Okay my site is pretty bogged down by feeding my posts here.  I'm going to have to stop now.   Please Visit http://michellejnorton.com to read my blog.

So Arizona was fun. I managed not to fall out of the raft or the boat but my brother did. We spent nearly every day in or near water as my family is wont to do. I’ll get some pictures up.

J. hurt his back after we got home. It’s pretty bad but he says it’s bit better. The stress worry is getting to me.

I’ll post more in a bit…I have three go-lives with a dead line of next week and a chapter to finish. Busy me.

Originally published at Fuzzy Thoughts. Please leave any comments there.

The Light Fantastic by Terry Prachett continues the adventures of Rincewind and Twoflower as they are falling off the side of the Discworld.

But then the universe right itself.

This tale of going home was a lot of fun to read. I really loved the theme…and now I’m gushing over stuff I can’t say cause it’ll ruin it.

Go read the damn book already.

Originally published at Fuzzy Thoughts. Please leave any comments there.

The Thief of Always by Clive Barker is an imaginative children’s horror story in which 10 year-old Harvey is whisked away from his boring life by Rictus, the smiling demon. Rictus takes Harvey to the Holiday House, a place were a year equals a day and no one ever ages, really.

Frightening and fun this spooky bedtime story was fun to read both for myself and by daughter. Fully imagined, the world of Holiday House has its delights and it’s nightmares. I love exploring it.

Originally published at Fuzzy Thoughts. Please leave any comments there.

So my phone died on Thursday and I headed to the T-Mobile store for a new one. Iphone was way out of my price range so I gave up on it. I was determined to end up with some sort of smart phone to piss people off with my twitters.

I got a google phone. Between being able spread out the cost of the phone over several, no interest payments and a HUGE discount, I have a phone that is exactly like the iphone except it has a real and a virtual keyboard, can sync with google calendar and has a built in camcorder….oh and the space is upgradable xd cards and…

Call it blasphemy but it’s totally better than the iphone.

I still love my itouch, and it shall still play my music. But dang this phone is fun and the notifications are great as are the themes.

I welcome and bow to out Google, not so evil, Overlords.

Originally published at Fuzzy Thoughts. Please leave any comments there.

The call to quit IE6 has gotten louder over the years. Now with the release of IE8 and PROOF that MS can make a standards compliant browser, those calls are turning to screams.

I am one of them.

Frankly IE6 is broken and old and should be tossed with the bath water. I am less and less inclined to bother checking my sites in them unless a client requests it. Why? Because there is less need. Lets go over the arguments for supporting IE6:

Most People Use It

While not only debatable it’s silly. First of all, just in case you had no idea (don’t worry most don’t), you can see who’s visiting your site with what. Most sites I develop have seen a serious down path in IE6 users over the last 7 years since IE6 release. Most sites don’t even garner 1%. Now if you want to say most people use IE as a whole you’d be right. But developing for IE7 is much easier and only needed a few tweaks and hacks…while so far IE8 needs NO tweaks or hacks. It’s a beautiful thing.

No one wants to spend the money to upgrade

Dude it’s free. Even MS isn’t that stupid. IE8 works on XP and Vista. If you don’t think it will run on 98 or Me (I’m sorry you’re still running that) get 7.

We are limited to IE6 at work because of proprietary software the company uses

Besides the fact they should upgrade for security reasons; you shouldn’t be surfing at work. I know we all do it, but you can’t cater to those who are doing something they shouldn’t. If, by chance, your job IS surfing the web you should be making a case for updating. Hammers aren’t screwdrivers. Get the right tools for your job, especially when free.

Websites shouldn’t limit the latest bling and I don’t need to see new bling on websites

IE6 not only doesn’t see the latest bling, it’s also 8 years behind STANDARDS. That’s right, it’s not to code. Things that IE6 can’t support have been around longer than IE6 and are no longer fads. Png, CSS, fricking padding are here to stay folks. MS upgraded the browers twice now. Even they know.

You can’t upgrade without a valid copy of windows

Dude pony up or get Firefox. FTL.

It’s time to drop IE6. Drop the support and you’ll have much saner webmasters.

Originally published at Fuzzy Thoughts. Please leave any comments there.

The story of Kemoc and his search for Kaththea as she and her power are stolen by Dinzil in order to take over Witch World could have been much more exciting.

Norton writes in a much more accessible form for this novel similar to the original Witch World. However what sounded like an exciting story of power struggles and betrayal described in the Sorceress of Witch World was far from that.

The story was actually Kemoc as he, against wishes of everyone else, goes after Kaththea who he believes is in danger. Everyone else either feels she’s useless or nothing to worry about. The majority of this book is about his travels. It’s not till the end when he finds Kaththea, deformed and about as useless as everyone says she is. Before any resolution happens (according to Sorceress, she’s fully on the side of evil) the book ends with her only slightly healed.

While I enjoyed Kemoc’s adventure, I expected to learn more of what Kaththea was doing. Kemoc didn’t defeat Dinzil in this book as I expected him to. I’m not sure how this set back the fighters at all except for in Sorceress where they take off to get Kaththea’s powers back.

The novel was much more lackluster than other Andre Norton book. Not my favorite by any means.

Originally published at Fuzzy Thoughts. Please leave any comments there.

So I’ve been slow to post. For the first time in a long time I have a bunch of unfinished drafts waiting for me to finish them.

This week has been hell. Aia woke up Monday morning with a fever and her entire face swollen. Naturally I panicked, called the dentist (who didn’t answer the phone) and the doctor. The doctor thought it was the mumps (back up, I gave her pink children’s Tylenol before all this. Not stupid.).

Crap I thought…mumps aren’t too bad…we totally have two weeks before Disney World, so she could still go and maybe I could work from home.

But then she couldn’t move and the doctor had me feel around her face. It’s not mumps, they told me to head to the nearest children’s hospital cause it could be meningitis. (For those that wonder there’s a children’s hospital still at St. Jospehs).

So after wandering around construction at about 80mph downtown while on the phone with work (they were having a mild panick attach because the realized (again) that they can’t do the website without me and they need training) we found St. Jo’s. It took another half hour to find parking. I finally found a $3.00 a day emergency lot.

We get her inside and through triage. I spent most of the time explaining what all the equipment was for (thank you birthing and kidney stones) so that she’d stop being scared of it all. The doctor comes in (no random nurse to do things, nice!) and declares it multiple abcess teeth that need to be taken care of today. They give her children’s Motrin and a perscription for pencillian and off we go.

Have I mentioned the dentist still hasn’t answered the phone at this point?

I started out of the lot to find out they only take cash or check, no credit (Who does that?) But the gate guard just lets us go. So we drive to Golden, which I70 midday traffic is pretty good, just so you know.

So I show up at the dentist office, explain the details and that they should answer their phone or at least check messages. They take Aia right away and take pictures. They decide to pull the teeth the next day. And we are sent home to eat, do mold, and keep the fever down.

Cue about 8:30am on Tuesday with me driving pell-mell late to the appointment because I took I-119 cause H56 was closed the day before and on Tuesday they close I-119 and opened H56 (Signs,people, SIGNS) instead so I had to go around the mesa to get to Golden. Good thing I lived in that neighborhood as a child and knew how to get around it. We get there late, but they still take her right away (love that dentist!).

So the shots begin (which go much better than the last time). However they can’t get her numb and have to stop. They send me with xrays down the street to the pediadontist. They take use right away, pull the teeth, give Aia a fudgecycle, and tell me that she has to come back for spaces (think braces that push instead of pull) and that she has to more teeth on the verge of bad but they think they can save them next week.

So after I feint from brokeness all is well. I’m not a fan of broke (especially when I finally had replenished savings a bit, all gone now.) But at least Aia’s okay. Now I just need to figure out how to pay for braces right now. Crap.

Originally published at Fuzzy Thoughts. Please leave any comments there.