10:07 a.m. An e-mail came in from a pen pal friend of mine. It was a short note about an interesting site called Geocities. She thought I might like to check it out.
7:00 p.m. I had explored Geocities and couldn't resist signing up for a web page and an e-mail address. I used the beginners' editor to set up a simple page, and was excited about improving it. I contacted a friend who designs web pages for a living. I asked for his help to add a couple animated graphics to my page. I learned my first lesson:
- Professionals tend to over-estimate the abilities of
beginners to do even the basic computer functions.
- Don't use blinking unless you have to!
6:00 a.m. I was at my computer e-mailing like crazy trying to find out if my friend was healthy enough after a bout of the flu to help me with my graphics. He was. Since it was easier for him, he downloaded my progam and "fixed" it at his leisure. Then, he had a little problem uploading it, so he told me to Save a copy to my hard drive, and then Upload it to my new site. Simple, right? Big mistake! I spent the next four hours trying to find out what went wrong and trying to rebuild my site. No luck.
1/7/97 It was Tuesday. The weather continued warm and was as foggy as my brain had become. I was lost and my friend was tied up with his own work. I discovered the Profile Delete--and used it!
- Five minutes later, I reapplied for the same site and got it. I
was back in business.
I sent a note to my friend telling her I hate her! :) I sent a note to another pen pal friend telling her to check out Geocities. Misery loves company.
4:17 p.m. I had rebuilt my main page again and my second page was looking decent. Nothing fancy but it worked and the link was functioning properly. I was ready to experiment with some new graphics. Big mistake!
1/08/97 It was Wednesday. The weather had turned cold and I was feeling as grey as the weather. I couldn't figure out how to move a .gif file to my page even though everyone said it was easy. I didn't want to bug any of the Community Leaders, so I spent the day just browsing through the neighborhood and checking out pages that explained HTML. I was learning a lot. I was learning how much I had to learn!
1/09/97 It is Thursday. I can't tell what the weather is because it is 6:47 a.m. and it is still very dark outside. I couldn't sleep because of plans for another page. I read that you can get more space for your site if you can become a Featured Site for your community. One recommendation was a History page. So, for the last hour and a half I have been working on this page.
My next project is to find out how to change the background so it is not just solid color.
Maybe I should link this page to my main page!
Just found out my e-mail isn't working right so I have to go fix a few links. And, I can't get my main page to BE the main page, so I have to link this one up as the main page with links to all the others! This is starting to feel a lot like WORK!
NOON I have been at this for almost 7 hours, and I think I have all my links working and I even got my husband, John's, page set up in some kind of order. I'll work on his more later. For now, I think it is better if I get out before I push the wrong button again.
1/10/97 It is Friday. And it is definitely not a good weather day in Michigan. We got 13 inches of snow in the last 24 hours, and it looks like more coming even though it has slowed down. It is a good day to learn all about putting color on my pages.
Last night I went browsing through a few sites, and "borrowed" a little code by using document source (that's a great funciton! wish I knew about it weeks ago.) If I did it right, I should be able to dress up my page a little.
A few people stopped by my site and sent useful hints and gave me detailed instructions for fixing problems. I appreciate it a lot. Any help would be gratefully appreciated. Special thanks to Jonathan Choy for all his detailed help. As soon as I finish this entry, I will be putting it into good use.
1/11/97 7:17 a.m. Ahhhhhhhh sleep--perchance to dream. Too bad the only thing I dream about these days is HTML. I don't know how much more of this I can take. I'm NOT a morning person but this page won't let me sleep past 7 o'clock. And I can't even have a cup of coffee to wake me up--I never learned to drink that stuff. What I NEED is a two litre bottle of Coke Classic. Unfortuantely I have developed an addiction to it, and have decided to go cold turkey to get off the stuff. I can only afford one addiction at a time, and the Internet is it.
My ISP has been busy and totally inaccessable all day. Don't let anyone tell you small towns don't have a lot of computer users. I think our town of about 10,000 must have 6,000 computers I think maybe the Internet has replaced S__ as the greatest winter passtime!
1/11/97 8:35 a.m. Still Saturday, and still snowing. How do you like the change in background color? I thought we were probably all getting a little tired of the blue by now. Since color is the only thing I can change, I try to do it a lot. No consistancy. But consistancy is boring any way. That's it for today. Can't add more until I have a brainstorm and think of something new to do.
While I was out wandering around, I also did something else rather off the wall for me--I signed up for the GeoRewards program. I wonder if they will think this site is up to it. I'm not sure I am. I'm glad they have people to help with banners, because I don't have a clue. Oh well, "Learn Something New Every Day" is more than just words.
(I was putting in the line below, and for the first time, I did it without having to look at another line to get it right. I am soooooooo proud of me! :) (Too bad all the lines went to the dumpster when I remodeled.)
1/13/97 Another Monday morning. Those who have been here before will notice a few changes. I got visit from a nice Geocities citizen who was kind enough to give me his uncensored opinion of my site--Ouch!!! Actually, it wasn't too bad. He strongly recommended some graphics (working on it), and some cosmetic changes such as font and background changes. I agreed some of the backgrounds were a bit much, and I changed them. As for the font, I'm considering it. Background design is in the "working on it" category.
I learned a new thing and implemented it yesterday. My smileys are now actual links instead of just the words under them being links. Took a while, didn't it.
I was wandering around visiting a few sites and dropping a comment or two around Geocities last night. I happened on a very nice site, but it had a problem I had seen before. For a change, I felt it was worth an e-mail to suggest a solution (I may not know the technical side of fixing something, but I can SEE a problem) so I dropped a note in the e-mail. I got a response that was cordial but which indicated the problem might be with my eyes--I agreed. Later, I got a second note saying the problem was indeed a technical problem. Maybe some others can benefit from the lesson:
Not all computers are created equal in the COLOR department. Most PC's have 256 colors. Sites created on a computer with unlimited colors can sometimes be very difficult for the average computer user to read. If you are using a computer with unlimited colors, have a friend with a 256 color computer check out your site before final text color decisions. It is especially evident in the black background/red text sites. This may be something to consider, also, when dealing with a very "busy" background. If your text can't be read, no one will bother to come back or pass the site on to friends.
1/15/97 8:02 a.m. Well, you asked for it and now you have it--my rainbow lines are gone to line heaven. I feel so depressed. It will take a lot of smiley faces to fix this! :( This was supposed to be about changing lines, etc. Unfortunately, when I got up at 5:30 to do this, I decided to first check out a chat room. I have never been to one before. I didn't get out until 7:45. I had to set up this page, and now it is time to get ready for a trip to take a neighbor to the grocery store.
Now that the backgrounds are done, and I have signed up for GeoRewards (did you notice all the pretty banners on the top of my pages? Go visit them--and come back here often to make my counter go higher--I love to see it go up!), I am ready for a banner of my own. Another nice man is helping me with that since we all know I would mess it up royally.
1/18/97 6:16 a.m. What a morning! Have you seen what
I finally figured out last night? No? Well, here it is in all
it's glory. 
Isn't that pretty? Now I just have to get
the rest of the .gif files moved to where I can use them, and I
will be all set to make my pages pretty. I know, not too many or
the page gets slow to load. I'll be careful. I am still working
on getting the animated ones. Give me time. To get this far in
just two weeks is pretty good.
Now that I have learned how to do it, you will see my backgrounds change every little while. I never leave anything alone until I find just the perfect one. For now, back to editing some of these pages.
1/20/97 7:00 a.m. I have to work fast today--some family members really get bent out of shape when you get on the computer at 6 a.m. and don't get off until 11 p.m. a couple times! My daughter wants it before school, now; and John wants it by noon but says I can have it after 6 p.m.--how sweet--that's when the server gets extra busy and everything is impossible. So, I get 5 hours to work and I better get at it.
1/22/97 11:30 a.m. What a morning! I have added a page and have done a lot of little editing jobs that were begging for my attention.
2/11/97 Well, get ready for a total mess. I have been working on a major reformatting of my entire site. It will be implemented tomorrow morning--very early before my ISP gets jammed up and I can't get to the upload utility any more. Yesterday we had "backbone" problems and I was forced off-line for 4+ hours. Why do the ISPs have to go down just when we are in the middle of something major? IF I can get things uploaded, everything should be in place by noon (EST) tomorrow. Let me know what you think of it.
3/19/97 I hope you are having fun trying to find anything worth looking at in this site today. I decided to really get to the destroying part of my search and destroy mission, and over half my site has hit the trash. Now I just need to go back and figure out what to use to refill this site! I don't have a clue! The idea I had fell through, and I am totally without a thought on the subject. I guess I will just take a day or two and forget everything else until I come up with something.
3/27/97 Wow! It is hard to believe it has only been three months since that day my pen pal wrote and told me about GeoCities. As I look back, I get kind of nostalgic for the days when I didn't know a .gif from a birthday gift. But, time has passed and we have all grown. For those of you who have enjoyed the History section of my site, I have bad news--this will be my last history entry. The page has reached a stage of maturity where it is going to remain until I learn about JAVA and Javascript and Frames and all those other fun things you should know by now are not in my immediate future. Why, you ask, am I ending this section? Well, I like the site the way it is. It is still growing with the addition of Helpful Computer Tips, and other things of that nature. It is in a style I like and am comfortable with--I finally got tables figured out!!! Besides, I am also a little busy with Community Leader work, and I have been drafted as web master for a total of 6 sites belonging to my friends. Is that ridiculous, or what? So, friends, thank you for reading these pages, and I hope you will continue to enjoy the rest of the site.
