Don’t call it a redesign, I kept on telling myself. Well, whether to call it a redesign or not is up to you, but a redesign was not exactly what I had in mind. I mean, I liked the old design, despite all its flaws, I really did. I’ve been thinking about a new design, but that was supposed to happen at the end of this year. The thing is, like many people I know, during final exams I get this endless flow of new creative ideas to distract me from studying, and I can’t ignore them because most of them sounded good (at least then). So, I decided that it won’t hurt to write down some of these ideas, or maybe draw a little sketch or something. But after I got my hands dirty with the code, I could not stop, and here is the result: a (kind of) brand new design.

The blog now looks cleaner, and the sidebar is less cluttered, but the design overall still has the soul of the old one. I have added some little Web 2.0-ish touches, such as the shades on top, and the use of the footer for more than the fine print crap that no one cares about. There, you can find the archives and a little search box. Also, there is an option for those who want to receive blog updates in their inbox. I don’t know how many people would find this useful, as I only had one reader in the past who asked if she could subscribe to the blog this way, and I had to set up an account with FeedBlitz to do this, but like Mike Arrington, I find it too orange, so I’m trying another service this time. RSS readers are still new and hopefully this would make it easier to many of you to stay updated. One more new thing is the contact page, where you can send me what you have to say without going through the process of composing an email.

Because I’m not a professional designer, the code is not as elegant as I wanted, but you don’t have to bother with that (I’m complaining, but this is ok: it’s my blog, you know). I may add a little box on the sidebar to show the latest picks from my Google Reader so you can always find something new even when I’m not updating the blog. Tell me what do you think of the new design. Everything should work fine, but if you found anything weird please let me know in the comments, in the contact page, or on my email: saudijeans at gmail dot com.

King Abdullah is coming to town today, and the streets of the city are decorated with large posters and everything. I was supposed to go out and take some photos for this stuff, but I was busy watching the World Cup. I’ll probably find some time tomorrow to go out and take the after party pictures.

Browsing through the World Cup photos, I was like: is it just me or all of England players’ wives/girlfriends are blonds? But then I found this photo and was like: maybe not :-)

This photo was taken by Mochness in the amusement park of a shopping mall in Riyadh:

According to the instruction of the Religious Police, girls older than 9 years old are not allowed to play

In spite of that sign, Mochness and her sister played air-hockey. I’m proud of you, gals.

So they think they can prevent us from reading Eve‘s blog? Well, they can’t. There are several ways to go around the censorship, and here is some of these ways. First, you can use the box below to subscribe, and you will receive a weekly email carrying the latest updates from the blog:

You can also use another proxy to access the blog by going to a website like this. The website mentioned there is blocked now, but I know of a similar website and I don’t want to put here because I don’t want them to block it too. If you were interested in using something like this, please drop me a line: saudijeans at gmail dot com. Finally, if are using a news reader to keep up with your favorite blogs, you can subscribe to Eve’s blog feed and get her latest posts syndicated to you as soon as they are published.

This World Cup will be so Flickred. And can I just say that I love to read about football on American blogs/websites. They make a lot of stupid mistakes making it so funny and amusing!

Few weeks ago, I was hanging out with a friend of mine, when he told me that he has been worried over my safety. “Look, I like what you do with your blog,” he said, “but I’m afraid that you might get yourself in some serious troubles.” To be honest, I tend to have such concerns from time to time, but I try to assure myself that I’m not doing anything wrong, so why be afraid? But then, it comes to strike me again: you would never know. Here, Rabah Al-Quaie was arrested, and in Egypt about 40 bloggers are still jailed since May. “Sometimes, it’s not worth it to lose four or five years of your life,” my friend, who is about 10 years older than myself, said. “Even when you believe.”

But I feel like I can’t stop now, not even anytime soon. It is really confusing, because when I think about it, it is not only about myself, but also about those people around me who love me so much, and whom I don’t want to hurt. The question remains: worth it, or not?