Year: 2007

A comment I left over at ChuckVision: Six Teeth of Terror in response to their short discussion on television shows we all know/love/hate.

Technically, Firefly didn’t get even a full season. Only 14 episodes were shot and of those only 12 ever aired. Fortunately, the poo-heads decided include the “extra” episodes on the DVDs.

Also, why no mention of NBC’s hit series Heroes!?!? Or This Old House?!?!? Or A New Yankee Workshop?!?!? What kind of craptacular list is this?

And if you’ve not seen enough of the new Doctor Who to judge how good it is; well they’ve got it over at Netflix. I hear that those nasty internet pirates also put it online and people all over the world have been downloading/watching it.

Aeon Flux was some really twisted shit animation which never seemed to explain anything but was still entertaining to me when it originally aired on MTV.

ALF was a show I liked as a kid and now I wonder what kind of damage it did to my brain.

American Idol is a show that I depise but my wife loves. So I either get to listen to horrible singing or flee the room.

Boston Legal, at least the bits with James Spader and William Shatner, is fuckin’ hilarious.

Charmed started off interesting and then turned into a Gilmore Girls with magic. *belch*

Commander in Chief was fun to watch, but then they did their mid-season break and I lost interest. I wonder if it’s even still on the air?

Cowboy Bebop is a fabulous anime. We might even have a copy around (I’d have to check) to lend you; if you like. It’s got a similar western-in-space feeling to it like Firefly but also with a healthy dash of blues/jazz.

CSI: NY had the disadvantage of coming out after the networks had started beating the concept to death, but has more (in #s and quality) interesting characters than the original CSI.

Gundam Wing is crap. If you want a good anime series set in the Gundam universe, you want to watch Gundum 0083: Stardust Memories.

Lost is another show that I caught some of and liked but after their mid-season break, I found no desire to go back and watch more of it.

MacGyver is another favorite from my younger years.

Monk: Since we don’t get the USA network, I’ve seen this show like 4-5 times. However everytime I’ve seen it; it’s been really good.

NCIS is my favorite of the current crop of crime scene investigation shows. That wacky cast is what keeps me coming back week after week. 🙂

Quantum Leap is a show I remember watching and enjoying when I was younger. But that’s about all I remember about it now, still I think I’d like to revisit the show and watch it again.

Star Trek: Meh.

Star Trek: The Next Generation was a regular feature in our house when I was growing up.

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Watched some of it, kind of liked it but never got attached.

Stargate Atlantis comes in again as a show I like to watch because I like the wacky characters.

Stargate SG-1 is the older sibling to Stargate Atlantis and seems to be tired & boring in comparison.

The Avengers, particularly the episodes with Diana Rigg as Emma Peel, was fabulous! Well worth the $$$ to get the box set!

The Mythbusters is a show that actually makes me think I should up my cable subscription to get more channels so I can watch it. Too bad I’m too cheap to do it for 1 show.

Twin Peaks was lovely in a severely twisted sort of way. A total cult classic.

In my day job, I deal with massive databases of business listing information. Occasionally, I am required to go through those listings to review the sites attached to the listings. And for the love of god, people you’re making my eyes bleed. In hopes that some of you out there find this blog post and are willing to fix your site, here’s a few tips.

Give your homepage the title of your company.

When you build your site, make sure your company’s name is the title of your home page. It should not be things like: “Welcome!”, “email”, “under construction” or “index”. This makes your site both more professional and easier for search engines to properly index your site.

Do not use massive amounts of Macromedia Flash/Javascript/Animated Gifs.

Some truly amazing things can be done with Flash. Using it to animate your navigation is not one of them. Flash is best used sparingly as it limits your audience, blocking the blind for your site and users of mobile internet devices (e.g. cellphones).

Likewise, javascript should be sparingly and the site should degrade gracefully when a user without javascript visits. Which is to say if your navigation or other major site features break without javascript; then you’ve done something wrong. So go back and fix it!

The occasional animated gif can add impact and interest to your site; while dozens are annoying and look amateurish.

Color is important, but try not to blind your site visitors.

When you blind your site visitors with odd bad color choices; they will move on to your competitors. Along the same lines if you have overly complicated background images behind the text of your website; you are marking it harder for people to read what you have to say. Keep it simple for maximum impact.

Make sure all your links have logical names.

Naming your various pages as: “Page 1”, “Page 2”, etc… might seem simple and easy, but it makes those links useless to your visitors. How can anyone other than you know that “Page 1” is the page where you sell dildos or whether it is the page where you’re selling balloons? They can only find out by clicking the link.

Avoid Comic Sans MS

While Comic Sans MS may seem like a fun, cheery sort of font to you; it’s been greatly overused and most people find it annoying/unprofessional.

So faithful readers that’s my list of big tips for the small business owner who wants a web presense. Did I miss one of your hot button issues? If so, please add it in a comment!

Updated: 2007-03-19

Kind readers have added some extremely good tips that I should have remembered in the comments on this post!

Mark’s Rating: 1.75 out of 5 stars

Friday, Ariesna and I were originally planning on having guests over. When we found out they were all canceling due to the weather; we hit up the video store and got a couple of movies. When we got home, the first one we watched was The Marine. I’d selected it because I remembered the trailers leading me to believe it would be a fun action flick. However after watching it, I have to declare it to be a steaming flaming pile of poo. From weak fight sequences to bad acting, this movie embodies the worst hackneyed and cliched parts of every C-movie action flick ever to be made. That being said if one watches this movie, thinking of it more like a parody of the genre (e.g. in the vein of Scary Movie) then it can be enjoyable. I spent the vast majority of the film’s 91 minutes laughing as cliche after cliche was perpetrated on the screen. I cannot, in good conscience, recommend this film to any one; though it could make the basis of a good drinking game (every one takes a shot for every cliche used in the film). However one would have to be careful with such a game to avoid getting alcohol poisoning!

Mark’s Rating: 3.75 out of 5
Johnny Blaze a motorcycle stunt rider with a carnival sells his soul to Mephistopheles in a bargain to cure his father’s cancer. The next day Blaze Sr. dies in motorcycle accident. Johnny blames Mephistopheles for his father’s death, but is still bound by his contract. Years later, Mephistopheles calls on Johnny Blaze to become the Ghost Rider and prevent Blackheart from stealing the contract of San Venganzas.

Fans of the original 70’s comic book may find themselves enjoying this movie, as will lovers of chessy flicks1. Which is to say this movie is no great work of cinematography, but it is an enjoyable film. And one I have no hesitation in recommending for anybody to enjoy at a matinee or a cheap seats theater.

1 E.g. Army of Darkness

We got hit with a blizzard warning for the weekend and last night things were not looking pretty out the windows. Then about 6:30 PM, the power went out. Fortunately, our house has a fireplace so we were able to stay warm until the power came back on around 1:00 AM this morning. We trooped up to bed, got a few hours rest and then went outside to shovel the sidewalks. *blech* Days like today make me hate having a corner lot (twice the sidewalks to shovel). The sidewalks had 4 layers on them: snow, slush, ice and water. It made shovelling the walk even more hellish than usual. Fortunately we have kind neighbors who lent us their snowblower which got rid of the snow and some of the slush. But that left us with plenty of ice and water. A few hours of backbreaking labor later, we had the sidewalks as clean we were going to get them and came back inside. Gack. You have to love living here; otherwise you go insane. I have the pleasant advantage of not loving it, but keeping my sanity locked in a box so I never lose it. :p