Needed to step back and take a look at things. For a couple weeks there, I thought I was done with the web forever. Thankfully, my objectivity returned from it's trip to nowhereville and jackhammered some clarity through the brick wall that the subjective built in it's absence.

I got caught up in numbers, I tried to force out an unnatural tone, ended up frustrated with the results and sounds. I felt that consistent voice that Josh talked about looming a little too heavy. Things weren't coming together, things were broken. All the parts came off with ease, but wouldn't go back on. Disillusionment set in. Started taking this real seriously.

I needed to get back that feeling. When I first found The Daily Report, when I shelved GoLive in favor of hand-coded XHTML/CSS, when I was psyched on design - design for the world wide web in particular.

More than that, I needed to reset the margins, to apply some filters, to push and pull and hammer and grind, to do some weeding, to clear the throat, to purge the unnecessary. To remember why I started this thing and what I want it to be about.

You learn things, know them well, live by them. Sometimes they get blocked out by the build up of wrong directions and distractions and unimportant information. That's when it's time push back for some perspective, break out the demolition equipment and destroy a little so you can create a little.

Redesign notes:
For those who are interested, this new layout is built with standards compliant XHTML/CSS, using all the tricks and techniques I've learned from reading The Daily Report, A List Apart, Designing With Web Standards, SimpleBits, Stopdesign, Authentic Boredom, et al.

I ripped the whole thing apart, started over a few times, bolted, unbolted, built, rebuilt. In the end I returned to what was working before, new sensibilities and ideas derived from the process in hand. And so here we are. There is still some buffing to be done, links to be hooked up, spam comments to be deleted and a new soundtrack to be posted. Other sections of this site are being fine tuned and will follow shortly.

OK then, onward.