did you miss me?

Yeah yeah, I know, I've been neglecting my blog here. 1,000 apologies for that. I've been working on many other projects and haven't had the time or motivation to worry about this project or the comment spam I used to have to deal with. Comments are still disabled, as is the blog archive/categories options, but I'm working on a new system for all of that right now. Comments will come to life through the magic of AJAX, which means if ya ain't got JavaScript, ya ain't leaving comments. Heavy filtering will be in use for anonymous commenters, but registered users will have no filters or restrictions before leaving a comment. This seemed like the easiest way to keep the awful spammers at bay.

So, much of this site is being re-written and re-coded and all sorts of fun stuff to make it stand out a bit from the ordinary personal blog site. And I still do plan on releasing the code to the world. Ya know, eventually.

Also, I'm tinkering with the idea of public vs. private vs. friends only entries. Yes, an idea blatantly stolen from the likes of LiveJournal and mySpace, but I think it's a solid idea. That will give me the flexibility to type about personal crap no one cares about, and if you're not interested or logged in, you won't be bothered with it. Plus I get to keep it away from strangers and I'll have a better idea of who is reading this thing every day. Or every week. Or whatever. Phew.

Okay, so there's that. On a more personal note, I've been giving a lot of thought lately to those people in my life who used to play a totally important, can't-imagine-life-without-them type of role. I've had a lot of those people in the past, and with a very few exceptions they've all disappeared. When I was younger, I thought for sure that when these people left me, a piece of my soul would be gone as well. These people had such an impact, good or bad, so how in the world could I possibly live without them?

Well, recent years and all-too-recent events have taught me otherwise. In fact, it's quite easy to live without them. Sometimes beneficial. Sure, it's sad sometimes that people just... ya know... disappear without a solid goodbye. I miss some of them. But the effect they had on me isn't gone like it thought in would be. In some cases, it's even stronger.

I don't have room in my life for everyone I've ever met anymore. At some point, you have to focus on the people who will mean a lot in your future, and not the people who meant a lot in your past. Those past relationships can really clutter up and make a mess of current relationships if you're not careful, which is a lesson I learned in a very personal way lately. Friendships cannot be difficult, or they're not worth it for me.

By the way, with comments disabled, typing in this deal is way more different than I thought it would be.