Juicy Fruit and a 9-volt batteryI’m reading the book Designing With Web Standards by Jeffery Zeldman (of A List Apart fame) and I have to say that I’m absolutely LOVING this book! I cut my teeth on HTML 4 back in 1997 and the current meme of designing web sites based on web standards has been a bit of a confusing experience for me. I’ve been sifting through the source pages of sites like Simple Bits, among others, but it just hasn’t “clicked” for me. I could see what they did, but I didn’t understand it. It has been a bit like looking at hieroglyphics. I could understand that I was looking at a bird, but I didn’t know what the bird stood for. Well, Zeldman’s book is making it all clear now. I’m two-thirds of the way through the book and it’s totally changed how I create web sites. I wouldn’t call it an epiphany, but I can say that I “see the light.” If you do anything with web design, this book is a MUST read.

Speaking of web design, I’ve been working a little bit on a redesign of the Nashville Palm Users Group web site. It’s been a journey of discovery as I attempt to redesign not only the look, but the underpinnings of the entire site as well. I’m attempting to redesign the entire site with web standards, so it’s been a challenge on more than one level. As I mentioned in Monday’s entry I was toying around with creating a new weblog focused specifically on my role as Director of NPUG. Well, I went ahead and created it. So far I’m documenting my journey through the redesign, but who knows where it’ll lead. I just hope I’m not biting off more than I can chew. :s

In browsing Jeffery Zeldman’s main web site Zeldman.com: The Daily Report, I came across The Ad Graveyard. The pages in this section of his site are described as “offering ad campaigns which nearly made it out the door, before being yanked at the last possible moment.” Some of the ads are distasteful, but most of them are a complete laugh riot. My favorite has to be Crash and burn because of the transcript detailing why the ad was pulled. LOL

My buddy Dan is in Guam now. I was finally able to hook up with him via Yahoo Messenger and then later with Skype. The flight from Houston to Hawaii was around 8 hours and the flight from Hawaii to Guam was approximately 6.5 hours. That’s one hell of a LONG day of flying. Oh and what’s really putting a kink in my noodle is that he’s on the other side of the dateline, so it’s already Saturday where he is. Freaky. I’m just glad that he was able to connect to the Internet. Granted he’s having to use the foil wrapper from a piece of Juicy Fruit and a 9-volt battery, but he’s online. 😉

Dan, if you’re reading this, you better start updating your weblog now buddy. You have no excuses anymore. 😀