Slogging blogger haunted by HTML

If you're reading this right now, which I'm pretty sure you are...you can see my blog has an interesting format change, one that has consumed me for the past two nights. Ever since creating my blog, I have been frustrated that the format so kindly provided by Blogspot only showed my content in a strip down the center of the screen. I'd admired blogs that lavishly used the entire screen width available, and longed to have the tech savvy to make the look of my blog more individualized and professional.

Finally, I asked a fellow blogger who hosts just such an expansively attractive site to help me. I'd already played with all the menu toys Blogspot offers but no tab said "make blog fatter" or even "fill up the screen width." So my friend took me for a (limited by his knowledge) foray into html.

The html jungle is filled with strange symbols, carets, dollar signs, lots of semi-colons, curly enclosures and a few recognizable words. That have strange meanings. Wrapper is not what your groceries come in. Padding is not what you end up with after a month of gluttony. "Startside" and "endside" are not the before-and-after of a political campaign. Nor are they at the "start" or the "end." They are, however, at the "side."

Now you know why I've had time for little else.

In my quest to get the background box from which my posts bleed to actually encompass the entirety of my posts, I have spent many an hour reading. The help button for Blogspot led me to many time-leaching sites, and the blogosphere is filled with an interesting plethora of pleas. (How someone got away with repeatedly posting a screaming all-caps ad for "BANGLAORE ESCORTS FEMALE ESCORTS IN BANGLAORE CALL GIRLS..." in the Google Blogger Help website is, however, beyond me.) But mostly there were questions like mine, with answers by programming stars who each had their own followings and websites and awards. It's a fascinating world, down in the darkened cellar of computer-dom. I nearly said "windowless cellar," but I suppose a majority of these programming moles do use Microsoft.

Unfortunately, even after scrolling through 300 desperate posts asking for help, I never found exactly my dilemma. Lots of people, however, seem to have the same aim as I do--to expand their blogs to fill the width of the screen. I spent time reading html tutorials, trying to extrapolate how to apply these plumping suggestions to the box behind my posts. I learned that "em" is better to use than "px," and why (just ask me!), and that one must be extremely cautious to insert semi-colons and spaces just so or risk a common complaint seen in the Google Bloggers' queries: "Help! I lost my blog!"

Made me rather grateful that mine's still here, even with the awkward-looking background border ending three-fourths of the way through my text. I'm hoping that maybe by tomorrow, if help comes through, I'll have a broad blog with big box.

Aspiring to Make a Difference--and Failing due to Laziness

A couple posts ago I said that the person I know (well) who gets 200,000 hits a DAY on his blog, was doing something more important with his time than I am--even though I enjoy many wonderful pleasures from my life. Does that make him superior to me? I maintain that it does, though it seems others disagree.

He uses his time wisely. He works constantly, and enjoys most of what he does, even though the writing can be challenging. I enjoy what I do too--family-centered stuff, and house-centered stuff and a much smaller amount of writing.

Is it enough to enjoy your life, or is it BETTER to be actively working to influence others? I do influence others--just today I was talking to a Jewish friend and, I hope, was able to influence her to take on more mitzvot. Very nice. But the 200,000 hit man has probably not only influenced thousands to advance their Jewish commitment, but also influenced many, many thousands of others to view Judaism more positively, even though they, themselves are NOT Jewish.

And for that, he is a better person than I am. He, I believe, will earn BIG credits with God. For my nice little impact, I'll earn perhaps a few piddly credits with God. Something, surely, but no comparison.

Now, you may say, as Moshe did in my comments, that what I do enables Mr. 200,000 to make his big impact. Yes, that's true, and I'm hoping that my backdrop-sustenance will gain me a hold onto Mr. 200,000's coattails when it comes to being judged ultimately. But when I load the dishwasher and wash laundry and cook a Shabbos meal and talk on the phone to people, maintaining our social network, I am doing mundane tasks--and tasks that Mr. 200,000 appreciates but doesn't really NEED to make his huge impact. If we bought food from a caterer for Shabbat, we'd have a nice meal, I'd get five hours, and Mr. 200,000 would enjoy it. If we used paper plates, we wouldn't be ecologically "green," but Mr. 200,000 would be churning out his profound wisdom just the same.

I feel guilty. I do fun things (like edit my huge number of photos, and shop for three hours on the Internet for a camera for my daughter) while Mr. 200,000 is spewing insight out into the blog-o-webworld. How can you argue with the fact that what he is doing is superior? And that his choice to spend his time on earth making a BIG difference is superior to writing this little un-read, self-indulgent blog that I enjoy?