Pixel Meadow has been online since September 2004. In that time, I’ve written (fairly) regularly and hopefully haven’t been too boring!

Prior to opening Pixel Meadow, I had another site. This site had an almost schizophrenic nature. One month it was an out and out blog. The next month it was a developer site. The next, it was both, then a portfolio/CV site… and so on, etc. With no clear focus, it’s a surprise it lasted as long as it did. I grew bored with it often, neglecting it for months on end. Pixel Meadow was me moving forward, getting focused.

However, ChrisMcLeod.Net was my first real website. Before that, I’d just mucked around with homepage builders on various free hosts such as Lycos Tripod. So there was an attachment there that meant that I couldn’t just shut it down and forget it.

Over the last few days, I’ve been working on the archives of my old site; cleaning and recategorising them. Today, I have added them to the archives of Pixel Meadow.

These additions represent everything that was left of ChrisMcLeod.Net. Over the course of its life many changes occured and data was lost – so these additions don’t represent everything that I’ve written there over the years.

It’s been an interesting process looking over old entries. I can see a definite improvement in my writing. I’m a bit more focussed and less “ranty” then I used to be. No matter the quality of the writing, I’d like to think that adding these old entries will add depth to Pixel Meadow as a reflection of self.

I’ve been fascinated by the Transformers – the “Robots in Disguise” – since I was a young’un. There’s just something about giant robots that transform into everyday vehicles and objects that is plain cool!

As is the way, most of my original toy collection was thrown out long ago. However, during the later stages of my stint at University, I happened across the (then) latest toy line. That was it – they’d pulled me back in. A couple of years later and I had a fairly substantial collection again, covering toys, DVDs and comics. For a while, I even ran a (now defunct) community site for fellow collectors.

I still have my collection, but it’s packed away in the loft, for the most part as there’s just no room for it in our home. It’s a bit of a shame, really, but it needs to be done. I think that I’ll probably sell it on ebay one day. After all, I think it’s maybe better in the hands of someone that can appreciate it properly.