Well, I’ve done it again. I’ve revamped my website. I seem to have this urge every few months… or maybe it’s every time I have a huge school workload and I need some major non-school-related task to allow me to procrastinate. :) Either way, here it is: Brendan’s new and improved website!

As you can see, I’ve moved the graphical navigation bar from the left-hand side of the screen to the top of the screen, and I’ve eliminated a lot of excess information from the homepage, trying to make it less junky. The most important change, however, is what you’re reading at this very moment: my new “blogger” journal.

“Blogs” are a growing phenomenon on the Web these days. They are basically personal bulletin boards. The owner can post whatever he/she wants, whenever he/she wants, and it will immediately show up on his/her website. The technical aspects of the uploading process are taken care of by Blogger.com, which makes life much easier for the blog owner — in this case, me.

Unlike the tradition method of updating my website — typing out articles in HTML format, playing with fonts, tinkering with the layout, etc. — blogging makes it very easy to update my website instantly, whenever I feel like it. The goal here is to actually keep my website fresh, with updates at least every couple of days, which is almost impossible to do with HTML, because I don’t have enough time. But with a blogger, I only need 5 minutes a day, if that!

To update my blog, I don’t even have to be at my own computer. I can go to Blogger.com from any computer, enter my username and password, and just like that, I can update my website. It’s the same principle as web-based e-mail, but in this case it allows website owners to keep their sites updated on the fly. In fact, I can even update my blog from my cell phone!!! I could be walking down the street, and if I see a pink elephant in the road and I want to tell all my friends about it, I can whip out my cell phone, use the Sprint PCS Wireless Web to log onto the blogger site, and type “pink elephant in street - details to come,” and voila, it’s on the Web.

Kudos to Andrew Long, my conservative friend, for guiding me toward the joys on blogging. (Andrew is pissed off at me at the moment because of the strongly anti-Sharon, pro-Palestinian column that I wrote in Wednesday’s Daily Trojan, but for the most part we get along fine despite our ideological differences.) Andrew knew about blogging because apparently, a lot of conservatives have blogs that they use to spread their ideological views, in defiance of the left-wing media establishment (not to be confused with the vast right-wing conspiracy).

I don’t plan to use my blog for ideological purposes, though. (Ashcroft sucks!) Mostly I’ll be blogging in my traditional narcissistic style, babbling about inconsequential details of my life, as if anyone really cares. :)

Anyway… enjoy the revamped site, and look for more news updates soon!