After a bit of downtime Skinartistry is back online. If you were a member you will have to sign back up, with your original screen name if possible). Quite a bit of their downloads have been lost so if you had work up you will have to upload it again if you want them to host it there.

Just who and what is Skinartistry 2?

SA2 is a growing community of artists, skinners, coders, programmers and just plain folks who really, really like customizing their desktops! SkinArtistry2 is the reincarnation of Skinartistry, a site devoted to skinning and learning how to skin developed by Bones 2112. Bones may have retired from running the site, but the spirit of community he inspired in all of us remains!

Do you have to be a skinner to be part of the SA2 Community?

Absolutely not! Our members come from all walks of life, and from everywhere around the globe. Some of us skin, others just love to use skins!

For those of us who do skin, our common desire to share ideas, to learn various applications , to make great skins and just have fun while doing it is not only what brought us all here - it is what keeps us here.

What can I find here that I can't at the larger sites?

What sets us apart is that we provide a community that not only provides top quality skins, wallpapers and the like, but also excells in mentoring in a constructive, positive manner. Mentoring at SA2 is not just via the fourms, but also thru our workshop where all skinners, beginners and experienced alike, can upload their work for testing, help and smoothing out the rough spots as well as encouraging learning by doing through participation in Community Projects.

CNET's Natali Del Conte shows off some of the innovative gadgets for the kids heading back to school this year.

I was just watching the trailer for Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince a couple of days ago when I ran across a story this evening that said that the release would be moved from November of this year until July of 2009 due to the writer's strike.

That sort of sucks. I enjoyed the Potter books and the girls and I go see each movie when it comes out, which is a big deal since I am only willing to pay for two or three movies a year.

Wanna see the short trailer? Not a lot to see yet but if you've read the books you already know what it's about.

...or any other mobile web browser for that matter.

Thanks to iPhoneFreak I have found a URL for those of us that are adamant about keeping up with the Olympics wherever we might be. I am actually not one of those but the wife is so I made sure to forward the URL to her.

Mippin is the name of the site and their coverage is fairly complete and all there in one place. Events, videos, results and more can be found over at http://m.mippin.com/mip/m/cat.jsp?&p=0&cat=Olympics and someone has been kind enough to set up a Tiny URL at http://tinyurl.com/2008oly.

If my sites only looked so good on a mobile browser...

I used to have a pretty cool computer desk. I like the look and feel of modern furniture but I find that as I get older I like older, stylish stuff even more. My parents are getting ready to move again and a while back my mom gave me her rolltop desk. It's beautiful heavy wood and pretty large. Large enough so that my monitor can fit in it and the top still shut. I love the desk.

My desk I ended up giving to my son, and then my daughter and now most of it is just stored in the basement. I had it for several years and it really came in handy when I was mainly just gaming but now that I spend most of my computer time working and researching I like having the extra nooks and crannies and drawer space.

A buddy of mine just recently moved back from up north to be a bit closer to his family here in the deep south. It's nice to have him back again but by the time his stuff got here he was pretty fed up. He used one of those national moving companies and didn't bother to check them out before he did instead of looking for a New York moving company.

The truck took a day longer than was expected. That in itself wouldn't have been a huge deal but in the process they damaged something like five of his PCs. He keeps a fairly large network for home standards. HTPCs, Home Automation server, file server, etc. You name it, he's got it. I don't know if the insurance is going to cover the damage or if he's just going to have to come out of pocket for the stuff.

For some reason when a comment is posted it's no rebuilding or showing up. Very weird. I am in the middle of upgrading and redoing the templates over at one of my other sites on the same server but that shouldn't have any type of effect on the ones here.

I will look into it later in the week and see if I can get things sorted out. Release Candidate 5 of the MT beta is out and I need to upgrade anyway so I may do that and see if I can fix that along with a couple of other display issues at the same time.

State Prosecutors have filed formal charges against Casey Anthony in the disappearance of her two-year-old daughter. More updates to follow at Shadowscope

Yahoo's board of directors emerged from the annual meeting this past Friday still intact. Very few of the shareholders raised any kind of questions about the director's rejection of Microsoft's $47.5 billion takeover bid, showing that the board still has their trust.

Is this the end of Microsoft's bid to get Yahoo? I think not but it may be a little while before we hear more from them. Yahoo as a company has made some serious mistakes over the last couple of years and they are digging their own grave.

Look for example at Meedio. An up and coming HTPC application and front end that was being actively developed. Yahoo! buys it and turns it into shit. Maybe it's just that I was a Meedio user, actually a Meedio purchaser as well. The folks that sold out to Yahoo! made a big mistake and alienated the biggest portion of it's user base.

I came across the links over at Live Crunch. Personally I paid for the wife's upgrade the day it came out but for those of you that want to save $10 here are a couple of links...

(Mirror 4) Download

(Mirror 5) Download

Go check out Live Crunch if you get the time...

There are some pretty cool additions to the software which includes the app store.