A note for those of you who have written to me recently: I think my subconscious is starting to kick in. I deleted a swath of what I THOUGHT was unnecessary email from my comments @ domesticat.net folder, and as a result I managed to delete a few actual emails that need replies. If you don't hear from me, that's why.

Two down. Seventeen to go. (You know, I'm going to look really stupid if it turns out I have to write more than seventeen pages for this admin interface, what with my decision to do a public countdown and all. Virtually guarantees I'm going to fall flat on my face.)

I'm still flush from my victory dance, having checked off the "edit your options" page not ten minutes ago. The way I have permissions set up virtually dictates that I have three separate pages devoted to the editing of authors. One is for the normal user, who does not have permission to edit all authors. The "edit your options" page contains rather innocuous bits for updating, including things like homepages and IM accounts and passwords and password-retrieval bits. The other two are for the power user—a person who has the power to edit the accounts of others. First, they'll have to be presented with a list of all authors, and then they'll have to be able to select a single author to edit.That secondary editing page will be a lot like the page I wrote today, except it will contain toggles for permissions.

Ah, but that's for later.

See, what you don't realize is that you should be impressed that I actually managed to get anything done at all. Why, you ask?

The Darwinian domesticat strongly suspects that it's time to post a notice in the skinning tutorial explaining politely that I'm simply not available for tech support via IM. Period. I've turned down quite a few requests along those lines in the past 48 hours—from people who, if they'd taken a minute or two out to read the front page of this site, might've figured out that perhaps I'm not available 24-7 to answer their code problems.

It's not that I mind the questions. Quite often I'll take a good chunk of time to help someone, even if I don't know them. But to rather rudely pop up and say, "Hi, I've read the tutorial and now I've got questions and need help"—not only are you careening rapidly in the direction of No Help Whatsoever, you're asking for a Darwinian Domesticat rant.

Will had a smashingly good response to such demands: "Uh. Well, I mean, for US$95/hour I'd even do help desk support… but for free, the line in the sand is nice and close to the margarita on my chaise longue, thank you very much…"

Other than that, it's quite stunning that I actually managed to get anything done today while at my desk. Why, you ask? I offer the following photos as all the proof you'd ever want:

Hard to do much of anything when those clowns are taking up over half your desk.

Especially when Tenzing decides to play baby seal and tries to take a nap on the oh-so-comfy keyboard...

Quarto: brought to you by code-fu, no caffeine whatsoever, and a lot of loose cat fur.