Relax.

Dedicated to my brother, David, who likes to relax.

Styling Youtube Videos on your Blog

Isn’t it weird how I capitalize titles like that sometimes? Moving on.

If you have a blog, chances are you’re going to be using Youtube every now and then. One downfall is that sometimes the video overstretches or is too small for your liking. Another downside is that sometimes you would only like the video to be used for it’s audio. Let’s start with the first issue. So how do you make Youtube videos a smaller size with CSS?

Just assign the embed (I also do the object, for other videos) to a max-width and max-height to a size that will fit nicely in your posts, and add margins as needed.

object,embed {
margin:0 0 18px;
max-width:491px;
max-height:386px;
}

Problem 2. How do you HIDE the video part of a youtube embed and only show the play button & bar for music? This is actually easier than it sounds. Youtube embeds automatically resize gracefully so all you need to do is change the height. Since I don’t want ALL my videos to just be music boxes, I only give this style to a specific class, .musicbox and I use it when needed.

embed.musicbox {
height:25px;
margin:0px;
max-width:237px;
}

Examples: Basshunter – Boten Anna. Lets face it. The video for this song sucks. I give the class musicbox to the inner embed while I write this entry. I’m also gonna center it cause it looks nicer that way. You can do that automatically in the CSS if you want all your musicboxes centered. You can mute and unmute, but you can’t change the volume. What, you wanted to have your cake and eat it too?

This is a clip from the movie Zoolander in Spanish which for some reason makes it alot funnier.. I copied the embed code with the largest size, but my css will still override it. *pets CSS*

So is FlashForward really getting canceled?

I found an interesting post on TVBN (a blog about TV ratings) concerning FlashForward. Here it is in summary:

Here are the 18-49 ratings for Castle, V, and Flashforward (All ABC shows) counting repeat episodes and clip shows.

CASTLE: 0.85
FlashForward: 0.92
V: 1.16

Castle has already been renewed – despite bad ratings. But just the average doesn’t show the whole story.
Now here’s where things get interesting. If you strip out the repeats and clip shows, their indexes come in as follows:

Castle: 0.96
FlashForward: 0.95
V: 1.25

Unsurprisingly, all better than the regular index above.

Now for something completely different. Let’s look at more recent trends. To make things simple, let’s look at numbers from 2010 only. This might better explain why a show like Castle, who initially appears to have an index much lower than FF or V, has been renewed for weeks while FF and V, which seem like shoe-ins using the initial index above, are very much in doubt.

Their 2010 indexes thus come out as:

Castle: 1.07
FlashForward: 0.63
V: 0.96

So, what does that tell you? It shows that recent trends are more important than overall season ratings, since Castle was renewed. It makes alot more sense when you look at the 2010 indexes. Further, it shatters all hope that FlashForward will be renewed. There have been rumours that an international audience will make up for the bad ratings – but that’s really not common and ad revenues are lower outside of the US. V still has a chance, but for humanity’s sake, I hope it gets canceled. Recent writing puts to shame any and all acting ability Elizabeth Mitchell has. It gives me the sads.

A last note concerning FlashForward – I believe they will try to end the season in a nice tidy bow – or if the producers are upset, they might do an insane cliffhanger – just to spite the network. Who knows? I’ll still be watching, because the recent episodes are getting better and better. It ain’t over till it’s over.

My Favorite Quote of the Moment

I want to acknowledge that making changes in your life is never an easy task. The key, however, is not to get caught up in the distance you have to go to get to where you want to be. Nor should you despair over the amount of control you have over your circumstances. Progress is made in the small, intentional steps, and chances are, you have more power than you think. By focusing on little steps you can take every day, the progress you make will motivate you to continue your journey, and eventually, you can go wherever you want to go. The important thing is simply to begin.

What are you waiting for?

Noemi

I have found power in the mysteries of thinking.

Euripides (484 BC – 406 BC), 438 B.C.

Having a bad day?

Kitty will eated u.

Healthy habits are the answer

My “Vegetarian for a Month” thing failed.. but I’ve learned a bit from the 2 weeks I consumed no meat. For one, I like how eating less meat feels. Another thing is that strictness doesn’t fix anything, habit does. It’s okay if you occaisionally eat meat, but I think a healthy habit is to avoid it when you can. Once a week or once every two weeks is okay, in my opinion.

I also had soda for the first time in probably 4 weeks. I was tired and was craving sugar. I think the same rule applies to soda. Most of the time, choose something healthy, but a soda a month won’t cause that much damage.

I think people that become to strict with their food turn it into a sort of religious thing, like it’s wrong to eat meat. That annoys me. So once again, strictness is not the answer, healthy habits are the answer.