Monthly Archives: February 2007

Cutline Default Sidebar Doesn’t Retain Formatting When Customized

Posted on February 24, 2007 | 2 comments

While reading another Worpress.com blog using the Cutline theme, I noticed that the formatting of the sidebar widgets was slightly different from those on my site. Notably, the search widget was titled “Search It!” and the search box contained dummy text that said “To search, type and hit enter”. Additionally, the Recent Entries widget displayed the date of each post.

The customizable widgets available for the Cutline theme cannot be configured to match that formatting. After some research, I found that this formatting is available only to the default Cutline sidebar, with no custom widgets attached.

Cutline Default Sidebar

The screenshot to the right displays what my blog’s sidebar widgets look like using the default sidebar. (There is a minor glitch in that the date for my Claiming this Blog on Technorati post is cut off).

Although I like the formatting of the default sidebar, I think the default widgets are insufficient, and so I will be keeping my customized layout. It’s a shame (although admittedly a minor one) that the formats can’t be used on a customized sidebar. I suppose that is the result of the limitations needed for the theme to function as a hosted theme on WordPress.com.

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Posted in blogging, cutline, themes, WordPress

Obvious: Tomlinson Devastated with the Death of his Dad

Posted on February 24, 2007 | Leave a comment

Today’s Obvious Headline of the Day is brought to us by Sports Illustrated and the Associated Press.

Oliver Tomlinson, father of San Diego Chargers running back LaDainian Tomlinson, was killed yesterday in a car accident.

Apparently, LaDainian is saddened by this incident.

My RSS feed reader is displaying an article with the headline Tomlinson devastated with the death of his dad. The link goes to this Associated Press article on the Sports Illustrated web site.

The AP article is headlined with the quote ‘I will miss him’. The article reports on the details of the accident and gives a brief background of Oliver Tomlinson and his brother-in-law Ronald McClain, who also died as a result of the accident. And, sure enough, the article quotes from a short statement issued by LaDainian that says he is, in fact, devasted by his father’s death and “will miss him”.

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Posted in football, journalism, media, nfl, obvious, sports

Coke and Pepsi to List Caffeine Content

Posted on February 21, 2007 | 2 comments

I read on the Consumerist that the Center of Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) reported that PepsiCo will voluntarily begin listing caffeine content on cans and bottles of soda. Currently, the Food and Drug Administration only requires that companies list caffeine as an ingredient when it is added to a product; they are not required to disclose the amounts. Interestingly, I could find no announcement of this initiative on PepsiCo’s website.

The CSPI news release calls on Coca-Cola and other manufactuers to follow suit and disclose caffeine content.

The Coca-Cola Company appears to have not liked to be one-upped, as it quickly announced that it too would begin disclosing caffeine content. Acutally, what the company did was announce that it would “continue the rollout of expanded nutrition labeling in the U.S. to include caffeine content on all of its beverages containing the ingredient”. Coca-Cola already does already list caffeine content on its Full Throttle and Enviga beverages, so this is merely a continuation of that initiative.

I like that fact that these companies will begin disclosing caffeine content. For mainstream sodas like Coca-Cola Classic and Pepsi, the caffeine appears to be added solely to make the beverage addictive. After all, caffeine is a highly addictive drug, and what better way is there to ensure consumption of your product than to have people be addicted to it? For “energy drinks” with large amounts of caffeine like Full Throttle, the beverage is merely a delivery mechanism for the drug.

See this Wikipedia entry for more information on caffeine.

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Posted in beverages, caffeine, consumer, food