Photos still blank

Or are they?
At times there really is nothing to say besides the obvious.  Hopefully that statement soon won't make sense because this blip will have been resolved.  The whole episode will be no more than a vaguely recalled speed bump in a bigger adventure.

I've done everything I can think of and the works in progress show is still a blank white space where the photos go.  I guess it's just going to be malfunctioning until I can figure it out or just give up and delete it.  In the meantime I'll keep rearranging and poking around at it and trying to get answers and results.

Hmmmmm.  Just as I clicked preview the window displayed with both the new and old (code should match, though) WIP slideshows along with both FO shows that are currently there.  However, as I saw at times last night the timing of the WIP versions is off.  If it isn't completely blank, it's doing what I just saw: flashing a blur, just a brief fuzzy gray rectangle that never materializes into an image and fades out as soon as it appears.  So maybe the issue is timing???

Added above paragraph and clicked preview and now I see 2 working shows each of FOs and WIPs.  I know it isn't me, lol.  I guess I'm just going to have to live with this for a while...  Fortunately, since I'm pretty much the only one here, the oddness of it will likely go unnoticed.

Just for fun, I'm seriously considering how to go about changing the size of those items anyway.  Surely it's not the time to do anything extra when just the basics aren't 100%, but why would I leave well enough alone?  I've been sucked into the underlying gobbledegook of the working parts.  That's a clear invitation for tinkering!  I've always been the kind of person who knows just enough to be really dangerous that way.  I can embrace this aspect, especially when I'm being provoked by items changing and functioning by their own whims.  That's how I've managed to get a lot of skill and understanding in a range of areas.  I'm not the least bit afraid of replacing sinks, faucets, light fixtures, and even had the old washing machine and dryer set in pieces and then working again several times.  I am fearless this way.  I will prevail.

I am not the least bit discouraged...yet

Although I have only just gotten started and have not so much as invited family and friends to view my latest indulgence, I was surprisingly dismayed to find that the page views component does not accurately track information.  It is clear that while I have the appropriate cookie settings and have selected the radio dial for not counting my own page views (and saved this setting which remains selected), when I edit and then view a post or rearrange gadgets there is invariably and additional page view recorded at the same time.

Beyond this, the malfunction is even clearer when noting that of all the page views recorded 100% of them were from a Mac OS using Safari.  Were I actively involved with an online graphic design group I might be persuaded to believe that statistic accurate.  I am convinced, however, that fellow Ravelers are largely Windows users.

I am writing for myself anyway.  I can own that.  I just don't understand why the blog has built in "vanity counting."

First Chatty Ravelry Extraction: Curses!

I didn't have a good idea of where to start when filling in the "About me" on my profile page in Rav, either.  The last blank to fill in asks for your favorite curse word.  So reflecting on something like that I entered the following anecdote.

While I don’t have a favorite curse word and my language is generally G-rated, I can say there is one that always seems to make me smile. I guess it’s not a funny story, though. It was sort of a context mismatch that really took me by surprise.

Several years ago my then college lab partner, Lynn, and I were thoroughly frustrated with our lack of progress in building the correct circuitry. She suddenly exclaimed, “Dookie!” And I instantly burst into laughter. Lynn soon started laughing at me because I couldn’t stop laughing or even catch my breath for a few minutes. My belly ached from laughing so hard and for so long, and I even had tears in my eyes. (It was a really good laugh!) When I could finally speak I looked at Lynn, who was thirty years old at the time, and said, “I haven’t heard that word since I was about 10 years old.” She replied that it was something her 10 year old had been saying lately. In a college class where students were often inspired to utter any number of different things expressing their frustration, it was a truly out of place thing to hear.

Later I told my dad about this and found the story is even less funny if you never heard or used this word as a child and don’t know what it means. When I was a kid it meant poop and more specifically dog poop, since that was the version commonly seen lying in a pile in the grass. (When I was a kid, kids still played outside and people really didn’t pick up after their dogs.) I suppose it might be regional or generational (the word), but I really don’t know.

I sure wish I could think of something else to say, besides that I DO pick up after my dog using Mutt Mitts and have always done so the entire time I’ve had her, even in my own backyard. (Because left out it can attract pests and contaminate soil and be a health hazard to children or gardeners up to five years in the future.) A Mutt Mitt goes with us on our walk three times a day every day and also when I take her to Petsmart, to see the vet, or to visit an assisted living facility and nursing home. The “pooh bag” (unused) goes in my left pocket and my keys go in my right pocket. As soon as something else comes to mind it’s definitely replacing what’s above. While it still amuses me to remember that incident I can’t imagine being known or recognized by it, lol.

I've not really wanted to leave that in my Rav profile for so long, I just didn't have anything else I could think of to put there and never came up with something that said "me".  But it has a home here now.  Could be no one else in the world thinks that is funny, but every time I think of that incident and my lab partner, Lynn, I can't help but smile.  It sure is wonderful fun to laugh until you can't breathe.