Is it deja vu if you don’t remember it?

It’s April, and we’re having one hell of a thunderstorm outside. Odd.

Even odder is the deja vu. I’m sitting on the sofa knitting a blanket as a gift for some friends. (The blanket, by the way, is responsible for the lack of comic tomorrow. I’m trying to finish the blanket before they finish the baby.)

I don’t have a visual memory stored of my grandmother knitting, but we lived with her until I was 11, so I’m sure I saw her do so at some point. She’s the reason I wanted to learn to knit. Somehow I feel closer to her when I’m working with my hands. And she was an avid storm watcher, sitting on the porch watching the lightening and listening to the thunder.

So I’m sitting on the sofa watching the storm through our sliding doors, knitting, and thinking of her. I feel like I’ve been here before – or maybe it’s just that I feel like I’ve come home.

whew!

Okay, so, here’s what I did:

  • Changed the colors, font sizes, etc. obviously.
  • Added navigational links underneath the comic on the homepage.
    • Click “first comic” to get to the first comic.
    • Click “navigation links” to get to today’s comic, only in single-post view, which is where I’ve been hiding the “first/next/last” links all this time.
    • Click one of the archive links to get to the list of comics under that category. (Each comic is in both Comics and a subcategory.)
  • Changed the category links for the comics in the left nav, so that they go to a list of comics, not the comics themselves. That way you’re not trying to read the archive backwards anymore.
  • If you want to read the archive, click the “first comic” link when viewing a comic and then use the “next comic” link to move yourself forward. You know, like any normal website would.
  • Left the Ideas (blogposts) archive alone. It’s a blog, it should read like a blog.

I think that covers 90% of the feedback I’d gotten, but feel free to comment.

And yes, I could apply almost everything I did today to the old layout, if you prefer “manilla folder” to “blackboard”. Let me know.