Other than a short break for Christmas and an even shorter one for New Year I've been working over the holiday period, I've even managed to be quite busy and as usual a quiet office has lead to me getting more done than usual. Combined with half empty trains and tubes, not to mention a good excuse for a few drinks, it's been a laid back time and rather nice. I wish work could retain this atmosphere all year round but I rather suspect it'll be back to the usual grind come Monday morning.

Against all the odds (ie. my amazing laziness) I have also managed to get the comments system for this site up and running, and now it looks like the few teething problems (my shoddy coding) have now all been ironed out.The latest addition is the 'Hot Gossip' board which lets you see all the latest comments in one place. Not much of a feature, and pretty darn hard to make it look visually appealing (I'm still not that happy with it), but I was getting a few posts on older articles which were hard to track. Well when I say hard it just invloved me writing a couple of simple SQL queries on the site database, but I'm far too lazy to do that all the time, so the gossip board was born.

The gossip board gave me the idea that a bulletin board/chat forum wouldn't be that hard to code based on the same structure, but I'm not really sure that's a feature I want to add, as interesting to code as it would be. Maybe my next project will be something like the modem emulator which was one of the big hits for 2003. I just don't have any ideas at the moment. Are there any features or special projects you'd like to see on Lazylaces this year? Leave a comment or drop me a mail and let me know.

For now I'm quite busy at home working on a disturbing project that arrived by post this week. It's on behalf of the SKL Network who are enlisting all the help they can in the hunt for their missing employee Jack Lorski. The key to his disappearance seems to be locked within a mysterious CD Rom (a copy of which was what arrived in my post this week). The trouble is the data is locked using puzzles that can only be solved by searching the internet for clues, and corresponding with other SKL helpers by mail. I'm hoping with my extensive internet knowledge I'm going to be some use in their search, but it's only early days yet, and so far I've only managed to unlock the CD Rom's user interface. I'll post more on this soon as although it is disturbing it is quite fascinating [huh?].

Use the comment form at the bottom of the page, to add your thoughts about 'Hot Gossip'. And if you'd like to track the comments on 'Hot Gossip', or generally keep up with all the gossip here at lazylaces, try using the rss comment feeds:

• Hot Gossip Comment Feed (RSS 2.0)
• Lazylaces Hot Gossip (RSS 2.0)

If you don't know what rss is, or how to 'get it', and are interested, try this dummies guide. Anyway, on with the comments...

I like the Hot Gosip board (the name as well as the implementation). Will try and think of something fiendishly difficult to suggest but must dash as I'm in hausfrau mode (cleaning frenzy) before friends arrive for supper.

Dashing between kitchen and bathroom to jot down an idea: how about a large picture of a <a href = "http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/11/13/60minutes/rooney/main583494.shtml">typewriter</a>, as you hit the keys they actually hit the platen and create an inky letter on the "paper". If you hit carriage return key the "paper" winds around and on to the next line. The aim is to create a sheet of "typed" paper to send to someone. Or put on your blog. No idea how or if you could achieve this but...

oh and that typepwriter link came from <a href = "http://www.dashes.com/anil/">Anil Dash</a>.

Cleaning for supper at 2 in the afternoon? Your place must be even more untidy than mine.

Our comments seem to cross over a bit there.

I like the typewriter idea a lot but it sounds darn tricky to do. Although it could probably be done in JavaScript and DHTML which would be good. Hmmmm...that's going on my pile of 'maybes'.

I'm actually mulling around one idea already (I may mail you about it if I get time) , but that's even trickier, but mainly for logistical, rather than technical reasons. I really need to think about it a bit more before running it passed you though.

Oh....the typewriter thing could be called the Tripewriter™.

Tripewriter? Genius! Were you thinking of me when you came up with that? Heh. And cleaning at 2 for the evening? Oh yes indeedy, place was a pigsty. You could knit a dog a week out of Frodo's moultings and I hadn't hoovered for a week, just swept up the most visible furballs in the hall. They congregate under the radiator in the winter, as if they too were feeling the cold. Bless 'em.

How about taking the modem emulator back a step further backwards into nostalgia and have lazylaces 'load' in the style of a mid-eighties spectrum game?

I never had a Spectrum :o( I did have an Atari but I really can't remember the load sequence for that - I'm not sure there was one as it was cartridge based. Currently the Tripewriter is in the lead as I like the name so much.

I had an Amstrad CPC 464... it was colour. It was fantastic. It still works.

I like this comment section. It means I get to talk to my friend on a more regular basis
Love Fiona Bruce xxx

Check the notes below if you want to do clever spoiler, hint or avatar stuff and you don't know how. Otherwise just add a comment (it's pretty simple):

SPOILERS/HINTS: Use the special <spoiler>, or <hint>, tags by wrapping them around your comment if you want to provide help in games comment threads. 'Wrap a tag' around your comment by placing one tag in front of your comment, and one tag after. See the examples below:

• Just type a regular comment.
• <spoiler>Wrap spoilers for games in spoiler tags</spoiler>.
• <hint>Wrap hints for games in hint tags</hint>.

If you are still stuck, try copying and pasting one of the examples above into the comment box, or use the hint & spoiler buttons.

AVATARS/GRAVATARS: Comments now support Gravatars if you would like to use your own user avatar/picture/icon on your comments. Simply enter the email address from your Gravatar account in the email field when adding your comment if you would like to use this feature. This is purely optional though, and you do not need an Avatar, or a Gravatar account, to use the comments. Note that if you enter your email address in the email field, but it's not associated with a Gravatar account a default avatar image will be used.