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.

🙂