.carolinecblaker.

Oil Paintings, Latex Paintings, Data Art.

Rants and Raves - My Career

A casual blog reporting on the life and times of Caroline C. Blaker

  • ExpressionEngine and how I ranted for 1 hour about it

    ExpressionEngine and how I ranted for 1 hour about it image On September 1, 2010 I gave a Webuquerque Presentation extolling the virtues of the content management systems I use, religiously, for client sites, ExpressionEngine. Using ExpressionEngine, I've never been able to say no to a client feature for any lack of the system's capability to handle the request, as it has enough built-in that its easy to add functionality on as a PHP programmer. Turns out I was giving a presentation to a group of hungry webbies who had been fed up with Content Management Systems of all walks mainly due to their 1) high barriers to entry and 2) their lack of support and never having quite enough stability to support deployment of projects. Who could blame them? I assured them that with ExpressionEngine, deployment and support are assured, and the barrier to entry is just low enough to be affordable yet high enough to keep the code out of the hands of hackers and/or other unsavory types. The video The Photos Notice some PSYCHED winners of Twitterscapes as doo...

  • A web-based developer makeover

    It feels oddly empty and voided: my schedule that is. I have a couple of projects to look forward to, but like any other new job or career situation, this one is taking its sweet time loading up on things to do. I have officially taken the plunge into freelance and have a little too much time on my hands. Wait, no scratch that. I have all the time on my hands that I used to want before I quit my job. Aha! As I’m looking around at my online presence, I see no shortage of tidying, organizing, and clarifying that needs to happen before I start to see a lot of work. Not that I don’t deserve it - I do, but the website focus is changing from “Here I am” to somewhere between that and “Let me work for you!” I have a couple of major things going for me - I’m on a site platform that I love, Expressionengine. Its all a developer could ever want, and can be made into what the client needs in every situation. (I’m not only the hair club president, but I’m also a client.) I also have a de...

  • A word on moving on

    I’m moved to post today not because I have any crazy news or life changing events to announce, but because for the first time ever, since moving to Albuquerque, the world is silent in all of its commotion and unyielding in its grounding, and my observation is how grateful I am to be a part of it, and for what help I’ve had to build the things that I have around me. I am grateful for so many things; from nature to my family, to the skills I have, to the skills others have, and for my incredible future that is now undeniably independent, lucrative, and everything else I could ask for it to be. Perhaps I wasn’t clear before, but I actually DO have very important news to share. I have declared my independence as a freelance web developer and am now taking projects on a bid-by-bid basis. I have dropped my 9-5 completely in favor of taking my own projects and working more closely with my clients to help them get what they want out of their websites. There are many reasons for this chang...

  • Micro-Recyclo

    Trying to get to work in this office can be so hard! There are distractions, co workers, things I don’t like. That and my job stretches me in so many different directions that I often feel resentment towards the lack of energy and creativity I retain towards building my own future in the mean time. Time after work is full of relationship-related spending time, living with someone new invariably obligates the people involved to give as much time to each other as is available. The above issues have inspired a lot of thought and a possible solution - to micro recycle my time throughout the day. So far, this means to use breaks I would ordinarily spend on Facebook and Huffington Post (reading comments and rants) and use them instead as micro efforts on my website and writing (like this very article) a few minutes at a time, to eat away little by little at my to-do list but more so help me find the peace of mind I require from taking a proactive effort in my own future. This is one habi...

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