Some Blog Tweaks

I have done some tweaking tonight and you may see the following things:

1. A new Icon should be in your browser bar and for Firefox users in your Bookmarks... may need to enter Lime Kettles via the book mark to refresh it and ensure the little lime kettle shows up :-)
2. A "Label Cloud" over on the right hand side... think its better than the label listing. Also have reorganised the nav panels over there in a better order.
3. Pull Quotes. See the posting below re the Blood Bowl tourney to get an example of this... they're fiddly to put in, but I think they look good... will make use of them from time to time.
4. Pictures. Have added a picture for the first time since I upgraded to Blogger Beta. Not sure if I like the look, nor is it easier. I can post using Picasa 2 if I upgraded my O/S to WinXP or better... it embarrasses me that I am still on Win98SE
5. "Recent Comments" added on the nav panel. The most recent comments posted will be shown here. Please try and use a "name" rather than Anonymous. First names are fine :-) I will see how that looks as the Comments come in, but it doesnt back track and get old comments... so comments only from NOW (hint).

Let me know what you think of the changes! Let me know if it looks broken in any way and let me know what browser you're using and resolution etc etc.

Thanks,
Clay

Pete's Bux Day - Group Photo

Just got the pics of Pete's Bux night - where we had the epic day of go-karting and then drinking...

Anyways, here is a group shot of the day... yours truly with his *excellent* trophy for "Cautious Driving".


This is my first picture post with Blogger Beta - better work :)

Blood Bowl Tournament - Blaxland Dec 2-3

There is a Blood Bowl Tournament on at the Blaxland Tavern this weekend and I will be playing on the Sunday.

If anyone is interested, I am sure roll up attendees are welcome and cost is $20 for NAF members (and probably a bit more expensive for non-NAF members).

I will only be playing Sunday because of Saturday cricket, so I will only be there for the social occasionI will only be playing Sunday because of Saturday cricket, so I will only be there for the social occasion rather than winning… I might take my flings or I might give my old Undead team a run… or go safety first and play Dwarves… hehe

Games start 9am both days I believe, 3 games a day.

Event: Mountain Bowl

Venue: Blaxland Tavern, Great Western Hwy, Blaxland

Date: Dec 2 and 3, 9:00am.

There will be prizes for all participants I believe… and full teams for the winners.

Car Update

Am writing this on the train home this evening as opposed to in as I am driving in in the morning… The guys from Quality Auto Search are coming out to inspect our Ford with a view to trade in value.  Need to get $8,600 for it and a used car of this make and model sells for around $10-11K… give or take.  It’s a bit beat up and tired looking, but runs well (the brakes are probably close to the end of their life though) and the rego is good for another 10mths.

So I will drive in tomorrow, they’re coming to the office in the mid-morning and I will drive back home in the evening.  On Friday, I will train it in, but I have a Camry Ateva for loan for the weekend!  So I will drive it around on the weekend, return it on Monday and hopefully have a Mazda 6 to try as well.  Mazda are also starting a sale this weekend for the base model plus a few features for $28,600 drive away… considering the recommended retail price is around $33K, that’s a good deal and I made the guy aware of that today… he’ll be coming back with a Mazda test drive details later this week and also is going to start sharpening the pencil on price.

This is all good, but I am a bit worried about the trade in… I guess I cant see why anyone would buy a 2001 Ford with 99,000 km’s on the clock…I presume someone will, but I am always the pessimist when it comes to cars.

I must admit, this is the easiest way to buy / sell a car and so far, its all good.

A most unfortunate typo....

Flicking through the Herald online this morning and this caught my eye:

"Crocodiles rock as Swingers go down"

Of course it should be "Slingers" as in the NBL team... hehe

AWB? Never heard of it Your Honour

Mid week lack of motivation has struck me this morning… couldn’t be bothered going to bed last night as I sat up watching NFL and consequently overslept this morning and my diary is uninspiring as I have no scheduled meetings today, which means a plodders day at the desk and a couple of the team are on a site visit in Victoria and the boss is in the UK so the office is quiet as well… It will be a day of punching out those things that you need to get done but never have the time because you have to attend a meeting about new work that wont get done on account of the fact you have more meetings… (clear as mud?)

The news today is doesn’t inspire me with confidence either… AWB Inquiry findings handed down and 11 AWB staff have been fingered for further investigation / criminal proceedings and NOT A SINGLE GOVERNMENT MEMBER NEW A THING.  Amazing isn’t it… they can drill down into the levels of AWB management and find the assistant manager of brown paper bags guilty of dire treasonous activities yet no one in the government knew that millions of dollars were going to Saddam Hussein.  And we all have a lot of newspaper dedicated to it, but the real medium of news in Australia – television – didn’t even have it on the news.  It is kind of sad that we blithely let the government do so many things with seemingly no accountability required.  But the day that Kim Beazley confuses Rove McManus with Karl Rove, then all hell breaks loose!  Why, because it’s a TV celeb and is deemed news worthy.  I guess my point is that the media seem to have this disparate view on what makes the news and what doesn’t.  The Beazley stuff up was news worthy and highlighted that he is a bit of a gibberer but the fact that all members of Howard’s Government escaped further investigation about the practices of the AWB is astounding and no one bats an eyelid in TV land.  Sad.

 

Google Analytics

For about 8 weeks I have been running Google Analytics – a tool that tracks who, when, where visitors to Lime Kettles come from and how they got here.

My hitcounter below has been running for some time and my readership has been growing but I wanted to get more stats than just “how many”.

Basically I can summarise the following:

• I receive between 10-80 hits a day.  80 being common on Monday / Tuesday and 10 occurring on Sunday’s.  This makes sense.
• 75% of visitors are “returnees” and I get approximately 25% of hits are from new visitors.
• 69% of my traffic is direct – ie someone has book marked me or types the URL in directly. 10.6% come from Google and the rest are referrals from blogger, bloglines and the like…
• Google.  This is where I am amazed.  Google Analytics tells me what people typed into the search box to get here.  “limekettles” is the most popular, but there are some weird ones like:
• “tracy grimshaw plastic surgery” (3 times?!?!)
• “botox Penrith”
• “burying a cat”
• “snorting snot in the office” – mmmm interesting that one
• “ballet exam what hairstyles”
• There are actually 91 different google search texts entered.  Some make sense, a lot refer to Blood Bowl, others are downright weird.
• I have people visiting from odd countries.  Australian’s make up 80% of traffic and the USA 10% throw in some UK and Kiwis, then we get down to odd bod countries.  Hello to people from Oman, Kuwait, Israel, Colombia, Saudi Arabia and UAE.  Also a fair number of Indians too… better start talking up the cricket and Bollywood.  The number of Arab nations is disconcerting…

Interesting stuff… I’ll post some more odd tid bit’s as they come up.