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Adding TrackBack and Related Entries to this blog

I’ve been spending the last few days fooling around with various technical aspects of this blog and Movable Type, the application it runs on.

I’ve been vaguely interested in the TrackBack feature since MT 2.21 came out, but have sort of been stumped as to exactly why I would have it on my blog. Honestly, I’m still at somewhat of a loss, but wanting to be an early adopter I thought I’d add the feature and see what, if anything, comes of it. So, if I’ve configured this right, there should be a “TrackBack” link at the bottom of this post.

I also added a “Related Entries” section to individual post pages, courtesy of a Movable Type plug-in from Kalsey Consulting Group. An example can be seen here.

I’ve also implemented some other tips and tweaks, most of them found at this post at andersja’s blog (see his Movable Type category for others), as well as accessibility tips from Dive Into Accessibility, such as adding acronym tool tips and title tags to obscure link text.

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Doing the in-law tango

A lovely and comforting article in today’s JT (online anyway) about co-existing with one’s in-laws. Okuma is married to a Japanese, and living under the same roof as her husband’s parents.

Living with your in-laws is not just an issue for foreign wives in Japan. Every month, more than 100,000 copies of the popular “Yome vs. Shutome” [daughter-in-law vs. mother-in-law] are bought by Japanese wives who identify with their manga heroine’s in-law problems.

Japanese women know, in part at least, what they’re getting into when they marry a Japanese man. But for foreign wives, it’s a case of sink or swim once they’ve been thrown in at the marital deep end. You get a rude introduction to Japanese expectations when they clash with your own.

My situation is the opposite, living as I do with my wife’s parents, but many of Okuma’s experiences resonate loud and clear with my own.

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Old magic lantern slides

The Brat The Craving

There’s something historically appropriate about old magic lantern slides — one of the antecedents of cinema — being used as the means to advertise coming attractions in movie theaters. This was done in the silent film era, as this wonderful collection of “Cinema Teasers from the Silent Era” from the Cleveland Public Library shows. 200 images in all, from all kinds of film, well known ones like Charlie Chaplin’s The Circus to relative unknowns like those whose posters I’ve reproduced above: The Brat starring Nazimova, and the 1918 film The Craving, with the intriguing tagline “A dramatic wonder-play with startling photographic effects.”