February 8th, 2018 @ 1:36 pm

well, i think i got off to a good kick-start posting again, and then a wrench got thrown into the mix…
i got laid off from my job of nearly 5 years.

🙁

i’ve been super bummed, as anyone would be.  just laying around like a sloth, cuddling with oscy and trying to get my mental faculties back together, but it’s really hard.  i’ve made so many close friends there, and i loved my company.  i keep thinking “stop feeling sorry for yourself, you idiot, things could be worse”, and i find myself repressing shit like i always do…  i’m trying to mourn properly.  that may seem a tad dramatic, but it’s true.  i have been released from a comfy, warm, steady life.  one where i could hang with one of my bffs whenever i wanted to, have a non-shitty commute with another buddy, and have lunch breaks full of laughs and good talks…  all gone.

i really need to cry… i HATE crying.  i avoid getting emotional like the plague.  i’m of the mentality that what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger (then i go off like a time bomb months later).  i really need to stop doing that.

i haven’t felt this way since my first web job’s company folded, and it was almost 5 years that i was there as well.  it’s almost like a breakup.  i mean, it’s half of a decade.  i should be upset and not just pretend it’s not happening.

i was actively starting to look for a new gig anyway, because i could tell my company was changing and depleting my role, so it’s not a huge surprise.  i was waiting to see if a new role was going to be available to me, since we acquired another company (which clearly never happened).  fortunately, i’ve been finding some great job listings and hopefully i’ll branch out to more creative than technical stuff.  i’m even looking for graphic design jobs.

i think i’m probably going to take a break from web for a bit since i’m so scatterbrained.  i haven’t really been using social media all that much, bc i don’t know what to even say.  like, how do you tweet about being depressed about something like this without getting pity replies?  that’s not what i want.  i barely post about personal things, not bc i want to seem like i have a sparkly/perfect life…  i don’t want people’s pity.  i guess i’m posting about it here, bc i just want to get it out and not bother the people i know IRL.  i’m being such a drag, and i don’t know how to get around talking about it.  i feel awful.

i need to concentrate on finding a fresh start and beefing up my portfolio.  graphic design is always best when i’m stressed, so i’m sure there will be new stuff on http://666.unruled.club soon (free lockscreen wallpapers).

February 25th, 2015 @ 3:25 pm

yesterday, i tweeted the following:
“mobile sucks the fun out of web design. as convenient as it may be, you can’t make cute layouts in mobile. fuck you, mobile.”

followed by:
“i’ve been doing this for 18 years. imagine a full canvas painter being forced to create/squeeze artwork on a post-it note… sads.”

i am one of those people that loathe change.  not only do i loathe change, i can’t stand when people try to fix something that isn’t broken.

when i started doing graphic and web design and web development back in the mid/late 90’s, things were different.  exciting, even.  i had a personal website (as many others in our little web community that i came across over the years), and every couple or few weeks, i’d switch up the layout.  to us, back then, this was challenging and fun.  our creative minds would reflect our interests and hobbies, while showing off our photoshop skills.  for myself, i came from the world of mario paint.  i would make the most complex pictures with that video game.  then i begged my mother for a computer.  then i discovered paint, and later on, my first boyfriend introduced me to photoshop.  it was a fun snowball.  once i discovered the layers in photoshop, my life was complete.

coming from the design/dev world of the late 90’s into the 2000’s, i knew the horrible pains of having to deal with early cross-browser bullshit, and the horror of dealing with several different resolution sizes.  i started designing in the days where AOL was your go-to browser.  YUP, i’ve put in my damn time.

once monitors started going flat, that meant wide.  that meant that everything us designers wanted to do – wide scale layouts – could finally be a reality!

…until mobile browsing soon came along. 😐

i don’t really want to get into the debate about mobile dev/browsing.  i will say, however, that i’m (obviously) definitely not a fan of it.  even though this article is from 2012, it still has completely relative points that i relate to, so i’ll let tom handle it.

my biggest beef has to do with the tweets aforementioned in this post.  although i’ve been doing a lot of the header/nav/content/sidebar/footer layouts in the last few years, i still LOVE layouts that are absolutely positioned/fixed/totally creative and OUT THERE.  creative, fun, out-of-the-box and different.  take a look at how i used to design…  it was so much fun, and the possibilities were endless.

granted, i could still pull off a bunch of those types of layouts, you can’t view a lot of them properly, on a phone browser!  in fact, i don’t even know if you can scroll iframes in a mobile browser, lol.

i don’t browse mobile websites.  i only use safari on my iphone for googling quick info, and browsing shops online that i screenshot of, and check on desktop later.  mobile versions of websites are awful, a lot of the time they lack information or navigation.  on responsive websites, you completely lose elements of the website.  and for what?  to read text larger?  people, all you have to do is double tap and it zooms in… just sayin.

October 29th, 2014 @ 5:03 pm

go grab one here…

July 18th, 2012 @ 2:23 pm

June 17th, 2012 @ 1:43 am

i redid my portfolio over @ S2UDIO tonight, and i felt weird when i was updating the homepage text, which was pitching the importance of having a website.  i felt like having a go to domain with a website isn’t going to be as important as it once was, because of sites like facebook and twitter, etc.

i think that everyone is so spoiled and reliant on smaller, more instant micro-updates, rather than directly visiting a site for “bigger” updates.  because of this, i think people would rather rely on a website like facebook.

i guess i wouldn’t consider myself a web-pioneer or anything, but do i remember the mid 90’s when people only went to AOL keyword pages and websites.  i’ve had my own website since around 1998, and always appreciate the importance of having a go-to information hub.  as a “blogger” (cringe), i still have this website (that now only sees less than 100 people a day, as opposed to other heavy traffic it saw years ago), i have a tumblr (for images only, really), twitter, instagram, aim, a flickr account, we heart it, it’s just endless.  now with pinterest (which i have, but don’t use), it seems like the better the technology, there’s more room for people to just get lost in the shuffle.  especially with the re-blog, re-pin, re-post options. (PS – people don’t use tags properly, nor do they provide sources, which is also frustrating.)

i don’t know if i sound like an old lady complaining about this, but i feel like it’s a bunch of chaotic bullshit.  as much as i love new technology and advancements, i wish it were like the early 2000’s still.  i’d be making a killing making websites, lol.

the demographic of people that could use my freelance services NOW sometimes complain about pricing, but what i charge is pretty inexpensive, especially for the quality and service of what you get.  because of the aforementioned sites, i feel like they’re less likely to see a website like that as a necessity.

i was seriously born in the wrong era.

March 30th, 2012 @ 11:26 pm

since i was out more nights this week than i was in, i decided to just chill out tonight…  i’m kicking back with kitty and trying to get some web work done.

not having a computer for a bit really took a hammer to getting freelance work done.  i completed a wedding website for my cousin in less than a day (woo! productive!), now i’m working on my friend kelly’s website to showcase her tattoo/art portfolio.

while i was eating dinner, i watched a show tonight that i have never heard of called “undercover boss” (clearly the CEO of a company goes undercover to see what their workers are all about).  i watched the episode with the yankee candle company’s CEO, harlan kent, going undercover to work at their flagship store, their factory, and two of their other retail locations.  he was focusing on one employee from each location, and getting to know them.  human-interest stories type of a show. honestly he was so good to those people, and it actually made me cry.

there’s more info here… i know people my age are usually out on friday nights, but it’s worth checking out if you’re into that kind of a show and just so happen to be home 🙂

January 26th, 2012 @ 9:47 pm

[my week in pictures]

i’m going to try to remember to do this weekly, as well as my nails (which apparently, i forgot to do already seeing as it’s thursday night vs. monday at any point).  these are whatever rad/important things that i managed to remember to snap last week. (mainly from IG – sorry if you’ve seen them already…)

the doors – riders on the storm, appropriately came on during a rainy day.

read more…

January 19th, 2012 @ 1:56 am

i’m too lazy to post, i don’t have a facebook or a google+, and i sort of fell off of twitter. the only thing i ever really do anymore is instagram. LAZY BETCH…

whatever, i keep meeting rad people on it and it’s the only social media i really use anymore…

i have been super busy freelancing, trying to stay above water as well. need rent monies and me and kitty need to eat!

so work first > my own website later, i guess.  although, i do find it important to work on this because it keeps my creative juices flowing… dur dur dur.

AKA NEW HEADER BECAUSE THE OTHER ONE WAS MAKING ME NAUSEOUS!

as far as work goes, i’m gonna take over 2012 projects now, i have a bunch of friends websites i need to start.  now that i’m getting projects out of the way, i’ll post about them as they get launched.

the amazingly talented homie jae (aka the cutest mommy in the whole entire world) and i, are going to start a site for the jewelry that we’ve been making.  other than that, i have to start working on my friends hair styling site, and i’ve got my friend kelly who is a tattoo artist coming up very shortly soon as well.

anyways, blah blah blah.  i shall now end my apologetic “i never post, i’ll try to start again” post now.

xo

November 30th, 2011 @ 9:14 pm

okay, i’m one day early from it being acceptable, suck it trebeck…  i put up my christmas tree the day after thanksgiving and i have these glade pine tree candles going, so i’m totally in the spirit.  so much in fact that i put on pandora’s christmas station and went to workin’ on cleaning, cooking dinner, and working on a new clients website.

i thought i heard zooey deschanel’s heavenly voice, so i checked to confirm, and i was indeed correct.  it was a track off of the she & him christmas album 🙂 check out some of she & him here (top/left – the record), and the christmas album specifically at amazon to preview.