What's in a Name?

As you can see Taking the Mickey is no more. Welcome to my new blog, 14 Legs. It's still pretty much the same blog as before only with a new name, a new URL and a new design.

It all started with wanting to change the name of my blog. The only good thing about Taking the Mickey is the fact that it has my name in the title, but what's so great about that? Most people don't even know what Taking the Mickey means which kinda defeats the point. It's an English saying which basically means mocking something or someone. While I do use that form of humour on occasion, it is hardly descriptive of the blog. So a new name was needed.

I was struggling to find a new name for a few days. It couldn't be too specific as I plan to write about different things that interest me, but on the other hand it couldn't be too vague and random either. And then 14 Legs just popped into my mind and I ran with it. Sure, it means that I will need to rename my blog every time we'll lose or gain legs, but I don't think it's very likely. We'll always have no more and no less than two dogs and if we will get a new human to join the family I will be more than happy to mark that happy occasion with yet another tiring blog name change and redesign.

With the new name in mind I immediately had the concept for the banner in my mind. A bit of Photoshop wizardry by yours truly and a nice background from Cutest Blog on the Block and you can see the final results of the re-design right here.

I'm sure it's not the most amazing Photoshop creation, but I'm quite pleased with it. The banner is composed of the following pictures:

Dexter at his Scottish vacation home.

Me in Winnipeg (with something on my back).

Señor Blake in his PJs at our back yard.

The other Mr. Blumental and Leo wearing a satellite dish.

The legs have been cut out and I did some colour and light balancing to make up for the different lighting conditions.

I then designed the logo and slapped it over a wooden floor texture I found on the web:

I then turned it into a 3D poster and rotated it to make it look like a floor for all of us to "stand" on.

There, I hope I sucked away all the magic out of the creative process.

My life is going through many changes, some of which I will be talking about in this blog when the time comes, so it is a good time for a new start. On the other hand, this is not a brand new blog, as you can see, with full access to the old archives dating back to 2005.

Here's a reminder of what the old blog looked like:

Please update any links and bookmarks to the new blog and let me know what you think about the re-design and new name! 

Mickey