Tag Archives: Website Design

This Will Only Hurt For A Little While

Leave a reply

busyGood grief, what’s that woman up to now? It’s something I imagine people thinking about me on a fairly regular basis, but I guess I just can’t help it–gotta stay busy. I know, that whole “Stop Glorifying Busy” meme is floating around (and I’ve actually posted it and meant it sincerely myself a couple of times) but busy works for me (except for last week, when only loafing worked).

So, my new project, getting under way this week (while I keep whittling away at The Water Bearers), is the complete overhaul of my website.

I created that from a template, in a complete state of panic, because I was launching Widow Woman in a few short weeks and my old website needed a massive update. Well, it’s been over a year now, and I hate my website.

Not dislike, not ho, hum, I’m bored–nope, this is an active, visceral loathing. I’m sure it could be worse (check out these bad boys–I actually held my breath when I visited this site, in case mine was #4), but as I’m sure you’ll agree, it could also be so much better. I can’t wait to fix this thing. But I am facing two daunting problems: 1) budget–hey, I’m an indie author! I don’t have the budget to blow everything on a website design. 2) I’m a technological moron.

moron[Warning courtesy of Fugly.com. I shall ignore.] Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead because I’m happy to say, I think (Lord, I hope) I have found a solution. Checked out a bunch of different options, including staying with my current hosting service, to see if they had any better templates to offer (they don’t) or if they’d finally be able to fix the blog feed problems on my existing site (they couldn’t), and decided that after several years, it’s time for me to jump ship.

I found a new, well-received hosting service that works with WordPress templates and technological morons alike–plus, they offer the best (and when I say best, I mean BEST) customer support, 24/7, I’ve ever encountered. I wasn’t even a client yet today, and TJ, super-supporter extraordinaire, spent almost an hour on the phone with me, answering every stupid question I could possibly ask (“Where do I find this thingie?” “How do I install this whatchimacallit to my doohickey?”) with extraordinary patience, courtesy, and an utter lack of condescension. It was amazing, and the best part is, he promised to do it again, if I need him.

So I leaped today, signed up with them. As soon as they send me my activation email, I can start working on my new design. It may take me a couple of months, but hey, if I can go through the whole process of self-publishing a book, I’m not going to let a little thing like a plug-in stop me from having a new, fresh website.

Oh, wait. What’s a plug-in again? TJ! Help! Stay tuned; it’s always an adventure.

[OHMYGOSH! Update: While I was proofreading this post, the new hosting service called me to make sure I’d received my activation e-mail, ask me if I had any questions, and personally welcome me to the family! I love these people!]

 

Course Correction

Leave a reply

For those of you who don’t already know, this post contains some surprising news: I resigned from my job. Yes, my new job, the one I started just a few short months ago.

It should have been obvious from my last post that the work-life balance was something with which I was struggling. It wasn’t the job–I truly did love it–but rather a combination of things, a laundry list of difficulties I should have seen coming but didn’t. Or, to be rather more honest about it, I saw them coming, but thought I could manage them. Long commute, family demands, less flexibility than I needed–a perfect storm of unsustainability for me. So after long thought, no small amount of prayer, wise counsel from my husband and others, I made the difficult decision to resign. I’m fortunate in that the split has been more amicable than I could have dreamed, though the parting last week was, nonetheless, bittersweet. I will miss the people and the work more than I would have expected.

But as one of my (now former) colleagues said on my last day, “It’s a wise woman who knows her own path.” Don’t know how true it is, but I’m hoping that I’m on the right one now.

Lots happening this week: my interview for the cable program  “It’s A Woman’s World” is airing today (MCN6, for those of you in theTwin Cities’ 7-county metro area, at 9:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m.; it’ll also run on July 23, same times; for St. Paul viewers, cable channel 15 on Thursday, July 19 and 26 at 6:30 p.m.); after it airs, it’ll be posted to YouTube and my website. So that’s exciting and scary simultaneously.

Speaking of my website, I just completed a speed-of-light overhaul, which was sorely needed. I used a do-it-yourself template service, since speed and a zero-coding requirement were critical factors. It’s not fancy, doesn’t have a lot of bells and whistles, but it’s eminently more readable and far less user-unfriendly (all right, I’ll call a spade a spade: user-hostile):  https://justscribbling.com/.

I’m also being invited to work on a number of projects that have popped up, seemingly out of nowhere, during the last few days, opportunities that are not only enormously flattering but also reassuring that the events of the last few months were not mistakes, only course corrections.

At any rate, you should be hearing from me a little more often now–hopefully you think that’s a good thing, because I know I do. Stay tuned!