26th december 2001
Well, I hope you had a good one and I wish you all the best in 2002.

Let's hope that next year will be a peaceful time. It's the third millenium, aren't we all just so sick and tired of violence; why can't we be beyond the primitive? Maybe human beings will always be the most selfish, vile and savage living creatures ever in known existence.

I have changed the "this is planet earth intro page", and "this is planet earth" itself. A lot of people who visit my site, come via this route. They look on search engines for animated gifs of planet earth - and come up with my site - and probably the largest selection of gifs (now updated to 100 globes) on the planet. This is because I registered this page separately, and wrote special meta-tags for it. I realised (by looking at my site stats) that possibly up to half the traffic to my site was now entering via these pages. In view of this, I have upgraded the intro page so that it now has the same navigation buttons as the other top-level pages, and links to links and my gbook. It also now says who I am, and what I do (which is pretty important information). Some surfers might have been confused when they entered the site before - they will now know exactly where they are.

24th december 2001
Christmas Eve
Trying to get "interactive", (well, why not?), and have added a poll, courtesy of Bravenet.com. It's a bit pointless, but it's a bit of fun. This poll, which is random and can ask up to 10 sets of questions, and looks grooovy too, is part of a new section called "Fun Stuff", (for lack of a more suitable name). You can also check out a portrait of the artist as an eleven year old boy there too, which I have updated.
Getting a bit pissed on cheap Spanish red, so I'll sign off.

Happpyy CChristtmassss!!

22nd december 2001
Yuletide greetings to anyone who reads this.

Erm, after having said that I was going to slow down on a journey and concentrate on other stuff, i have now added 10 more steps - steps 101-110. I think, because I haven't done much work in the new studio (it's too cold, and I haven't got any heating there yet), I have to be creative somewhere else. So, in the meantime, these "animated paintings" will suffice.

17th december 2001
A few modifications. Changed the guestbook links sitewide, so that the visitor can now go straight to the gbook, instead of an interim holding page. I did this because: a) it was a bit long-winded before, and I think people were put off signing, because they were given an extra choice not to. b) according to the web hosting stats, a lot more people were visiting the guestbook intro page, than actually proceeding on to the guestbook itself. Now that choice has been removed, it will be interesting to see if more people sign the book - or conversely, leave the site earlier than they would have done before.

Fiddled with the links page a bit.

16th december 2001
one hundred steps
Blimey, it's 100 steps already. 28/10/01 - 16/12/01, and a fair way down the road. At this rate, I will have to negotiate a new contract with my web-hosting company, because think I might well exceed the hard disk space allocated on their server. See what happens. I might slow down the journey for a bit, because there is some other stuff I want to do on the site. Hey, the traveller is weary and needs a rest. But seriously, I want to put up some of the images of paintings that were not photographed before, or that I modified and added to, just before I moved studios. I will continue this journey, not least because it is such fun to do, but not at the pace of the previous 100.

Anyway, the last 10 steps (steps 91-100) are all my own animations, unlike the 10 before, and also unlike the previous 10, these images will take longer to download (around 100k per gif). The last 5 steps are combinations of the first five, so should therefore download almost immediately, because the images should be stored in your browsers cache.

13th december 2001
Felt like running this evening, and ran 10 very quick steps tonight. 10 steps in about 4 hours - that's fast! These paces should load quickly, because the image files are all quite small. The rhythm should be more flowing in this session. Thanks to all the anonymous artists for their unwitting collaberation in this artwork.

11th december 2001
Three months (already) since the terrorist attacks. Seems a long time ago, but I think a lot of people just want to forget about it, even though they know they never will, and try to carry on as life was before. Things do seem to be a bit more optimistic, and the situation in Afghanistan is certainly better than it was, although food is still desperately needed. But a rubicon has been crossed, and no-one can be confident that such a crime against humanity will never happen again. Man's inhumanity to his fellow human being knows no boundaries.

Anyway, chin up, as the Brits say, but I have been miserable for other reasons too, mainly due to being virtually broke all the time, so if anyone wants to BUY A PAINTING – let me know!

Added ten more steps to a journey and I slightly modified that page too.

1st december 2001
George Harrison (my favourite beatle) died today. He is undoubtably in heaven or nirvana or some higher plane now. He is at peace.

Still deeply involved in a journey and have now finished and uploaded steps 51–70. More of these stages involve animations that are of my own creation, rather than using pre-existing gifs appropriated from the web. However, some of these self-made animations take a bit longer to download, because they are quite involved.

20th november 2001
I'm in pain.
I pulled a ligament in my back at the studio on sunday, and it hurt - a lot. I was unable to move for a bit for fear of the horrific pain. I eventually managed to crawl to where i had some paracetamol - I took all four that were left. I then shuffled to Accident and Emergency at The Royal London hospital (less than half a mile away) - it talk me 50 minutes! After checking in at 9pm, I duly waited for 4 hours (in agony), before I was seen. This is the British National Health system after all. Simon, the doc, was good though, and assured me I hadn't slipped a disc or worse, and prescribed me some serious analgesics, which do work, but they make my thinking even more stupid than is usual. I'm feeling a lot better now, with only the odd sharp twinge, if you need to know, thankyou.

41-50 episodes of a journey make their appearances

14th november 2001
a journey continues with steps 31-40. Had to re-do the entry page for a journey, because of the extraneous html code that Dreamweaver insists on writing was messing things up.
I have done some more scannerheadz, but will upload them later, because I have decided they need an entry page too.

8th november 2001
Uploaded a series of self portraits into the photography section. SCANNERHEADZ are 12 images of me scanning my face whilst moving my head or mouth or face in an arty way. If you try this at home - make sure your eyes are closed!

6th november 2001
23-30 steps stup.

4th november 2001
uploaded steps 11-22 of this journey I've embarked on. I intend to do at least a step a day (assuming I'm sitting next to my mac).

1st november 2001
sill continuing with this new experimental adventure a journey. I have modified it from what it was 3 days ago, and added 9 new stages. I think this is going to be fun.

28th October 2001
a journey
starts here and now

I've changed the intro section to LUCKY DIP, because there is a lot more in that section now, than there was when the website went online. I have discarded the redundant "text" page, because it wasn't happening, and replaced it with a new project called a journey. This is to be an experimental on-going art journey, that I have no preconceptions for.

27th October 2001
4 more "Web paintings".
• REDZZ • BLUSPHERE • GGRREEEENN • MELLOYELLO •
These are a bit more complicated than the previous ones (see web stuff page), but they should still load fairly quickly. Unlike flamingthing (see below), which is a big animated gif that i made up in photoshop & imageready and is about 220k.

26th October 2001
# f l a m i n g t h i n g # (220k)

24th October 2001
http://www.ahumanbeing.co.uk celebrated its first birthday the other week. How time flies! I want to thank everyone who has taken a peek at what I do and who I am, and especially those who have written positively about the work in my guestbook - it's great to have feedback!

I have now uploaded a new links page - this is basically a page of my favourite sites that I personally use, rather than a page with links to reciprocal websites, as in my original links page (which I have modified slightly). The new links page is a labour of love, and I had major problems trying to do the javascript for pop-up windows. There is a way in Dreamweaver, which I used eventually, but I think that I have done it the wrong way. However, it works, and that's what counts.

I have updated the stats page, after having neglected it for a few months. The figures show that visitor numbers are improving month-by-month (apart from september 2001 - when there was a distinct reduction). Maybe that has something to do with world events, or maybe visitor numbers have reached their peak. I will have to try to get more traffic. Nevertheless, I have worked out that in the first 12 months of the website being on-line (apart from the first week in october 2001), there have been 114,670 successful requests for individual pages. This seems incredible and I am shocked!! Talking about statistics, I have just recreated the site cache for the website, and the link checker in Dreamweaver says that there are 1222 files altogether, of which 387 are html (the rest being image files). There are 5217 links in total, of which 350 are external. GOSH!!

I'm still feeling angry, impotant, sad, shocked and upset at world events (just like nearly everyone else, it seems), but I realise that I must just try to carry on as before, and not let the situation get the better of me. As long as I can carry on creating and I have the love and friendship of my friends and family (and give them mutual support in return), then that is what matters. It's difficult being positive, but that is the only thing that counts. I'm sure the way I feel is the way most people feel too.

15th September 2001
STILL TRYING TO COME TO TERMS WITH THE SHOCKING EVENTS IN THE UNITED STATES THAT HAVE TRAUMATIZED PEOPLE AROUND THE PLANET. THE WORLD WILL BE A CHANGED PLACE AFTER THESE APPALLING ACTS OF TERRORISM. WHAT PRESIDENT BUSH DOES NEXT WILL DETERMINE THE COURSE OF HUMAN HISTORY IN THIS, AND POSSIBLY, FUTURE CENTURIES. THE AMERICAN PEOPLE UNDERSTANDABLY WANT RETRIBUTION (AND, BECAUSE OF THE MANY CASUALTIES SUFFERED BY BRITISH PEOPLE - MORE THAN ANY OTHER TERRORIST ACT - SO DO MANY PEOPLE IN THE U.K.), BUT I HOPE THAT THAT RESPONSE IS MEASURED. IF IT IS ILL CONCEIVED IT MIGHT HAVE THE OPPOSITE REACTION TO THAT INTENDED. WHICH IS, I ASSUME, TO TAKE THESE PEOPLE OUT AND IMPRESS ON OTHERS WHO HAVE SIMILAR BELIEFS OR CAUSES, THAT THE WORLD WILL NOT SANCTION SUCH CRIMES. MY FEAR IS THAT THE REACTION WILL BE SO FORCEFUL THAT IT WILL CREATE MANY MORE MARTYRS. WHAT MAKES SOME PEOPLE HATE THE UNITED STATES AND ITS ALLIES SO MUCH THAT THEY ARE PREPARED TO GIVE UP THEIR OWN LIVES (AND THOUSANDS OF INNOCENT LIVES TOO) TO EXPRESS THAT HATRED? THESE PEOPLE OBVIOUSLY FEEL SO AGGRIEVED TOWARDS U.S. FOREIGN POLICY THAT THEY SHOW THAT ANGER IN A TERRIBLE AND PERVERTED WAY. AMERICA WANTS BLOOD FOR THE OUTRAGE COMMITED ON ITS OWN SOIL, AND WILL UNDOUBTABLY GET IT, TO ASSUAGE THE WRATH OF ITS PEOPLE. I JUST HOPE THAT AFTER THE OVERWHELMING EMOTIONS HAVE BEEN NECESSARILY EXPRESSED AND VENTED, THERE CAN BE A MORE RATIONAL AND CONSIDERED APPROACH. I'M JUST AN ARTIST, BUT I DO REALIZE THAT ALL PEOPLE ON THIS SMALL EARTH OF OURS NEED TO START ACCEPTING EACH OTHER AND HOW THEY LIVE, OR WE WILL EXPERIENCE MORE AND MORE VIOLENCE TOWARDS EACH OTHER. WE NEED DIALOGUE, UNDERSTANDING AND TOLERANCE. UNTIL WE SORT OUT THE MESS THAT IS PALESTINE/ISRAEL THIS SITUATION WILL NEVER BE RESOLVED. CHRISTIANS, JEWS AND MUSLIMS ALL WORSHIP THE SAME GOD, SO WHY ARE THEY UNABLE TO LIVE SIDE-BY-SIDE? AMERICA NEEDS TO BE LESS INWARD LOOKING, AND REALISE THAT THERE IS A WHOLE WORLD OUT THERE THAT IS ACTUALLY QUITE AMAZING, AND STOP BELIEVING THAT IT HAS ENEMIES EVERYWHERE, BECAUSE THAT PARANOID ATTITUDE ACTUALLY CREATES THOSE VERY ENEMIES. I WOULD LIKE TO BELIEVE THAT THIS HORRENDOUS "ACT OF WAR" IS THE CATALYST THAT BRINGS PEOPLE TOGETHER, BUT INSTEAD, I FEAR FOR THE FUTURE.

Mundane stuff.
I now have a new monitor - a 19" trinitron flatscreen. Hooray! So I can now update the site on a more regular basis than recently.
I have started some new work in the new studio - some drawings, just to get myself back into the art groove. This summer has been busy so I haven't done much at all, art wise. Working on a new links page, which I will upload shortly. Had a couple of trolls writing in my guestbook.

4th August 2001
Have added 20 more web paintings to the web stuff page.
Following the addition of the guestbook, I have now a page for people to add your own link - again a facility coded by Bravenet.com.

2nd August 2001
FINALLY!! I have managed to sort out my guestbook. OK, it's not exactly how I wanted it to be in terms of design, because it is a guestbook that is managed by an external site - Bravenet.com. I just couldn't get my head around the CGI scripts. Bravenet does it all for you, but because it is free, there are advertising banners. However, there are thousands of websites out there who use their guestbook facilities, and this hopefully means that I will get more traffic to my site, so it is worth the pay-off.

24th July 2001
Still without a monitor full time. No money at the moment to get a new one. Too many bills! Hope to rectify situation shortly.

I've now sorted out the new studio - ie, I've built a storage area for the paintings etc. This means that there is now an empty white space in which to start some new work. I have some trepidation as to what I am going to do next. I have some ideas, but I feel also I should try to get people to see the work I have already done, before I start another body of work. I need to get some galleries round.

I have updated this is planet earth so that now contains 90 rotating animated gifs of our planet, and takes even longer to download!

Sorry about the guestbook situation, which is still not functional.

7th May 2001
A few tweaks here and there. Slightly changed vortex.

22nd April 2001
Added quite a few more moving images to the web stuff page, to which I have also changed the layout. I have developed a method with which I create these "web paintings", so that there is a uniformity between them. Moved vortex to the web stuff page, and put this is planet earth on a main page by itself in Lucky Dip.

15th April 2001
I have added a few more animated gif pages to the web stuff page. These are called flamexplosion, load of balls, sunssun and globamotion. These moving page images are easy to create, but I think they make effective and fun viewing.

7th April 2001
I haven't done that much to the site recently, this is mostly due to me going on holiday to Vancouver, Canada to see my dear sister Alison and her family. Vancouver is spectacularly beautiful and clean and the people are so genuinely nice - which I found a bit disturbing coming from the capital of cynicism (London). I had a fantastic time.

I have slightly modified the subject pages ie: abstraction, figurative, tunnels, photography, lucky dip and information, so that they now contain obvious links to the homepage, what's new, email me, guestbook (still unfortunately not ready) and, er, links. This, I believe, will help the navigation of the site and hopefully encourage feedback from people via email.

I have added a page called stats in the information section. This is the data that my web hosting company provides, and gives much more accurate info as to visits to the website, than a simple counter.

Oh, and I slightly redesigned the home page, so that the rollover gifs of the subject pages are clearer.

I have just realised that the website is exactly 6 months old today!

22nd February 2001
I've changed the layout of the lucky dip pages to make them a bit more interesting because previously they were just pages with boring info about me to act as fillers until I had to time to put some more stimulating content there, after the rest of the site was worked on. I got rid of the page that was going to be a sporadic diary - I hadn't written any entries so it was pointless having it. I might get around to writing some stuff in the future when the site is a bit more complete. I also got rid of the page about graphic design because it was dull and depressing. I replaced it with an animated page I've called vortex. I altered the web stuff page (removed the redundant text) and jazzed it up with a couple of animated gifs. I changed the concepts page (got rid of the back sign) so that it is simpler and more direct visually and conceptually. I also adjusted the me me me page so that there is a fab pic of me instead of the drivel I had written.

I have added a picture to the recent work page in the figurative section. This page was empty before - a future presentation. I will sort out some more of these drawings soon.

18th February 2001
this is planet earth is a new experimental animated gifs page. These are getting more and more complicated each new one I do. This one is my collection of spinning planet earths.

14th February 2001
Did a bit more work on the home page and have added more art sites to the links page.

11th February 2001
Redesign of front/entry/splash/index/home page so it looks more funky. I added more info to it (like a direct link to the links page - which I have also updated) and I've included my email number. Since putting the site up in october 2000, I have had very little feedback from people who have visited it. I know that people are visiting, because of the stats I get from my webhosting company. I just think that the email page was too deeply buried in the site. The navigation seems logical to me, but I need to make certain things more direct and obvious to the visiting surfer.

Erm, I am still trying to get the guestbook up and running.

I've started scanning a series of figurative drawings that I did in '99-'00. I hope to have them up fairly soon.

29th January 2001
I have discovered that my scanner, which I had thought was kaput, does actually work. It's all to do with the black art of scsi connections. Anyway it means that I have started scanning my drawings and some photos, which should go online fairly soon. One result of this new input is the idiot - a photomontage of a very peculiar character I once met.

Still working on guest book.

28th December 2000
Major update to the photography section goes online.
This includes extensive overhaul of portraits, abstract, weird and colour photography sections.

I have also adjusted the entry pages for each section so that they fit the browser page better.

Still working on guest book.

Also did a couple of experimental animation pages using gifs - heartbeat & things

12th October 2000
Altered this page so that it is now an ongoing account of changes to the site. A friend of mine asked whether there was a guest book. There isn't, and now I think there should be one, but it involves using cgi and perl and coding stuff, which I know nufink about. I have got a script off the net which I could use, but it needs modifying and it's scary stuff. I know someone who does that sort of coding so I'll get him to have a look.
Meanwhile, I've been submitting the site's url to various search engines, so I'll wait and see if anything happens. It's quite exciting!

7th October 2000
Website goes online