Scope for the Imagination

Am very bummed and am feeling like a very bad fan-girl.

Apparently, Elijah Wood was within mere miles of me, at a premiere that I could have attended, if I had of realized that he would be there. But the only celebrity news I had heard of Sundance was that Paris Hilton was going to be there, and I really have very little desire to meet her. Elijah and the other Hobbits are a different story.

*Pouts* And I just know that he was supposed to bump into me and fall instantly in love. That's the only thing that's been holding us back.

To top it off, I missed seeing the premiere of "Ringers: Lord of the Fans" because I was out of town when the tickets went on sale. I'm hoping that I can grab some same day tickets on Thursday, but I'm not holding my breath. However, Ellie, you'd better keep those toes crossed!

There's pics on the slamdance website of my LOTR friends here in their costumes at the premiere. *sigh* I haven't been able to go to a meeting in months. I miss the lembas bread. And raving about Tolkien.

In fact, I miss my Tolkien group online too, my LOTR Inklings. We started reading LOTR again and it just fizzled. I know I didn't help matters by taking forever to get my chapter out and I've been a perfectly lousy list mommy. But I've been working on my webpage and hope that tomorrow, I will have all of Book 1 finished, and at least the index page looking nice. And since I've had to reformat all of the emails into a readable, pretty webpage, I've been reading all of our old discussions. I'm just amazed all over again of the insights we discovered together, the life lessons, the ties into mythology that left me astonished. I'm lost as to how to reactive the group to get that again. I'm hoping that the website will help - having all of the basic pages actually say something and actually have something to which you could navigate would probably be nice.

I suppose I could just let it die naturally, but I am really reluctant to do so. We really had something, something that I haven't found in another group. But maybe, it's just like everything else in my life and I don't know how to say goodbye. Any ideas?

Enough pointless fretting about something that nobody wants to read anyway. It is definitely time for bed!

Okay, I admit it. This sucks.

I'm frustrated and angry and about to throw this helpless (but not harmless, oh no!) computer out the window.

I feel old and it's not a nice feeling. Mind you, I'm (only?) 25, but technology-wise, it looks like I'm ancient. Withering. Decrepit. Stoop. Frail. I've never felt so ignorant in my entire life. It's like, no matter how hard I try, how much stuff I read, this will remain a black hole, a taunting enigma that just stands there and laughs at me.

I was going to lj-cut this, but I'm too tired to even remember that code, so here ya go:

"The Rant on the Evilness of Webpages"

I've been working for the past five days on the website that I (foolish mortal) am trying to design for my group, Lord of the RIngs Inklings (see my info for link, I'm too tired to type in the address). I've worked on it, off and on for the past six months, and saw Christmas break as the perfect time to get it all coded and ready to go for our two year anniversary on the 5th.

I started out formatting the compiled messages from our book discussions. Two days later (and we're talking working 12-13 hours straight), I've finished 6 chapters. Out of around 60. I'm faster, it's true, the major of the time was spent on the first chapter, but still.

Got bored. Decided that I probably ought to update the links on my templates, so do that. Realize that I've designed the templates wrong, so changes don't work. Try to fix template and ruin every file that used that template, yep you guessed it--all of my work of the last two days. Manage to recover most of it, but now fully aware that I have to build new templates and copy, by hand, all of my hard work over.

Frustrated. Decide that I ought to put in the buttons and drop down menus and the "ooooo" of the page--a vertical, rollover menu navigation bar. Download the file for that one... And I can't make out a single word of what it says, what I'm supposed to change, etc. I've cobbled my way to a basic understanding of HTML, but apparently, JavaScript is completely different.

Spend last two days, browsing the web, learning JavaScript, or at least patching my way to a workable code for the buttons and the drop down menus (yeh!). Found a place that will give me the code for my guestbook, so I don't have to worry about that (I'll believe it when I see it).

But I wanted my beautiful vertical rollover menu navigation menu, gosh darn it. Went back to the site, found their (poorly written) references, and basically looked up every single code and what it meant and how to change it. Followed instructions. Painstakingly typed in every single link. Put it where they told me and....


Nothing.

Not a thing. I can't see anything. I'm not getting an error message, except from Safari, who thinks that there's some file that doesn't exist. Now, even the template that came with the package doesn't work.

Five solid days of hard work and absolutely nothing to show for it. And I've just made you read through all of this programing crap that you probably don't care one iota about. But if you've made it this far....


I need help.

If there's anybody out there, who stumbles across this and understands JS/HTML and Dreamweaver and could look over my code and figure out where I've gone wrong, wow, I'd go and register a star under your name. Or write you a really sappy poem. Or whatever. We're talking "give up the first-born" desperate. Just email me, post a comment, and I'd send you the files all wrapped in eternal gratitude.

On the plus side, I've finished my next chapter of LNB. I have to let my sister read it and tell me what she thinks, but it should be posted by the end of this weekend. It's short, only 12 pages instead of 18. :)

Airports, airplanes are wonderful things. Seriously, think about it--you get to your destination in a small fraction of the time it would take you to drive, you don't have to worry about packing our car, or where you put the map, or the crazy drivers on their cell phones, and you share a seat with someone who inevitably is defined by the word "interesting"--and for some reason (the cheesy side of me is saying it's because in a plane you're high enough to brush the angels' wings...ugh, I'm making myself ill), inspiration flows, your muse becomes yours again.

A few weeks ago, I flew to Washington, DC, probably my favorite city in the world. Some day I'll live there, just off of Rock Creek Park on Connecticut Avenue. But I digress. I had layovers on the way there in St. Louis and on the way back in Houston, nice long layovers. I brought my notebook, my "Pilot P-700" blue ink pen, and a three mixed CDs that I had made the night before--so with Eva Cassidy, Matchbox 20, Loreena McKinnett and, yes, Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Musical playing in my ears, I wrote. Mostly on my story, Like Never Before. I wrote most of chapter 7, the first scene of 8, the last scene of 12 and polished up 9. Not bad for a few hours on a plane, eh? I'm so excited about it! The chapters are coming together just as I had hoped and I've received a little more encouragement (thanks guys!), which just makes the juices flow better and sweeter. Boy, i really am waxing crony tonight, aren't I? :) :)

I posted Chapter 7 last night. My sister read it, declared it perfect, then proceeded to lecture me of how random the scene with Jamie was. I was afraid of that. I rewrote it a little and I hope it flows a little better, but it's extremely important that it happen this way. I hope most people can forgive me for Jamie. Jamie is such a foreign character to me--we've seen him, twice, and yet Paris and he have this "relationship"???

Jamie doesn't have a last name, does he?

In any case, I should have chapter 8 done shortly (fingers crossed), as long as I don't get distracted by my other project: I'm designing a webpage! Now, I know basic, basic, basic HTML--I know what < i > and < b > mean, for example, but I've never designed a site from scratch. It's for my Lord of the Rings literary discussion group--we just finished reading LOTR together, and I'm trying to compile all of our ponderous thoughts and discussions and put them on an easily navigational site. I made our logo today, which I'm really impressed with--it's exactly what I was hoping for. I'd proudly display it, but I have no idea how to attach an image if it's not on the web. Now to figure out how add drop-down graphics and lay out a table. Ah, right now, I am really loving life.

10 days until I start school again. I think I've completely forgotten all of my "doctoring skills." Oh dear.