more balanced look and Rus played around with the filters until he got a look that was a little brighter and not as white as the other one. I also thought that it would look nice if we used the back for contact information, which gave us the last image. All in all, I’m pretty happy with the end result. Now, I just have to find a place to print it at.

The other item of note is that I finally got a hosted account with DreamHost in order to host zellerfurniture.com and to possibly be the future home of the zibblog. Currently, there is nothing on the site, but hopefully, I’ll get something up in the next couple of weeks. They had a pretty good hosting deal if you signed up for 2 years, so I figured why not and went ahead and did the signup for 2 years.

Just when I start to think that my life is simply devoted to bug fixing, some stuff starts to work itself out. I sat down with Rus last night and after a couple of hours of playing with Illustrator and Photoshop, we tweaked Rus’s original design for business cards for my dad until we were happy with it. Mostly, it was Rus trying out some stuff and me saying “more of that” and “maybe less of that”. I’m really happy with them, and I’m hoping to get them printed up by the time my parents go back home to Nebraska at the end of Sept. (they get here at the end of next week). We worked up a version of the cards with my contact info as well so that if people see items like my soon to be built entertainment center and are interested, they can have a bay area point of contact.

In addition, I got a tracking number for the last backordered piece of my plasma tv. I was waiting for a module that plugs into the tv to allow it to accept HDMI signals. When it’s in place, I can give the DVD player its own tv input, and I’ll only have to switch cables between the xbox and digital cable box. It’s funny how just a couple of random things coming together can make the whole week go much more smoothly, even when it’s just bug fixing … all day long.