How I Made a Button for my Blog: Part 2

If you missed the first part of my journey in button-making, make sure you check it out.



7. Head back to Blogger and go to where you always edit your layout: Design tab > Page Elements

In the side-bar section of your blog click 'Add a Gadget' and choose 'HTML/JavaScript'.

By the way, click on image to enlarge :)

WWW: Muliebrity

I've just spent a few days with one of my bestest friends.  I have no idea if she will read this, but she knows who she is... (woohoo beeeatch-h ;) 

This partially explains a lack of posts this week.  It also partially explains the build-up of posting material in my edits, on my camera and in my brain.

End of mid-year break is looming so I'm cramming in lots of people time before I disappear from the world.  I can't say 'hide under a rock' any more since I've had express orders not to do that this semester.  Whatever!

Anyway, I made a discovery while at this particular friend's place.

Actually 'discovery' is probably the wrong word (and we're all about words in this post, right?).  More like 'recovery'.

Chick flicks.  Maybe I should put that in hot pink.  Chick flicks.

Let's get something dead straight here...my favourite ever movies are all historical dramas.  Especially ones set in the 1920s-1940s.  I watch them just for the costumes and sets.

Now, little fact: Mouse lives in a house in which all movies have to be pre-approved by father and brother.

How I Made a Button for my Blog: Part 1

Now, I am very unqualified to be telling people how to make little bits and pieces for their blog.  My knowledge of HTML coding is limited to the bare minimum.  Every time I want to try something I need to Google "How to make a..."

But you may be in a similar sort of zone.  If that's the case, I can save you a whoooooole heap of trouble and lengthy Google searching AND hours pulling out your hair wondering why something didn't work.

Because if The Mouse can do it ['it' being techno wizbang stuff], then anyone can do it.  Nothing will be explained here that I haven't already done.

The other reason for this post is that I keep saving little bits of HMTL code in random Word documents, and then I can never find them again.  If I put it all here I'll be able to find it again.  Theoretically.

Okay, let's begin with the making of pretty things.

Buttering sandwiches...

WWW: Parlous

This week we've been watching a man called Bear Grylls.  He gets [literally] dropped into a desolate place and then has to [literally] find his way out of it...while remaining alive preferably.

Dad borrowed the series on DVD from the library...you know, Man vs. Wild.

I can tell you now that in Mouse vs. Wild, Wild would win hands down.  No doubt about it.

City Mouse [still movie]

WWW: Rumbustious

Wonderful Word of the Week no. 3

Rumbustious {adj.} /ˌrəmˈbəsCHəs/1. Boisterous or unruly

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003

Rum, rum, rummmmmmbling.  That's rumbustious.

I came across this word while trying to spell rambunctious.  Even now the spell check in Blogger is giving me a little red squiggly line.  What?  No rambunctious?  I love that word!  Turns out RUMBUSTIOUS will do just as well instead.  Doesn't come up as misspelled.

(see the difference there?)

Noisy, loud, rowdy ...and in. your. face.  That's rumbustious.

Sid the Sloth

Uproarious, tumultuous, clamorous...

Rather than explaining the above in further creative ways, how about we look at what is NOT the essence of rumbustious-ness. 

Snails of the garden variety.  Tulips, or basically any other type of inactive plant.  Getting out of bed on cold mornings.  Whispering in libraries.  My Internet connection.  Sheep.  Calm, still waters.  Molasses.

Oh, and sloths.

When the Door Slams Shut

My Dad has this annoying little ditty/song he sings around the house.

It goes
"be careful what you pray for"... *dramatic pause* ...."cos you might just get it."  *some sinister boom boom booms*

And I think there's more but that's the only bit I remember.

I have a feeling it's from the old Gospel glory days in the 80s.  My parents became Christians then and every now and then it shows. ;)

It's annoying because of the way he sings it, not because he's singing it at me.  It's a catchy tune, but when I go to pray I've usually forgotten it.  

I believe that God hears and answers every single one of my prayers.  I'd have to be pretty dense and thick-headed not to believe it when I see it happen.

I'm not saying I pray for rain and it instantly falls from the sky.  Or I pray for my greens to be turned into ice cream and this little divine act happens on the plate.  (God preserves my teeth - see, no cavities.)

No, I'm still learning how to pray (that's one of my prayers.  'Teach me how to pray effectively, God!'  Is that oxymoron-ish?)

The Chooka Parker Effect

When I first met Chooka Parker, I noticed his name, his hat, and the funny way he walked.  When I saw him on TV a year later, not much had changed.

Especially not the way he played the piano.



Funnily enough, the way he played the piano didn't startle me too much.  I'm obviously completely blind to talent.

*Me walking past the piano in the YTC dining room*
*Chooka thundering up and down the keys*
*He stops*
*I stop*
Me: "That was cool.  Did you make it up?"
Chooka: "Yep."
Me.  "Cool."

Let's go on a picnik

Growing grass...

Fluffing clouds...

Sprinkling dew...

Floating kites...

Stealing picnik basket...

What on earth?*

*above phrases taken from the picnik site.  it's very cute.

Picniking is one of my hobbies.  

Confessions: Ital-Anglo Mouse

It has come to my attention that this blog has a bit of an Australian/Italian flavour to it.  I think the official term is Anglo-Italian.  Or Ital-Anglo?  Wog?  Anything?

My Nonna features quite a bit and that was entirely unplanned.  Maybe my Australian life is more multicultural than I realise.
It comes out at odd moments.  Things I think are normal, and then suddenly someone says 'Really?  You do/say that?'

I AM pretty Australian though.  It's my mum who is the child of the ethnic immigrant (I think that's an official term).

Here are some momentos of my quasi Ital-Anglo normal life..

WWW: Extempore [and law firms]

My vocabulary took a great big leap yesterday...in all things commercial law.

I'm really enjoying this mid-year break.  I have no idea what is about to happen next.

Last week I was eating ice cream from Dairy Bell in the sun overlooking Docklands Melbourne.
Then suddenly I turned 20.
Before that I walked down the driveway of my childhood home in Thornbury for the first time since I was seven years old (can't even describe how that felt).
The weekend before last I was helping a group of children sticky tape bits of paper to more bits of paper.  And rescuing my skirt from a pair of scissors.
I went to a health conference and came back swearing to take my vitamins regularly.  I've made more lasagna with my nonna, I've vacuumed the house, I've sewed a little, shopped a lot, written more of my novel, vacuumed the house, lay on the couch for an entire weekend (winter sickness - must take those vitamins), and vacuumed the house.  I worked in a law firm for the day, and read Northanger Abbey in the city library.

Only a few things remain constant amidst the madness of unscheduled life.   The wood fire (ah, must go chuck on another log), the dust I'm always vacuuming in the house, and chai lattes at McDonalds (sorry authentic chai fans, but McDonalds is everywhere and hot drinks on cold mornings keep me sane).

My Two Cents: 20

It was kind of hard to decide where to file this post.

It could go under 'a story' because it's a chapter in the story of my life.  But that sounds a little too philosophical and scary.  The Mouse Files is probably the opposite of philosophical and scary (it better be, because if it's not, I won't be reading it in twenty years like originally planned).

Maybe it's a confession?  Okay, I confess that it is a confession.

But it's also what I think, my two cents, on the issue of turning twenty.

So here we go.  The big two-oh.  Double decades.  The transition from teens to... what?

I'm going to get the confession out the way first.

This was The Mouse two days ago:
(It's not use whispering this, because I've already been blaring it out to all of my friends)

* whiny voice*
me: "Twenty is such a blah age!  I don't want to turn twenty!"
*sympathetic murmurs from friends*
me again: "Nineteen is the best ever!  I don't know why, but I want to stay nineteen for another year...and then skip to 21!"
*agreeing murmurs from friends, then a discussion of all the cool things we've done since being nineteen*

I have no problem being 20-something, just 20.

There, that is my confession.

Two days later, I am now irreconcilably no longer a teenager.  Perhaps not surprisingly (depending on whether you are pre or post 20 yourself), I actually don't feel blah.

Granted, no one has asked me how old I am yet.
Also, I noticed that a lot of birthday messages this year stressed just how old I am now.  AND how much older I'm about to become (thanks everyone, love you too).

But I have three things going for me:

a) I literally could pass for a fifteen year old.
Baby faces run in the family - you only need to look at my dad, my uncles, my granddad.  The flower of youth blooms within is (or something like that).
It is actually really annoying.  I don't have anything against being fifteen (other than it was my drama queen phase), but I'm always having to show my ID and assure people it's fine that I'm not with my parents.

me: "Yes, I can fill out that form myself, no, I'm not driving illegally."

"And NO I'm not wagging school today!  Believe it or not, I've actually finished with all that!"

Yes, I'm nineteen twenty.  *cough*

b) My post-twenty friends are definitely NOT blah.
They are the coolest people ever!  They work and study, take out foundlings like me for coffee, give really good advice, get married (gulp), go on road trips and actually work for money (as opposed to working for experience which usually doesn't involve money).

c) I'm not the only one turning twenty this year.

This time next year.
me: "Twenty-one is such a scary age!  I don't want to turn twenty-one!"
*sympathetic murmurs from friends*
me again: "Twenty is actually much better than I thought it would be!  I think it would be easier to be twenty for another year and skip twenty-one!"
*agreeing murmurs from friends, then a discussion of all the cool things we've done since being TWENTY*

My two cents: those that think twenty is a blah age... I'll let you know if that's true next year.  ;)

Now, I'm going to go buy twenty candles for my cake.  Let's do this thoroughly.