Omnibus

Omnibus |ˈämnəˌbəs| : (noun) an anthology of the works of a single author or a volume containing several novels or other items previously published separately. ¶ There’s your word of the day. This section just combines all the other sections of my site on one page in chronological order. Specifically paginated chronological order, ten articles to a page.

The TITLE element and jQuery’s text() function

Posted on 3 Sep 2010 by Rae

You’re doing it wrong. In a day of zero fun, a coworker and I ended up tasked with debugging a jQuery-based script that seemed to be perfectly fine, except of course, the part where it wasn’t working as expected in IE. After some tracing, it turns out the issue had everything to do with one line of code not returning a value: $("title").text();. To translate, the author of the code had been trying to retrieve the text of the title element using jQuery’s text function. But, turns out that doesn’t work in IE.

The solution

If you want to retrieve the value of the page title, use document.title. If you want to set the value of the page title—the title displayed at the top of the browser—use document.title.

It doesn’t matter if you’re working with straight JavaScript or a library like jQuery, the correct way to interact with the page title is through document.title.

Here’s a full code example:

var foo = document.title;
alert("The title was "+foo);
// on this site, the above alert would read
// "The title was The TITLE element and jQuery’s text() function"
document.title = "Now it’s been changed.";
alert(document.title);
// this alert = "Now it’s been changed"
// the display at the top of the browser changes too

The explanation

Don’t worry, I’m not going to leave you high and dry without explaining why the original approach didn’t work.

The problem exists in IE because IE doesn’t consider the title element to have child nodes. By W3C specs, the title element contains one, and only one child node: a text node. It can not have any child elements. Just the one text node.  But according to IE, that text exists in some strange nebulous state outside of a normal text node. Here’s a code example.

var titles = document.getElementsByTagName("title");
var kids = titles[0].childNodes;
alert(kids.length);

If you run that code in IE, the alert will be 0. In FireFox, Chrome, Safari, Opera, etc, it will return 1, the expected amount.

Breaking down jQuery.text()

So, the reason $("title").text() doesn’t work in IE is because of jQuery.text()’s reliance on children nodes. Let’s take a look at the function (jQuery version 1.4.2, line 3418):

function getText( elems ) {
	var ret = "", elem;
	for ( var i = 0; elems[i]; i++ ) {
		elem = elems[i];
		// Get the text from text nodes and CDATA nodes
		if ( elem.nodeType === 3 || elem.nodeType === 4 ) {
			ret += elem.nodeValue;
		// Traverse everything else, except comment nodes
		} else if ( elem.nodeType !== 8 ) {
			ret += getText( elem.childNodes );
		}
	}
	return ret;
}

Confused by the fact that the function is called getText? A few lines down (well, a little more than that, line 3680 to be exact), you see this code: jQuery.text = getText;. This allows the utility function getText() to be called as jQuery.text().

A quick translation of the code is as follows. The first line of the function sets up a variable ret as an empty string. This variable is the return variable for the function. Then we jump into a loop that goes through each object in the array that was passed in (remember, $("title") will return an array with a single element). For each of these elements it checks whether it is a text node. If it is, it appends the node’s value to the return value (ret). If it is an element, it recursively calls itself on that element, appending the result of the recursive call to the return value. At the end, ret is returned.

But, remember, in IE, the title element has no text node, because there are no child nodes. So what does ret equal? An empty string. The entire for loop is skipped, because elems is empty. It essentially goes straight from declaring ret="" to returning that initial value.

The code continues to work in other browsers because they rightly treat the element as having a single child node—a text node— and that node’s value—the text—is added to ret.

innerText doesn’t work either

Even if you’re using plain JavaScript without a a library, document.title is the way to do this. Typically, to set the text of an element in IE you would use the innerText property, but you shouldn’t do that in this situation. There are a couple reasons for this:

  1. It doesn’t work in IE. In fact, it’s a documented issue dating back to IE 5, maybe earlier. At this point, we have to assume Microsoft has it working as they intend it to.
  2. The innerText property doesn’t work cross browser. In FireFox, you have to use the textContent property. Why bother writing extra code to be cross-browser compatible when document.title will work without issue?

Wrapping it up

Here’s that first script again, showing the correct way to do it:

var foo = document.title;
alert("The title was "+foo);
document.title = "Now it’s been changed.";
alert(document.title);

So now you know why you can’t use jQuery.text() to retrieve the page title. But that’s ok, because doing so would be inefficient anyway when you can just call document.title. Good luck with your dev.

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Remembering my Grandparents

Posted on 1 Sep 2010 by Rae

This year has been a difficult one. I lost two of my grandparents in the first half of it. It seemed like every time I visited my family, I had to turn around and fly home two weeks later for a funeral. They’re both greatly missed, as are all of my other grandparents that have passed away. With all the renovations I’ve been doing on this site and the content I’ve been putting out, I’ve been reminded how much they taught me—much of which is vital to the topics I write about here. So, here’s a post in memory of my grandparents, and a little more about the lessons they instilled in me.

Grandma Edie

Though I called her just “Grandma,” Grandma Edie was actually my great-grandmother. She passed away this June. She was my last living grandparent that I was very close to. Growing up, I spent a lot of time at her house and even stayed there some times during college breaks. Without her, chances are that all my posts about sewing wouldn’t exist. She taught me a lot about sewing, and I logged many hours on her machine while visiting. Her stash was always open to me, as were her wise words and helping hands.

Sewing wasn’t the only skill she tried to teach me, although it’s one of the few that took. She constantly baked, and would show me how to make whatever she was working on at the time—delicious cinnamon rolls, wonderful cookies, moist cakes—but my baking skills are still sub-par. She was an expert at the art of letter writing, constantly corresponding with numerous acquaintances, but she often called my penmanship horrible, complaining that I never wrote in cursive, just chicken scratch.  Her garden was always full of beautiful flowers and tasty vegetables, and I spent many a summer day helping harvest, but I can’t keep a cactus alive. Regardless of all that, every time I work on a sewing project, I remember sitting in the spare bed room, setting up her sewing machine, and sewing away at whatever I could think of to make out of the scraps I dug out of the depths of her fabric dresser. It’s a wonderful memory, and a defining skill.

Pee-paw

Although I didn’t consciously meet him until I was 10 years old or so, I’m glad that I was able to develop a close relationship with my paternal grandfather before he passed away this January. He taught me a lot about classic cars and history. He also taught me that there’s nothing wrong with reading a pulpy romance novel for the historical setting (*wink*). He might have stuck to the historicals more than the paranormal, but my willingness to be entertained by these non-literary masterpieces is thanks to him and his his paperback collection.

Granny

Granny, Pee-paw’s wife, was a defining part of my late teenage years. Again, although I didn’t know her for most of my young childhood, we established a wonderful bond before she passed away my senior year of college. Her years-long fight with cancer (surviving well past most of the expiration dates her doctors tried to give her) was an inspiration; gumption and plain ol’ stubbornness can get you a long way. She expected great things out of me, and made sure that I planned on staying on path for college and graduation. Not to say she wouldn’t have loved another great-grandkid (there are quite a few), she always reminded me that she would be sublimely happy if I didn’t get married or have a kid before she died; just to be sure that I’d get through school and be successful in a career before I started a family. While she may not have been a CEO, she was nothing if not successful. Successful in raising four boys. Successful in being a matriarch of a huge family. Successful in all the work she did for Eastern Star and the town she lived in. She taught me that you have to want success, work for it, and balance the fine line between strong-willed and obstinate.

Grandma Faye

We lived with my Grandma Faye for many years, throughout her long decline from Alzheimer’s. She fought the disease for many years before passing away my sophomore year of college. It is a terrible disease that changes a person’s personality immensely—especially when someone battles it for a decade—but I still remember my Grandma before the disease advanced. From her, I learned a lot about compassion and that family isn’t necessarily just about blood. All her life, she took in strays (of the human, kind, not so much the animal), giving them a sense of family. She was always willing to help with whatever was needed. She taught me cursive (not that I use it), religion and tried to teach me how to cook. She taught me to play the piano. I can still bang out “When the Saints Go Marching In” and “Amazing Grace” by heart (though not any better than I could at five years old). When my cousins and I were young, she took hundreds of photos of us (this was before digital), and encouraged me to take them as well. I’m not a great photographer, but I do enjoy heading out to Carl’s races with my camera in hand. Her encouragement of all my projects pushed me to be as creative as I could be, something I endeavor to continue.

Grandpas Joe

I have three grandpas Joe, one of whom is still living. The others, my maternal grandfather (husband of Faye) and a great-grandfather (husband of Edie) passed away 20 and 10 years ago, respectively. While I was still quite young when they died, I’ve found that they’ve both taught me many lessons posthumously. Both men were the breadwinners of the home, career men for their companies. They also both died rather unexpectedly. Luckily for my grandmothers, who both outlived their husbands by a decade or more, both men were also frugal, smart investors who left enough money behind to make sure their wives could get by without too much of a difference in quality of life. At 3 and 13, the concept of retirement planning, pensions, and investments was a nebulous concept, but now that I’m grown and saving for myself, I credit these two men with teaching me the lesson that the future matters: be prepared for it (and the living Grandpa Joe’s pretty smart about it all too).

What is your favorite or most useful lesson from a grandparent (or grandparent-ly figure)?

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Demystifying My Post Writing

Posted on 30 Aug 2010 by Rae

Shadowed Text Most of the time, my new posts are published right around 1:45 or 2pm, corresponding with the end of my lunch at work. Sometimes I’ll tweet about them saying “Lunchtime blog post:…” but truth is, it’s highly unlikely that I just wrote it over my 30 minute lunch. It’s more likely that I started them during lunch a few days before, finished them up that night or the next day, then gave them a final once over during lunch the day I post them. Exchange “lunch” for “after work,” “during a break,” “at work” or “when the idea struck me” and you have the process of most successful bloggers out there.

The idea for a post may come at any moment, and very few are time-sensitive. If I can’t lay fingers to keyboard right then, I’ll try to jot down a few notes to come back to when I have time. Once I’ve written something, I generally go back and reread it multiple times over hours or days, editing all along the way. Sometimes I’ll start a post then let it sit unfinished for a couple weeks, usually because I don’t like where it’s headed, and end up rewriting it.

I’ve actually heard people say that grammar and spelling don’t matter in blogs. They’re idiots. No, seriously; I think that they are complete morons (and likely completely lazy, trying to excuse their lack of skill with language). It matters. It bothers me when I find a silly grammatical mistake glaring at me when I reread my content that has gone live. I edit, and edit and edit. And reread to the point that I miss the mistakes because I’m so familiar with my content. And the editing isn’t just copy editing. I trim down things, expand on others, clarify, rewrite and rehash.  That’s what writers do. Bloggers are writers. I’m a writer (some days).

Sometimes I’ll have a few posts queued up to publish when I have dry spells for other content. Bloggers that make money do that. They might have a month or more posts sitting in queue so that they can stay ahead of the game. I’m not at that level, but I also have a full time job and myriad hobbies, so limited blog post writing time. For them it is a full time job. Also, it’s a lot more interesting for my readers, I’m sure, to see a new post every couple of days rather than three posts a day then none for two weeks.

So this post, although I’m calling it a lunchtime blog post, was actually written a few days ago at lunch. And then reread over the weekend. And then edited a slight bit more today before I hit the “publish” button and started distributing the link. In fact, I just had to add the ‘l’ to publish, because I didn’t realize I mistyped before.

Maybe calling it a lunchtime post isn’t the most truthful thing out there, but hey, it was published during lunchtime, so I’m sticking to it.

Do you blog? What’s your posting process?

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You Are Not a Web Developer

Posted on 27 Aug 2010 by Rae

Yes, I’m talking to you, Dreamweaver user. You. Are. Not. A. Web. Developer. You’re just the person that is screwing up the nice, pretty, semantic, standards-based Internet for the rest of us. The one that devalues our hard work with your naive undercutting. The one who makes our life hell when our project managers quote maintenance or design-tweaking projects not realizing that we can’t just reuse your code and keep our dignity intact. You. I really hate you, you MM_preloader using, nested-tables employing you.

But it’s not because you use Dreamweaver. It’s the fact that you use it as a crutch. Yes, you call it a tool.  A great tool that lets you create these awesome sites without knowing how to do any coding. That, my enemy, is a crutch, not a tool. And p.s. your sites aren’t awesome; they’re bloated, inefficient and have nasty, nasty code under the hood because you don’t know the two types of markup that a developer uses daily: CSS and HTML.

Why is it so wrong?

Don’t worry, I’m not going to just berate you and not try to back myself up a bit.

You can’t fix it when it doesn’t work right

So, you tell Dreamweaver to lay something out in a specific way, but then it doesn’t look right in a certain browser. But, you don’t know how to fix the code and make it work right, do you? Yeah, didn’t think so. Don’t get me wrong, developers spend time debugging and don’t always know how to fix it, but we do know what we’re looking at when we take a gander at the code, and can understand what the code is doing when we find a fix from some other resource.

You’re ignoring SEO

Sure, you might be using header tags, and may even have the right meta tags in there. But you’re not coding for search-based optimization. First, your code is bloated. Search engines sometimes parse the first hundred or fewer lines of code, and your bloated code might not have anything of interest until far later in the code. Second, if you are using rollovers or drop-down menus, you’re using code that search engines can’t do anything with. Much of Dreamweaver’s built in code for things like drop-down menus and rollover images is based on JavaScript, even though it’s not generally needed to do either of those things. Both can be accomplished with CSS.

You’re letting your users get bored

Have I mentioned that your code is inefficient and bloated? Yes? Well, I don’t mind saying it again and again and again. Because all that inefficient, bloated code is extra bytes for your users to download. Extra bytes that really increase loading time. People get bored waiting for a site to load. Then they leave. Without seeing your content. In this new world of 2010, where it seems like everyone has mobile Web access, small, efficient sites are back in vogue. Who wants to pull down three different JavaScript libraries and hundreds of extra lines of code on 3G? (Gods forbid a user is still on EDGE) Slow sites mean fewer visitors willing to stick around long enough for the chance to visit. Svelte code is sexy. Your overweight code is as bad as the obesity epidemic plaguing America.

And this point isn’t just true of Dreamweaver-based sites. iLife, Frontpage, Microsoft Word, whatever other WYSIWYG editor du jour you can name… they all create truly horrendous code that is terribly bloated.

Hey Kettle, you’re black!

Yeah, Pot, that’s right, I do use Dreamweaver. Eight hours a day, more or less. But you know, for a while there, I actually forgot it had something called design view, until my preferences got all screwed up and reset themselves, causing a project to load up in design view. That was a shocker. See, I use it because it’s a decent text editor and code completion speeds up development time. It has a built in project system with an FTP tool that keeps me from having to run two or three programs at a time. But ultimately, I use it because it is what is on my system at work.

Curtis McHale said it well in an article reprimanding hiring managers for saying “Dreamweaver users need not apply”:

At my fulltime job it simply comes down to cost. I use Dreamweaver because it is in CS3. There is no real break through feature that I could find to justify to my boss so that they would purchase Coda.

And Curtis is lucky. He posted that over a year ago and had CS3 at work. Here it is Aug. 2010 and I’m still stuck with CS2 at my 9-5. It’s a sore point for me. But hey, I’m employed, I’m not going to complain too awful much. But there’s probably a snowball’s chance in hell that my company is going to pony up cash for a different program.

I could write a site up in Text Edit or Notepad if that is all that was available to me, then pull up an FTP program to upload to the server. It’d decrease my efficiency, but I could do it. But if you’re paying me, don’t you want me to be as efficient with my time as possible? Of course, if you aren’t the company I work for, you’re not paying me to use Dreamweaver because I use Coda at home. But you, you’re not efficient. It takes me less time to type it all out, because I know the code, than it does for you to go through all the WYSIWYG dialogs.

Are you willing to defend Dreamweaver WYSIWYG? Go ahead, play Devil’s advocate in the comments.

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What is a fat quarter?

Posted on 26 Aug 2010 by Rae

Back before I started this whole quilting endeavor, the quilting section of fabric stores was quite a mystery to me. Sure, I’d wander about because patterned cottons can come in handy for other types of sewing, but one section of fabric really confused me: the fat quarters. I had no idea what that meant. But now, the mystery is solved.

It’s all in the cut

Fat quarters are are 18″ × 22″ rectangles of fabric. They get their name from the fact that they are quarter yards of fabric, but cut differently than “normal” quarter yards. Rather than cutting a quarter yard off of a bolt, which results in a 9″ × 44″ piece of fabric, a half yard (18″ × 44″) is cut in half parallel to the selvage, resulting in two fat quarters.

Diagram of fat quarter cut compared to normal quarter yard and half yard.

Here’s a diagram

So, you see the measurements come from the size of “normal” quarter and half yard cuts. The size of those cuts are determined by the width of fabric, which is almost always 44″ for quilter’s cotton (plus or minus an inch). A yard is 36″.

Fat quarter uses

Fat quarters have some advantages over traditional quarter yard cuts.

  • Longer strips can be cut parallel to the selvage, or lengthwise grain, which is less stretchy than the crosswise grain.
  • You may be able to cut more of certain shapes. For instance, you can cut 12 5″ squares from a fat quarter (3 rows of 4 squares) rather than 8 from a normal quarter yard (1 row of 8 squares).
  • For larger patterns, the 18″ side may allow for more flexibility in larger blocks (as in you can get more of the pattern).

Beyond their usefulness of cutting, more fabric sellers and manufacturers ship pre-cut fat quarters as part of a fabric collection, meaning you can easily pick up the prepackaged cuts (sometimes in packs with multiple patterns).

You can also find fat eighths, which follow the same idea. Rather than a very thin strip (4.5″ × 44″), a quarter yard is cut in half resulting in a 9″ × 22″ piece of fabric.

Fat quarters aren’t just useful for quilting; they can be a boon to crafters as well. In fact, some pattern makers even sell craft patterns made for use with fat quarters.

What is your favorite use of fat quarters?

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New Sewing Goodies

Posted on 25 Aug 2010 by Rae

Shot of all three presser feet The presser feet I ordered finally came in the mail today! I’m looking forward to all the things I can do with them.

It all started with the narrow hem foot (or rolled hem foot). I made some alterations to a friend’s bridesmaid dress and needed the foot to shorten the hem of the poly chiffon layer. Unfortunately the foot didn’t make it in time, and it was not the best attempt at hemming a dress I’ve made. But, I was excited to have an excuse to buy the foot, because there are so many uses for it. It’s the perfect foot for finishing off edges of fabrics like silk georgette (of which I still have a few yards in my stash even after making a shrug). It’s wonderful for finishing off the edges of light-weight linens for historically-pieced late-Elizabethan shifts that were seamed using insertion stitches on hemmed edges (of course, historically accurate reproductions would be hand sewn. I don’t want to hand sew them). It works great for things like sheer curtain edges and likely a million other things I haven’t even begun to consider sewing.

Closeup of rolled hem (narrow hem) footView of a rolled hem made with the rolled hem foot

Left: The rolled hem foot. The fabric feeds through the curved part in the middle, turning it under for the neat hem.  Right: a quick hem sewn with the foot on a scrap of fabric I had laying around. So small and neat!

Then, since the shop I was buying from had a great shipping deal when you purchase multiple feet, I went ahead and grabbed two others I’ve been wanting: a ¼” piecing foot and an even feed (walking) foot.

Closeup of the piecing foot

This piecing foot has a small round opening for the needle, which gives the proper pressure on the fabric. It has ¼” guides on the right and 1⁄8″ guides on the left for use in top-stitching.

When I first started my quilting adventures, I put off buying a piecing foot in favor of using my standard foot because I knew there were some ¼” feet out there that also came with 1⁄8″ guides as well, but my local shop doesn’t carry one. This shop did. So, I’m eager to throw it on and continue piecing the blocks of the quilt I started on this past week.

Closeup of the walking (even feed) foot

The walking foot has a set of feed dogs on top to move all layers of fabric through, rather than just pulling on the bottom one.

Although I haven’t finished piecing either of the quilt tops I’m working on, looking ahead I know that I’ll need a walking foot to successfully quilt them. Without it, the backing of the fabric gets pulled by the feed dogs enough to visibly offset that part from the top regardless of how well the layers are pinned. The even feed foot isn’t useful only with quilting though. It is wonderful to use on projects where matching patterns is vital, for instance when sewing plaids or stripes. The foot acts as a second, upper pair of feed dogs to ensure all layers of fabric move through the machine together, making sure that matched patterns stay matched. Having sewn plaids without one before, I am eager to see what a difference it makes. Supposedly it’s great for dealing with vinyls and other fabrics that don’t want to feed correctly using a normal foot.

Now, I’m off to try out the piecing foot! I think I have about all the presser feet I could ever need now, except for a darning foot. I wanted to grab one of them in this order as well, but the shop didn’t carry one for my machine, nor does Joann Fabrics. Oh well, I should probably try quilting with straight lines before I try to start stippling, any way.

What is your favorite presser foot?

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The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner

Posted on 24 Aug 2010 by Rae

The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner by Stephanie Meyer

Twilight Saga Novella

Rating: 2/5

I had a bit of time and hadn’t been reading much lately, so I decided to take this newest Twilight world novella for a spin. I should have chosen something else. It wasn’t particularly bad, but it wasn’t anything special. The main gripe I had is that the focus is on these street kids that are being turned into vamps, and so—for the most part—the dialogue is as you’d expect, but then Meyer has them drop some vocab of the day word. It’s jarring. That, and I’m kind of tired of the whole Twilight craze.

Form your own opinion: Buy from Amazon

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Decluttering the Closet (and Life)

Posted on 23 Aug 2010 by Rae

Stock shot of half-emptied closet Here’s an idea: owning less “stuff” means having a happier, less spendy life. I’m trying to apply that idea to my life. (Actually, I have been for a while; it’s an ongoing process, especially because I hop from plan to plan.)

So, my mission this summer has been evaluating my wardrobe, clearing stuff out, and working on rebuilding the basics. There are a gazillion pages out there that describe the “basic” wardrobe for a woman. I agree with some items, vehemently disagree with others, and think that yet others have no bearing on my lifestyle. Part of this journey involves evaluating what my basics are. But the main issue: getting rid of things.

I decided to set up ground rules. If it doesn’t meet the rules, out it goes. Those rules are:

  • I have to like it
  • It has to fit correctly
  • It doesn’t need repair (or if it does, I have to do it right away)
  • I have to have worn it this season (or during the last season it was appropriate for)

The easy decisions

I have a few items in my wardrobe that I never really liked all that much, but purchased because I needed something like it for a specific occasion, or liked at the store, but not once I brought it home. Things like the $10 clearance dressy shirt I bought because I needed one while out of town and all I packed were tees. Not that it was a bad shirt, but I just didn’t like it much and didn’t wear it. Those types of things are gone with no regrets.

A few times this summer, I wore an item that I hadn’t for a while, and noticed that it didn’t fit very well at all, and I didn’t like how I looked in it. In each case, it was generally an item that never really fit well. When I got home, I’d wash it, then toss it.

In a couple of cases, there was an item or two that I liked ok, and fit fine, but I was just kind of bored with it or maybe it was looking a little on the limp, over-worn side. So long as I have another item of its type (like v-neck sweater), out it went. If I don’t, then it is on the list of things to get replaced eventually (but at a lower priority than things I actually need).

Overcoming mental hurdles

Unfortunately, the easy decisions were few and far between because I have tried to purge my closet like this in the past, but came up against mental hurdles for why I shouldn’t get rid of such-and-such item. Sometimes an item fell into multiple categories, which made it even harder. It was a struggle this time too, but I steeled my resolve and started tossing. I haven’t missed anything.

The “it’ll fit someday” items

Not to generalize too much, but it seems like almost every woman I know has some of these items. The “I’m going to lose weight and fit in these” jeans. The “I’ll find the right bra to wear so that the buttons stop gaping” shirt. Out, out, out. If I couldn’t get into it, it is gone.

I don’t think “struggle” is the right thing to say in regards to me and my weight, ’cause I’m not exactly fighting it. I put on weight in college because of my eating habits and some health issues, but I’ve been steady at that weight for a few years now so it’s not like I yo-yo. Sure, I would like to lose some, but I’ve been liking to lose some for over three years now and not doing much about it (though I have changed my habits so that I don’t gain more). Who cares about the future; I need clothes that fit right now. I can buy new clothes when I finally lose weight.

But not all of the “it’ll fit someday” items weren’t worn. Some kind of, sort of fit, so I still wore them. I had pants that were too small. I had shirts that never properly fit my boobs (yes, I said boobs. I’m not going to be demure about it: I have a very large pair of them and have since middle school). I had sweaters that shrank so I would wear camis underneath so that my stomach wouldn’t show. I had pants that were too long, because I stand a towering 5’3″. I had cheap clothes that weren’t made to fit my body type. A lot of cheap clothes that never fit my body type. They’re all gone. I now vow to wear only clothing that fits correctly.

Ok, that was a lie. They’re not all gone. I still have two women’s medium t-shirts hidden away (the form-fitting-ish kind, not the basic cotton tee, free t-shirt kind) in the deepest corner of my closet that I hope will fit someday because I’m also sentimentally attached to them. I won’t wear them until they fit, but they’re still there, taking up space. I’m working on that problem, which brings us to…

The “I’m sentimentally attached” items

I have a million t-shirts from college. These t-shirts memorialize events I attended, groups I was in, causes I cared about and in a couple of cases I even designed them. Yet, I never, ever wear them, because I have this idea that I’m an adult now and it’ll look silly for me to go about wearing my Feb Fest 2007 shirt. These shirts just take up space and lots of it. In a couple of cases, I had duplicates of the t-shirts (generally same design, different color). Duplicates were tossed.

I had a few different items that were gifts at one point or another that I didn’t want to toss because they were gifts. Most of these fell into the “don’t fit correctly” category (although sometimes they used to fit). I had a few different items that I wore to a certain event that has good memories but haven’t really worn since.

It was difficult, but if it didn’t fit, or I haven’t worn the item in months (or didn’t wear it the last season that it was appropriate for), out it went.

Ok, so some of the keener readers may have noticed that I only mentioned tossing the duplicates of college shirts. See, I can’t bring myself to get rid of these, despite the fact that I don’t wear them. I’ve had this problem in the past; I toted all of my high school shirts to college, wore them on occasion freshman year, and then never again. But I still carted them around for three more years before I did anything about it. Finally, the day before graduation, I tasked my sisters with slicing off the collars, sleeves and unadorned fronts and backs, leaving me with the designs to someday create a quilt out of. It felt freeing to take that step. This is the fate that will meet my college shirts as well. It takes up far less room to store them that way, too.

The “but, I only wore it once” items

The concept behind keeping these items is that I need to wear them again to get their worth out of them. Some of them had been sitting in my closet for four or five years. They’d stuck around not only to wear again, but as “it’ll fit again someday” items. So, many are gone because they don’t fit. The rest are gone because I hadn’t worn them in years.

A subcategory of this is the “I don’t want to just give them away, since I paid good money for them” items. That’s complete idiocy on my part, because 99% of my wardrobe is cheap items from places like Walmart, Target and Steve & Barrys. I did make a couple of exceptions: two dresses that I did paid a decent amount for and only wore once because I purchased them for specific occasions. They’re being listed for sale on Ebay. If they don’t sell in one auction, they’re going to be tossed.

The “just in case” items

Quite a few different pieces made it through previous wardrobe clearings because I thought they might come in handy in the future. I kept them just in case. These were items like a t-shirt with a kind of cool design and strange cap sleeves that I kept for days when I didn’t want to wear one of my plain tees. Except, I never wore it, because on days I don’t want to wear a plain tee, I wear a different style of shirt all together. These kind of pieces are all gone.

The only exception to this is an old winter coat I have. I’ve kept it around because it still fits and I keep thinking I might need it for something when my wool coat won’t suffice, or would be silly for the occasion. I wear it maybe once a winter, but more as an excuse to wear it, not because my wool coat and a sweater won’t work. I’m not going to keep it, but I want to wait to toss it until closer to winter, so that I can donate it to a charity that will give it to someone in need. There’s nothing wrong with it, and I really only wore it for one winter.

The “why don’t I wear this” items

There were a couple of items in my wardrobe that I just didn’t wear. It’s not that I didn’t like them. They fit fine. Nothing is wrong with them. I just never wore them. They were mostly items similar to another in my wardrobe that I preferred. Previously, when I’d clean out my wardrobe, I’d keep the item with the intention of wearing it. I might even wear it once soon after. But then it’d fall back to the bottom of the drawer or back of the closet and not get worn again. Now they won’t ever get worn because they’ve been tossed.

Definition of “tossed”

Unless the item was being tossed because of stains or tears/rips that couldn’t be fixed (destination: landfill), almost everything I’ve tossed has gone to the local Salvation Army. Some of these items were tossed because I think they look a little worse for wear, but I know many people out there that commonly hit up the thrift store for items that they can re-purpose or alter. So, for instance a sweater that has dingy looking faux-button up collar and sleeves could easily have those parts removed and used over a real button up. It’s just not something I’m willing to do. The large majority were ill-fitting or things I didn’t wear.

In a few cases I gave away items to certain people. These were usually ones that I had some sort of sentimental attachment to, or knew that they’d really like. But regardless, they are no longer in my closet!

What is left

So, now that my closet has been cleaned out, there are a few holes. There are a some basic items left, but far fewer than there used to be. Almost everything trendy or beyond-the-basics was culled by one of the toss it criteria.

Now I need to work on building a new wardrobe. Check back next week, when I’ll talk about my goals for this new wardrobe.

What does your closet/basic wardrobe look like? Have you tried to do this sort of purge before? Have suggestions for me?

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Tour de Loop 2010 Photos

Posted on 21 Aug 2010 by Rae

This morning we were off to Oswego, NY for the Tour de Loop. It was overcast and chilly on the shore of Lake Ontario, which played havoc with my exposure settings for a while (and I’m too lazy to do much editing), but I managed to get some shots later in the race of both the B group (which Carl raced) and the A group. The loop was more of a figure eight without the crossover, allowing me to take a gross amount of photos from a single place of two different approaches. Unfortunately the lead pack beat me to the finish, so I didn’t catch Carl crossing the finish, but on the brighter side, the camera took photos with him in focus this time!  See the photos.

The B group pelaton midway through the race

A handful of MVBC riders were in attendance, and a couple even took home medals for placing in their age groups. Go club!

Carl took 14th overall, 1st in his age division. Now it’s off to bed, as we’re headed to Delta Lake tomorrow where he’s doing a 25mi time trial as part of a Tri team. It exhausts me just thinking about it.

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Canal Classic 2010 Photos

Posted on 18 Aug 2010 by Rae

Carl raced in the 2010 Canal Classic this past weekend, which takes place in Little Falls, NY. Camera in hand, I snapped away at the start, finish and just shy of the crest of a 4-mi 18% average-grade hill climb. The day was overcast, and my camera didn’t want to play nice, but I did manage to get some passable shots (and posted some not so great ones just in case anyone wants them). See the photos.

The riders of the 2010 Canal Classic lined up for the start

There was a great turn out, including a lot of riders representing the Mohawk Valley Bicycling Club and Dick Sonne’s Cycles.

Oh, and in case you’re interested, I’ve taken photos at a couple of other races Carl’s been in this year:

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