Having benefited from free information available via the web for the past decade almost in terms of research information when I did my degree, buying digital cameras, or listening to radio stations "streaming" off the web, I have decided to give something back in return.
I certainly don't want to directly promote myself by using my initials or even my whole name for a website as this would defeat the whole object. The other consideration is that I have no idea what the future holds (certainly not in terms of 10 years down the line) and whether family, friends or for that matter even future partners will also wish to contribute to the content of this site to any extent or not at all. It's a case of keeping my options open.
I concede it's crazy, but it may just possible work, and that is to call this site 'Pillow Muffin 2004'.
The problem using say 'www.PillowMuffin2004.co.uk' is that it's simply too long to water mark images with, not to mention all to easy for me to miss-spell pillow without the w when half asleep. All web sites must have at least 3 alphanumeric characters after the www bit, unless you happen to be British Telecom for example, and as the site was registered in April 2004 - the obvious solution was the one I chose in the end.
In fact you only really need to enter pm04.co.uk into most browsers.
One which I hope you'll agree will be easy enough to remember should you need to.
You seriously think Pillow Muffin came out of thin air?
OK I'll enlighten those of you who like anticlimaxes of realising that in reality I'm a simple soul.
I used to bring baps, made with my own bread, into work during the summer months of 2000 & 2001. Rather than bake loaves, due to the fact I'd managed to damage the loaf tin of my bread maker - at that time - I simply used it to make the dough as all it was fit for. I would then divide and roll the dough into small ball shapes, slightly flatten them, give them enough time to rise, and finished them off in the oven to make baps. It goes without saying that putting round shaped baps into oblong shaped sandwich boxes resulted in me needing a larger sandwich box than I would have liked. Having so much excess room in the box the tops and bottoms of my baps invariably moved in transit loosing their fillings, to varying degrees, into the remaining space of the sandwich box.
Whether it was because I was fairly new to the job, which certainly was the case back in 2000, the fact I made my own home made bread or a prominently large 2 litre sandwich box on a coffee table in the staff room whilst I reconstructed my baps prior to munching them is largely irrelevant. A number did ask why such a large sandwich box, to which I would replied I could only buy them locally in 1 or 2 litre sizes. The 1 litre size is slightly too small, or this two litre one, which although much too big enables me to fit them all in. Either way it provoked a work colleague at the time to pose the following solution, "As you bake your own bread surely you have control over the shape they turn out . If you could bake square shaped baps you could get more in a given space, have a greater chance they would stayed intact, and use a much smaller box to put them in as well. Could be a very nice little side line?" Granted he was only joking but he did have a point. And being the sort of person who occasionally likes an impossible challenge . . .
I say impossible, because anyone who has ever baked their own bread will tell you, since the top of a loaf is never perfectly flat. Pedantic souls would state "If you used a purpose built square shaped loaf tin resembling a squared Victoria sponge tin (yes I know they are round but it gives you something to picture in your mind) with an additional lose weighted top, would enable you" do have a point, I agree. Anyone wishing to build one for that matter, for the sheer hell of it, please send me an email at the email address below. It may even become a marketable product who knows?
I digress . . .
Giving it a go I rolled out my dough with a rolling pin to about 8-12mm thickness on a chopping board. Used a sharp metal herb cutter to cut them in to rectangles allowing them time to rise before finishing them off in the oven. The result - pillow shaped bread requiring me to only need a 1 litre box to take to work from then onwards.
The problem was it was no longer a bap, the wrong shape and size to be called a loaf and due to me using a good dollop of honey and oats the bread was both sweet as well as being a soft light texture. Calling it a muffin on the grounds of being sweet soft English bread stretches things just a tad I agree, but what the heck the "Pillow Muffin" was born.
I still bake bread, but very rarely these days, despite having replaced the bread maker (the spirit of which has long since gone to the big bread maker in the sky) but that's how life moves on - but the memory remains.
For those you who know me - yes I agree this is not the first website I've tried to put together and everyone I've done to date has come to a grinding halt a few weeks down the line.
The difference this time around is that I have some of my own material namely digital images, I have taken myself, actually worth posting to a web site, some of which will be totally unique and not available from other web sites. As PCs now have the memory for such luxuries as desktop images (without having memory shortages) and windows XP the ability to display images as a screensaver straight out of the box - the need for high quality digital images is there. Also since my very first website the download bandwidth has dramatically increased from the dizzy maximum heights of 4Kbytes between 9 and 10 am on a Saturday morning from a University Campus to something capable of flooding a broadband connection, but alas only if your in the States. For those in the UK I'm averaging speeds of about 75Kbytes/second.
The rhetoric as to why hasn't changed over the years. As previously stated, I have personally benefited from other people's time and effort for free in the past, so it's my way of me being able to repay that debt. After all I there's no such thing as a free lunch and as I'm in a position of being able to contribute something back to the web community I feel I should.
Although I take a lot of photographs for personal reasons, mainly as a way of remembering where I've been, what I've
done and was that really a bank vole or just a species of mouse I saw. The vast majority of what I take never see
light of day which is a real shame. Having an audience for what I photograph should hopefully improve my photography and
the enjoyment I get out of it. Where I've taken Flora and Fauna my skills at being able to identify what I've actually
seen should improve. Hopefully with a bit of occasional direct feedback from yourself via email, should you wish, on
"why have you no photographs of animal/plant/place etc.., that's never a thingamabob its a doodad, to ever though
of visiting . . . ."
I'm not guaranteeing I'll do every request but I'll then be able to take photos you yourself would like to see, as well
as seeing new places myself and in some cases stretching my photographic abilities even further. Just as long as it's
not at the expense of my camera gear or my life. I've already nearly written off a 2 year old camera lens very recently
due to fungal growth caused by photographing in the rain occasionally, not to mention a camera and lens that ended up in
a river.
In addition to hopefully improving my photographic abilities, I'll also be able to part with that knowledge as well as useful information on putting a web site together - after all that is what I'm doing at the moment anyway.
The objective for the site is to provide you primarily with high quality free (for non commercial use) images - a number of which will be large enough to be used as background wallpaper/screensaver for your PC, Mac, palmtop etc. Tips on how to get the best out of, primarily, a digital camera and photography in general. Storing of digital photographs and the black art of compressing an image to send via email. Although I'm no expert I do have hands on experience of having to deal with over 8000 digital images and video clips (20 Gbytes worth) as well as a decade's worth of experience in using both email & using various graphics applications from freeware to the likes of Adobe PhotoShop & Paint Shop Pro.
Knowing that this site will stand or fall by the quality and originality of what I photograph this should improve both the quality and diversity of what I'll capture digitally and enjoyment I get out of my it. This is one of the key reasons for doing this website for me in the first place.
In addition to this - information on creating your own website, bits of useful JavaScript code, links to other useful web sites, in addition to the links already.
Although this website hasn't initially been created as a commercial site I reserve the right in the future for it to be at the very least self financing. So should you feel you may want me to take some commercial photographs, even a framed laser printed A4 copy of what I've already posted (as long as it's not a heavily cropped image to start with) by all means send me an email. In addition to which if you have any recipes, anonymous words of wisdom then by all means drop me an email.
The one thing I can guarantee is the absence of banner wear advertisement, and impartiality of any equipment or software I use.
Please remember I'm a one-band man and I'll be surprised if by the end of 2004 some parts of this site are still to be started. After all putting this site together is purely intended as another hobby for me - and not something which will dominate my life.
There is only so much I can achieve spending the odd hour here and there during the week.
After all there is more to life than being glued to a computer monitor every night of the week.
contact: webmaster
First posted 1st May 2004 - 18:00 G.M.T.
last updated 22nd July 2004 - 20:30 G.M.T.