Feb

3

2010

The snow has been coming down …

The snow has been coming down again and it’s busy settling. Visions of sub-zero temperatures and more burst pipes… arggh! Do Not Want!

Jan

28

2010

And here’s the obligatory test…

And here’s the obligatory test post checking to see if my Twitter -> Wordpress shenanigans is still working after I set the plug-in going.

Jan

28

2010

Twitter Amalgamation – Super Special Bonus Banality!

For a while now I’ve been wondering how I could possibly make my site even more tediously inconsequential while still giving it the façade of a throbbing hive of activity. It was quite a head scratcher. Luckily, and as is usually the case, the intaweb was there to steal from inspire me! Twitter, of course!

A few months ago I laid claim to my very own Twitter account, protecting the ‘Skoardy‘ brand on yet another digital frontier, and had been dropping 140 character lumps of wisdom on a (very small) circle of people far too kind to unfollow me.

But it’s time to further utilise that stream of sh… um, conciousness and feed it directly to this site. You might have spotted two remarkably short posts directly below this one, already. Yeah, that’s the new plug-in (Twitter Tools by Alex King) hard at work. The short nature of the posts highlighted a couple of flaws in my year-or-so old theme but they’ve already been fudged fixed.

So look forward to a bright future full of 140 character long posts detailing things you probably never even knew you didn’t want to know until you came here. Right… how do I funnel my Facebook crap onto the site…?

Jan

24

2010

One of those days – opened a b…

One of those days – opened a box of matches upside down and then proceeded to try and strike up the wrong end of the match… a ‘few’ times.

Jan

17

2010

Slept funny last night and rea…

Slept funny last night and really want to sneeze. Each time I get to the explosive conclusion, my back twinges and puts me off. Infuriating!

Nov

28

2009

Greetings from the hand

Long time, no post! Yeah, things have been a little ‘distracting’ lately and I’ve found myself with little I wanted to warble on about. Still, better late than never, eh? And I’ve found some to mention (or at least something to try out).

You see, I’ve recently gotten hold of one of those iPod Touch doofers and while tootling around the app store, came across a Wordpress app that allows you to edit/create entries. I could probably do it via the built-in web browser (though the interface might be a bind to wade through), but I thought I’d give this a bash instead.

All in all, it’s pretty easy to use. The usual fat-fingers problem with the on-screen keyboard but I’m getting a fair pace out of it. Daft thing – I’m sat right in from of my desktop PC while tapping this out but, like I said, I wanted to give this a try.

So that’s that for my first ‘mobile’ update. Who knows, maybe I’ll do more like this – maybe even while out and about… like on the loo or something!

(Joking!)

May

31

2009

Angus freaks me out!

This post is about Angus T. Jones, one-third (or should that be one-fifth?) of Two And A Half Men. I’ve nothing against the kid and it’s not even that Angus specifically, as a person, that freaks me out. It’s that damn title sequence for the show. It’s gotten decidedly creepy and all evidence points to it getting worse for some time to come.

If you were one of the imaginary visitors who used to read my old site, you’d know I sometimes get a bit obsessed with TV show title sequences. I mean, we’re into season 5 of ‘Lost‘, people, and the BASTARDS still haven’t fixed the god-damned gaps in that rendered logo that flies past. The only way I could forgive it now is if the thing was integral to the plot and given how screwy the show has gotten, there’s actually a fair chance of that being true!

Anyway, back to Angus. Like I said, I’ve no problem with the actor. Sure, he’s no Olivier but that’s not really what the show demands. My gripe is with that morph they do when the little ditty they’re lip-syncing to comes to an end and ‘cute as a button’ little Angus goes all you-wouldn’t-like-me-when-I’m-angry and stretches out into teen Angus. Then he grins. Yeah, maybe that last little bit of creepiness is all Angus but the morph? Ick!

And it’s only going to get worst. This morph is something they’re updating every season, so that as Mr. Jones growth-spurts his way further from the cherubic mug that started this gig back in 2003, I can only assume he’ll start disappearing off the top of the screen. They’ve already announced the series has another three seasons all signed up. It’s going to be grotesque!

The series creator, Chuck Lorre has joked that the show remains ‘Two And A Half Men’ despite Angus becoming a ‘whole’ all to himself since both his co-stars are shrinking as age takes it’s toll. Given how he’s grown, I think either Charlie Sheen or Jon Cryer are going to have to lose a limb or two by season 9 just to even things out.

Apr

2

2009

Stinker, looking for love

Although the Valentine’s day inspired ‘Love is in the Air‘ world event in World of Warcraft may be a distant memory and even the crying on the forums about the random nature of the Be Mine meta achievement has died down, there is still one critter out there desperately trying to ‘get his groove on’… and failing.

I am of course talking about the mighty Stinker. Now, I’ve already managed to obtain this pet (as detailed here) but was quite amused to find the bods at Blizzard have given this critter a little extra oomph in the personality department. Quite clearly inspired by the legendary skunk philanderer Pepé Le Pew, it seems our little Stinker has a thing for the ladies. And by ‘ladies’, I mean cats. Specifically, the Bombay Cat and the Black Tabby Cat.

Whenever Stinker spots either of these felines, he falls instantly in love, chasing his prey around the area until he is finally scorned and his heart breaks. All together now… awwwww.

Don’t worry though, old Stinker has the memory of a goldfish and will again be pursuing the unobtainable within seconds.

Feb

25

2009

The Proto-Drake Whelp is mine!

Okay, okay, I promise not to announce every single thing I acquire in World of Warcraft like this but this particular vanity pet has me more than a little pleased for the moment. Partly because it completes the ’set’ and partly because it’s one of those long slog kind of rewards to get. Let me explain (and show you how to get your hands on the flying bundle of fun to the left)…

The Proto-Drake Whelp comes from the Cracked Egg, which comes from owning a Mysterious Egg for the alloted 7 days – after which, it transforms and the roulette of what you get can begin. The Mysterious Egg can be bought from Geen, the Oracles Quartermaster once you have Revered reputation with them (and 3 gold to spare). You’ll find this race of Gorlocs in their village at Rainspeaker Canopy, in Sholazar Basin, Northrend. Yep, you’ll need to be tootling around in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion for this reward.

Now, building reputation with these beasties requires you to have finished the Oracles quest line, ending with ‘A Hero’s Burden‘. This quest has you taking down an elite mob, Artruis the Heartless (so maybe bring friends) but during the fight, you’ll be attacked by a Gorloc and a Wolvar (the Frenzyhart Tribe being the other warring faction in the Basin – by this point you’ll have met them already). Who you kill decides which faction’s daily quests you can take. If you’re going for the Oracles rewards, you’ll want to beat the puppy to a pulp. Complete the quest chain and you’ll be honoured with the Oracles but hated by the Frenzyhearts. Meh. Never liked those slave-driving morons much anyway.

Right, now just do the daily quests in the Basin to earn that Revered standing and you can purchase an Mysterious Egg. Stick it in the bank for a week and forget about it. When you come back, crack that sucker open and then cry because, chances are, you’ll just get some Aged Yolk for all your effort. Don’t worry, you can buy another egg but that means another seven days. Yay!

If you happen to get lucky, you’ll receive one of four possible vanity pets. In order of how common they apparently are, you could get either a Tickbird Hatchling, a White Tickbird Hatchling, a Cobra Hatching or our friend up there, the Proto-Drake Whelp. If you’re really, really lucky (2% drop rate according to Wowhead), you could wind up with the Reins of the Green Proto-Drake, a flying mount!

No. I haven’t got that yet. *mutter* *grumble* Note – you can get the same pet even if you’ve already learnt that one. Great for flogging on the auction house, not so great if you’re impatient for some other reward.

So there you have it. How to get your very own Proto-Drake Whelp. It’s not a hard process and not particularly expensive either, just time consuming. Yes, I’ll probably be swimming in Aged Yolks before I ever get the flying mount but I’ve got my mind set on it.

Oh, and if you do get everything and become Exalted with the Oracles, don’t forget to switch back to the Frenzyheart Tribe faction, complete their daily quests and become Exalted with them so that you can earn the Mercenary of Sholazar achievement!

Jan

20

2009

Bleaurgh… IE

Pretty much just a follow-up to one of my earlier posts (‘Skoardy v3.0‘) where I unveiled/announced my revamp of the Skoardy.com theme. I was pretty happy with the results as I’d almost managed to achieve everything I set out to with the new look and also added some elements I’d overlooked the first time I switched everything over to WordPress.

Of course, I have little-to-no faith in my skills with CSS, hence the comments about not coughing. It’s a rickety set of stairs, the outer shell of Skoardy.com, and give it too much of a hammering and it’s likely to fall apart. But, it looked okay and everything was where it should be… or so I thought.

In comes Microsoft’s Internet Explorer with it’s size 9 clod-hoppers and its own unique take on what things should look like. Normally, I use Firefox as my default browser. It’s small, fast and best of all, with the right add-ons, you’ll never need to see another advert again. It looked fine on that. I even tried the site with Google’s Chrome – the new kid of the block that’s also small/fast. Also, looked fine. And with IE? Yeah…um, well, it was borked on IE.

I don’t usually like booting IE up. These days it seems there’s always some kind of new exploit being reported and death from within for anyone foolish enough to take it for a spin on the intahwebs. Eventually, I worked up the nerve to have a look. Things were misplaced, oddly positioned and some bizarre gaps were appearing. One by one, I managed correct the flaws, writing in more specific code so that even IE couldn’t get creative with my instructions. Everything was fixed, except for some gaps in the sidebar. I know IE users take up the market share of web tourists (seriously guys, switch to a new browser already!) so I wanted to fix it but nothing I tried could get rid.

So every few days I’d get a new idea and try it out with the hope that it’d fix the problem without breaking the site for other browsers. Every time, same result. Nada.

Tonight, however, the new fix worked and everything fell into place. Better still, it’s something that other browsers appear to care little about. Of course, this is just with version 7 of IE. If it’s broken on older versions, screw you. Upgrade… or better still, switch to a new browser already!