If you're a regular visitor to this site you'll notice that this isn't one year on (Dec. 25th 2003) by the time I've gotten around to this; it is in fact now January 8th 2004... which only goes to prove one thing: cr*p happens. That cr*p in this case is depression.

But enough of that for now. So just what has been happening in the year since my tribute to Steve first found it's place on the net? Most of what was ready on launch day is still in fact here. Photos have constantly been added and the tributes section has grown quite large: a Tributes For Steve section for you to leave your tributes to the great man was launched on the 12th anniversary of his passing on January 8th 2003. On Steve's birthday a brand new Artwork feature (amongst other things) was added especially to honour his day. The latest section of the site is still in progress: a treat for those fans who aren't able to get to the UK to visit Sheffield.

Those who are regular visitors may have noticed that since September 2003 I started making minor changes to the site design (I had never been happy with all of the index pages, so they're being changed... slowly). I say minor because the site philosophy is still exactly the same: you'd never see Steve with a flashy paint job on any of his guitars and I don't want my site to be flashy either... but, as with a lot of things in life, things that seem effortless and simple very rarely are: what may look like minor differences are taking a lot of behind the scenes effort. There will be no noticeable change on many pages, but the coding I am now doing is a little more complicated. (The irony being that this page has probably the simplest coding on my site). However, it gives me more control over how you see the pages, which is a good thing as (hopefully!) every visitor gets to see the pages the way I designed them. Which is all well and good until you hit a snag. That snag in my case is my illness - the same as Steve had - the dreaded depression. By mid-November I had already been struggling more than usual so early in December the decision was made to take a break: website coding is almost impossible during a bad phase of depression as concentration is non-existent... not to mention enthusiasm dwindles considerable, even when your website is dedicated to someone so special who means the world to you. If you have no idea what I am talking about maybe you should check out the Get Informed section of the site.

So December... it was then that I was kicking myself for doing everything on my website myself. From the outset I have done absolutely everything on this site myself: coding, graphics, artwork, design, layout, all original text etc. It was at that point that I was starting to regret not using a template or sitebuilder (call 'em what you want they're all the same thing, no matter where your website's hosted). Had I used one of them I could have had the site remodelled in a few minutes... I thought about it for a millisecond and then decided that no, I would never give in and use one. No offence to anyone who uses them (probably 95% of webmasters do), but they're not my thing: I wanted to do everything myself, from scratch, even though it means hours slogging away at the keyboard. That is what I started with, and it's what I'll finish with; something that's 100% my own work. I had wanted to get the site finished within the year with minor updates after that, allowing me to take time out to battle my illness, full onslaught. Not using coding software means that it wasn't possible to have the site almost finished by 25th December 2003. Instead I decided to take the break and come back to finish the site at my own pace. It will be finished, just a little more slowly than I first anticipated.

There was a point for the shortest amount of time when I thought to myself why bother with all of this, sick of being faced with the continual ignorance that surrounds depression and it's associated disorders. I had grown weary of even trying to make a difference when there is still so little understanding (I have come across it on the few occasions I have bothered with the internet save for working on my site over the past few months)... but, as ever if I don't bother then ignorance will probably reign with an even tighter grip than it does at the present time. My site was set out to make people aware of what it's like to suffer from depression; most people when they think of Steve's problems just seem to think 'alcohol', they don't know the other half of what it's like to suffer from depression as he did... and so I will continue to try to raise awareness, to get people to seek help and to try and educate those who wish to learn more.

If I had to choose one sentence to sum up this year it would probably be...

"Nothing ever changes... but nothing ever stays the same."