Formerly The Mighty Head
Check the updates page for new content and news.
Welcome Surfers. Do you know who I am? If not, it's very likely you found this site through Rumble or another fiction site that published one of my stories. Please, snoop around all you want. I mean it. I really want you to. This is the personal site of Craig Snyder, amateur web designer and writer of short fiction. The contents include examples of my short fiction, some CSS experiments, and links to sites related in some way to this one. In time it may contain other stuff.
As the heading indicates, this site used to be called The Mighty Head, and was hosted for free by Angeltowns. Recently the fine folk there decided to eliminate free hosting and I was forced to hunt for new webspace. A curious fact about many free hosts is how skittish they are, how changeable about giving away stuff. Such is the life of an Internet Gypsy. 1
Many of the web design examples on this site have been built specifically to showcase short fiction on the web. This site may be unique, if only for that reason. Not many web designers are also writers. You are free to adapt any of these designs for your own purposes, although credit and a link back would be appreciated. If you are not familiar with CSS and need help adapting one of my designs, you may contact me. 2
I might be persuaded to offer my assistance.
Site Design
The current design is inspired by Mac nerd John Gruber's Daring Fireball but is not a CLONE of that fine site. The nav link and footnote styles are basically the same, but design geeks will see the differences. I built several beta versions based on designs of my own but eventually decided that they all sucked. I finally opted to go with a simpler, cleaner interface, and I liked the idea of the footnotes.
If you are not a designer you might want to skip this next part as it will probably bore you to death.
I do most of my basic designing on an old Windows 95 machine without an internet connection. Not very efficient, I know. I use Notepad as my main editor, and sometimes Npad and Notepad2. The graphics and font programs I use are all freeware. After I put together an initial template I check and improve the design by going to the University, which has modern browsers. I use the W3C Validator to spot basic mistakes. Assuming everything is working, I get on a Mac and check the pages in Safari and IE 5.2.
Everything looks better on a Mac, did you know?
I'll post [soon] links to some of the freeware programs I use on the links page. A few of these programs are portable, meaning you can put them on a disk and carry them with you. They've been very helpful to me in my crippled condition. Sadly, I am an ADWP. 3
Micro Fiction
I write very short stories, called "Micro" by some and "Flash" by others. Sites like The New Absurdist helped get me started doing this. Stripped to the bone fiction is so beautiful sometimes, and easier too. It's the preferred form for those who have very little talent but wish to disguise this fact. Some of the best short fiction on the web is produced by the author of the Fireland site. You should go there. Want more? Go see the brand new Giganticide.
Have I been published? Yes I have. For money? Yes. But not much money. I will put together a page with links to all of my published works soon. In the meantime munch on this. If you want to learn more about this type of fiction then you've come to the right place. The Wikipedia page is a good starting point. From there you shoot on over to 50 word fiction and if you have any guts at all visit Double Room and ponder.
In anticipation of the new site going live I've done some work reformatting and revising the stories slated for inclusion on the Micro Fiction page. I'll add more stuff slowly over time. Kind of like how your toenails grow. Do you see how this works? Now my fingers hurt from typing all this stuff so I'm going to stop for a while. Go do something else now.
Notes
- Internet Gypsies: We wander the electronic pathways trying to stay out of the rain, taking what we can get and discarding what we don't need. We have very little pocket money. Late at night we sit around the fire with plastic sheets wrapped around our heads and listen to the web gurus. As the stars fade we fold into gentle sleep warmed by overheated and ancient monitors. ↑
- headsfromspace @ gmail dot com. ↑
- ADWP: Amateur Designer without Photoshop.
If you're a clever and artistic designer, which I'm not, you don't really need Photoshop to build an visually striking website. However, if you want to build a truly cutting edge, top of the line visual interface, using the latest CSS techniques, Photoshop is a must. There's just no substitute. And the thing that kind of pisses me off is that you don't really have to be a great designer if you have this program, because most of the visual effects are generated with background images, and Photoshop is great at producing them. Just don't get me started on this. It's very frustrating. ↑