Some people are agog when they discover the amount of time that Matthew and I sit at our computers; sometimes it amounts to over 13 hours a day - plus we have to eat and sleep like normal humans.

Follow up:

Not all of the time running Pinkeye Graphics is spent designing party invitations, flyers and websites. Neither Matthew nor I leave the house without a camera and consequently Pinkeye Graphics has an extensive photo library (with, admittedly, a biodiversity bias). When indoors, Matthew spends hours on valuable internet research whilst I use the web to keep abreast of technical developments and design techniques and styles.

The interweb is full of programmers, designers and have-a-gos, bursting to share their techniques and, with the help of a tool such as Stumble Upon, I fine-tune my searches to include all things design-related. To quote the BBC:

"StumbleUpon is a brilliant downloadable toolbar that beds into your browser and gives you the chance to surf through thousands of excellent pages that have been stumbled upon by other web-users".

For example, when skinning this blog, I decided that, as well as the sketches and collage-style background, I should show off my web 2.0 button skills. With the help of this PhotoShop Star tutorial, I upgraded the Pinkeye Graphics logo into a shiny, reflective header. How now!

My internet bookmarks are catalogued in folders of tutorials, colour and design inspiration and coding websites. So next time I realise at 01:00 hours that I have been surfing the internet all evening, I can pat myself on the back and say it's all in the name of research! Well, nearly all...