February 2009 Archives

I spent a great couple of hours with Kris this past Monday and I can honestly say I was glowing for the rest of the week!

It's been 6 plus years since we last sat face to face at a Film Festival in London, and a lot has happened to both of us. Thankfully we keep in touch and therefore we are quasi updated on goings on in our lives. He has a slight advantage since I publish Club Josh, but it's not too long before I catch up.

There is a very good chance that he will be in LA more frequently this year, and the very thought is amazing to me. We have been friends since the 8th grade, and it's been over 20 years since we have lived in the same town, let alone state. While I tend to get a bit nostalgic with him, what excites me is the possibility of new adventures that lie ahead. I so am going to drag him out on the town to discover new places and I certainly hope he drags me around as well!!

Photos of our meet and greet coming soon...

There is a lot of cutting going on in my circle - not just budgets and jobs, but also the physical variety.

First up, last week Gary had spinal surgery to plus up the fluid and bone structure in his neck. He made it through the surgery and is now on the long painful road to recovery. It's one of those situations where I wish I was closer to help out, at the same time I want him to relax and recover and stay out of the way. I'm hoping he gets well soon so we can be off on another trip with my mom.

Next up, Sarah had her second child Levi today via C-section. Everyone is doing well in the family and I hope they get home soon!!

Finally, my good friend and mentor Paul is going down on Monday for hip plussing and will be down for refurbishment thru the beginning of April. I'm interested to see if one recovers from hip surgery or neck/spine first. Maybe Steve Jobs will beat them all.

At any rate I wish everyone better health ahead!

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Originally uploaded by Club Josh.

This time, Kai Owen and Gareth David-Lloyd pose with Josh and the Gorn at the Gallifrey One Doctor Who Convention.

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Originally uploaded by Club Josh.

I rather like this "get your photo with everyone at the same time" approach. Unfortunately, I did have to clean it up a bit since the lighting was rather bad in the room, but at least it is a good shot with everyone..

This weekend I am attending the 20th Doctor Who Convention presented by Gallifrey One. I have not been to a Sci-Fi convention in many, many years (probably 15 or so), back when Star Trek was really at its peak. I am not ashamed to admit that I used to visit Star Trek Conventions from High School through College, as it gave me a chance to interact with some of the stars from all of the Trek shows over the years. I never did dress up in a uniform, but I do have a great picture of George Takei and I that I am proud of to this day.

Flash forward to last year as I introduced Daniel to the wonders of Classic Doctor Who (as something to watch while waiting for new Who at the end of Series 4). Daniel wanted to attend the convention this weekend, and I said, "Sure, why not.."

I had vague memories of old Trek conventions, but I had no idea what to expect. From reading the history of this particular convention, it seemed to be on the small size, but since the new series of Doctor Who, it seemed to be growing. I was also excited to see the Dealers room since this was one of my favorite things from Trek conventions past.

Arriving at the convention today, it was apparent that it was indeed a smaller convention, but that the people were more of a mix of different types of people than your normal Trek convention. Sure there were the housewife/obsessive fans and the geeks in costume, but for the most part it was a fairly normal group.

We sat through a bunch of Q n A sessions, and one of my favorite moments was when Naoko Mori showed up in the middle of a session with Gareth David-Lloyd and Kai Owen from Torchwood. Naoko played Tosh on Torchwood, but also has a special place in my heart as Sara/Titicaca from Ab Fab. Sadly I could not think of a great Ab Fab question to pose, but it really was a thrill to see her. Another highlight was seeing Wendy Padbury and Frasier Hines during a game show session after missing out on them earlier in the day. I can't wait to get a photo with them tomorrow! Hopefully, they will pose with the Gorn as well..

Off to bed tonight and back to the convention tomorrow. I do wish we were staying at the hotel so we could have gone to the parties and Karaoke, but perhaps next year!

I finally have Twitter, Facebook, and Club Josh playing together nicely. Now I am focusing on redesigning the Club Josh homepage for the first time since 2005. Actually there was one minor change to the home page where I moved it to a left-align state back some time between when I changed the photo of me in Australia back in 2006. I am leaning back to going to the centered design (I know boring), but aesthetically I have always liked the centered design.

There will be some small stylistic changes, but more of an updating to some code in the page as well as the addition of the status update. My next question is whether or not to go to 1024x768 for my template finally. I might just wrestle with it a bit more...

Once again I find myself waiting to see what the next step is for me at work. My time in Guest Services has come to a close (for now) and I am back in Tomorrowland for the time being. Today was my first day back and I am learning the Monorail. The Monorail is something that I have wanted to learn since I first came to Tomorrowland in 2005 and I am excited that I finally get to learn how to drive in the highway in the sky. I can't wait to see what will happen in the next month or so, but in the meantime, I am going to just enjoy myself and have a great time!!

Something I am trying on an interim basis is the first export of Club Josh. I know a lot of people are now on Facebook, including most of my friends (some I am sure will never make it there). Facebook has a nifty feature that allows the Daily Update to be imported into my profile so people can read my not-so-frequent musings without going all over the place. Of course, I think this will reduce my hits on ClubJosh, but as people know there is so much more than the blog on the site and hopefully they will visit. The more I think about it, my Facebook profile is more like what I wanted my Club House section of my site to be. Perhaps I should just screen shot it and repost it here.

Another thing I would like to figure out is to export my Facebook status (and/or my Loopt status) to a single line near the top of my Club Josh homepage. Anyone know how to do that?? I know perhaps involving a Twitter account? I do know that I want to be able to have one status and be able to post it across Club Josh and the rest of my social networking sites.

Having said that, ultimately, I want Club Josh to be the one stop for all my information (as it has been for the past 14 years) and I want to make sure any content that is generated on the other sites to be available here - rather than have all my CJ content on Facebook or another site. Is MySpace still around? I used to have a Friendster account and I finally deleted that after several years of non-use.

Maybe with the extra time I will have I will finally get Club Josh into the Web 2.0 era!