marramgrass

This post brought to you by the slightly clunky WordPress iPhone app.

It looks like I probably won’t be posting anything substantial here for the next wee while. I am beset by IT problems and will be having to take the MacBook in for repair, I think.

Catch y’all when it’s back.

I’ve finally got round to upgrading to the latest WordPress.

Apparently it’s quite a major upgrade from where things were, and I always find it a pretty nerve-wracking process, so I’d be grateful if you could do me a favour:

If you notice anything screwy around here (more so than usual, I mean), please drop an email to blog AT marramgrass DOT org DOT uk and let me know.

Ta.

(This post also checking that MarsEdit will still get through ;-)

Five years ago today, I made my first blog post.

I started out of curiosity about this thing that more and more people seemed to be doing, with the simple aim of amusing myself. Five years later that is still my primary aim, and I’m still astonished and humbled by the small (very small in internet terms) but steady trickle of traffic that comes through here every day. So to those who drop by and occasionally leave a comment or three, thank you.

Over the next wee while I’ve a few major things planned round here. There’s a ground-up redesign in the works, and a few lengthy, almost article-like, posts that I’ve been working on for a while. And maybe one or two other bits and bobs, too.

In the meantime, cheers again for being here :-)

I’ve done some tweaking to try and fix an old silly problem with the layout here.

I think it’s all good, but if anything looks broken to you, please leave me a comment and let me know. It’d be handy if you told me what operating system (WinXP, Vista, 98, Mac OS X 10.?, etc) and browser you’re using.

Ta.

This morning I came to a decision. I spent a few weeks trying out this BlogRush thing, but today I have ditched it and deleted this site from the network.

It’s a pretty harmless thing in itself, and it’s always fun to attract more visitors, but the widget that they give you to display is just plain ugly. I’m not pretending that marramgrass is a shining example of wondrous web design, but the BlogRush widget is just too much for my poor eyes.

For some reason, yet to be determined, I have been moved to sign up at Twitter. I can’t shake the feeling that it’s the real low-point of the new, interactive, 2.0 web, but at the same time it is strangely fascinating.

Cue questions of self-censorship and the further shrinkage of the already miniscule online ratio of signal to noise.

I’m at http://twitter.com/marramgrass/.

I’ve been looking for a new job for a while, and after a few interviews (all pleasant and enjoyable - I’m a weirdo who enjoys such things) I started my new job on Wednesday just past.

My wife started her new job on the same day. Fun week ;)

So I’m not employed to directly do youth work any more, although I continue to volunteer in that way. I now work for a network of community work projects in a volunteer development role. One of the emphases is to help volunteers reflect on their experience, and particularly on how their experience of community work interacts with their faith and their understanding of God and of the world. By the by, I’ll be hoping to do some recruitment of volunteers in to the projects as well.

You could say it’s right up my street.

It’s been a rocky road getting here, and I think the time is coming for me to write and post a bit on the experience of the last six months. Maybe not this week (all the spare brain cycles are going on trying to get my head round the new job), but soon nonetheless.

As I’m still fooling around trying out some new ideas for this site, there’s a couple of new things in the sidebar over there to the left.

Up at the top, under ‘Info’, is a new link to Diversions, where I fancied trying to keep a log of the books I’m reading, the DVDs I’m watching and the music I’m listening to. It’s very basic, with new stuff being shoved in at the top, and it’s more for my own amusement and curiosity than anything else, but it’s there if you’re curious.

Then, at the very bottom of the sidebar, you should see the funny-looking widget from whos.amung.us, which is a stats thing. It’s bit different to the usual, because it’s main purpose is to say how many visitors are on the site right now rather than doing any detailed logging. It’ll probably be quite depressing, actually. If you happen to look at it and see a number bigger than 1, please leave a comment and let me know!

Tonight I have done some housekeeping on the server, including updating my WordPress install to the latest version.

What did you do with your Saturday night?

When these things happen, things can get a little jumbled. Accordingly, if you find any problems on the site, I’d be grateful if you could leave a comment here or shoot me an email to blog AT marramgrass DOT org DOT uk.

Cheers.

So, this site got broke for a little while from last night. Some more configuring at the web host that caught me on the hop.

All is well again.