name :    xdelight
previous name :    Akuryou
created :    circa December 2002
type of site :    Personal blog
past locations :    brinkster, hostultra, portland, silversix.nu
current host :    kaleidica.net
current URLs :    x.kaleidica.net, kaleidica.net/x
recommended viewing :    1024 x 768 or 1280 x 800 resolution, Firefox, Chrome, or Opera
made with :    Adobe Photoshop CS4, Notepad, Dreamweaver, WordPress

If you read something here and don’t like it, then please leave. If I know you “in real life” and I say something about you that offends you, then I’m sorry, but this is my journal and I have the right to express my thoughts. Please keep in mind that this is the Internet, and I never asked you to visit this particular corner of it.

I don’t remember the exact date, but I’m sure that Akuryou was first created sometime around December 2002. I had no graphic programs other than MS Paint, but I remember using a Photoshop trial to make the first layout of this site. It was all right, except I wasn’t very talented at coding from scratch, so the site ended up kind of empty. This was all on Brinkster. After the trial expired, I only had Paint to work with (I had already used the PSP trial up a few years ago). Honestly, the layouts were not all that bad.

My account was hacked or removed or something mid July 2003. Heartbroken, I redid the entire site. After Brinkster started to go crazy with ads, I found Hostultra and stayed there. Because I was stupid, I thought that they had ads too, but it turned out to just be the tagboard. Yes, like I said, stupid. Once I settled in with Portland, I realized that it was not the host’s problem, but the remote tagboard. I decided to stay, just because everything was already done. After careful pondering and debating, I decided to apply for a host. I entered Akuryou into PickMe and surprise surprise, Amy found me! Was extremely delighted. I stayed with Amy for three years-ish before I got my own domain and space and moved my blog to Kaleidica.

Version 23 | A blend of pretty images that took me forever to do. But it was quite popular with the visitors, so yay. (March ’04)

Version 24 | “Broken Fire” Featuring Keira Knightley, whom I absolutely adore. Firey colors. I loved this one. (April – May ’04)

Version 25 | “Verdant Summer” Greeeeeeeness. And swings. A sorrowful, summery layout. (June – July ’04)

Version 26 | “Welcome to Blue City” A coooool blend of cityscapes and fountains and streetlights, and the like. =D I liked the image a lot, but the content wasn’t laid out as nicely. (July – August ’04)

Version 27 |” Melancholy Sunset” A blend of two images of the sea. Prettyful. Rainbow. =] Very neat looking. (September – October ’04)

Version 28 | “Autumn Equinox” The fanciest blend I have done so far, but it looks better as simply a blend than as part of a layout. Was too noisy for me, so lasted only two weeks. (End of October – Beginning of November ’04)

Version 29 | “Candlelit Hearts” I liked this one a lot. The image was that of an assortment of candles lit in a corner of a room. (November – December ’04)

Version 30 | “Nighthawks” I love this painting by Edward Hopper, but the layout didn’t turn out as great as I’d planned. I still liked it, though. Very simple. (January ’05)

Version 31 | “A Thousand Dreams” Pretty cool main image, but the colours were a tad too bright for me. Fiiire. (February ’05)

Version 32 | “Placid Beauty” Features a picture of lakeside houses. Such a pretty layout, but it didn’t really motivate me to post. I just kinda wanted to just sit there and stare at it. Hah. (March ’05)

Version 33 | “Infatuation” Look, it’s Catherine Zeta Jones looking lovely in a random photoshoot. Everyone say ‘yay’. This was a very neat and boxed layout, which is pretty awesome. (April – June ’05)

Version 34 | “Summer Solstice” This was one of my best layouts, I believe. Palm trees, a lighthouse, a sailboat, a sunrise, and a couple holding hands and strolling on a beach at sunset all contributed to the overall mood/theme of a relaxing summer vacation. (End of June – July ’05)

Version 35 | “All Fall Down” Autumn colors! Yes, that is a dead woman lying on the ground in a train station. Yes, I do think it’s pretty awesome photography. No, I’m not a complete lunatic. (August – October ’05)

Version 36 | “Hope” Oh, I was on such a high…of hope with my thing for New Person. I believed I had a chance, I really did. And look just where it got me. I like how symbolic this layout is, though. A sunrise, light shining through an open window, a rainbow… ♥ (November ’05 – January ’06)

Version 37 | “New Beginnings” An empty road with an arrow on the ground pointing to the big city, a sunrise, the sun shining down upon it all… All symbolic of the journey I was about to embark on with my first relationship. (February – March ’06)

Version 38 | “Be Still My Heart” A couple holding hands and making their way down to the sea. A brand new world, a place far away from “the cynics in this town”, a place where I could “kiss you on the mouth”. (April – June ’06)

Version 39 | “Sailboat” What can I say? It’s a layout of a sailboat. Was trying to capture the relaxing, calm mood of summer. (July – August ’06)

Version 40 | “Speedway” Yep, that’s right. A Cars layout to match my obsession! Oh, I adored this one. It was a tasteful kind of fandom layout. (August – November ’06)

Version 40.5 | “Bent” So I made this awesome graphic to Matchbox Twenty’s Bent. Then I tried to make it into a layout. And failed. Desperately. But I worked on it for so long I think that it deserves to be celebrated here. (N/A)

Version 41 | “Dream” I really liked this one, even though the content box was way too small for my excessive blogging. The quote was “After all, it’s no sin to dream,” a gorgeous quote from Xan-Vallen’s Fubuki No Kaen. This was the first time that I’d tried a gradient in the background, and I loved the way it turned out. All the visitors did, too. Yay! (December ’06 – February ’07)

Version 42 | “Boulevard” I got mixed reviews for this one, but I really liked the colors. Blue and green is so me, yay! And the lyrics that go with it are from The Difference, my favorite song. I really liked how neat all the boxes looked. (February – April ’07)

Version 43 | “Stand or Fall” I’d been dying to use this really sexy image of Kate Moss since I found it, but I kept trying to save it for summer. In the end, I said, “Screw it,” and just made the damn layout. See, it even ended up lasting me until July, haha. But not for lack of trying to make another one. Still, I thought it was pretty cool. Neat and simple, just the way I like my designs. (May – July ’07)

Version 44 | “Burning Room” I’d been totally obsessed with John Mayer’s “Slow Dancing in a Burning Room” ever since I heard it on the flight to Taiwan, so I decided to make a layout for it. The pictures are of a couple holding hands, a couple kissing, and then the man alone. And throughout it, the balloons remained the same; I thought some social commentary on how everything seems to last longer than love nowadays would be fitting. This one was pretty cool, albeit in a slightly different style than usual. (August – October ’07)

Version 45 | “Clouds” Simple layout with really pretty colors. The image is actually a blend of two images, but they worked so well together that I even forget sometimes that I didn’t just grab a pretty picture of clouds, haha. This layout started making me feel claustrophobic after a while (it seemed really small for some reason), but it was too pretty to take down. (November ’07 – January ’08)

Version 46 | “Caged Freedom” Slightly different styled layout than usual; big fonts and bold colors. I’d wanted to use the picture for a while, but I could never figure out how, so yay! I really liked the cage in here. And the sexy lady, of course, hehe. (February – May ’08)

Version 47 | “To Love and To Cherish” Reflecting my feelings on my very happy relationship and featuring my favorite color–obnoxiously bright blue! This one was a little different from the norm but still exuded “Elaine”. (June – October ’08)

Version 48 | “Beauty Remains” Featuring my recent favorite eyecandy, Miss Hayden Panettiere. Simple and pleasing to the eye; my first attempt at real PHP. (November – December ’08)

Version 49 | “Klean Kut Kate” Clean, simple, professional — and featuring the dazzling Kate Beckinsale is just the way I like my layouts. (January – March ’09)

Version 50 | “Bigger Than My Body” Another one of my classic landscape layouts with inspirational lyrics. Simple but satisfying. (April ’09 – August ’09)

Version 51 | “Maybe Someday” Thought that the new phase of my life deserved a new layout, a hopeful one that featured the lyrics from one of my favorite Matchbox Twenty songs. (August ’09 – January ’10)