Category: Adventures

  • Alabama man saves family from attacker on gameday (True Story)

    Alabama man saves family from attacker on gameday (True Story)

    The green tea tea-bagger strikes again! Tuscaloosa, AL โ€“ An Alabama man, Sean Lee, was enjoying a Saturday morning bath while his wife and two young daughters walked their lab puppies outside their house near the Bryant Denny Stadium.  Suddenly, screams from his wife cut through the fall air.  Lee springs into action, fearing the…

  • Starting a Digital Marketing Department at a Web Design Agency

    Starting a Digital Marketing Department at a Web Design Agency

    In January 2020, I joined The Nine, a website design and development company, to start a digital marketing department as their Marketing Director. Their existing web design clients started asking for help with digital marketing services like Lead Generation, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Ecommerce Marketing, Content Marketing, and Social Media Marketing. Without anyone on The Nine’s team…

  • Permaculture.

    Permaculture.

    All humans need these three things: Clean air, clean water, and clean food. Everybody wants them. Everybody needs them. Sadly, the concept of a clean “environment” has become politicized and saturated with unnecessary baggage. After a few years of learning and experimenting on my own land, this is the beginning of documenting my exploration into…

  • My plugin gets added to WordPress core!

    WordPress 3.5 was released yesterday.ย After upgrading my site, I checked the editor screen and noticed a tiny tweak that made me smile. It looks likeย my humble suggestion finally made it in to WordPress core. Notice the Add Media button… it’s an actual button!ย The previous version of the button looked like this: It was an easily…

  • How to fix the Netflix DRM Error N8151 in Google Chrome for Mac

    Quick Summary: * Try watching after each step. You may not need to go all the way through the process to fix the problem. Delete the PlayReady folder (This step fixed my problem) Uninstall & Reinstall Silverlight Create a new user Contact Apple Check Browser’s Rosetta settings Check for corrupt fonts The Troubleshooting Process This…

  • Discovering Synecdoche

    I’ve learned a new word: Synecdoche. Synecdoche is a word that’s both fun to pronounce and understand. The Greek word it comes from means “simultaneous understanding”. In english it is a figure of speech expressed in several ways. Basically, a synecdoche occurs when the word for a part is used to refer to the whole…

  • An Inconvenient User Experience: Gmail Drafts

    Summary I love Gmail. If you accidentally discard a draft its gone forever. I think Gmail should send discarded drafts to trash. You can vote for that featureย here. I love everything about Gmail except one thing… Discarded drafts are unrecoverable without warning. I accidentally clicked the Discard Drafts button while scrolling by a different part…

  • Fitts Architects Website Design Process (2009)

    Fitts Architects Website Design Process (2009)

    Fitts Architects in Tuscaloosa, Alabama hired me to redesign and rebuild their website. Here is the story behind the project and the process we went through to polish their brand on the internet. Respect at first sight In college I lived within 100 yards of the Fitts Architects office. Every time I drove by I…

  • How to rip the faces off WordPress hackers… their cheeto-encrusted life-sucking evil faces.

    How to deal with website hackers Find hacker that attacked your site and destroyed the efforts of your labor. Insert hand grenade into hacker mouth. Pull pin. Kick in the nuts. Run, laughing as their head explodes. If that doesn’t work, here are some plugins to protect your WordPress site from future hacker evil. WordPress…

  • Goodbye, office ninjas.

    I was looking at the asphalt walking slowly to my car, thinking, “This is it. This is the end.” I’m not dying. But, it’s true. I’m moving to a different company. Starting Monday morning I’ll be sipping coffee, about 15 minutes across town from the people I’ve worked with the last 3 1/2 years. Good…

  • The Beard of Legend

    The Beard of Legend

    I’ve been published!!!! My photo is used to represent the Biblical character Goliath. Halarious.

  • 5 places freelance designers go to find jobs

    5 places freelance designers go to find jobs

    Here are 5 places I visit regularly to find freelance work. Of the sites listed below, only Sortfolio and Coroflot have given me actual projects. I think my prices were too high for most of the jobs I applied for on the other sites. It’s hard to compete with Asia, but for now, there are…

  • Say no to spec work… even in France.

    I recently got a request to design a logo for someone in Paris, France. They found my site while looking for logo designers in Paris. How did they find me? Guess who’s number one in Google for the keyphrase “Paris logo design“. That’s right. As of 3/26/2010, ParisVega.com ranks number one for that search phrase.…

  • How much should I charge as a new freelancer getting started?

    This is the first article in a new category I’m starting for my blog: Reader Questions. I’ll be answering questions that I’m often asked by young designers just starting out in their careers. If you have questions about freelancing, graphic design, web design, or anything really, I’ll do my best to find the answer for…

  • Why freelancers should use digital contracts with esignatures

      Word of mouth agreements are too risky There is no reason to waste time and money by running your business on word-of-mouth agreements. The risk is too high, and the cost of integrating contracts into your business is getting lower everyday. I use a simple PDF e-signature contract that is sent to the client…