.

I have moved

Jump

I liked playing with Vox but now I am done. I have a blog of my own over at http://jessamyn.com/journal (rss, atom) and I encourage you to read it if this is the sort of thing that interests you. I have photos at Flickr, a professional blog of sorts and I'm even sometimes on Facebook. I'll still be reading here, I just won't be writing here.

I don't ever want to have to unclick a box that says "This may be offensive or otherwise not for the public." again. I do not want to read the Welcome to Vox Design thread anymore. I want to size my pictures more than four different ways. I do not want to see a lock next to a "viewable by anyone" indicator. I want to copy and paste without copying line height and font faces and hyperlinks. I want to see a cursor. I want styles of my own devising. I would like more friends and neighbors, and fewer "friends" and "neighbors." Those of you who are both know where to find me, and I know where to find you.

More to the point, it's Spring and I want to type less and walk by the river more. This is part of that. Thanks for your kind attentions. Come visit if you're ever in Vermont.

my house

Singing/Signing - some signing YouTubery

I posted this over on MetaFilter, but I wanted to add a little and copy it over here. Right now I'm in the DC/Baltimore area. One of the things I like about DC is how you always see people signing on the subway. This is probably because Gallaudet is nearby. When I gave my talk at Computers in Libraries on Monday I had an ASL interpreter.

I've always liked cover songs on YouTube. It's fun to see people's performances. I've become really fascinated lately with ASL (and sign languages from other countries; yes, they are different) cover songs. Some of these are done by Deaf people and some are done by kids in their sign language classes or just signing hobbyists. Texting and videoblogging have really changed the way that Deaf people interact both with each other and also the hearing community. For many folks who signed before they learned English, having a way to speak their native language on the Internet is sort of a big deal. Here are a few signing songs that I liked.

Popular: It's Like That, Humble Neighborhood, Son of a Preacher Man, Beautiful, Barbi Girl, Truly Madly Deeply, I'm Alive, Hips Don't Lie

Indie: Blister in the Sun, Across the Sea, Tom's Diner, Zombie;

Classics: The Rose (more, also without lyrics), Revolution, Hotel California

Rap/Hip Hop (some comedic): Baby Got Back, Ice Ice Baby, Music (more), Paul Revere, Grillz, White and Nerdy, Where'd You Go, Hey Ya

Non-English songs: Film Dust, Comme Elle Vient; Pseudosign: Torn (again), Sweet Home Alabama

Instructions: general tips, religious songs, and how to sign "rock & roll"

when etiquette gets a little absurd

On-the-phone banker: So can I ask you a few security questions before we proceed?
Me: If I say no this conversation is pretty much over, isn't it?
Banker (laughs): Yeah, I guess it is.
Me: Well okay then, fire away.

The Digitization of the Rural Electrification Project

Rural Electrification Administration - WPA Poster

Sometime in 1999 there was an episode of 0sil8 where Jason had people call his voicemail
at work and leave him messages. Then he published them on a little timewasting page.
I can't get them to play through the interface but all the .rm files are still there. I liked having
an audiorecording of a story I liked, so I made a little web page with the text, and a
nice looking picture and linked the story. Then I forgot about it for a long time.

Now that I've been making some little movies, I'm digging through some old folders labelled
storage/ancient/reallyreallyold/misc crap/todo and finding things like this. I got a copy of
Audio Hijack and made an aiff out of the story. Then I converted it to an MP3 with iTunes.
Then I put it here.

Rural Electrification Project

I am sorry I ever posted a comment in the "Welcome to Vox Design!" thread

...because it is going to be on my "recent activity" page forever. And, unlike other sites with recent comments type pages, Vox always shows all the comments since your comment, 79 in my case, so happy scrolling! My comment -- a minor bug that I noticed -- was in January. Someone has commented in the post or added it to their favorites once every few days since then. No you can not delete your comments on other people's posts, I tried that. maybe I can get Vox Design to block me. Seems like they haven't posted to their own blog since January either.

Usually I just skip over the pestier interface design choices I see here -- stuff mostly works and that makes me happy --  but this one is harshing my post-AFD mellow.

too long for twitter

...but file under "why I enjoy Wikipedia"

Someone should censor all the genitals in the pictures in this article

It's just disgusting. We should really draw the line at bestiality.

Excuse me, but I would like to remind people offended by this of one little detail;

IT IS A BLUE FROG WITH TEETH, WEARING A LEATHER FLYING HELMET AND LEATHER JACKET, RIDING AN INVISIBLE MOTORBIKE!!!

It's poetry. Also on YT, natch. 1, 2, 1+2.

Australia 2007, pack o' photos online

a few more apostles

I got my Flickr set of travel photos all up and running, in case you want to see a few more pictures like this and a lot of photos of odd caravan parks and sort of normal public libraries. I had a good time, but jet lag is a bear. Photoset is here: Australia 2007. My sister has a few more but she's a pokey uploader.

lest we forget

I walked past the same sidewalk in Adelaide, South Australia last week that I went past in December 2004. I spotted the same grafitti. Metaphor, no?

strangely alluring... maps

Fullinterstatemap-web

Eisenhower highway system, simplified. A great graphic from this week's favorite blog: strange maps.

QotD: Repeat After Me...

How have people mispronounced your name?  How is it supposed to sound? 
Submitted by Lorie.   

My name is sort of like it looks: jess - uh - min. People who don't know me and haven't seen or heard the name before seem to have a hard time with it. Either they say Jasmine, which makes sense, or they say Jezz-uh-min or Jess-uh-mine. The thing I always find weird is that when I say it out loud to them, like over the phone, often they'll pronounce it back wrong. So I'll say jess-uh-min and they'll say "Jasmine?" like maybe I'm pronouncing my own name wrong.

People called me Jess until college, but I never liked "Jess West" much. Then I had a college boyfriend who called me Jessamyn in that college-y way and it sort of stuck. I answer to both. The only name I really dislike is Jesse because I had an evil English teacher who would call me that to get my goat, I have no idea why.

Jessamyn Charity West, it's not a bad name really.