thanks to my awesome host jess, i now have my very own domain for system overload! so please change your links and follow me to http://system-overload.org

i’ve been dealing with a horrible bout of depression recently and its firmly embedded its self into every single thing i do. i’m going to blame the weather and its screwed up fluctuations for the mess my brain is currently in.

today however, i am proud of myself. i woke up fairly early, set about a task and completed it. as you can see, there’s a new layout. yeah its certainly not the most creative thing in the world, but it took me forever to come up with something i could slap up on my website without cringing at the thought of it. there are still some things to tweek so if its broken don’t freak out, i’ll fix it as fast as i can.

another reason i’m proud of myself? today i hopped on the scale and beheld a grand sight. i am 200lbs. there are only 60 more pounds between me and my goal weight, and i have a good feeling that i’ll be able to continue getting rid of this weight, and keep it off.

i still have a long way to go, and i have trashed some things along the way, some things might not be salvageable, some things probably aren’t worth salvaging. i don’t really know anymore.

i’m going to see a doctor at the beginning of next month for a few issues and hopefully the results from that visit will be informative, and not as bad as i’m scaring myself with.

and now i’m going to go back to tweeking my layout.

not sure if i’m ready to just yet but i was tossing around the idea of getting a domain again. its been a LONG time since i’ve had one and i would love to start one up again. uploading the stuff for this blog layout made me realize that i’m running out of space on here! so i was digging around looking for nice cheap web hosting like hub hosting. i think though that my own host has domain type packages so i might ask her if i can do something… not sure yet.

first thing i would have to do is figure out a new name X_x i loved my old domain name “serial-kill” but that was when i was more of a dorky kid on the internet trying to be cool, now i’m a bit more grown up and i’m pretty sure having serial kill in my website title would not be a good idea i already have enough weird hits as it is by having my blog named “system overload”.

got any suggestions on who i should go with for web hosting? or a domain name? i don’t really care for having my own name as a domain name, so bleh to that. maybe i’ll just be lazy and stick to the free hosting i have…

so how is the new layout? no one has really mentioned anything so i guess it isn’t giving anyone any problems. personally i like it a lot, though the colour scheme is a big unusual for me.

i’ve been trying to make my blog more like the fancy blogs out there on the net but i don’t think i have enough readers to really warrant some of the Gadgets out there for blogs. i did put a feed burner count on here but apparently only one person is subscribed via feed burner and it just gives me a ??? so i dunno if that’s my fault for doing it wrong, or just lack of subscribers. i made it so you can subscribe to comments, added commentluv and the ability to add your twitter name to comments. anyone else have any suggestions on plugins i should look into? i do plan to go in one day and style my comment form a bit more. i am jealous of everyone having pretty graphics all over their comments form! i am just too lazy to dig though the code to fix mine up like that. someday i swear i will do it!

i’m starting to feel confident enough with the wordpress code that i may actually be able to design and release a wordpress theme! i’ve had it on my bucket list for a while now and now its just a matter of coming up with a visually pleasing design. the code shouldn’t be too hard to manipulate into something usable, its the graphics that always give me a headache. not because they are hard to make, but because it takes me forever to decide on what it should look like! hence why my blog was red for almost 2 years.

speaking of graphics i need to make new link buttons!

so finally after a million years i have finished a new layout for the site! its looking pretty awesome and i have actually spent a lot of time tweeking things so i’m pretty proud of myself. i really want to bow down and worship sarah from onestarrynight.com for her bad ass tutorials and advice which helped me make this layout way awesome.

of course i usually miss a few bugs so if you do see one please let me know! there’s new plugins in the comments section so if something doesn’t work you can email me (or leave a comment if it lets you of course XD)

not much else to say! i’m exhausted right now and i need some sleep.

i wanted to write up a blog post about the various sites i’ve been working with recently to try and get a bit of extra cash. i was pretty worried about starting up this stuff, thinking i wasn’t really going to make any money but i am pretty surprised at my results. of course there are people out there making quite a bit more, but those people also have more than one blog, or they are just damn good bloggers. for a casual blogger like myself, i’m pretty happy with what i’ve made so far! so lets check out the various sites and programs i’m working with.

a small disclosure before we start. even though i am using some referral links here, i do want to mention that i did not write this blog in exchange for any payment. i am just writing this in hope that it will help others who are interested in getting into this sort of stuff.

paid blogging:

to some paid blogging is spam, and yeah i used to really hate going to blogs and seeing a ton of ads and hardly any real blog posts. however with the way things are money wise, i can see why a lot of people are gravitating to paid blogging, and it really does work out! i am using a few different sites for paid blogging.

• pay-per-post – this is an izea site that offers assignments to bloggers to write about different advertisements. its a very simple site thought sometimes there aren’t many assignments. you don’t get to go down the list and grab ones you want, instead the advertisers will pick you if they want to. you can cash out at any time but they do charge a fee if you cash out before you reach 50$.
• inpostlinks – another izea site, this one has by far paid me the most. all you need to do for this site is go to the available links, pick the one you want, write a blog and stick the link in it. they prefer you to write on the same topic as the link, but you can pretty much blog about anything and add the link in where it seems relevant. this site is great because there is no cash out. it just pays your paypal account automatically.
• social spark – yet another izea site. this site i haven’t had much luck on, and i assume that’s because my blog is not very popular. it looks great, and has a very social media feel to it, but for me most of the time its dead. there are no offers and i’ve only made a couple bucks. they do have some affiliate programs though which i have taken advantage of. this site only lets you cash out after you reach 50$.

twitter advertising:

along with the paid blogging, i resurrected my twitter account to start advertising there. its fairly simple to do and currently i have two sites that i use primarily. magpie and sponsored tweets.

sponsored tweets is another izea site, and for you to qualify for advertising you must have specific number of followers and a specific number of tweets (though i cannot remember those numbers at the moment) they have both opportunities sent to you via advertisers and cost per click ops which you can take at any time. the site uses an api that automatically sends the tweets though twitter so you don’t have to tweet them yourself. it does allow you to write the tweet in your own voice though, which makes it less robotic and more personal. i’ve not made much money with sponsored tweets, but i’ve only had the required number of followers for a few months, so i’m expecting to see more from this site in the future.

magpie runs on almost the same system but it is not an izea site. advertisers send you offers and you decide if you want the system to tweet it or not. if you accept they make sure you’re what they need, and then they send the tweet on though the api. like sponsored tweets, magpie allows you to rewrite the tweet to suit you best. magpie has been far more successful for me, but that is mostly because it does not have the limits like sponsored tweets has, therefore i was able to begin tweeting advertisements almost immediately.

i woke up to a lovely email from wordpress letting me know that wordpress 3.0 is now available. i had the initial fear of “oh god if i update my wordpress i might have to recode this whole damn layout” but thankfully nothing exploded. i love the newer versions of wordpress for their auto update feature. never again will i have to go though the hell of old wordpress upgrades.

for a while now i’ve had a little trick up my sleeve for my theme writing and blog testing. i have a local install of wordpress tucked away on my hard drive that i use to make sure i’m not going to cause my blog to die in a fire. its seriously simple to set up and you can find the directions here. you can use it to build your new themes without having to upload it to your site, you can test out new wordpress updates without making a mess, and you can make sure those new plugins work right before setting them up in your live blog.

so i just ran to my local install and updated wordpress and everything looked ok, so now the real blog is on wordpress 3.0. yay!

finally starting to take the time to work on the graphics i wanted to use on this blog layout… been using the bare bones for too long! you may notice changing colours and other junk over the next little bit while i fiddle with css. lemmie know if anything is completely broken!

i forgot to blog! i’ve been pretty depressed over the stupid video card situation. i know its a dumb thing to be upset about but i am…

i’ve installed photoshop on my laptop. it hates me and my laptop is not too friendly with my tablet either, but its better than nothing, and so i’m going to start working on a layout that is less basic. i think i will stick with this colour scheme though, no one has complained that its blinding them, and i like it.

the paid blogging thing is not going well, social spark has declined me for a couple of small issues, first for not having dates on my post, which i honestly forgot in my template, and then again today because i don’t have enough active recent blog posts. so i’m doing my best to keep posting. the other site i signed up for hasn’t sent me any offers, so i’m guessing my site is not good enough or them either… its my fault though really, i just don’t know what to blog about anymore.

its time to go work on the new blog layout…

*frowns* i meant to blog more today but i just couldn’t motivate myself. i’m still working on the layout a lot, tweaking things here and there. i know its pretty boring looking but my graphics card comes tomorrow and i’ll use this as the framework for my actual layout, which i hope will be much prettier.

today i mostly laid around in bed on gtalk with lucas, i am attached to my computer via the ears for most of my day. we played a lot of WoW and finally got up to level 70 this afternoon. then there was a storm, and i had to log off for a bit because my wireless and storms do not get along.

later this afternoon i ended up having to chase a mouse around my bedroom trying to catch it to put it outside! i am a critter lover, and i don’t hurt rodents. i just trap them and take them out and put them into the flowerbed. yes i know they will come right back, but i cannot stand to hurt them. if it was my place, they’d end up being pets probably.

now i’m going to sit here and try to spruce up my dying link list. if you would like to exchange links please feel free to email me or comment on this entry, i’d love to add you.