Anyone who knows me, knows that I’m no big fan of dressing up. My usual uniform is jeans and t-shirt, or cargo pants and t-shirt. Unless, that is, I’m in the other extreme of wearing medieval garb or dressing as an alien. Then, of course, all bets are off. I’m a mother of young children, and anything I put on is going to get messy in the course of the day.

Dressing up on the web, however, is a completely different story. I think I’m a terminal fashion victim when it comes to website design. Perhaps it’s because for years, site design, like my writing (I was a tech writer) had to be functional before it had to be artful. Plus, it had to use a lot of corporate doublespeak and company logos, so the artistic side of it just couldn’t get creative. The mindset was that usable and pretty could never cohabitate functionally. I say nay (and did say nay at the time, too, but functional and pretty were both high-maintenance princesses, so the words “over” and “budget” were frequently the wacky sidekick pair.  Of course, that time in my life taught me a lot about clean writing, so I walked away from the old life with some valuable, if painful, lessons.
Now I’ve got my chance, though. I’m determined to make Xandragregory.com the functional and lovely site I know it can be in my heart. So the changing fonts, graphics, and layout may hurt a little…