The Homestar Runner Text Listing: The Blog

Last of the big updates.

2013-01-16T09:30:00.000-05:00

Well, that was fast. All the changes I wanted to make that I mentioned in the previous post, were made fairly quickly in today's update. I didn't go through the descriptions yet, though. That's something I'll save for later. Two things made updating the site quick and easy: (1) I found a copy of my unkempt HTML file that was very close to the last version that had been on the server, which last version was made 17 December 2010, and (2) I discovered that the program I'd been using was one Balthisar Tidy, a GUI port of HTML Tidy for Mac OS X, the latest, and likely last, version of which is a Universal Binary. (Fun fact: Freehostia hadn't been mucking around with my code. The strange CSS I saw had been done by Balthisar, as it cleans up everything.)

Content-wise, here are a few things that changed:

I added "Which Ween Costumes," which was added a week after "A Decemberween Mackerel," and which I apparently never added to the Text Listing.
Basically all the red text is gone, by which I mean has been commented out.
The blog's shoutout has been changed to match its current name.
Episode titles have been cleaned up.

Now all that's left is to get the toon and game descriptions as good as I care to make them, which means pretty damn good, and make sure all running times and release dates are accurate as per The Wiki.

Jump back, run forward.

2013-01-15T09:30:00.000-05:00

I.

Hey, remember when I thought The Brothers Chaps would start updating Homestar Runner again in Spring 2011? That was a good one, wasn't it? (Spoiler alert: They didn't. The site hasn't been updated since 22 December 2010.)

Back when I thought 2011 would see the end of The Great Homestar Runner Hiatus, I said TBC were working on a "feature film" called Monster Safari. Other than that blog post and a clip on the production company's website, I haven't been able to find anything about the cartoon. That doesn't mean Mike and Matt haven't been doing things. Or at least it doesn't mean that Matt hasn't, because he's been writing and directing for Yo Gabba Gabba! and The Aquabats! Super Show!, and occasionally working on Gravity Falls.

Seeing as it's been two years since the last update to Homestar Runner, and three years since its last regular update, I hold out zero hope for there to be future updates, or at least for there to be semi-regular ones. Last February the Wiki posted a photo from one of Matt's tweets teasing an eventual new sbemail, and that's about it. I think they'll do one big-ish toon, or maybe a handful of emails, but not for quite a while. My advice? If you want HSR updates to resume, lobby for all the shows Matt's working on to be cancelled. (Spoiler alert: That was a joke. Please don't.)

II.

On my end of things, apparently the Text Listing's XHTML is no longer valid. I used a downloadable program in Mac OS X that was a port of HTML Tidy, which port was written for PowerPC (including the bash script of it), and because I'm running Lion, I can no longer run PowerPC programs, only Universal Binaries or those written for Intel. (Though I just saw there's a Java version, so I might give that a go.) I used to be able to do valid XHTML 1.0 Transitional by hand, but because I haven't written HTML by hand regularly since high school, not so much anymore.

There are a few things I want to change on the Text Listing, all of which are minor:

Get rid of the "Oh happy day!" text banner underneath the site's name and tagline.
Change the blog's name to The Homestar Runner Text Listing: The Blog underneath the Welcome list.
Get rid of the Newest addition(s) section, because the toon listed there is two years old.
Get rid of the superscript (NEW) preceding the title of "A Decemberween Mackerel" in its spot in its table.
Clean up episode titles and descriptions to match my current style of capitalization and grammar.

Other than that, everything's pretty much dead. Graduated, dumped, and hours cut, what else is there to do but come back to an old project and finish it up? Though the fact that Freehostia appears to have bastardized my code, combined with my not having an old copy of the index page on my hard drive, will make it a bit more interesting.

Oh happy day!

2010-12-17T19:00:00.004-05:00

Well hey there, folks. I've got some good news for you. The Brothers Chaps have updated HomestarRunner.com. And it's not an "update" like the one when they posted their new calendar, it's a full-fledged, honest-to-God cartoon. Not just a cartoon, mind you, but a holiday cartoon, a Decemberween cartoon. It's called "A Decemberween Mackerel." Go on and watch it. Visit the wiki page if you want to read a line of dialogue you didn't understand. Check out the Text Listing and see that I actually updated it.

So what do I think of "Mackerel"? It's rather good. It's not quite as good as "A Death-Defying Decemberween" or "Homestar Presents: Presents," but it definitely holds its own. Seeing Marzipan in a major role for the first time in years was definitely appreciated; Homestar's cluelessness was amusing at every point; Senor Cardgage as a main character was unexpected and worked well; and Strong Bad's conclusion at the end fit with the non-sequitur-ness of it all. Timing in this cartoon was tight, and the voices sounded like they did four or five years ago, right when they were at the tail end of their prime.

It's a nice break in the hiatus. Hopefully we'll see more come the new year. Peace out, y'all.

UPDATE ^{(12/17, 8:57PM EST)}: If the resolution on the official page is too big for your monitor, try it in Grey Small-O-Vision or Corkboard Small-O-Vision ^(11:47PM).

Halloweener

2010-11-03T09:14:00.002-04:00

Wow, the Brothers Chaps didn't update for Halloween this year. I don't know what this means for Homestar Runner, but I sure hope it doesn't mean the good times are over. The characters are too quirky and TBC's humor too fun for the website to not be a creative force for another ten years.

Long time comin'

2010-09-26T14:14:00.004-04:00

"Long time comin'." Get it? You know, instead of "Long Train Runnin' "? Sorry, I just had that stuck in my head 'cause the Marching Chiefs played it at halftime yesterday. Go 'Noles! What was I talkin' about? Right, I was telling myself to stop acting like Kerry James Evans. That guy's a badass, by the way. Just thought you'd want to know.

Speaking of know, you know what all this pointless rambling means. I've finally updated the Text Listing! Head on over and see for yourself. Seeing as The Brothers Chaps haven't been doing regular updates since November 2009, and there hasn't been any new material since "Xeriouxly Forxe" and its accompanying menu, I figured I'd look productive and all by adding everything that's been added to HSR since April 2009 to HSRTL. And if you followed that sentence without any trouble, congratulations, you're Hunter S. Thompson reincarnated. Go read Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Do us all a favor.

And do me a favor and don't get all pissy about TBC's lack of updates. They're working on a feature film entitled Monster Safari. If they miss Halloween this year, we know the site's done. If not, we know it's still near and dear to their hearts, and we'll probably see regular updates resume in the spring. Longest hiatus ever for them, and I hope it never happens again. Peace out.

Updates forthcoming!

2009-05-06T17:18:00.001-04:00

Mi molto dispiace, ma I've been ridiculously busy these past two weeks or so, and so I've had no time to update HSRTL. I will catch up, though, sometime tonight or tomorrow.

Goin’ away.

2009-03-04T09:48:00.002-05:00

In case that someone actually uses the Text Listing, and in the even less-likely case that someone checks the Text Listing Blog, allow me to make an announcement: To my knowledge I will not have access to a computer at all next week, meaning that if the Brothers Chaps update HSR at any time from March 8th through March 14th, the Text Listing will go unchanged.

Validation.

2009-02-27T13:21:00.004-05:00

Good news, everyone: The Homestar Runner Text Listing is now valid XHTML! I'm not big on forcing websites to have picturesque W3C-compliant code, but I do want the website to appear as properly as possible in as many web browsers as possible. I don't use IE6 anymore, and I only occasionally use IE7 (as I run Windows in Parallels), so I do not know what the site looks like in those browsers now. I do remember that IE7 displayed inner borders on every table on the website. Hopefully this rectifies that, but considering IE7's, eh, difficulties with properly rendering valid code, I doubt that anything has changed.

As a slight side note, I use Firefox 3.0.6 and Safari 4 Developer Preview 4526.11.2 in Mac OS X 10.4.11.

::cough:: ::lookoverhere:: Hi.

2009-01-24T03:37:00.002-05:00

Well, after half a year of inactivity I have finally updated the Text Listing. So just head on over if you give a flying crap, or, well, don't bother. And if you feel like you wasted your time, feel free to not tell me about it.

In other words, Happy January? I'm not in a bad mood, I just began writing from "if you give a flying crap," and it went on from there.

I don't celebrate new years.

Argh, downtime!

2008-04-14T19:45:00.004-04:00

This is rather strange. Not only is Freehostia HSRTL down, but so is the FreeWebTown mirror. I have no clue as to what the problem is, and I’m currently working on setting up a third mirror. I’ll update this post as soon as I have one up.

UPDATE (4/14, 7:54PM): I’ve set up a mirror on MyHosting247. (Sorry the subdomain is lividfiction rather than hsrtl, but I thought I could customize the subdomain.)

UPDATE (4/15, 10:08AM): HSRTL.freehostia.com is back up and running. The FreeWebTown mirror is still down, and I think it’s safe to say that it’s been supplanted by the mirror I set up last night.

Wednesdays

2008-02-06T19:50:00.000-05:00

HSRTL isn’t exactly popular no matter what kind of spin you put on the traffic stats. In fact, since moving the site over to Free Hostia, the Text Listing has garnered an amazing 800 hits. I don’t know how to promote the site. That’s not the point, but it is related to the content of the post.

To the few people who do visit the Text Listing, and to the fewer who read this blog, Wednesday will be called Yahtzeeday from now on. The reason is simple: Every Wednesday Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw does a video review for some video game. The series is called Zero Punctuation and, if you're not offended by language and sexual slang, you should check it out immediately. (Just in case the antecedent of the second half of the previous sentence didn't warn you well enough, I'd rate the Zero Punctuation videos PG-13. Happy?)

MIRROR’d!

2008-01-17T13:26:00.001-05:00

Just a quick note that I’ve set up an HSRTL mirror.

Visual overhaul

2007-11-18T13:31:00.000-05:00

Well folks, after two or three years of its paragraph-based look, HSRTL is getting a major visual overhaul. I am placing the information for everything in table cells, which has given the site a rather neat look so far. The new table layout has allowed me to squeeze in links to the Homestar Runner Wiki, and that’s definitely a plus.

I’m not done with it, but the redesign should be up by tonight or tomorrow morning. If you’re curious as to what it looks like I’ve uploaded a sample for you to feast your eyes on. Don’t worry, I’m keeping the old design online, but I’m not sure if I’m going to keep it updated.

UPDATE (11/18, 9:01PM): The new design is up and running. I’ve decided to leave the original design alone.

Change to “Newest additions”

2007-11-06T20:38:00.000-05:00

Long time no blog post. Just popping in to point out that I’ve changed the “Newest additions” layout from a horizontal list to a vertical bulleted one. This makes the list considerably less unsightly, as when there are several updates to HSR the newest additions would stretch across the screen and continue underneath.

And the reviews aren’t coming yet, although the savvy reader will notice I’ve inserted rather minute snippets of commentary in a select few places.

Finally.

2007-09-08T20:35:00.000-04:00

Hey there, ho there! Long time no update, eh? Just wanted to drop a line saying that I’ve finally brought the ol’ Text Listing up to speed with the Homestar Runner universe. Things have been crazy these last three weeks, what with my heading off to college and all.

Speaking of college, remember those reviews I mentioned in the previous post? They’ve been put behind the oven in a Ziploc bag with a label that reads, “DO NOT OPEN TILL CHRISTMAS 2029.” Who’d’ve thunk, eh? College cutting into free time? Say it ain’t so!

That being said, there is a very slim chance of my writing and posting a review or two, but for now, don’t hold your breath.

If you did then I would have no visitors whatsoever.

Brand name! Chicken soup! Possibilities!

2007-07-03T15:27:00.000-04:00

All right, folks, don’t expect this any time soon, but I’m considering adding reviews to the Text Listing. The reviews aren’t going to be anything fancy, and they’re not going to take up space on the Listing, but with the announcement that updates might be “scarce” for the next few weeks, I’m gonna need something to do with the site.

It’s what we call “moving.”

2007-07-02T18:29:00.000-04:00

So I decided to move HSRTL to a better host... http://hsrtl.freehostia.com/

I have also changed the blog’s name from HSRTL: the Blog to The Homestar Runner Text Listing – the Blog. Not a very dramatic change, I know, and the URL’s still the same, but, you know, I figured I’d let y’all nonexistent readers know just in case you decided to freak out.

One last thing: I’ve change the blog’s look somewhat.

Dust off the cobwebs and say “Halloa there!” again.

2007-06-25T19:09:00.000-04:00

It’s back, folks. I don’t know if anyone cares anymore—or ever did—but HSRTL is back. I’ve moved it to a new location, though, and I have to finish editing the file before the site comes up again. I’m currently hard at work updating the site—adding all the new stuff and capitalizing the sbemail titles (turns out TBC actually capitalize them).

~~I’ve uploaded the work-in-progress page~~ The site is now available at http://bellsouthpwp2.net/b/o/boarder8925/, and all the changes have been made. I’ve even added descriptions to the Teen Girl Squad issues and ~~I’m considering the same for Marzipan’s Answering Machine and the character videos~~ Marzipan’s Answering Machine and the character videos.

Coming soon It's here.

2005-11-28T16:46:00.000-05:00

I'm currently working on listing:

~~Character videos~~ Done.
~~"First Time Here," KoT email, "Super NES," more lost toons~~ Done.
~~Games~~ Done.

~~That stuff might be done by 22:00 (tonight), but I make no guarantees.~~ It's been sixty-one minutes, and everything's done.

End-of-month changes

2005-11-28T16:37:00.000-05:00

All links now open in the same window.
Due to the newest animation line, the "New! Click {insert section}" line has been removed.

Minor changes

2005-11-21T20:23:00.000-05:00

Two things:

I have added a "newest animation" line. It comes immediately before the TOC.
I have put Teen Girl Squad above Marzipan's Answering Machine, since that's how it's listed on the official toons page.

Minor redesign

2005-10-28T21:33:00.000-04:00

I've changed the intro and navigation somewhat. You now get to see pretty bulleted lists! Isn't that lovely?

UPDATE (10/29/2005): The navigation is no longer bulleted. The look was annoying me, so I imitated Wikipedia's table of contents listings.

Sorry.

2005-10-26T22:28:00.000-04:00

Sorry for the lack of updates over the last few weeks. I changed my EarthLink password but forgot to adjust it in OneButton FTP, so I was unable to connect due to stupidity.