Testing Blogging Software: BlogDesk

Lately, I have been getting behind in posting to all my blogs and journals. Its not like I was ever consistant to begin with, but when I had a happy bit of software at my fingertips, it became the most simple of actions to update any one of my journals or blogs at anytime… and with the bringing of FireFox 3 the convenient application disappeared to buggy annoyance. As a result, I am looking for a new desktop blog application.

When I looked at WordPress.org for suggestions, I found a few that really stood out and looked like they may be worth my time. So I am taking a little time to check out a few of them. Using each through its trial period.

What I am looking for…

There are a few things that are important to me. Any application I am going to use must offer a decent WYSIWIG alongside the ability to edit the HTML at my own discretion. I don’t want the program to suddenly decide to add its own markup, similar to MS Word’s way of doing things. Next, it must be able to access any number of blogs and journals. If I can’t access at least thoes I update frequently, it wouldn’t be worth it. I must be able to add tags and/or categories, depending on circumstances. Above all, it MUST be LiveJournal friendly. I have my userpics maxed on that LJ and I must be able to choose my icon for each post. Having new features to offer to me is a bonus any of the applications.

Read more…

Testing Blogging Software

Lately, I have been getting behind in posting to all my blogs and journals. Its not like I was ever consistant to begin with, but when I had a happy bit of software at my fingertips, it became the most simple of actions to update any one of my journals or blogs at anytime… and with the bringing of FireFox 3 the convenient application disappeared to buggy annoyance. As a result, I am looking for a new desktop blog application.

When I looked at WordPress.org for suggestions, I found a few that really stood out and looked like they may be worth my time. So I am taking a little time to check out a few of them. Using each through its trial period.

What I am looking for…

There are a few things that are important to me. Any application I am going to use must offer a decent WYSIWIG alongside the ability to edit the HTML at my own discretion. I don’t want the program to suddenly decide to add its own markup, similar to MS Word’s way of doing things. Next, it must be able to access any number of blogs and journals. If I can’t access at least thoes I update frequently, it wouldn’t be worth it. I must be able to add tags and/or categories, depending on circumstances. Above all, it MUST be LiveJournal friendly. I have my userpics maxed on that LJ and I must be able to choose my icon for each post. Having new features to offer to me is a bonus any of the applications.

Read more…

Gymnastics: Vitamin D

Its been a while since I updated the gymnastics info. As a matter of fact, I do have a gymnastics post in draft format. I never finished it and I am sure I will get back to it soon. In the meantime, I just got back from my class and checked my twitter account. I found in my timeline a note from ChelseaPiers referencing a New York Times “Well Blog” article about how Vitamin D can improve your athletic performance.

I took a quick look at the blog post found here: http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/23/phys-ed-can-vitamin-d-improve-your-athletic-performance/

I found it completely interesting. I have been looking for which vitamins I have been getting deficient in and I suspect that I need to add vitamin D to my normal B-Complex and Nuun electrolyte drinks.

Testing Blogging Software (Partial Post)

I am not happy. I wrote a nice blog post about how this particular bit of blogging software I am using was high in wins with limited fails. But I just added another fail to the list. It doesn’t auto save as draft. I accidentally closed the application because of a FTP issue I was having. Another fail here, btw. The fails are racking up quickly. I will have to go over how much I like it despite these issues… but I will have to do that later because I have just wasted a whole bunch of time. Mebbe Lunch will be good. In the meantime, enjoy this pretty picture of a storm Drew captured on our way from San Diego to Los Angeles.

  (crossposted to various blogs… because I want to test it all!)

Now playing: Mercedes Lackey, Margie Butler, Larry Warner, Kristoph Klover, Dominic B – Philosophy

Ranger’s Apprentice Book Tour

Ever since the first copy of Ranger’s Apprentice: The Ruins of Gorlan fell into my hands at the library in late 2005, I have been extremely interested in the series. I found that the author, John Flanagan, had a way of keeping me enthralled from cover to cover. I didn’t want to put the story down and I really wanted the next book in the series. Currently, I have read the series through Ranger’s Apprentice: The Siege of Macindaw and I eagerly await the opportunity to devour the next two books.

In case you haven’t been introduced to this interesting worlds, allow me to tempt you into the world revealed in The Ruins of Gorlan: 15–year-old Will was a foundling sheltered and fed by the baron along with other foundlings. He wanted to be a knight as he believed this father had been. When the day came to give his and his yearmates apprenticeships, he ended up not in his dream school, but with the dark, scary and mysterious Ranger. With the only alternative being to leave the castle and make his own way in the world, Will reluctantly took the apprenticeship and began his training. The people of the village whispered about the mysterious rangers, they claimed that rangers practiced a magic that made them invisible; All that Will had seen up to that point didn’t discourage the rumors. However, after a time training under Halt, he found that hiding in shadows, moving quietly, gathering information and relying on your own wits held nothing magical at all. They were all skills that were completely normal. Skills that would eventually let him survive when he’s suddenly thrust into the midst of deadly conflict.

One of the reasons I really enjoyed this series was because the books focused not on kings and queens, sorcerers and wizards, dragons and knights, but on normal every day people given an opportunity to make changes and influence events in their world. As an added bonus, the author was able to show that learning isn’t easy. It takes time and dedication, thought and planning, and lots of decisions that aren’t always easy to make. He makes the story entertaining and completely human. Although the series is aimed at the ages of 12 & up, I feel the story can reach people of all ages and levels.

While we have to wait until January 2010 for the next book in the series to be published here in the US, there is solution to getting your Ranger’s Apprentice fix. An interactive authorless book tour is happening right now. A set of actors from The Striking Viking Story Pirates children’s theatre company is enacting a show called Escape to Araluen, which is based on the first book in the series, at each location where they stop. The 2009 tour is traveling to smaller cities, as opposed to hitting the bigger cities, giving more opportunity to bring more action and adventure to groups of children who may have missed the 2008 tour. While they are traveling, the actors are taking their own videos of how things are behind the scenes and posting them to the RangersBookTour Channel on YouTube. You can find out more about the locations and stops at the official homepage: http://www.RangersApprentice.com

What do you like best about the Ranger’s Apprentice series? Be sure to comment and let me know!

News: Wheel of Time

I was impressed this morning when I discovered that many very cool announcements were presented about the Wheel of Time series this weekend at the Dragon*con. Tor.com’s WordPress Blog tells all about the news. The two announcements that really have me excited though are the news about the entire series being released officially to eBook, and the Fact that they will all have new cover art exclusively for that format. Totally rockin’! Go check it out! It looks like they will release the series sequentially, they haven’t listed a time schedule yet, but we can expect The Eye of the World to appear October 27, 2009, the same release day as The Gathering Storm

Tags: Books, fantasy, news, wheel of time

Food Talk: Chicken, Rice and Veggies

I have mentioned in several places that I have interests that are wide and varying. Well here is another new type of post. Food.

I like to cook, I don’t like my current kitchen, this keeps me from cooking. However, I have recently done something that I thought tasted fantastic and I thought I would share.

This is a rice dish. I previously cooked and refrigerated rice with no salt or butter. In this case it was Jasmine White Rice. Delicious all on its own. However, I need to dress it up so I usually add it to something else. My favorite additions include scrambled eggs/frittata, soups and random meats. This night, I was out of pepper and oil and out of my usual additions, however, I did have a nice bit of marinated chicken breast. To compensate for my lack of oil, I added a layer of water to my frying pan and made sure it was boiling before I started trying to cook. To be fancy, I added a bit of sea salt.

Once the water was boiling I added in the marinated chicken breast. Flipping it almost immediately and cooked it all as if I was using oil. It did an interesting thing, I released flavor into the water and then absorbed it back as the meat cooked. About the time my pan was trying to dry out, my chicken was mostly done. I added some more water, a smaller amount this time around, I just wanted to loosen the drippings. While the water was reclaiming the drippings, I took one part of my chicken breast and cubed it with my spatula, leaving a nice fillet part for a topper.

After the new water was heated and the chicken cubes were finishing cooking, I added my cold rice, some chopped garlic and a diced stalk of broccoli. The rice ate up the water rather quickly, so I added about a tablespoon more water, stirred it all around until the drippings were no longer on the bottom, but threatening to return. Then I turned off the heat and let the food settle while I retrieved a plate and sliced some sharp white cheddar and checked some random veggies I had in a boiling pot of water. The veggies were done.

I pulled the plate around, scooped a good helping of the rice and chicken onto it and placed the fillet on top. I then surrounded that chicken with the cheddar slices. While that began melting, I added the veggies around the perimeter of the plate. I wish I had thought to take a photo of it.

All in all, it was a satisfying creation and I was proud of how I didn’t add extra oil or use that tempting butter. It also made cleanup easier. Hmm, must remember that part.

I do stuff like this a lot. If I find something missing, I try to find a way to substitute. I have had a variety of interesting things. A Mexican/Italian fusion was attained by running out marinara and yogurt. I added salsa and beans to my fettuccine. It was so tasty, I did it deliberately the next few times. I have a love/hate relationship with eggs. When I want to eat eggs, but don’t want to soft/hard boil them, or deal with yolk from sunny-side up, I usually do a variation on frittata. I hit up the refrigerator searching for left overs. So far my favorite mix has been scrambled rice. Preferably with Basmati Rice.

Do you Franken-food your meals? Tell me about them!

Tags: chicken, rice, vegetables

Don’t mess with a bard.