Victory Soap v. 2.0

Yep, I've gone back to Movable Type, and re-opened Victory Soap. Let's hope it doesn't turn out to be a case of "I'm gonna wash that blog right out of my hair." MT has let me down before, but I'm a woman, and I can't completely escape the need to give cads and scallawags a second (third, fourth) chance. Fortunately I have turned this failing onto blogging software instead of male human beings.

As for how easy it is to set up a blog in Movable Type version 3x, I'll just post an early "test" comment of mine: "Jesus Christ, setting up comment authentication was like pulling a station wagon down the road with my tits." Yep, it was like that. But the site is up, and seems to be working.

A few things: the stylesheet is dark, I know, but it's one of the few that Movable Type provides that I like. It used to be relatively easy to fiddle with MT stylesheets -- now, not so much. I use their "Stylecatcher" plugin, and if setting up comments was difficult, I don't know what to call the crazy manoeuvering I had to do to get this plugin working, and I can't even get the one stylesheet I really like (the "forest green" one) to work at all. (For some reason all the other ones -- even the ones with images -- work just fine.)

As for the commenting... I am not entirely please with the Typekey-registration thing. I realize it's a pain in the ass. But every time I visit a blog with unmoderated comments, I am reinforced in my vow to never, ever, have open comments again. Of course, I realize that there are plenty of unpleasant people who have Typekey IDs, but I also have first-time comment moderation set up (that means the first time anyone comments here their comment will be held in a moderation queue), so I can ban anyone who attempts to misuse the privilege of commenting here. On the other hand, I have heard that spammers can take real advantage of the Movable Type comment scripts, so I may just change to an outside system, like Haloscan, that has a comment moderation setup. I don't know.

Trackbacks have been turned off and will never be turned on. They are a spam attractor. If you want me to know you've posted on something here just drop a line in comments. Or email me (go to the main page of the site for my email address).

That's all I can think of for now. I don't really know what direction this blog will be going in, if a personal blog can be said to have a "direction." My life doesn't really have a direction -- my personal goals are few and modest and not really interesting to the general public. My only vague resolution is to stop nattering on about my every little health problem, as I think last year's blog descended to that point often. It's boring, and old-ladyish in a way I don't want to be (I aspire towards the crusty, self-sufficient spinster sort of old lady, not the needy, whiny, sickly sort).

That being said, that doesn't mean I'm not going to talk about my life at all. Here's the latest: I was able to finally, thanks to everyone's generous donations to my Paypal and Amazon begging bowls, able to buy the platform bed I've been wanting. And I was able to get a decent bargain on a better bed than I could have gotten on the internet by getting my butt out the door and into one of the local outlets. So I ended up with a full-size hardwood bed instead of a pine, for less than the pine bed cost. It gets delivered this coming Saturday and soon my futon will be on a stable surface instead of a creaking, wobbly old futon frame. Thank you all!

Cats update: the outdoor cat is a little better, though she does not like getting her pill at all. And she still isn't eating much -- I can't tell if it's because she's still off her feed, or if she just doesn't care for the expensive special cat food. I may cut some of her favorite store brand into the expensive food to see if that will get her to eat more. She's also still drinking a lot of water, which worries me because the vet said it could be a sign of failing kidneys. Oh well -- it's only been a little over a week, so hopefully the treatment will get her back on an even keel. To make matters more fun, one of the neighbor cats (who is young and well fed and has a collar) came around night before last and was harassing her. I was woken up about 2:30 am by yowls and hisses, and ended up getting very little sleep because I had to keep getting up to throw water on the invader. (Or near the invader -- I need to get a water pistol from the dollar store.) Comedy moment: every time I'd chase the invader away, O.C. would go out into some part of the grounds and pee. "MY territory!"

As for Xena (my indoor kitty), she's still in the rudest of health though I've decided to make a vet appointment for her -- she's overdue. She's taken to sitting on my desk in between me and my laptop, which is nice and cuddly, but makes it hard to type.

Weather is cloudy here, and it's going to rain at some point. I think I'll walk over to Walmart before the clouds break. Later, my peeps. (And remember, if you leave a comment and it doesn't show up immediately be patient -- I'll upload all new comments when I get back.)