SO, I finally stopped tinkering with poking at fucking up updating the theme.*

I consistently underestimate the amount of time and mental energy it takes to do a redesign. This is because it is usually around 1am when it occurs to me, and the part of my brain that deals with things like decision-making and impluse control conks out around 11. (This is also the time when I tend to place orders for new shoes.) I go “BORED NOW. Mess with code?” and then realize I a) have taken the theme apart beyond all repair and b) will be required to sleep at some point long before I have finished the site. Oh and c) did not make a backup of the original theme so must put up maintenance splash page. WHICH IS WHAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN THERE ALL THIS TIME, in case you weren’t following. (Note: it is not WordPress’ fault that the maintenance plugin got disabled. I needed a screenshot of the plugin-disabling process for the book** and I didn’t want to disable all the plugins on the companion site because I had JUST gotten them looking the way I wanted them to. So I used this site for the screenshot because it’s not like I was doing anything ELSE with it. Then I forgot to re-enable the plugins. That is my epic tale. It’s a lot to take in. It is all right if you need a moment to process.

Anyway, so. Enough about the redesign! Unless you want to tell me how awesome it looks, in which case, carry on.

*(I did this, in part, because I realized I’d disabled the maintenance screen plugin at some point so the site was showing up completely unstyled – horrid blue links and all. It’s like it was naked.)

**What? Book? YES. The new edition of the WordPress Visual QuickStart Guide is IN PROGRESS and will hit shelves IN OCTOBER and you can PRE-ORDER YOUR COPY NOW if you are into that sort of thing. And have I mentioned how lovely you look when you pre-order things?

We got a new cat.

After we had to put Savannah down, I was thinking we’d be a one-cat household for a while. Not forever – more cats = more happy, after all – but for a while. But as soon as it became abundantly clear that Nicodemus was lonely as hell,* we decided we’d get him a new friend sooner rather than later.

Sooner turned out to be the next day, pretty much. (I don’t like to dilly-dally.)

This is Kobayashi Maru (Maru for short).** He’s a rescue cat with gorgeous blue eyes and opposable thumbs. He makes the most adorable little melodic chirp when he wants something.

Right now the thing he wants the most is for Nick to be his bestbest friend.

Nick, of course, is all “KID. There are protocols to follow. We do not just jump into this whole ‘friend’ thing. First I must snub you, then I must assert my dominance, then – HEY. Are you trying to lick me?”

And Maru is like “Hi. You’re funny. Let’s snuggle.”

*Nick is my baby and I seriously can’t stand to see him in distress. Also he is 14. 14 is young for a cat. SHUT UP.

**Other name possibilities included Astro, Matrix, Phantom (Ellison’s favorite), Coleco, Pixel, Asterix, Helvetica, and Ninja.

OK, so my test revealed that I somehow borked the Woo Tumblogs plugin I was using, in that it doesn’t play nicely with my custom “tumblogs,” and anyway I should set up all my custom sections as taxonomies ANYWAY since that would be the right way to do it. Also maybe I should set up post formats. Y/N?

Which is a long-winded way of saying the site will look wonky for a while.

I am testing a thing. Go ahead and ignore the thing. It is only a test.

Yesterday was my birthday, which naturally I spent in bed. YOU tell me how cheerful and motivated you feel when a) you’ve just had to put down your second-favorite cat and b) in order to do so you had to use all of the money you were saving for your birthday celebration.*

HOWEVER, awful though yesterday was (and it was pretty awful, what with the depression and the frustrated loved ones and the donut shop which OF COURSE ran out of donuts like 5 minutes before I got there) it wasn’t my worst birthday ever. Vying for Worst Birthday Ever:

1) The party I threw when I was 14 at which no one showed up except our neighbor who was spending the night anyway

and

2) The year I spent all my money and vacation time on a hotel in Seattle for me and my long-distance boyfriend and watched every single passenger on his flight debark before realizing he HADN’T SHOWED. Apparently he’d missed his flight because he hadn’t been paying attention to the time. He didn’t bother to call me and tell me this before I’d made the TWO HOUR BUS RIDE from Bellingham to Seattle because he thought he could just DRIVE REALLY FAST. His roommate said he’d be on the next flight, probably, so I had no choice but to sit in the airport all day. Also when he did finally arrive he told me he was sleeping with someone else.**

So COMPARATIVELY yesterday was fine. I may have spent the day crying and wishing I’d never been born, but no one cheated on me or forgot me entirely! So that’s a win.

*And of course feeling shitty about the fact that you’re even THINKING such a thing, when OBVIOUSLY the whole “compassionately ending a beloved pet’s life” is WAY more important than someone’s STUPID BIRTHDAY.

**His birthday was the day after mine, so instead of dumping him on his ass and spending the remainder of my hard-earned vacation time touring Seattle on my own and eating room service, I wept until exactly midnight and then pretended it hadn’t happened so he could have a good birthday. I…don’t know, either.

Apparently this April is the third-wettest in Portland history. Delightful! If by ‘delightful’ you mean ‘soul-crushingly awful and also kind of cold.’

I like the rain. I have always liked the rain. It’s soothing, and makes the air smell lovely, and all the colors look richer afterward.

But seriously, Portland: IT IS APRIL. ENOUGH WITH THE WATERWORKS.

March, man. March is brutal. For one thing: the weather. Last year at this time it was temperate and beautiful. Sandals were worn. Skirts.

This year? Rain and more rain, with high temperatures barely cracking 50 degrees.

So maybe I can blame the weather for the fact that I am totally lagging on my second Health Month.

Don’t let the points fool you: I’ve healed myself twice (and Not So was kind enough to heal me once as well) so technically I should be barely scraping by at around 5 points.

Surprisingly, it’s the little things that are catching me out – flossing, for example. Some nights it’s just too much, you know? Cooking dinner four nights a week – well, some weeks we’re doing a lot more takeout than others, is all I’m saying. (It’s a good thing I don’t have a ‘clean the house’ rule, too. Seriously.)

I’m not as motivated this month as I was last month and it shows. Shockingly, being sick for three weeks (and then having a sick kid) kind of takes it out of you! Not to mention the fact that we’re doing a huge lifestyle restructure, which is good – very good – but not unstressful.

There are a few things lurking on the plus side, though. Sugar, for example. Sticking to the three-days-a-week rule this month? A breeze.

And since I’ve been forcing myself to floss (almost) every night, my gums have been a lot happier. It’s like every dentist I’ve ever had knew what they were talking about! Crazy.

Maybe the trick is to not load up on rules. Incremental changes are the way to go. I’ll keep that in mind for next month, when I – oh, who am I kidding? I’m going to do what I always do: vastly over-estimate the amount of time and motivation I possess and then feel horrid when I don’t accomplish everything on my list.

Join me next month! It’ll be like a slow-mo train wreck. You know you want to.