September 9, 2009
Is This Thing On?
Nope, you’re not mistaken. Your RSS reader isn’t lying to you, though I’m surprised you’re able to see anything through all the cobwebs that have probably accumulated over this pane in Google Reader. But yes there is, in fact, new content on Cabeeb.com. And if you’ve followed your curiosity to actually navigate to http://cabeeb.com, you’ll hopefully notice that content isn’t the only thing that’s new.
This blog has been horrifically overdue for a jump-start for far too long now. I can’t imagine anyone disputing that my blogging report card this past year is one giant F-. Why, I even had the audacity to “relaunch” with a new design a little less than a year ago. Since then, I’ve posted three (3) full blog posts, and possibly a dozen aside updates. I should be ashamed of myself, and as luck would have it, I am.
Fortunately, as luck would further have it, I’m not too ashamed to admit my mistakes and move past them. And in this case, moving past them looks a whole heck of a lot like what you’re seeing right now.
I started the redesign process with some vague ideas and sketches in early June, but it wasn’t until mid-July that I really started to spend a significant amount of time on it. One big hurdle was that I wanted to design it from scratch myself. This being the first site that I’ve ever actually designed as opposed to just focusing on the code, it took a good deal of practice, experimentation, scrapped ideas, and helpful feedback from a few friends. In the end, I ended up picking a color scheme and general visual style and running with it, designing it largely as I coded it.
Early on, I was significantly influenced by the hyper-retro visual and musical style of the iPhone game, Eliss, as well as the indie, subtley-throwback sound of Phoenix’s latest album, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix. Clearly, these weren’t direct inspirations, but they helped point me toward the style I eventually went with, and I think the blog still considers them grandfather figures.
So now, two months, dozens of hours, a thousand lines of CSS, and countless iTunes playlists later, it’s live. Still a work in progress, mind, but live and functional. I’m definitely happy with where it is, and very excited about getting back into the habit of posting new content.
And yes, as the Recent Cabeebage section of the sidebar may lead you to believe, I am going to start putting up some technical (by my standards) posts. And Websinal? Well, I suppose it’s those posts that fall somewhere between Personal and Technical. Gadgets, apps, life on the web, social media, technology, etc. It should probably be called Geeksinal.
I should probably be called Geeksinal.
Sweet goodness I love every thing about this blog and this delicious new design.
Awesome refresh man. :)
I really want to find time to clean mine up now. : shakes fist :
Thanks, man! Can’t wait to see what you come up with!
Well this will be a tough act to follow. I’m constantly inspired by just about everything you do.
“Geeksinal.”
Brilliant. : sigh :
LOVE, LOVE, LOVE the vintage look, man. Also, I can’t stop mousing over spectrum at the top. Pure jQuery sexiness. Grats, my friend, on a blog well done.
Love the retro look. Thanks for posting this on my lucky day, 9/9/09. What more could a cousin ask for than a posting from Cabeeb? I ask you.
Goooooosh dangit. You’re gonna down right inspire me to start this crap up again. :sigh:
By “start this up” I assume you mean that you intend to write another blog post and then let your blog rot for 9 months? http://shelbmeister.com/?p=78
: ahem :
:|
Fine job sir. Makes me want to pull out my Intellivision console and play a game of Burger Time. I ♥ this…alot.
I love it! You have done a fabulous job with the throwback style. Your personality shines through on this my friend, in genius ways. Congrats! :)
Color palate and typography for the win! Good jeorb. LOL @ ‘most rights shy; all rights reserved”
Oh Caleb you’re so awesome, blah blah blah… well enough of this gishy gooey talk. Let’s get down to business. Header – check, menu – check, sidebar – check, content – double check. Now that I have done a thorough review and made sure all standard elements are in place, I will continue with the test of sexiness. Logo – sexy, jquerified sidebar and other elements – EXTRA sexy, content – too much sexiness to handle. Looks like you’ve earned yourself a “O” on your O.W.L. (overwaited website look) exam. And while that may not seem as good as an “A”, I know a few wizards who would disagree with you.
Keep up the great work.
I really enjoyed this and I am very excited to see some more posts. Now if only you and Josiah can get back to making some videos that would be greaT!! yeah that’s right greaT with a Capital T! what!