At long last, my freelance site is officially open!

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…that’s not to say it’s “done.” Your business is never “done” growing or improving. I already have an entire Trello board dedicated to not only maintenance tasks but also things I want to try, add, or tweak. It’s a never ending work in progress.

But long story short, I’m ready to offer my services in freelance web design, web hosting, graphic design, and illustration! I specialize in farms and ranches, but I can provide a great website at affordable prices in a wide variety of industries.

Whether you need a new website, a redesign of your current website, logo design, or even single-use illustrations, I have a broad set of affordable services I can offer you.

You can see some of my web design work at the new website and my illustrations there or on my Facebook page. If you want to talk about your needs, get in touch with me at hello@smokielee.com or over at my website.

So if you’re in need of a web designer or an illustrator, feel free to pop over there and see my work. I look forward to hearing from you!

Link Would Totally Carry a Tom Bihn Bag

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So for my birthday recently I got a Tom Bihn bag, a Pilot. I’m going to write a longer post about it and other Tom Bihn purchases later, but the last time I ordered from them I requested a sketch of something and promised that I would draw them something back. They drew me a sweet fucking T-rex with a wizard hat, which was hard to beat, I admit. The husband has been playing a lot of Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, and watching just how much shit is in your inventory, it occurred to me that Link could only carry one brand of bag. Then the rest of the sketch was easy.

I made a thing for a good friend of mine, Katzmew, for his birthday. Happy birthday buddy!

overwatch's d.va mech with cat in the cockpit with a plaid background

Stranger Things Season 2 Ghostbusters Illustration

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When I saw the Stranger Things season 2 trailer with the boys wearing Ghostbusters costumes, I knew I had to make it into an illustration. It was a bit harder than I imagined, and honestly there are still things I want to tweak on it, but I think it’s good enough for now. I’m really pleased with the colors and the shadow (the new perspective tool in Illustrator CC is…different).

This is also posted over on my freelance design site.

Freelance website almost done – do you need a web designer?

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I’m putting the final touches on my freelance website. Design-wise, it’s simple, and it will definitely change over time (and much more quickly at least in the first year or so), and content-wise it’s a duplicate of my many portfolios around the web, but hopefully will serve as a single repository for my best work that should land me more work.

Speaking of work, if you or anyone you know is in need of a small website or in website design, or if you need a front-end designer on a contractual basis, get in touch with me! When working freelance, I specialize in small businesses (typically agricultural) and brochure websites, also known as informational websites, landing pages, or one-page websites. Looking forward to hearing from you!

Goal: network more (uuuuughghghghgh)

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I’ve been trying to network more, because I dislike doing so. Part of it is a dislike of socialization, especially pointless or random socialization, and part of it is a genuine anxiety that I’ll be judged harshly by my peers. Of course, everyone has this problem, but it seems like a worse problem for some than others, or some are just better at pushing past it.

Part of it stems from the fact that I’m not very conventional: I have blue hair, I have an usual name, I curse like a sailor, and I don’t really pull punches. I’m brutally honest nearly all the time (something I’ve had to work on since having a kid), and I often say that life is too short to beat around the bushes. That being said, I’m not going to try to hurt people’s feelings on purpose, but if someone asks me my opinion I’ll be honest, often regardless of the consequences. Freedom self-imposed, if you will.

Expiration dates for .io domains on Google Domains

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TLDR: As of February 2, 2017, the policy of the vendor that Google Domains uses for .io domain registration is that an .io domain is auto-renewed or deleted 3 days before the expiration date displayed in WHOIS information and the Google Domains dashboard. This means that your “real” expiration date is effectively 3 days earlier than you might expect. While there are email notifications at the 30 and 7 days prior marks that list the “real” expiration, there isn’t any obvious indication in your dashboard and only the email seems to mention the “real” expiration date.