PCPPP Font

Hi Christian. I think we need a new font. I don’t like this one. It is staid and dull. I propose Calibri. Or Futura. Either one signifies a new age, one of exploration and adventure and surefootedness, while acknowledging the importance of tradition through their crisp and clearly defined lines. Whatcha’ think?

Christian: Before I give you my argument, I think we need to give our treasured readers a little insight into the PCPPP writing process. I’m sure most of you picture Pat and I sitting behind large grandiose mahogany or ebony carved desks surrounded by shelf upon shelf of expensive leather bound books of great length, as we dip our quills into ink extracted from the rarest of squids, and scribe each PCPPP blog post as we sip from our brandy snifters.

And I’m sure you then imagine how upon finishing a post, we hand our parchments of paper, that have each been wax stamped with our family crests, to one of our many attractive secretaries whose task it is to publish our works onto the internet, and then kick our legs up onto our rhinoceros skin ottomans and enjoy the finest of colonial period cigars.

Well, it’s more or less like that. But one difference is that we use shared Google docs to do our madcap back and forth writing exposes (We’re currently in the works for trying to patent back and forth writing so don’t even think about doing it). We then copy the contents of the Google doc (We’re also trying to patent Google docs) into our blog and viola! PCPPP magic is birthed. And when I say ‘We copy’ I mean ‘I copy’ because another thing that should probably be known to our dearest readers is that Pat is what I like to politely call “tech dumb” (Patenting this too people).

Don’t take this the wrong way Pat. Your skills just lie in other areas. That’s all.

This guy’’s skills lies in other areas too. Am I right ladies?

Now that I have filled our readership with the proper background I can address your suggestion about changing our font. No. I don’t think we should. And here’s why...

First off, since we are using Google docs we are limited to a select few fonts to choose from. Futura isn’t one of them. Sure there might be a way to get more choices into Google docs and sure there’s the option of changing the font after it is copied into blogger but both would require effort. Effort I just can’t get behind.

As for your second suggestion of using the font Calibri - yes this font is available in Google docs and as you can see this paragraph is being written in it. And now I have a migraine. I don’t think this font is as nice to read as the pleasurable Arial that we have all grown to love and adore in an "just friends” kind of way. In fact I better switch back to that sophisticated yet whimsical Arial before I vomit all over my keyboard.

Ahhhhh... there she is. Much better.

And my last argument against changing fonts lies in the fact that, as I think you are aware Pat, our blog is posted on the internet. Sometimes referred to as the web. I don’t want to get into the technical details here but there is a concept of web safe fonts. Kind of like safe sex but with letters and numbers instead of extreme pleasure and mayonnaise.  

A font is considered to be web safe if it is a very commonly used font across the different computer systems. The reason is, at the basic level of web stuff (non-technical term) any font you see while browsing the internet has to actually be loaded on your computer otherwise it won’t render. Nowadays there are ways around this but it is still a good idea to stick with web safe fonts.

And guess what? Arial is a web safe font (Is there nothing she can’t do?).

Oh dear god, look what you’ve made me do Pat. I’ve become informative. *shudders* People who are reading this blog now might be actually learning something. I apologize for that dearest readers. I never meant it to happen.

So Pat, are you cool with sticking with Arial? I think she’s “the one”.

Pat: Umm...okay.  Sorry.  I just thought it might look nice. I didn’t know, y’know, that it got all complicated and techie and all. Sorry. I won’t ask again.

Christian: Well shoot, now I feel bad. I didn’t mean to rain on your new exciting font parade but... wait a sec. Are you underlining your name now? Is this just to spite me because of this font thing?

Pat:  Yes, yes I am, and yes it was, but then I tried this new backlighting shadowy thing, and now I’m stuck Christian, and I can’t get out of it and make it go away and I’m really sorry, but I’m kinda’ freaking out ‘cause it won’t stop, and I was only trying to be funny and I really won’t ever bring it up again if you can just make this stop. I really don’t like this...it’s like when you took me to that bar and promised me that the jello was just offered in bite sized servings so I had a lot of them and then felt really funny. Help.

Christian: See what happens when you play with fire. I think it’s best that we just leave everything as is, before you end up breaking the internet.  

However I don’t want you to feel bad about your lack of technical knowledge (see “tech dumb” above). Yes, nowadays it’s pretty common for most people to use a computer on a daily basis, but I’m sure there are other people, such as yourself, that have difficulty with them and at times feel a bit overwhelmed. I guess not everyone can be computer savvy. But don’t fret it. I feel like over time, someday you’ll get there.

Below are some examples of confident computer users that don’t accidentally get themselves stuck highlighting text and become distressed.

But there isn’t anything saying that over time, as you get more experience, you can’t be part of this group too, Pat. Until then don’t worry about it.