So, I decided to try and build this little thing I called ‘Lucky the Leprechaun’ the other day. Wasn’t really sure what it would be at first, just had the name pop into my head, maybe ’cause St. Paddy’s was around the corner or something, who knows.
Getting Started
Anyway, I figured I’d make a small interactive thingy, maybe for a webpage. Nothing fancy. I didn’t want to get bogged down in complicated stuff, so I just planned to use plain old HTML and a tiny bit of JavaScript. Keep it simple, right? First thing, I needed a leprechaun. Spent a bit of time looking for a simple, cartoonish picture online. Found one that looked cheerful enough, not too detailed. Saved that.
The Messy Middle
Then I opened up my text editor and started banging out some basic HTML. Just a button and a place where the leprechaun could show up. That part was easy enough. The idea was simple: click the button, Lucky appears. Click again, he disappears. Or maybe he just appears randomly?
Okay, decided on the button click. Now for the JavaScript part. This is where things always get a bit fiddly for me. I started writing the code to make the image show and hide when the button was clicked. Seemed straightforward.
But it never is, is it?
- First try, clicking the button did absolutely nothing. Checked the console, bunch of red errors. Typical. Forgot a semicolon somewhere, or misspelled a variable. Fixed that.
- Okay, now clicking made him appear, but he wouldn’t disappear! Back to the code. Logged a bunch of stuff to the console to see what was going on. Realized my logic for toggling the visibility was messed up. Rewrote that bit.
- Finally, he appeared and disappeared! But… he was showing up way off in the corner of the page, not where I wanted him. Ugh. CSS. Spent maybe half an hour just tweaking the positioning, margins, padding, all that nonsense. Why does putting something exactly where you want it always feel like black magic?
It’s funny how these small projects sometimes eat up more time than you expect. You think, “Oh, this’ll take 20 minutes,” and then two hours later you’re still wrestling with some tiny detail.
Wrapping It Up
Eventually, I got him popping up right above the button, looking all cheerful. Added a little text that appeared with him, saying something like “Top o’ the mornin’ to ya!”. Tested it a few more times. Click, he appears. Click, he’s gone. Good enough.
Didn’t add sounds or fancy animations. Just wanted to get it working, to finish something. It’s nothing ground-breaking, just a silly little leprechaun on a webpage. But hey, I started it, worked through the annoying bits, and got it done. Feels good sometimes just to make a thing work, you know?
