Name: Kirsty
Site: Her Mask
Review completed on: 25/04/08
There are several things in life that one can always be certain of. Taxes, death, and the inevitability of Freddy Kruegers' return to name a mere few. On the other end of the scale, one thing that remains uncertain is how many reviews I can write in a month! I miss the golden days when they flowed faster than diarr....no, I won't say it, I'm determined to keep this review clean. I can't be having no stinkin' visuals dominating my hot-as-fuck, detailed critique. If the PSGR queue were a car, it'd be a shitty 1.3 litre, ugly as hell Daihatsu Sirion that I'd rather die than be seen in. I hate being slow and shameful, but unfortunately my current situation doesn't allow me to be online very often.
This is also going to be the first review that displays a hardly noticeable yet new format -absence of 'First Impression' and 'Layout' (etc) headers. Don't ask me why I've decided to omit them, I wouldn't be able to tell you. It's a full moon tonight and I'm feeling fruity, so let me be!
So anyway -- hello, Kirsty aka Cursed Tea who hails from bonny Scotland. Holla at the fact that my Dad was born and bred in a random slum in Glasgow, thus making me half Scottish. Polite greetings aside now if you please, let's get down to the nitty gritty. Hope I won't be too rusty.
This is a fairly simplistic layout you've got up, but overall I like what I'm seeing, save for a few minor issues that can easily be corrected.
The pattern that serves as your header image is fantastically retro - I can just imagine it being the wallpaper in George and Mildred's front room. What I'm not so enthusiastic over however is your menu links. The white text seems so light against the light grey background, and although it is of course readable, it isn't instantly so. The rollover colour is so much better, you should use this as the default colour instead! As a replacement rollover colour you could use the green you've used for "Mask" (in your site title.)
Your sidebar looks kind of fat. No, that's not the best word - let's call it pudgy. I wonder how it would look if you decreased the width? You could decrease the font size too, so that it doesn't look the same as your regular text.
You've set out your Webmiss section in a way that I really like -- quickfire facts at the top, a medium length write up in the middle, and some additional links at the bottom. That is sooo the way to do it. In the fact file you mention you have "Two half Sister, one half Brother" - first of all there obviously needs to be an S on the end of sister (I know this is just a typo so no harm done) and regarding the capitalisation...as far as I know sister and brother do not need to be capitalised because they're not proper nouns.
The write-up you've provided for yourself is so detailed and informative. I was very sorry to read that you have cancer of the neuro tissues. I'm glad though that you've learnt to become more comfortable using a wheelchair to get around. So you should - mobility is overrated and wheelchairs rock! I often have visions of having a wheelchair, y'know, making off with one of those ones they have for people in malls that you can use to get around the mall with. I'd customise or should I say "kustomise" the chair myself, trick it out with hot pink glitter paint and all that jazz. I'm not joking. Anyone who gives you grief or prejudice because you're in a wheelchair is nothing but a ignorant loser, and people like them aren't worth even thinking about. I'm saying all of this because I've already read in your Domain section that you have received quite a lot of prejudice for your disability. You don't deserve that.
And now for some additional links, starting with Pets. On the actual page you've got "Pet’s", so you need to ditch the apostrophe in this case. OMG! SMUDGE! Holy crap your cat is cute. Aww, what a precious bundle o'love! You've mentioned that he's a fairly new addition to your household -- how is he getting on with your two dogs?
Wow, you've listed so many titles on your Reading page! You're a dirty little bookworm, missy. I only hope you use protection! Your favourite genres are horror and fantasy - you'd be in good company with my ex boyfriend then, he'd read fantasy-type novels endlessly. I used to give him shit about it actually, can't remember the taunts now though as it's been a few years. Nothing against the genre really, I just enjoy being a generally difficult human being.
As far as your Fanlistings go, there's not much I can say. Bit of a structural error kicking off the page though - Her eare = Here are. Sorry for being Captain Obvious, I just can't help it :( If you pity me then that's great, just e-mail me and I'll provide bank account details should you wish to donate to me.
I totally know where you're coming from with this quote on your Music page:
The top tracks are one’s that I usually keep on repeat for an hour or so when I first hear them till I get bored of them lol.
Ah, yes - I can think of at least one track in which I've done the same - "Today" by Junkie XL. I listened to it over and over again a couple of months ago, so much so that I cannot bring myself to play it anymore, and I doubt I ever will again. Listening to tracks on repeat makes me sick in the head.
By the way, one's = ones, and I've added you to last.fm. Sweeet.
You list 28 Days /Weeks later as favourites on your Films page. I liked both of them too, I remember seeing Weeks last year in Christchurch. I'm not sure if you're a frequent visitor to PSGR but if you are you're probably aware that my mum won a years' supply of double movie passes. I've seen three movies via the passes so far - 1408, Shutter, and St. Trinians. I saw St Trinians last weekend, and I was so disappointed. I wasn't expecting much from it in the first place, but still...it made Spiceworld look like Citizen Kane! If it wasn't for the mildly entertaining performances by Rupert Everett I would have probably walked out of the theatre. I've only done that once -- during the first installment of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I went downstairs into the mall and bought The Best Of The Doors and then grudingly went back into the cinema for the sake of my friend. I'm thinking about going to see Sydney White this weekend, wonder what that'll be like? Amanda Bynes was great in Thirteen. Anyway, you've only listed a handful of titles here so I think you could certainly afford to elaborate on some of them if not all. What is it that you enjoyed about the films you've listed? Perhaps you could even provide a brief synopsis of each? Some people already do this but usually it's by way of a lazy link to IMDB or Amazon. It's much better explaining these things in your own words instead of relying on other sources of information.
Feel free to call me out on my possible ignorance, but a line on your Domain page left me scratching my head in confusion: "I decided on Her-Mask, mainly because I feel we all differently to people in our lives." Say what? We all act differently to people in our lives, do you mean that? Going by what you've written underneath it seems you might mean this, but your first sentence is enough to throw people.
Online, I’ve become adapted to a more relaxed personality. This is mainly because I experienced quite alot of prejudice offline for my disability, and online I did not. It sounds strange to say things like that, but I think people can generally be more accepting online as they don’t neccessarily have to deal with the person on a constant bases.. Or maybe that’s just how I feel.
No, I completely agree with you. Well said!
I like the write-ups you've provided for your past layout screenshots. I notice that under Lilac Waves you've got it’s instead of its, which is how it should be in the context you've used. I used to make this grammatical mistake all the time, in fact it's forever present in my 2004-2005 review archives. An easy way to get around this is by remembering that it's is a contraction of "it is" or "it has," whereas its is the possessive form of "it." Managed to bore you shitless yet?
To continue my role of resident grammar Nazi, you go on to use look’s and Red Hot Chili Pepper’s under the other two layout write-ups. Unlike it's and its, look's is incorrect in every way. Pepper's should also be Peppers in this case.
Your Links page is pretty straightforward, as are most link pages. Your links have been neatly organised under respective headers -- Hostee's and Affliate's to name a few. Just change these two headers to Hostees and Affiliates and it'll be all good in the Her-Mask.Net hood. One of your affiliates' websites is no longer available - Marieke of Faeriemetal.Net. She seemed a nice girl, she entered W2C 2007. After I clicked her link, it turned invisible on your page. I know that you can assign a different colour to visited links and it seems you've assigned white, which is the same colour as your content background thus making the visited link appear non-existent. Change to dark grey or something?
You've provided link buttons in a variety of sizes, and I like that. Yay for 468 x 60 banners, perfect for plug sites aren't they. To be a sad and desperate nitpicker, the text on the second half of your 80x15 button is very hard to read. The whole small white text against light grey background thing doesn't really do it for me. Black could be a sexy replacement.
On your Credits page I notice you've linked to Marieke too, but with a different, updated URL. Don't forget to update the URL on your links page as well so that it matches. Better to list a new URL rather than an old one that has since expired. Also, in the write up in the region of the link you've got as well as aswell. This is a common error for people to make, but really it is two words not one.
And this brings me to the end of my review. I've enjoyed my time at your site, and I leave it with a smile on my face. Her-Mask is definitely what I'd call a true personal site as the content is pretty much all about you, there's nothing really here for the visitor unless they're interested in reading all the content about yourself and your site. I don't see that this should be a problem for anyone though as you come across as an interesting person. I know that I certainly feel like I know a great deal about you after ploughing through your site, and that's a really good thing. Sometimes (more often than not, actually) I'll review a site and the webmaster will still seem like a stranger to me post-review. I much prefer reading a great deal about others instead of being offered shitty graphics and boring George W Bush / Abortion type opinion pages.
The only suggestions I can think of to give you in terms of improvement would be to consider making those layout alterations I mentioned earlier, as well as paying more attention to your grammar. The latter isn't a big deal realistically, it just depends on how you want to come across to your readers and whether or not grammatical accuracy is a concern for you.
Good luck with everything Kirsty! Hope we can keep in touch.
