Stephanie left early (I mean EARLY!) yesterday morning to travel to the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana to begin her Master of Library Science degree. She arrived safely in St. Louis, met at the airport by her mom and sister-in-law (Laura). Today she made the drive to the University with Laura through a thunderstorm.

I am bitter that I missed it.

She begins class tomorrow morning at 8am, armed with her new MacBook that was a birthday present from her family and me. She comes back on the 23rd, which means this is probably the longest we've been apart in six years of marriage. But she sent me some pictures taken on the MacBook to keep me company:

Bluebeard by Kurt Vonnegut

Gattaca

If you have a Digg.com account, go here and digg this:

Possible Wordpress killer: b2evolution 1.8 beta released

If you don't have an account, get one! Let's digg this up to the front page so more people can hear about this release. Sorry for the sensational story title, but those are the ones that grab attention on Digg.

The new version of b2evolution has some very cool features. Brendoman.com has been upgraded. In a somewhat related story, I'm now listed as a contributor to the project in the linkblog that comes with a new install. Go here and look in the section on the right side labeled "contributors" if you want to see.

If you have a Digg.com account, go here and digg this:

Possible Wordpress killer: b2evolution 1.8 beta released

If you don't have an account, get one! Let's digg this up to the front page so more people can hear about this release. Sorry for the sensational story title, but those are the ones that grab attention on Digg.

The new version of b2evolution has some very cool features. Brendoman.com has been upgraded. In a somewhat related story, I'm now listed as a contributor to the project in the linkblog that comes with a new install. Go here and look in the section on the right side labeled "contributors" if you want to see.

Moo Goo Gai Pan
Moo Goo in Chinese means mushrooms and Gai Pan means chicken slices. Cooked with colorful vegetables in white sauce. Hey, you special Chinese too...

Szechuan Beef
Imagine shredded celeries, carrots, and green onions dancing with beef slices in the wok "showering" under our fiery spicy plum sauce.

Shrimp with Garlic Sauce
Thin cut of celeries, carrots, water chestnuts, and wood ears tossed with shrimp in spicy garlic sauce. It’s good enough that you won’t then your friend kisses you.

Seafood Combination
Shrimp invites imitation crabmeat and scallops wearing colorful vegetable dresses to a velvet white wine sauce party.

Purpose
The Sideblog plugin allows you to insert another blog in the sidebar of your skin with simple plugin call. A sidebar blog can be used for brief posts, links, photos or any other list you want arranged chronologically.

Installation
Requires b2evolution 1.8 or later

1. Download this file: _sideblog.plugin.txt.
2. Replace the .txt in the filename with .php and upload it to your b2evolution plugins folder.
3. In the backoffice, go to Settings > Plugins and find Sideblog in the list. Click "install".

Usage
To use the plugin, just add this code to the skin where you want the sidebar blog to appear:

<?php
// MostComments plugin:
$Plugins->call_by_code( 'sideblog', array(
'limit' => 5,
'blog' => 3,
) );
// Add parameters in the array.
?>

Limit is the number of posts you want to show. Blog is the blog you want to display there. Refer to the plugin source for other parameters you can adjust.

Syd Barrett, founder of Pink Floyd, dies - Yahoo! News

So, so you think you can tell Heaven from Hell,
blue skies from pain.
Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail?
A smile from a veil?
Do you think you can tell?
And did they get you to trade your heroes for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees?
Hot air for a cool breeze?
Cold comfort for change?
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage?
How I wish, how I wish you were here.
We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl, year after year,
Running over the same old ground.
What have we found? The same old fears.
Wish you were here.