http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves A casual blog reporting on the life and times of Caroline C. Blaker en artist@carolinecblaker.com Copyright 2011 2011-08-15T18:47:02-07:00 http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/support_an_artist_while_spending_nothing/ http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/support_an_artist_while_spending_nothing/#When:18:47:02Z One way to support an Artist is to buy art. If this isn't an option for you, there are costless ways to make a huge difference in an artist's career path. Any person who loves the art of an artist can make a huge difference.Many people feel that supporting an artist beyond compliments and verbal encouragement is out of their reach if they don’t have money to buy artwork. While the best way to support an artist is to (buy art and) support their livelihood, here are a few things that are free, that make a huge difference to the artist you would like to support. Share their work ~ Do you have a Facebook account? Twitter? StumbleUpon? Guess what - if you said yes, you also have a network outside of the reach of the artist you would like to help, and chances are your network and you share a lot of common interests, so why not this artist? The options are endless here: share one piece, their portfolio, their blog, their events, their entire website, their facebook page - and the list goes on. Don’t know quite what to share? Ask the Artist! Volunteer time or skills ~ If you live near an artist this is easy - hang a show with him or her. Help set up a studio open-house, or just go to the artist’s events, talk to strangers on their behalf, and start conversations about the art. Don’t live near the artist? You can still write a blog for them, talking about your opinions of their work, or introduce their work to somebody else in your network, one on one, who you feel may be as interested as you are. Participate ~ if the artist you know is collecting materials of any kind, this is a fantastic way to support them. My collection of credit cards would be nowhere without 5 specific awesome people - yet I could be completely buried in credit cards if only a percent more of my fan base saved their solicitation credit cards they get in the mail, rather than throwing them away. Chances are, if you are able to collect it, the artist will willingly and gratefully facilitate the transportation of materials back to his/her studio for use. Inform them ~ Have a favorite gallery? Or just a place you drive by all the time that reminds you of them? Know of an upcoming exhibit that you feel they would like? Did you go to a show and end up speaking about an artist to someone, or see work that reminded you of theirs? Artists who are trying to emerge mainly seek opportunities to expand their reach to a relevant audience, something that is a lot trickier than it may appear to you, as someone they have already reached. If you have a quick tip or direction, they will do all the work to pursue it, and you will get all the credit! Be ready ~read their content, subscribe to their newsletter, and have conversations with them about the work you like or the content they send. Know some key points to their artist statement. Know where they come from and what they value about their background. When you have the opportunities to act on the previous points, you will be educated enough about this artist to be able to share them, volunteer, participate, or inform them with relevance and timeliness. Let me tell you a little secret - an artist’s popularity isn’t defined by the sales they make. It’s defined by the number of people who know about them and admire their work. Secondarily, it’s also defined by the number of people who hate their work. As much as a fan will tell their friends about a great experience they had somewhere, or a great product they bought, or a great artist who inspires them, an average consumer will talk five times more about a product they hate, an awful experience somewhere, and maybe even art that they saw and hated. Artists deal with a lot of rejection, but attention is attention, and if a person is fired up about artwork, either positively or negatively, and they talk about it, it counts as valuable publicity and attention. Even better, the folks that don’t like it, who share it as “bad” (or whatever they come up with,) are unwittingly supporting this artist whom they despise.Popularity, more than any other thing, drives art sales throughout the art industry. Assuming this, there is no network that is unsuitable for promoting this artist you like, especially not yours. And yes; your time, attention, words, and information all count, and the artist should notice - and if they don’t, there’s nothing wrong with bringing it to their attention. They will react with gratitude and take notice that you are paying attention to what they are doing, and if they don’t, don’t feel the need to continue supporting them. Without a captive audience, artists never reach the collectors, buyers, or patrons who have the power to make or break their career. The bigger this audience is, the better the artist’s chance at succeeding at what they are trying to do - sustain themselves solely with their artwork, and the better their chances at sales in general, even if you never buy anything. You can play a role in the success of your favorite artist, a big one, without any money at all. You just have to want to support them - then take action. Career management, Opinion 2011-08-15T18:47:02-07:00 http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/the_logo_what_you_dont_know_about_it/ http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/the_logo_what_you_dont_know_about_it/#When:17:01:35Z My logo is one of the few works that have stuck with me since the age of 18, and among the only illustrations I have ever done.Two-dimensional design is a notoriously difficult class for incoming freshmen at any art school, and here I found myself; second semester, under the tutelage of one of those “never gives an A” teachers, learning the basics of radial and symmetrical designs in black and white. Oh, and three days prior, I had been diagnosed with Mono(nucleosis) as every college student at some point is: first, you drink your neighbors water instead of your own, never mind that this person should not have been out in public let alone working at the phoneathon. Then, a month later, there’s a brick wall that hits. You go into medical services and get a blood test. Then, when they call, they obey every paltry privacy rule (a practice on which your friends report conflicting adherence) in urging you to the third degree to show up at once so they can break the bad news to your face, as if you already did not know. If you’re a sucker like me, you also gave blood a few days before; blood you really could use right about now. I decided to tell some of my teachers about my illness, mainly the ones in the mornings with attendance policies. I missed a few morning classes. I slept every chance I got. I took a few unexcused absences. After a relatively unrelenting week, I began noticing that no matter how long I slept for I felt the same. Every nap, every night, every time; I would wake up exactly as tired as when I laid down. While the observation was exacerbating to my frustration in trying to beat the condition, it was also empowering; despite the constant weight of being tired, I stopped thinking of Mono as something sleep could affect. Instead, it was apparently this crazy shroud illusion of constant effect that I would need to wait out. There’s something transformative that happens to the intention of a person once their most fearsome boundaries are determined to be nothing more than paper tigers. Over-exhaustion? Like every waking hour! - but it’s fluctuations were no more severe than the average day-to-day levels I would experience on perfectly healthy days. It didn’t take me more than a couple of days, once testing this theory, to settle into it’s groove as a constantly exhausted person and just chug along with my obligations. I managed to avoid telling most professors, like the 2D one; as I was not interested in being judged as different by them or my peers or being offered unnecessary shortcuts. Never mind that I should not have been out in public. One of these nights, my logo was born. The assignment was radial symmetry and invention of a design of our own. (there were other specifics but I cannot remember them.) this was the only late night I had all semester before finals, and I spent it deliriously scribbling, erasing, and eventually penning the design on auto-pilot. Unlike every other assignment that semester, none of the visual decisions that went into this composition had been reconsidered, weighed, or otherwise consciously evaluated. There was a simple, almost industrial sensibility informed by a sense of urgency and limit of will to interfere. My sub-conscious did the work, and my consciousness sat back and watched it on the big screen. Later on, I was fortunate enough to be able to steal Illustrator CS and migrate the logo to a digital .ai file, while learning hard lessons about computer memory and limitations. I’ve been able to fine tune it some by adding and moving key points on the paths. I still have the original (dog-eared, stained) drawing I submitted, and it still has the grade on the back. Anecdotes, Self Reflection 2011-08-04T17:01:35-07:00 http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/i_am_a_native_european/ http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/i_am_a_native_european/#When:18:51:25Z Otherwise known as “White American” or Caucasian.My contemporary struggle with cultural identity began with my husband and ended with my vacation to Europe. Over the span of nearly four years, I examined why my now-husband’s proximity to his (Native American) culture evoked jealousy behind the gratitude I felt for his happiness and sense of identity with his tribes and with the earth. I wanted an identity with the earth. I wanted to be close to a rooted ancestry group. I wanted what he had - but not exactly what he had. No matter how much I wanted, pleaded or begged, I wouldn’t be allowed in anyway. As I began to learn more about the paths and histories of the Native American tribes, the answer was clear: to fully respect them is to leave them alone. While pining after an adopted new identity additionally felt like both a callous waste of time and a dishonest path to the truth, I began to wonder where else to look. Of course, what Buddhism teaches, to look inside oneself for all answers, didn’t seem obvious at the time, but it came out eventually. And the Q&A was simple: “What are you?” “This” “How did you get here?” “Sex and boats.” Hm. Those boats; from Europe. But before that, where were these people? Were they migratory? Where they indigenous? I’m not anthropology expert, but they had to have come from somewhere. And Europe has been settled for tens of thousands of years. Those people, my ancestors, migrated as tribes to Europe and settled in to cultivate the land - or to raid the settlements of others, much like other tribes that still carry tribal identity. We are all indigenous from somewhere. Some places those folks have brown skins, but in Europe those people have white skins, like me. And they’re still there as well as over here. Identifying myself as “white” has always echoed in memory the least savory aspects possible of cultural identity. Aryan raiders, American white settlers who ravaged Native American tribes and lands (and later bought and sold Africans as slaves), Nazis, Klan. [I think] these folks identified their whiteness as superior and that was part of what drove them to kill, pillage, and worse. Thinking of myself in a group among these people and trying to be proud of my world heritage are completely mutually exclusive. While other peoples enjoy and celebrate their heritage, folklore, culture, and identity, white Americans have roughly a 200 year settlement history marred with brutality and prejudice, but still a few mainly military and government history holidays that we manage to celebrate. There are also Christian holidays that are widely celebrated for some folks more than others. Despite the long-ago Roman empire takeover of most of Europe that planted churches just about everywhere, holidays of pre-existing religions and worship are still celebrated today. These holidays combine very old mythologies with the change of the seasons and the behavior of the earth both on the surface and in space. These religions vary in their current names and some, like Wicca, were persecuted. Each one was a system of belief for a small group of people in a small place. They evolved in small quantities and many joined forces for underground survival during various times of persecution, melding deities, holidays, rituals, and more. My own personal heritage is Norwegian, Swedish, British, German, and possibly Romanian. Yet it was this latest vacation to France that awoke me to the notion of blood-line belonging to a place on Earth. During many visits to small villages, farms, and homes, it gently occurred to me that I was meeting people whose first ancestry in their region or country might be completely lost for thousands of years of age. Even if a grandfather came from nearby Italy, or further Poland, there would be other ancestry that went further back than that, locally. Even so, the distance from Warsaw to Paris is only around 850 miles - less than the distance from New York City to St. Louis. No matter what arbitrary divisions are created for the sake of government, language, or currency in this region, the fact remains that this tiny region of the world is where I am from, even as an eighth generation American. Coming back to the states where everybody, it seems, is ethnic but the whiteys, was a true realization that I don’t fit in to that mould. I am ethnic. My skin is white, and my hair is blonde, but I am indigenous to Europe and that is a simple fact. My blood lines have been here for 300 years, but they have been there for thousands of years, and they still are there. I am a Native European. I think I’m going to start to use this on forms where they ask to profile me. I’ll choose “Other,” and if necessary write in “Native European.” After all, what convention about being native to Europe has allowed us to drop mention of our continental heritage in profiling? Native Americans, African-Americans, Asians all have this privilege. It says to me that the creators of these conventions are naming the differences compared to their own population, and furthermore “We are normal, you are different.” I’d rather be different. I didn’t just pop out of some white gelatinous mess to be in-line with a history of oppression. I’m from somewhere with a rich history, and whether or not they tell me that I have it, I do. And I can find it. Meanwhile, feel free to think of yourself as “Native European” or “European-American,” if this mould doesn’t suit you either. Opinion, Self Reflection 2011-07-06T18:51:25-07:00 http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/what_this_is_a_twitterscape/ http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/what_this_is_a_twitterscape/#When:20:28:49Z Did you know that the process of developing Twitterscapes yielded images that don't look like Twitterscapes? Neither did my printer, apparently.Yesterday I sent 9 of the preliminary “Twitterscapes” off for printing for the upcoming exhibit. My printer called me three times out of what he called “confusion,“ though I read in it disbelief. My art printer (one of the best fine art printers in New Mexico,) who spends days at a time immersed in fine art, could not fathom why I wanted to print these, nor could he tell if I had sent him the correct images, or if I had just gone crazy. He may have thought he got a set of images that were corrupted. Of course, the images I sent him don’t look like Twitterscapes, or fine art. They look like mistakes. Explaining to him that these were the visual clues I had for developing Twitterscapes in-process seemed to clarify a bit, though he still appeared to think they were not worth printing, or at least not well suited for it.  Hm. I guess he doesn’t see a lot of conceptual art. They are a bit strange, but conceptually they are some of the richest images I have ever made. Moreover, the stronger my career and tenure as an artist gets, the more fundamentally important they become to my body of work. Even though they might be minimally visually engaging, these images tell a story; one that my efforts will ultimately define its role to myself and others. Nine of these images will be a part of the March 25 exhibit: The Twitterscape Theory at Petroglyph Creative. Anecdotes, Career management, My Career 2011-02-20T20:28:49-07:00 http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/marketing_newsletters_projects._oh_my/ http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/marketing_newsletters_projects._oh_my/#When:19:34:00Z 2010 was terrific, but 2011 already has a distinction all its own.And suddenly, as Eric Meyer eloquently put it on New Years Eve, we have passed yet another “arbitrary gregorian boundary condition.” Out with 2010, in with 2011. While I’m glad it’s over, 2010 was a revolutionary year; marriage, career independence, all in the span of two months and continuing now and into the future. God Almighty, I’m free at last. And since 2011 is here, I shall declare that this year will not be about improvement, yearning, or gaining freedom as last year and years past have been. This year is about engagement. It’s about full-throttling on connecting with people, an audience, and introducing the world to my bodies of work on its terms. What do I do? How is it contributing anything to anyones life? There is very specific language being used for artwork and web development; I have learned it for web development but not yet for art. It’s a new palate of research- one that has to be approached by appropriating the use of descriptions from several existing working examples, then absorbing its ingenuity and faults, and lastly creating an independently formulated use of these rules that is the best description for the work possible. Seems like a lot for an artist statement, but then there are shows, gallery proposals, and of course my blogs, by which I have the chance to grab fans and collectors out of thin air. So the efforts that shall come from this will be: more reaching out to juried exhibits, more newsletter blasts, more on-site projects (I hope) and more blog posts, social media communications, and more organization around all of these. If I have it my way, I’ll even revamp this site to organize everything a little bit more effectively. This year is also about commemoration and celebration of being healthy for five years; the (again, arbitrary) time period formerly known as “remission” ; I will have a lot of anniversaries this year, from diagnosis, to cure, to end-of-treatment - all this year, beginning in 9 days (1/12/11)- which will be five years from cancer diagnosis. Come to think of it, I found my lump 5 years ago tomorrow! It’s cold in New Mexico. Yesterday the thermometer read 2 when I went for my jog. Today, it thankfully skyrocketed to 26. At Petroglyph, where the building leaks heat, I’m sitting in front of a new heat dish I picked up at Costco. Gratefully, I am bundling up, stoking the fire (or turning the heater on “HI“), and getting ready to work through this long, cold month or two. In Albuquerque, that’s the length of the winter we have. Two months is all you get. By the end of January, the jackets start to come off and the warm afternoons are spent with the windows open.  But hey, look - this year has actually passed. I almost missed it - I was too busy living life to its fullest. Career management, My Career, Self Reflection 2011-01-03T19:34:00-07:00 http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/bigger_than_pink_-_actually_being_aware_of_breast_cancer/ http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/bigger_than_pink_-_actually_being_aware_of_breast_cancer/#When:18:27:50Z Pink flags, pink clothes, pink pin-cusions, pink pink pink - how can it really claim to spread awareness while teaching nothing about the disease itself?As you and I have both been bombarded with pink fabrics, billboards, store items, and apparel as far as the NFL, we both know that it is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. It’s a month that is either officially dedicated, or unofficially dedicated, (not quite sure here) to some particular cancer that women get in the breast, and that by buying said pink stuff or by being reminded of some cancer you’ll probably never get (or whatever, you might, but who cares?) you are being told by some charities and some other authorities that by just seeing or spreading pink in any way possible, you are making the world a better place. At the inception of my adult life around 2003, all of this became the rage every October. I mostly ignored it. I did pick up a credit card that promised donations to Komen, without having any idea what Breast Cancer was. So what? Its a charity. They gave me a high limit. That was okay with me. And what was Breast Cancer anyway? I quietly put up with all of this crying about Breast Cancer crap, like everyone does, who is as unrelated to any “survivor” as I was. I even resented a little, as an artist, how they hijacked the color pink once a year. I didn’t really have any need for pink, so I mostly ignored this one too. Despite all of my ignoring, I was becoming more aware of Breast Cancer, involuntarily, by all of this atmospheric baby-girl pink everywhere at all times. I was becoming more aware, that is, of something that is a Cancer of the Breast existed, and that more and more people felt that they should find a cure for it. It’s kind of like an election with no voting. For a momentary period of time, some part of the populous is consumed by some cause that will cure some problem and then it’s over when they say it’s going to be, beit Novemer 8th or October 31. Then everything goes back to normal. We get to wait another year to be bombarded with Pink once again. The tiny place in my mind where my “Breast Cancer Awareness” existed was ripped open, stuffed full, surgically hinged, and locked shut again in a single day, and it didn’t have October’s help to ease the transition. It was January 10, within 2 weeks of the statistical Worst Day of the Year (actually I think I had my lymph node surgery on that day, maybe.) I had a mammogram, an ultrasound, or three, and a biopsy oh AND the medical student they allowed to take the second core missed the novocated area. (They are brilliant I tell you.) What had lead up to this was that I felt something like a pebble on my boob, right near the nipple that had disappeared into my breast for 8 months. It had been examined by an Ob-GYN, who did not find it. Nobody else who had seen it had any idea why it would be so stuck in there. Then I guess I touched a place near there where nobody else had yet, and to the phone I went. I walked out of the hospital that day with my head down, every radiology tech or doctor trailing me from their chairs with bewildered faces. Not only could I get Breast Cancer, I did have it, it is what this was, and I didn’t know anything more, like if I was dying or not. Breast Cancer Awareness, in its floods of pink and whole month of marketing blitzes, is failing. It is failing every future person who will get Breast Cancer who doesn’t have any idea what it is, like me. It would be better renamed to something like “Breast Cancer Comfort” for what it does best, which is to remind and assure survivors, families, and loved ones that the world is watching and trying to do better. Breast Cancer Awareness does nothing to teach the uninvited world anything more about the disease. Even when you do get some information, like “Look for a lump in your breast” or “ Do a self-check every month”, all I can say is at least it is something, but my Ob-GYN DID NOT FIND MY LUMP IN HIS OFFICE with all of his experience, performing said exam. I cannot stress that enough. He thought my breast looked weird but his exam turned up nothing. Half the time when you do find lumps they are cysts and other natural, harmless things. The dude later apologized through his “assistant”. In other news, I won’t be going to a golf-loving, young male Ob-GYN ever again. Here are some points that I would like to make that I feel that Breast Cancer Awareness is sorely missing, from my own personal experience as a patient with the disease: Go outside, pick up a pebble. If you ever feel this (short of surface texture) under your skin anywhere, beit, breast, armpit, or any other body part, RUN to the nearest screening center. Men do get Breast Cancer, though these cases occur alongside genetic indicators. If you feel an abnormality in your breast that moves, is squishy, or hurts, it probably isn’t cancer. But get it checked out anyway. If anyone would have been exempt from a Breast Cancer threat by statistics: age, family history, or the like, it would have been me. NO woman is exempt from the threat. Feel your boobies. Roughly 70% of breast cancer is Ductal, the rest is Lobular. Ductal means it occurs in or near the milk ducts, which means it sits right no your nipple. If you notice anything weird going on with your nipple at all, even loss of sensation, get it checked out. Lump or no lump. I noticed loss of sensation when I was 21. Lobular carcinoma occurs in or near the milk glands themselves, so that can be harder to find or sense. If your breasts feel unevenly weighted or textured, get it checked out. Most tumors require surgery. If it’s Ductal, you will lose your affected nipples. Sorry. I know it sucks. If it’s Lobular, the balance of your breast will be affected. Looking like frankenstein under your shirt can put a real damper on dating, but most partners who don’t mind are actually worth your time. (hello silver lining!) Depending on the number of affected lymph nodes (hopefully none - you will lose at least 4 even if it’s determined to be none) - you will need surgeries to excise them, which while not being too dis-forming, can cause the lymph in your body to just sit and collect in these spaces where the lymph nodes used to be. This is called lymphedema. Chemo is scientifically-engineered poison. It comes in bags and in syringes. They will probably insert a port under your skin over the right side to access your Aorta instead of sticking your arm with this burning stuff, during some other surgery. You’ll feel like a robot, but in the end it saves your arm veins. They’ll also want to keep it in in case you need more chemo after your initial round of 8, 12, 16, or 20. Chemo treatments vary, but mine were done every 2 weeks a total of 8 times. The sensations also vary, but if you have ever been very hungover or recovering from the influence of a stronger chemical, this feels similar. Ongoing, inescapable, toxic pain. Best of all, you have to babysit yourself - if you get hungry or thirsty and ignore it, it could become a medical emergency. If you have not had all of your children yet, they will put you through medical menopause to give your reproductive system the best chance of survival. This is menopause induced by hormones by injection monthly. As if the chemo wasn't bad enough, you will no longer have estrogen and re-experience life as a 10 year old girl. If you have surgery to remove your tumor, ask about the margins. Do not accept anything other than 100% perfect, clean margins. If you don’t get clean margins, find another surgeon to clean up the mess the first one made. Radiation isn’t that bad, but it is daily. You may not survive. After all of this treatment, you will be bald, fat, out of shape, frankenstein, and expected by everyone to get your life back, because nobody likes to see you like this. Nothing will ever be difficult after this, ever again. Well maybe a few things, but the list diminishes significantly. --BUT-- Every time you see a pink flag, you will be grateful for your life. Personally, I wish that Breast Cancer Awareness take the next step of making the public truly aware in sharing facts and patient observations more fluidly, as well as placing the emphasis on funding. Funding the medical research necessary to develop less invasive, more effective treatments, or even a cure, will eventually solve the problem that is Breast Cancer: a deforming medical hell that is on the rise because of mostly unknown factors. All Cancer research funding is worthwhile, it took a 400 Level Biology of Cancer Class during the summer of my treatment to prove this to my ears - They can and do figure out ways that all cancers start, grow, and metastasize. This, however, takes a lot of time, effort, equipment, and trials. Without funding, no advances can be made. Eventually there will be a cure, even if this is determined to be “No air pollution shall exist,” they will discover it, and when they do, it will be because of Komen, and Dr. Susan Love, and all of the generous funding, charities, and hard working scientists who dedicate their days to mindfully breaking down the secrets of Breast Cancer. And while I wish Pink taught us more about what the disease really is, I love seeing it and knowing that so much effort is behind destroying Breast Cancer. Anecdotes, Opinion 2010-10-07T18:27:50-07:00 http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/expressionengine_presentation/ http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/expressionengine_presentation/#When:21:33:16Z I am not always a superb public speaker or anxious to give away my "professional secrets," but ExpressionEngine deserves an exception. It deserves an introduction, an explanation, and time for questions like so:On September 1, 2010 I gave a Webuquerque Presentation extolling the virtues of the content management systems I use, religiously, for client sites, ExpressionEngine. Using ExpressionEngine, I've never been able to say no to a client feature for any lack of the system's capability to handle the request, as it has enough built-in that its easy to add functionality on as a PHP programmer. Turns out I was giving a presentation to a group of hungry webbies who had been fed up with Content Management Systems of all walks mainly due to their 1) high barriers to entry and 2) their lack of support and never having quite enough stability to support deployment of projects. Who could blame them? I assured them that with ExpressionEngine, deployment and support are assured, and the barrier to entry is just low enough to be affordable yet high enough to keep the code out of the hands of hackers and/or other unsavory types. The video The Photos Notice some PSYCHED winners of Twitterscapes as doorprize winners! Thank you to Emily Jones, Zerek Weltz, Emily Lewis, Jason Nakai, and Sam Metheney for everything that you did! Career management, My Career, Web Development 2010-09-21T21:33:16-07:00 http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/ricks_roll_in_our_wedding/ http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/ricks_roll_in_our_wedding/#When:16:20:47Z Since our wedding song was too sappy, we had to heel it with a lively juxtaposition. So we decided to Rickroll everyone. For our wedding song, Travis picked out In this life by Israel Kamakawiwo'ole (get) and one night played it for me before I even knew what it was. It was so romantic and sappy, yet totally accurate, that we both burst into tears. It took listening to it a couple of times before we would ultimately be able to make it through the song without waterworks, but there would be no way to give our guests this advantage. Even if we could, many of them hearing the song for the first time would actually listen to its words and knew what it meant to us. The only way to avoid a sappy, heavy feeling would be to follow the song with something funny, upbeat, or otherwise bizarre. The father-daughter dance was not going to cut it. Then along came this idea that we would Rickroll everyone. Ha! Perfect. Rick Astley’s Never gonna give you up (get) would not only be in tune with the theme of our gathering, but after such a sap-filled song, this eighties megahit turned rock paradigm would enliven our guests who were familiar with its success (unlike our wedding song, which was rather obscure) and bring giggles and laughter to everyone who knew about or had been Rickrolled before. Finally, with all the bouncing around I would be doing, the bridesmaids would surely join me on the dance floor for a couple of minutes of nobody’s-looking dance moves. We proposed this to the Deejay in our planning meeting who said, “We don’t have that song.” We must have looked really puzzled, because he immediately followed up with, “Nobody has requested Rick Astley in 15 years.” (If you want to watch a video of our wedding, my cousin and creative blogger Agatha Wells made us a video) Technorati claim tag: VZ6Z72AEZ6ZQ Anecdotes 2010-06-25T16:20:47-07:00 http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/the_planet_earth_amazons_earth_day_gift/ http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/the_planet_earth_amazons_earth_day_gift/#When:21:54:04Z It appears that for Earth Day only, Amazon is offering Planet Earth: The Complete BBC Series [Blu-ray] for a mere $37.99 (down from $100) - here is why I love this series so much.The Planet Earth BBC Series is on sale at Amazon today, Earth Day, only. Here is why I'm going to buy this: The footage covers surface of the earth, pole to pole, covering both the obvious and secret species. The narrator is a succinctly spoken British man, lending the series an aire of sophistication and drama. There's an American narrator version - this is not it. The coverage of the animals is at some of their most emotionally dramatic moments - migration, mating, famine, and fear. The program uses aerial shots and close-ups interchangeably to convey the space of movement and emotions of the scene's participants in an extraordinary perspective. Its on Blu-Ray, so the resolution is as close to real-life as possible. In fact, you might actually believe it IS real. You know, for a second or maybe 10. In other news, a Roadrunner found itself in our back yard this morning, drinking the doggie water and looking for lizards. As much as we like our lizards, we were so happy to see this amazing bird at our home for the first time, ever! Opinion, Totally Random 2010-04-22T21:54:04-07:00 http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/a_web-based_developer_makeover/ http://carolinecblaker.com/about/rants_and_raves/a_web-based_developer_makeover/#When:21:18:50Z A major shift in career for any web developer means a major shift in that developer’s website. Here are five major things I have identified I need to do with my website before it becomes my greatest online asset.It feels oddly empty and voided: my schedule that is. I have a couple of projects to look forward to, but like any other new job or career situation, this one is taking its sweet time loading up on things to do. I have officially taken the plunge into freelance and have a little too much time on my hands. Wait, no scratch that. I have all the time on my hands that I used to want before I quit my job. Aha! As I’m looking around at my online presence, I see no shortage of tidying, organizing, and clarifying that needs to happen before I start to see a lot of work. Not that I don’t deserve it - I do, but the website focus is changing from “Here I am” to somewhere between that and “Let me work for you!” I have a couple of major things going for me - I’m on a site platform that I love, Expressionengine. Its all a developer could ever want, and can be made into what the client needs in every situation. (I’m not only the hair club president, but I’m also a client.) I also have a design flexible enough to change or be seen in multiple browsers, and have developed my templating to allow for changes on a per-situation basis, whether I deem that to be per-page, per-section or per-paragraph. Long or short, I’m not limited by my platform or my design, so that leaves limited to my own invention, my ability to self-reflect and be critical, and my understanding of my website’s new desired place on the web and how to get it there. Its going to be a long road, but here are 5 preliminary things I came up with, immediately: Make Blogs more Bloggy How many Blogs do i have on my site? Two actually. One is called Conceptually Driven and the other is right here, in Rants and Raves. They function like blogs- I work on them like blogs - a post here, a post there, some pictures, etc. The trouble is, they don’t look like blogs, as they are missing some of the features blogs truly deserve: Categories links, Recent posts listings and dates, tags, and obvious connections to social networks, for reader posting and to connect with mine. They actually have RSS feeds, but these can only be found by clicking the little link in the address bar. And just forget about my self-SEO.. In order for my blogs to be seen and used, they must be treated like blogs. This is a fairly simple concept that I have clearly missed until now. It wouldn’t hurt to make the rest of my site a little more bloggy too - that way you might be able to find my artwork and videos.. yes, I have those too. Update site content to reflect my latest career move This, I have already begun in bits and pieces. However, my About This Site page still details how I found expressionengine and how much I love it, which is funny because that conversation is better saved for in-person, or for a site that is experimental and new. My new career is about moving beyond that and saying/doing/making exactly what is needed of an online situation. I do this well, in fact, but at this moment my content has not caught up. “About this Site” should really say something like “This is the home base for all that I do: check it all out.” Its otherwise unprofessional. This also includes adding sites I have recently worked on to the projects section and posting testimonials where appropriate. Migrate my portfolio into a flexible environment You may not know this, but my artist portfolio section is contained within a module called "Image gallery" which while sounding promising, is even more limiting for its look and feel flexibility and the ways I am able to use it without hacking it apart. As an Expressionengine developer, a capable one at that, I need to drop this unflexible, antiquated module and migrate my images into a system that is more like the rest of my site, with all its flexibility for templating and for optimizing the page for search engines. As someone who can create major functionality in a page, there is no excuse for using this limiting module that was included for folks who need more pre-existing structure with their development. I thrive on flexibility and fresh ingredients, and this has neither. Integrate live Twitterscapes My newest, most favorite art form, Twitterscapes, exists behind a lock and key, so that nobody can reach it and get at it before I’m ready for them to. How utterly sad. How can they be shared, loved, experienced, or understood by anyone but me while sitting back here waiting to be explored? Truth is, I want them to be live, but I need the code to work server-side before they do go live. The solution? Get off my duff and expose the most innovative contribution I have ever come up with, live, on my own website. While people are able to see Twitterscapes now, they are not live or driven by anything dynamic, but static representations asking viewers to imagine seeing them live. Not acceptible. The vitality of Twitterscapes exists in their representation of live Twitter data - without this Twitterscapes don't represent the full idea. These need to be live on my site, and then I need to take the sharing from there. Make leads easier to get So if someone wants me to develop their website, what do they do? Go to my side bar and fill out this leedle tiny form? Ha ha, No. They see that its so small and so geared towards art that they just move along and find another developer, one who has a huge contact form geared towards development, inquiring about scope, existing sites, budget, etc. That person clearly wants the project! Well I do too, so I need to do that too. End of story. My site wasn’t created to generate leads, but now its my best bet of getting them independently of others’ projects they don’t care to work on. Not only do I need this contact form, but I need to make it in an obvious place like “http://carolinecblaker.com/contact” and have links to it wherever I can justify them, with calls to action that suit my look and feel. They need to be placed at the tops and bottoms of project/portfolio areas and on my site’s header. This is a lot of places! It will require some rethinking of design and layout, just a little bit, but this is the most important part of having a website as a developer - if you don’t need leads, you probably don’t need to develop websites at all. Now since I’ve posted these here, this is how I am going to remain accountable - I am going to go through these in the next two weeks and make sure they are done to the best of my understanding. Is there something I missed? Please feel free to let me know below. Career management, My Career, Web Development 2010-04-13T21:18:50-07:00