Anyone know a good Web design community? And I mean a good one?

I tried joining DayDreamGraphics.com again earlier this week by submitting my Poison Paradise layout. They rejected it, saying that the admin “wasn’t fond of it” and that it didn’t work in Opera. Funny… I checked it! They also said that all it looked like was a picture on the side of an I-frame.

This is my third and final try to join that place. My first few posts on their MB were ignored, save for my intro. I want to improve my design and coding skills, not be ignored until I create something l33t enough to join their little clique. I tell when I’ve done that either. DDG has such strict anti-advertising rules that I can’t tell when I’m advertising or asking for help. One of those posts I made I was asking for help and was told I was advertising. *sigh* They say genuine posts asking for help are tolerated, but obviously they have a different definition of “genuine.”

I’ve deleted my account and I’m on a hunt to find another Web design community I can join. I simply don’t have the time or tolerance to fight to join a community clique anymore. I’ve never had that kind of energy in the first place.

Just a quick quiz from . ^_^

Nothing like a new machine to remind you how crappy your old one is/was. Yep, we finally got our new machine. $614 dollars later we have a clearance model Compaq. (Funny thing, I seem to remember declaring I was never going to purchase a Compaq ever again!) XD

• 512 MB Ram
• 200G Hard drive
• AMD Athlon 64 Processor 3300+ running at 1.81 GHz
• Windows XP Home
• 9-in-1 Cardreader
• CD/RW and DVD-ROM

It’s nice, though it’s loaded with crap we’re still trying to delete. Most of my J-Rock and MP3 collection is still trapped on my old machine, with no real way other than e-mail or transferring via my domain (bandwidth = ouch!). I never realized how clunky my old machine was and how slow it had gotten until I began working with this new machine.

Just finally got myself registered for classes; the college sat on some issues long enough that the classes I wanted to take were full. lol Now I somehow have to come up with an extra $200 next semester to pay for my extra software. XD I should be happy/grateful this is all I have to be worried about! I mean, really, this means I get to play with Dreamweaver and Flash sooner than I expected. Though I really wanted to purchase some upgrades to this beast to push it up over the 1G limit for RAM and save the extra software purchases for later.

Anyroad, I have most of my software transfered. (Including my Chrono Trigger sounds / Mouse pointers. lol My system just seems naked without them.) I forgot to transfer my diabetes logs over, so I have that to do yet. I think I’m going to price Flash sticks so maybe I can transfer my MP3s and the rest of my junk over; and then maybe back up my Homework once that’s done. It’s a thought.

I’m going to try to make the blog rounds today before the next round of homework begins coming due. *glomps* Sorry I’ve been so disconnected.

I’m still very unsure of myself in this class. Again, I realize that I’m always my own worst critic and that I expect too much of myself. Part of me still is very intimidated by the entire idea of taking composition 102. I can safely say I learned things and that APA style did come back to me relatively quickly.

That being said, I’ve realized I dislike citing government publications — especially those found online. Our government makes things far harder than they need to be and insists on using the absolute longest names for their pages. I found myself becoming increasingly frustrated with the parenthetical reference — or “that little name and date you put immediately after a quote” as I explained to my mom in hopes of getting some direction. I eventually dug out my copy of “The College Writer” that Baker issued me for my College Success Strategies class, since they tell you how to cite organizations with long names. I hate the idea of plagiarism; much less being accused of it myself.

I think I wrote a decent essay, even with my many bad writing habits and confusion over the parenthetical references. I had to remove full paragraphs in order to keep the essay tight, especially since I feel so strongly over the idea of the chain letter and Internet hoax. Though I do hope my thesis came through okay and that I had at least some credibility. Hopefully over the next few weeks I can begin feeling more confident about those topics.

I think I finally beat my favorite Internet Explorer bug! No more horizontal scrollbars! ^_^ I don’t know if the css I used is compliant, but I don’t have time to check it right now. (Besides… Since when is anything connected to IE compliant?)

My next classes are going to have me at a dead run for the next three weeks, so I’m going to have to be extra disciplined until my 3 week class ends. Until then, it looks I’m going to be writing lots of papers. ^^;;

So I get to finish up my assignments for my first session classes and then get right to work on the new ones. Fun fun. For some reason I thought I had more time than what I actually do. I’m just glad my Experiment ended on Monday, now I can pull my head in and focus on school. Jass won’t be as busy, I think, so I think I can entrust him with my junk until I’m free.

As usual, I’ve started second-guessing myself ever Grandma went off on me. I know I should take everything she says with a whole salt mine, but she manages to get under my skin each and every time. I suppose next time I should play it smart and let my sense of self-preservation win for a change. Yeah, I should be that smart.

Much love and glomps, see you after class!