This morning I needed to condense a long URL about fistulotomies (I was in a chat room - one person had just completed the surgery, another didn’t know what it is, and I’m the Google wonk). The infamous TinyURL seemed to be down, so I tried Shorl instead. I was impressed by a couple of things - first, it keeps statistics on how many times a URL has been visited. You get a bookmarkable URL with a password - for the fistulotomy site, it’s here - and you can check back to see how many times the Shorl has been visited. The other cool thing is that Shorls are meant to be able to be pronounced. They use a system called koremutake that strings together valid syllables into “words” - they tend to be kind of long, but you could say them…and, they say, that makes them easier to remember. The statistics part is really awesome, though - I might use Shorl instead of TinyURL for some of my condensed URL needs.

I’m a little late catching up with my Ask Yahoo and Yahoo Daily Wire e-mails, so I only just came across the Ask Yahoo question for October 24th: How do I start my own blog? While the answer is short, it’s probably enough for those unfamiliar with the topic. The November 15, 2002 question is What are blogs, and how did they become so popular? and that page’s last paragraph echoes my favorite blog-related cause:

Weblogs and online journals are often confused, and they can frequently overlap in content and style. But purists point out that a person writing in an online journal or diary is logging their life, not the Web. Weblogs still exist to log what’s going on around the World Wide Web.

Yes! Blogging is the world out there, journaling is the world in here (that is, the author’s life). Ask Yahoo also has a question from November 3, 2000 (they seem to do the blogging questions in the fall, heh) that asks Are there web sites for writing and storing diaries online? The two sites mentioned in the answer are still around, though My Dear Diary is looking for a buyer.

The blogging and journaling community is already vastly overcrowded, and people tend to start keeping a journal and then quit after a short time. Is it a good thing that Yahoo is encouraging people to start blogs by telling them exactly how to do it? I think there are enough resources out there that those who want to create a blog should be able to do so with no problem, without having their hand held by Ask Yahoo.

My ISP’s SMTP server used to work just fine, but for the past couple of days I’ve been having trouble with it. Mozilla claimed to be unable to connect, so tonight I finally called tech support to ask if anything was wrong on their end. I waited on hold for more than 20 minutes before finally getting to talk with somebody. The tech I spoke with sounded alarmed when I mentioned Mozilla - “ooooh, we don’t support that” - but I convinced her it was the SMTP server I really wanted to talk about, not my browser. I finally determined that they switched from being mail.express56.com to smtp.express56.com without telling me (well, perhaps they e-mailed my account with them, but I don’t use that), so I hung up the phone, changed the settings, and tried again to send e-mail. No dice - same problem! I didn’t want to spend another 20 minutes on hold, so I thought I’d try one of the free SMTP services that are out there. You usually have to go through a lot to prove you don’t want to use it to spam, but I figured it was worth the effort if I could just send e-mails directly rather than going through webmail.

My Google search for “free smtp” turned up something called PostCast Server, a free SMTP server that runs happily on a Win98 box with dialup. It took a while to download the 14MB installer, but I managed to get the whole file and install the program. I sent myself a test message, and it works great! I like that I can view the logs and see what servers are saying to me, and it was amusing to view the headers of the received message and see they included my own IP address. (I’m on dialup so that will change, but I confirmed that it’s my current IP address that showed up in the header.) I don’t have to bother with my ISP’s SMTP server anymore - this is awesome!

I got a Bloglet e-mail digest a couple of days ago that included a terse entry from Shawn (aka webgrrlie), a blogger in the DC area. She said she didn’t have anything more to say, and it was pretty obviously a final post. I posted along with a couple of other people, wishing her well and hoping we’d hear from her again.

Today’s Bloglet e-mail included another entry from her site, this time with her husband writing. He says that Shawn has been getting sicker - she’s been ill for quite some time now, and has mentioned it in her journal when she posts - and that she may be dying. I went to her site to post a comment…but there was nothing there. The toe-tag design she’s been using recently has been replaced by an older one, and the archives haven’t been updated in a long time.

I don’t pray, but I am going to keep Shawn in my thoughts and I hope those of you who know her will too. If I can find out what hospital she’s in, maybe I’ll pay her a visit (she’s local to me, after all).

I haven’t been posting for the past several days because I’ve been busy. We had a yard sale on Saturday and made $8.50 - we only sold a very few items, mostly because we started late in the day (A has a class on Saturday mornings) and didn’t have adequate signage. In fact, it’s amazing we sold anything. We got rained out on Sunday, but I think we’re going to try it again next weekend. On Sunday I attended my friend _E_’s wedding; it was very nice but now I have to write a three- to four-page research paper about the interpretation…it’s due Wednesday night. I’ve gotten the first two-and-a-quarter pages written; I’m taking a little break for a bit.

It’s hard for me to explain just how difficult it is to interpret songs. My mother posted recently about an interpretation of the Capitol Steps, and she asked me how I would have handled the situation. My answer was that I wouldn’t have put myself there in the first place, because I am absolutely not skilled enough to handle songs. (The RID Code of Ethics says you shouldn’t accept assignments outside your skill set.)

I just came across an article called Signing for the Boss, in which the coordinator of interpreter services at Boston University explains what it was like to interpret for a Bruce Springsteen performance, and how she handled individual situations. The article is a great explanation of why it’s hard to interpret concerts. [via USA-L News]

Now this is amusing - there’s a website called Draft Wesley Crusher encouraging him to run for president in 2004. As joke sites go, it’s not very well done (the writing is decent, but there are a lot of non-functional links), but it’s a funny idea. The Yin Blog has followed up with an analysis of a potential campaign, which concludes that Wesley is ineligible because he’s not old enough. Of course, Wil Wheaton is a blogger himself and will doubtless hear of this eventually - I’m eager to see his reaction. [via Memepool]

I feel that this could be partially inaccurate because I don’t remember all the people I’ve ever met online and offline! This is recounted to the best of my abilities, at least. [via my mother]

My Relation To Countries
Visited	Known People From
	Offline	Online
Canada Grenada Turkey United States	Afganistan Argentina Aruba Australia Bangladesh Belgium Brazil Canada China Colombia Costa Rica Cuba Denmark Dominican Republic Ecuador Egypt Estonia France Germany Guatemala Haiti Honduras Hong Kong India Ireland Italy Japan Lithuania Luxembourg Mexico Nepal Netherlands New Zealand Norway Pakistan Peru Philippines Poland Portugal Puerto Rico Russian Federation Singapore South Africa South Korea Spain Sweden Switzerland Taiwan Turkey Ukraine United Kingdom United States Venezuela	Antigua and Barbuda Australia Austria Bahamas Bosnia and Herzegovina Brazil Bulgaria Canada Chile Colombia Costa Rica Croatia Cuba Czech Republic Denmark Egypt Finland France Germany Greece Hong Kong Iceland Iraq Ireland Israel Japan Luxembourg Netherlands New Zealand Philippines Poland Portugal Russian Federation Switzerland Taiwan Thailand Turkey Ukraine United Kingdom United States

Statistics
Number of Countries I Visited:		4
Number of Countries I Talked To People From	Offline:	53
	Online:	40
Which Countries Are You Related To?
Brought to you by: khalidz0r

According to the Net-Sweeper software used to block objectionable sites at the middle school where I worked today, http://dmoz.org/ is a Sex Site. Now granted there is an Adult section, but it’s a directory. It definitely should not be blocked; it even has a Kids & Teens section! Grrr.

I posted pictures of Agaricus on LiveJournal’s rateyourcat community, and he won a first-place stamp! That means I get to be a judge of other kitties whose pictures get posted. Plus the stamp graphic comes with a picture from Nyan Nyan Nyanko, San-X’s adorable food kitties.