Happy New Year 2010!

I finally gave up on waiting for myself writing my own content management system only a few days before New Year’s Eve, and decided to instead go for something already out there. After much thought, I went for WordPress, and started the work of converting my existing design into a WordPress template. It took me a few days to do that, plus transferring all my previous posts, images and comments to the new site. Also, the new site is now hosting on one of my virtual servers, located in London (UK). Why London? I just hadn’t started using that particular server just yet, and this would be a great way to make use of it. Also, that server is hosted on a fast connection when seen from both sides of the Atlantic puddle.

And why the change of blogging system at all? I was simply getting tired of hand coding all my posts, especially around times where there would be a lot of pictures (ie. my vacation posts). Every little bit of formatting (bold, italics, images, whatever) needed their own little bit of HTML code I had to insert. Although I’m quite knowledgeable in HTML, it’s tiring not being able to think solely on my writing. And that’s just one of those “small” things that made blog posts far from eachother in time. From now on, I can focus on what to say, rather than how to format it. Maybe that will also mean I will post more often. I have my fingers crossed, at least.

I’ve also kept my Norwegian-only posts, and placed them in a category of their own. The title for my Norwegian-only posts will now also have the Norwegian flag next to them, just so you can filter them out (visually) whenever they appear.

They usually won’t, though, unless the subject of the posts is only intended for people in Norway.

If you’re wondering about the colorful image at the beginning of my post, I just felt I had to start the new year with fresh images of me, and in a slightly humorous way. That’s me making faces to my camera on a tripod taking 10 snaps at a time on a self-timer. Fun stuff. Then again, after snapping 50 shots of myself,  I had to pick a small selection of these to process and tweak, just to show off. Not nearly enough of those snaps were good enough, though, either quality-wise or regarding the face I was making.

As for the last three months, life goes on as normal, except:

I’ve learned that I’m going to be an uncle. My sister Lene is already half-way, expecting delivery in early May, and one of the latest exams revealed that it’s going to be a baby girl. We’re all excited, to say the least. The whole ordeal also serves as a strong reminder to myself that I’m no further on my own path in life. I mean, I turn 30 in a little over a month from now, and I’m still single. I can almost feel the biological clock ticking (in the sense that I’m emotionally ready for both commitment as well as family expansions). My sister’s little upcoming nugget does overshadow those slightly-depressing thoughts, at least.

Back in August,  my cousin and his wife had a son of their own, named Alexander, and he was baptised on the third day of Xmas, unfortunately landing on their own 1-year wedding anniversary.

And Xmas has  just passed, and this year’s catch included some things I had on my wishlist, a few things I should’ve had on my wishlist, and a few things I hadn’t wished for at all, but were still appreciated. I’ll provide details if someone asks.

I noticed Barrack Obama won the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize. Personally, I thought it was nice, even though his peace efforts up to that point have been more in words, rather than actions. He hasn’t come through on a lot of things this past year, but then again, he has accomplished some good things in this short time, which I can hardly say about his predecessor. Obama has so far minimized the long term damage from the economic recession in the U.S., and has come through on the American health care reform (that’s good). Even though he announced he was sending additional troops to Afghanistan between the Peace Prize was announced and he actually received it (that’s bad), he did seem to make long term plans for withdrawal (that’s good). We’ll see what happens. At least he seems enthusiastic about going for diplomacy first, insteading of “shoot first, ask questions using any means necessary later” (which seemed to be the strategy of “Dubya”).

Let’s just hope for a prosperous new year for everyone and be done with it.

Jacob Dicke (one of the people I met at the Blue Man Group fanmeet in Orlando this summer) tagged me with this on Facebook, so I (almost) had to make this list.

Then again, the introduction said I “had” to tag an additional 25 people while posting this (including the person who originally tagged you), and since I’m very much against chain letters and variations thereof, I’m reluctant to do just that.

But anyway, here are the ABC’s of me:

• A – Age: 29 (at the moment)
• B – Bed size: Junior king, or whatever it’s called (just wide enough to fit my wide ass)
• C – Chore you hate: Vacuuming (but it has to be done)
• D – Dog’s names: No dogs or pets of any kind (unless you count the occasional dust bunny)
• E – Essential start your day item: Daily cartoons and/or jokes
• F – Favorite color: Blue
• G – Gold or Silver: Gold
• H – Height: 171 cm (that’s roughly 5′ 7½” to those who are stuck with the “imperial” system)
• I – Instruments you play: None at the moment, but I did learn how to play recorder, piano and cello back in the day
• J – Job title: System Administrator
• K – Kid(s): None (yet)
• L – Living arrangements: Large basement room at my mom’s house
• M – Mother’s name: Marianne
• N – Nicknames: NeonNero (chosen) and Kimmen (from others)
• O – Overnight hospital stay other than birth: Once during elementary school, I was admitted for monitoring after an accidental (and small) overdose on my asthma medication
• P – Pet Peeves: Spelling and/or grammatical errors on commercial products and big signs. I mean, COME ON!
• Q – Quote from a movie: The Terminator: I’ll be back.
• R – Right or left handed: Right handed
• S – Siblings: Two younger sisters – one 3 years and 1 month apart (same mother and father), and one 17 years and 11 months apart (only the same father)
• T – Time you wake up: Anywhere between 9am and 11am, usually, unless I need to get up earlier for some reason
• U – Underwear bought most during Clinton administration: I was in my mid-teens, so I basically didn’t care too much about what type of underwear to use – but I think I used
• V – Vegetable you dislike: Broccoli (something about the texture that makes me twitch)
• W – Ways/Reasons you run late: Absent-mindedness, mostly
• X – X-rays you’ve had: Head and hand (when I was checked for any stunted growth)
• Y – Yummy food you make: Pizza! From scratch!
• Z – Zoo favorite: Giraffe

For those few who follow me on Twitter, I got the new puppets on Saturday.

After spending a few minutes unpacking them, I got slightly disappointed when I started trying them on… I could barely get my hand in there! That is, I could barely fit my hand inside one of them, I had to give up trying on the other. And the one I was able to fit my hand inside, it was a tight fit. I had to spend almost a full minute on getting it on, and a full minute getting it off, both requiring some effort of tugging and wiggling. Judging by that, and the fact that one of the attached labels said it was intended for children 5+, I’m thinking these are more suited for – exactly – children.

This also means that the initial plans regarding which characters to use will have to be scrapped. I do have some puppet patterns to work from, but that means I’ll have to wait until I unpack my sewing kits before I continue, and create a new character from scratch. It’s not too hard, but it’s a time-consuming process. My sewing kits (mainly, the outside fabric of the puppets) are packed pending my room redecoration, which in turn means that the original time table has to be extended a fair bit.

Also, the puppets I received were not true Muppet Whatnots per se (although they did have the Muppet look), as they both had their features sewn or glued on (non-removable).

Though I won’t be able to use these puppets too much myself, that doesn’t mean I won’t feature them on the show once in a while. I just have to figure out how to perform them without too much strain on me. One of my ideas for this is to use some sort of rod control to perform the mouth from a few inches below the puppet neck. Another idea involves the training of a youngster in the art of puppeteering (which will be a lot harder to find in this area), so this boy or girl can perform the Whatnot characters alongside my own designs. Judging by my own hand size and how hard I had to work just to get my hand inside, I’d say the best puppeteer age would be around 13-16 for these (or even up to 19-20), or simply just someone with smaller hands, considering my mom was able to fit them on her own hand without seemingly too much trouble. I’m not too comfortable with the idea of training someone else in the art, as I don’t think of myself much as a teacher.

In any case, there will be no training of new puppeteers by me until the new puppet is created. I currently have fleece (skin) fabric in dark blue (like marine blue) and light blue (blue like sunny skies), so far I’ve worked with the light blue while creating the half-made ones; one puppet head with ugly glue spots (my first attempt), and one puppet head not yet attached to a body (second attempt, where I also discovered why the puppet pattern was specific enough in the step-by-step process that the cardboard and foam rubber inside mouth was glued on after attaching the body) – both are of ProjectPuppet.com‘s “Glorified Sock Puppet” pattern.

I haven’t given up on the planned show just yet, though. I just have to recast it, that’s all. I’m now thinking that the next puppet I create, which will now be headlining the show, should either have a roly shape or a melonhead shape. I already have both of these patterns, I just have to decide which one. I’ll get to that later, though (but I’m certainly open for suggestions).

So to sum things up, I was a little disappointed about the puppets I finally received, but I haven’t given up on neither the puppet show or the Muppet Whatnot puppets I bought. I just need to rethink some of my original plans.

I’m about to start a new hobby project of mine, which has been a long time coming. I have something of a blurry vision of what it will be like, but I have somewhat of an idea. I don’t, however, have a more clear idea of the name of this pet project of mine.

First off, let me just blurt out what the project actually is about. For some time now, I’ve been “secretly” training my skill as a puppeteer. This comes heavily into play in this new project, which is, in general, about a group of puppets living together and vlogging (video blogging) on YouTube about their lives using a webcam. The project is not meant to be daily, but hopefully at the very least a weekly segment will come out of this, and the current plan is to eventually expand this to live segments on BlogTV (or similar site) and to some segment parts filmed outdoors and on the move (to show off some sights and on vacation). These are future plans, but it will all start from a webcam in front of a computer. The starting premise might change, though, depending on the name suggestions I get. There might also be a possibility I’ll make some minor changes to the format these segments are produced.

To start with, this group of puppets (both performed by myself) will consist of two male characters (the puppets are actually in transit from across the pond at the time of this post). These will not necessarily be performed simultaneously (not without some heavy post-production editing, at least), but the segments will be improvised upon a partial pre-written script (which will be more like a summary of events to talk about).

Now all I need is a name for these vlogs. The name needs to be short enough to be memorable and easy to type as a URL (short domain name as well). I won’t necessarily use the full name suggested by my reader(s), I just need a few starting points to brainstorm my way out of. Please note that if the name I choose isn’t available for registration (as a username at YouTube and BlogTV, and as a domain name), I won’t use it. I might consider the name if you’ve already registered the domain name for it and is prepared to donate it to the project (or at least sell it at GoDaddy.com’s retail price), but that’s not a given.

The puppets themselves should arrive here in about two weeks (or a little less), but I also have some room cleaning and redecoration to do before that time arrives. I will also have to do some test scripting, test filming and general preparations before the actual project starts up. There’s really no telling when this first video will be released, but I’m setting my sights on being ready for mid-April or the beginning of May.

I know there aren’t a lot of people reading this, but if you guys would e-mail me a list of suggestions that pop into their minds, I’d really appreciate it. Those who provide suggestions that are used, either in part or in full, will of course get listed in the (short) end credits unless you don’t want me to.

I’ll be accepting name suggestions up to the point where I announce the name of it in a new blog post here.

Big thanks to anyone who participate.