Hello 2012 and Happy New Year

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Where on earth did 2011 go, one day it’s January, and the next you know we’re back round at December. Time really does fly when you’re having fun it’d seem! Can we get all of that again in 2012 please, but with the addition of even more achievements?

What Happened In 2011?

Nothing sticks out like a sore thumb, so just a few things from the past year! ;)

January: The new computer I’d been waiting on finally arrived. I still laugh at the story that goes along with the purchase, but I never did get round to blogging about it here.

February: I bought myself a bike, I should really try to use it a little more in 2012!

March: Had my arm twisted into writing for WPCandy.com — So far it’s been a rather interesting experience to say the least. While I’ve not written hundreds of articles, I’m not that far away from my 50th, so maybe some party celebrations might be in order?

April: I got a reply back with regards to a recent application for a Happiness Engineer at Automattic, which I was pretty excited about. In terms of progress, I thought things were going alright, even if I’d have liked some better communication at times. I felt there was a point when I was just left hanging, knowing nothing, but more on that further down!

May: It was my birthday, another year older, but still young at heart! :)

August: I reached the Championship Final at Haddington Bowling Club for the first time, and ended up getting beat by a guy a year younger than me; who said this was an old mans sport? While it was a shame to lose, the better man won on the night!

October: It was about time I faced my fears attended some kind of WordPress meetup, so what better than WordUp Edinburgh? As explained in my thoughts after the event, I loved it, and would do it all over again! (Also happened to help sponsor the event too!)

December: Ended up working Hogmanay again, like last year.

Sounds like an interesting year when you look at it that way! :)

If we go back to the Happiness Engineer application, I did get a reply in June saying my email(s) had been caught up in email filters, therefore obviously ended up in the wrong place. In August, I (maybe stupidly) reached out to Toni Schneider, Automattic CEO, to check if the Automattician was alright or not and say we’d lost contact somewhere.

When we eventually spoke again, it turned out I’d potentially be a good fit for a trial, but I would need to shape up on my written English first! :( ME NO HAZ GD ENGLSH SKLS

What’s 2012 Going To Bring?

I predict some exciting things, if only I knew the answer(s) in advance though! ;)

Other than that, I’d like to take the opportunity to wish you a Happy New Year, and all the best for what 2012 brings. I’m definitely planning to blog a lot more around here, throw in a picture or two, even tempted with Project 365 366, but I’m just not sure?

WordUp Edinburgh 2011: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

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Can you believe it’s been a whole three five weeks now since WordUp Edinburgh took place, it’s amazing how times flies. Well I’ve finally gotten round to writing up the draft post I’d started, and also found the publish button at that; better late than never! :)

It all started quite early on Saturday morning, too early for my sleep pattern, but I had something like 30 minutes to get ready. Taryn Wallis and her husband Allen had kindly agreed to come and pick me up, they also had Martin Young too. I still can’t thank you enough for that! – Next stop was Surgeons’ Hall to get setup for the day ahead.

We arrived in plenty of time to get things sorted before registration, so I took the chance to get connected to the WiFi, and charge my phone up too. I’d need some kind of power if I was going to Tweet during the day, not that I ended up saying much anyway.

Before long, people started arriving and taking their seat; I recognised a few faces!

Still don't remember Martin Young taking that picture!

I met some fantastic people throughout the whole day, Mike Little, Kevinjohn Gallagher, Donnacha Mac Gloinn, Michael Kimb Jones and Andy Gilpin, really just to name a few.

Having never attended an event like this, let alone a meet-up, and you can just forget about a WordCamp, you could say I was a little outside my comfort zone to start with!

So what did I think about the WordUp event itself? …

The Good

Without a doubt, the main event of the day was the sessions!

  • Learning CSS Using WordPress
  • WordPress In The Enterprise: Can It Work?
  • WPTRT: How The Theme Review Process Can Benefit Custom Theme Design
  • Panel Discussion: WordPress In The Voluntary Sector
  • How Did You Do That?
  • Managing Large Networks Of WordPress Sites
  • Responsive Design
  • How WordPress Themes Changed The World: Updated

I really liked Kevinjohn’s round-up, he summed my thoughts up nicely. For the first two sessions he did miss, I felt like I learnt something new. CSS is a wonderful thing, that I already knew, it’s quite powerful when you know what you’re doing. When you’re using WordPress in the Enterprise on the other hand, you get a whole new kettle of fish.

Did anyone mention the pizza we had for lunch, it went down a treat! While not all the toppings were right up my street, it was still pretty cool for that time of day. This was in part thanks to all the kind sponsors, of which I was one of them! :)

It was about 5PM before WordUp Edinburgh finished, we headed straight to Brewdog (which was only about a 10 minute walk away if that) for some socialising. I see what everyone says now with regards to this kind of event after, the different topics you talk about and food-for-thought conversations/observations; it’s crazy but in a good way!

The Bad (Improvement/Idea For Next Time)

I’d have liked if we’d went to a restaurant for a meal before hitting Brewdog. While yes we got a bite to eat in the end, it wasn’t exactly my cup of tea. Going somewhere with more of a menu might have been a better idea; maybe something for next time?

The Ugly

Well that’s a good question, but did you see me in the photo above? ;)

Overall I had a blast at WordUp Edinburgh and would jump at the next chance to attend a similar event again. For anyone who’s never been to something like that before, you really need to get yourself along. My first time and I really would recommend it!

I’m Twenty Today

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Today really feels like any other normal day of the week to me, except that I can now no longer go around calling myself a teenager, which can only mean one thing; it happens to be my 20th birthday, so Happy Birthday to me! :) Normally I would offer you a couple of Maltesers or a nice piece of chocolate cake, but I managed to polish them off earlier, and we’ve not opened that cake just yet!

The Twenty Eleven Experiment

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With the release of WordPress 3.2 Beta 1 into the wild last week, I decided it was about time I activated the new default theme, Twenty Eleven. If I’m honest, I have been running trunk on here for a while now, and am quite excited with all the performance improvements that have been made. I even feel the new Admin UI refresh helped with that too! – So here we have what I’m calling The Twenty Eleven Experiment, and a slightly different look for the year ahead. Guess you’ll just have to watch this space! ;)

The Fullscreen Visual Editor In WordPress

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While I wrote the previous post in the early hours of the morning, I thought I’d switch over to using the Fullscreen Visual Editor for a little change, and doubt I’ll ever change back when I’m writing anything again? It’ll be interesting using it for the longer posts (there are a few that I’ll have to finish and get published), but I love the fact you’ve not got any other distractions! – Have you ever used it yourself, and feel the same about it as me? :)