Jeffrey Veen and I will be conducting a one-day workshop in San Francisco a week from Monday, the 8th of November: Redesigning Blogger. We’ll be covering the process and thinking we used when Adaptive Path and Stopdesign worked with Google to simplify and redesign Blogger earlier this year. Jeff and I have worked together for a little over eight years now. We’ve learned a lot from each other, and from our successes and failures on various projects. We certainly didn’t always do the right thing at HotWired, making many mistakes while we were constantly experimenting. continued

The last three days I spent in Wellington couldn’t have been better. The weather was ideal: clear skies with a few clouds, mild temps, and a low breeze blowing off the harbor — apparently kind of a rare environment for Wellington. The days were relaxed, nothing was planned, and I got to meet quite a few local webbers. continued

Best taken while suspended upside-down, dangling by a rubber band strapped to your ankles. Begins with intense anxiety. Guaranteed rush to the head follows. Heart continues pumping for at least 30 minutes after.

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I mentioned in a previous entry that I’m actually going to make it to New Zealand’s North Island for a brief stay. Thursday — 21 October — I’ll be flying from Christchurch into Wellington around mid-day. I’m spending a couple days there, and I really don’t have much planned. I just want to see and experience New Zealand’s capital city, enjoy the coffee, see a few LoTR sites, and hang out with more Kiwis. continued

On Friday, Mt. Hutt was still closed, and I had almost given up hope of boarding in NZ. But after walking around Methven, John and I learned that one small club field was actually still open: Broken River. Not willing to forfeit another day of boarding, we jumped at the chance. A 90-minute drive away from Methven, and we were switchbacking a narrow, rocky road up to the club field. After parking at one of the tight bends and dropping our gear into a lift that would pull it up to the changing room, we had another 20 minute hike up the mountain in front of us, just to get to the ticket window. After buying a lift ticket, collecting our gear from the lift, and changing into our boots, another 15 minute hike up to the first rope tow. continued

I arrived in New Zealand late last night, after quite a bit of drama at the Cairns airport earlier in the day. I almost didn’t make it to NZ for multiple reasons. For the biggest bit of drama, if you know me, ask me about getting detained for knocking a security guard on his bum, most likely ending in him having a black eye this morning. continued

For those of you loosely following along on the OZ/NZ adventure, I just wrapped up five very relaxing days at Airlee Beach and the Whitsunday Islands. It was a perfect spot to use as a base for exploring the nearby islands, and ended up being a great spot from which to head out to the Great Barrier Reef. continued

A few times while traveling around Australia, either I’ve noticed a slight glitch on a site (Stopdesign, or a client site), or someone else points out a bug or problem with some file on a site I have control over. I left my laptop and cables, etc. in Sydney to shed the weight, so I haven’t had access to the tools I normally have at my disposal. Any of these changes are usually quick edits or corrections of previous oversights, assuming I have any type of net connection and my normal toolset with me. However, I’ve been missing some sort of text editor that can work on files remotely via S/FTP. continued

Check out the latest Stopdesign mini-project: Mighty Goods, a new shopping blog by Margaret Mason, known for her long-running Mighty Girl weblog. Margaret came to me wanting a simple, clean design with integrated images for most of the items she posted. This is the end result of holing ourselves up in Canvas for a Saturday a little over a month ago. continued

I stepped off the plane yesterday in Cairns and immediately got hit with a warm tropical breeze. It was a drastic change from the cool San Francisco-like weather of Melbourne. I loved Melbourne, and wished I could stay longer, but this short trip mandates that I keep moving so I can experience everything I planned. continued