State of the Blog Address

My friends,

It’s been a rough few days here in the World. First week of school, blog randomly breaking for reasons yet unknown and so forth have kept me frantically working to keep this ship afloat. The theme you see right now is only temporary. But I’m also excited. The great blogtastrophe could very well be a blessing in disguise. I’ve wanted to do a new layout for the new year and spent most of my time scheming, planning, and drawing. Alas, I can’t wait until the Fall semester is over to put my plan into motion. What you see right now is a temporary look designed to keep blog functionality going. I have a very limited window here since exams and assignments start piling up towards the end of September and late October.

On a side note, if you have two midterms, how does that work if they’re supposed to be done during the middle of term?

Anyways, with that in mind, I’m setting an extremely ambitious plan to have a functional blog layout operational by Monday the 8th. With luck, I’ll finish in time before my hockey fantasy draft (Ovechkin or Crosby first pick?)

Schedule

Friday

0600: 20 Questions with Veneretio (tankingtips.com)
1000: SYTYCB Bloggers critique and bottom 3 announced (and an explanation on Tulani’s absence which I’m sure many of you have noticed)
1800: SYTYCB cuts announced
2130: TNB Podcast (Live!) hosted by Fimlys and Breana (Matticus and Wyn guesting)

By around that time tomorrow night, I should have a theme ready to go.

Saturday

0600: Responding to the Where the hell was I? meme from Gamedame
1200: Assigning Healing Strategy: Part 5 of 5 – Things to Watch For

Blog logistics and other minor and trivial details need to be handled. Certain categories will be axed and remade. Lots of retagging and reorganization of posts will be happening. I have like a billion posts. This is going to take a while :(.

Sunday

Blog will be in maintenance mode for the entire day which means it will largely be inaccessible. I have to raid from 1630 onwards until 2100 which means I may not be able to finalize deployment just yet. If all goes according to plan, then you’ll see the 4th reincarnation of the World.

I’d like to take a moment to recognize Lassirra for her tremendous support and technical expertise in troubleshooting the majority of the cataclysms affecting World of Matticus recently. Thanks Lassirra!

I have to confess. I came *really* close to throwing in the towel and calling it a career. That feeling only happened for a split second but it was long enough. Of course, I needed only to look up at the Feedburner counter to realize that I had at least 731 reasons to keep pushing.

All I ask is for more patience.

In the mean time, here’s a trip down memory lane:

Version 1: This theme ran from early August until late September. I didn’t care much about the layout at the time. I focused more on writing as much as I could.

Version 2: I opted for something new and fresh. Something that was more vibrant. Something more… me! This one was live from September on until towards the end of December.

Version 3: The longest lasting theme thus far, this theme served me well from the start of 2008. My only regret is that I could not make it work long enough for the whole year. This was by far my favourite and I’m disappointed that I have to retire it earlier than usual.

Go beyond what’s asked of you. Never settle for just being “good enough”. This new theme will be better than the old one. It has to be. I won’t be happy with anything less. I will do whatever I can to make sure it reaches that point. My readers deserve no less.

Thanks for sticking it out this long.

Your friendly Priest blogger,
Matt L.