Yes Bubblewrap ran in Flash.
No offense but why’d you have to include the advert for your biz on the post?
I didn’t know I did. I got an email with your post and responded to the email, so I guess it had my signature block (since it went to my business email). I didn’t even realize that it was posted. I now see that I need to click on visit the topic instead of replying via email. Believe me, I am not looking for business (on this message board or in general–I am semi-retired and do no marketing.) I am not very familiar with message boards–that was my daughter’s thing, not mine. So if anyone was offended, it was not done intentionally. In fact, I am more concerned that my personally identifying information is now on this messgae board.
Yes, the “respond by email” feature is not particularly intuitive and I can see how it would’ve added your signature. I reported the post to the mods for you.
Taken care of. Thank you for flagging it.
Her son is not interested in selling any of her original art.
Copies of her art are for sale on her Fine Arts America site. Even very small items can be purchased there. Her share of the proceeds is automatically deposited in her son’s bank account. He’s in college now, so that always helps. (I don’t know if Fine Arts America discontinues sites that have no traffic, but the last time I looked, it was still there.) In any event, her art can be seen there. Her name on Fine Arts America is Katherine Huck Fernie Howard Artist.
(Katherine Huck Fernie Howard Art - Fine Art America)
This thread is giving me all sorts of nostalgic feelings. She was beautiful, and kooky (and please understand that I consider kooky one of the best things a person can be), and an amazing artist, and a great poster!
I mean, who else…
- could have created a whole epic harangue about how the word buckeye was gross because it evoked a male deer’s eyeball,
- single handedly redefined the meaning of list, which must include three or more things, which led to that classic doperism:
- Hi Opal!
Sending my love, @OpalsMom - your daughter was such a light in this world. I hope you continue to post on the boards.
Eh. You can argue it was technically true, but the title contained implications that were not. The new title makes it clear that the site just broke, rather than someone replacing it with their own site.
thank you for that link. her art is amazing.
we do try to keep her memory eternal on this board.
Thank you!
I was here about the time these sort of social media came popular. I seem to remember her own website also has a message board. I remember a few very specific things and some visuals from back then…about 20 years ago. Take care!
A touching memorial! 
I am Katherine’s mother, age 74 and not a web designer. I don’t want Katherine’s webiste taken over by anyone. If I could keep it up as it was, I would have done that. I don’t want or need her fans and friends to become my legal clients. The redirection was something that Hostmonster directed me to do so I could keep control of the website (my grandson did not want to run it). It is apparently backed up, so the content is still there. I don’t have the know-how to do that, and she she designed it with her own proprietary design, and nobody I’ve talked to knows how to do anything with it. Her son and I make a decision every year as to whether to continue to maintain her various domain names. We let the virtual bubblewrap domain go–it was broken and used flash(?) which was no longer supported. On this, which would have been her 54th birthday, I wish I knew how to preserve her Internet intellectual property. I am doing what I can, but if someone with more knowledge than I have can let me know how I can do something different with opalcat.com while still preventing other people from taking over the domain, I’d just as soon NOT have it redirect to my law firm website.
nevermind
Hi @OpalsMom,
opalcat.com is currently registered with GoDaddy (even though Hostmonster hosts it). If you want to change how it works, that should be doable either through GoDaddy directly (if you have a customer relationship with them) or maybe through Hostmonster, if they were reselling it somehow (probably not, but maybe).
The domain was last updated August 2025, and the current registration will expire Aug 14th of this year unless you renew it again.
If I were you, I’d:
- Look for any GoDaddy logins you might have squirreled away somewhere, or contact their support: GoDaddy Help Center - Contact Us
- Tell them the situation, and ask if you can redirect to opalcat.com somewhere else, like maybe to the archived version on the Way Back Machine. That would be better for you because you don’t have to maintain it; the Internet Archive is a nonprofit online organization that collects and archives copies of old websites.
- Consider paying for a 5-year or 10-year registration renewal upfront, so the domain will be paid for and safe for a while.
Separately, you can also try to find your Hostmonster logins and see what’s in there (if anything). It’s possible some old files are still in there and the website can be recovered and set back up, or it’s possible it’s just a redirect now. Can’t say without logging in and checking. (You can ask their support too).
If you need help, I’d be happy to assist however I can (no charge). I’m a web developer. Just PM me here.
Can Dominic’s dad help with it?
I should have said Godaddy—I know the domain is registered there, because that’s where I renew it every year. I have everything backed up somewhere and would love to have it available for people who want to access those files but have it frozen somehow so people can’t hijack it. (I don’t understand any of this enough to know what is and isn’t possible. I was able to access one site and put on there that she had died and that the site was not going to be updated—I think that was her art site. [By the way, Fine Arts America has a dedicated URL for her art (I pay an annual fee to keep that premium membership. Proceeds all go to her son): https://katherine-howard.pixels.com/] I would like people to be able to click on opalcat.com and get her world domination headquarters et al content.
You’ll need to log in to Hostmonster (probably?) and/or GoDaddy to see if any of the old files are still there. If so, it should be possible to set them back up in a way that lets people see it again, along with providing some safeguards against hijacking and such (like a domain lock).
But web technologies have changed a lot in the last decade, so somebody familiar with all that stuff would need to log in to your account and see what they can find, restore, and reconfigure into a working site. It’s (probably) not some simple switch to flip, but looking at the existing files, code, and configuration and updating them as needed. It’s possible (but not guaranteed) that GoDaddy or Hostmonster support will be able to help you with this if you explain it to them, but I’m not sure.
I’d be happy to help with this, like via a video or phone call. Or if you prefer, you can find a well-reviewed local web developer or agency (any of them should be able to do this), or a family member/friend that you trust.
But it basically boils down to logging in, finding the files, fixing whatever needs to be fixed in terms of making it viewable again, and then changing the hosting settings to point it at the old site. Depending on the complexity of what they find, it could be a few minutes, hours, or days of work (but probably not longer than that).
That’s assuming the files are still there.
If not (or if you don’t want to go through that trouble), you can also redirect opalcat.com to the Way Back archived version instead. But in any case, it’s probably not something that’s easy to walk you through via internet posts. It would ideally be somebody sitting next to you, or a live screenshare, etc.