Darren Hoyt Dot Com | Archive for Personal

September 2010

Thu 9^th

Current Status

A year ago I started collaborating with my friend Lawrence to develop custom software that hooked up technical experts with people in need. We launched WPQuestions first, and later, PHP Emergency, Symfony Experts, Javascript Questions and MYSQL Emergency which are aggregated at our umbrella site CodeWise.

Wed 7^th

Update: Spider, Frog and Turtle

Late last summer, I blogged about 3 critters my girlfriend and I had found nearly drowning in a pool filter. Since then, the story has gotten some exposure.

Mon 1^st

All the Way Down

At the swimming pool, Wistar and I sometimes poke around in the filters to see what animal carnage might be swirling around. Usually it’s frogs, Japanese beetles, dragonflies, grasshoppers or some combination. This is especially true during summer storms, like this week’s heavy rainfall which surely killed hundreds of animals unlucky enough to be trapped in small spaces.

Wed 20^th

Tell Me About Your Town

After thinking about it for awhile, I’ve committed to renting out my house for two months this summer so I can live abroad and work remotely. The plan is to find a room in some beach town, work on what is hopefully a reliable and fast connection, and otherwise travel, surf, read, write, drink in bars, and clear my head for awhile…

Wed 26^th

Celebrating 2008 in South Africa

This is late notice, but I’m going to be in Cape Town for the first 10 days of January. Needless to say, I’m excited about the trip! I’d spoken to Adii catching drinks and talking Wordpress one night, but I’d love to meet other designers from the area, on the off-chance anyone else from Cape Town reads this blog. Maybe there’s time for a meetup? Get in touch if you’re interested.

Thu 8^th

DarrenHoytDotCom Among the ‘Top 40 Blogs About WordPress’

A belated thanks to Artur over at WP Themes Gallery for featuring this site in his ‘Top 40 Blogs About WordPress’ list — it’s cool to be featured among a lot of really excellent sites. I’m somewhat an outsider to the ‘themes’ community, but I do rely increasingly on Wordpress for general non-blog development purposes which I’ll continue documenting here.

Sun 30^th

Looking for More than Music

My music collection, both store-bought and digitally encoded, numbers in the thousands of albums at this point, yet I go through periods of feeling burnt out on all of it, every single song and every single album. For the past couple years I’ve been seeking alternatives – talk radio, lectures, news, comedy.
Tue 18^th

New Charlottesville Panoramas Plus Photomerge Tips

A year ago I bought the Canon Powershot S3 IS after comparing about ten different cameras and driving the Best Buy staff to distraction. I mainly chose the S3 for its 12x optical zoom and Stitch-Assist (panorama) function and right there ends my entire repertoire of digital camera jargon.
The Stitch-Assist has been easy to [...]