this blog of mine

I am blue

Or at least the website is, now. I’ve changed up the colour scheme again, going with an icy blue theme to reflect our wintry cold. Mostly, I just wanted a change.

For future reference, it looks like this:

Also, if John Gruber was dead, he’d be spinning in his grave because the header font is Aptos. Yes, Aptos! (I was lazy and just grabbed a font that was handy. I may change it later.)

The next experiment in design might be to go with some kind of dark mode style. I wish WordPress had a built-in way to switch between light and dark themes (you have to use a plugin). It seems like an obvious thing to add, vs. whatever AI nonsense they’re planning to shove in.

At long last, my website is recognized

Along with approximately 1 million other small websites! Here’s the link to the giant mosaic of thumbnails you can pan around and zoom in on:

One million (small web) screenshots

I found this link in one of Andreas’ weekly link dumps here.

That’s me in the middle. That’s me in the…uh…spotlight?

It captured the site on August 25, 2025, when I posted about having 30 apps on my iPhone that needed updating and how I refused to update them.

That number is now 38.

This blog of mine (in 2026)

I have tried adding various dark mode toggles to the site and all have not looked quite right, which keeps me from sticking with them. If you read this site and find it too bright, it actually looks pretty good in the reader mode of most browsers. Reader mode will work on individual posts, but not from the main page.

I’ll continue to look into better light/dark solutions. And I may tweak the colours (again) for 2026. Maybe I’ll go dark mode.

I’m also playing around with how to display categories and such. The dropdown menus are space efficient but look a bit utilitarian. On the other hand, they almost have a retro charm now. Another thing to ponder.

Here is a cat celebrating the new year.

I like the personal touch of it being signed by Cat.

Running from a Ghost

A Ghost host, to be precise.

Last year, I began my search for a WordPress replacement in earnest, and signed up for a yearly plan using Ghost via https://www.magicpages.co/.

I have no complaints about the service or support, but 20 years of using WordPress proved a bigger hurdle to overcome than I thought. I really like some aspects of Ghost, but just as often I run into limits. It’s possible some of the limits might be theme-related, or could be overcome with CSS or something else, but I find I have little patience anymore to go down these rabbit holes to get things to work the way I want. WP is far from perfect (I could write a book–probably just from my posts highlighting WP’s issues) but I know it and have adapted to its flaws and weird bits.

I feel Ghost is close, but not quite it. Or maybe it is and I’m not willing to put in the effort.

Either way, I’m sticking with WP for at least a little bit longer. I’ll continue to ponder a move, but the urgency is no longer there.

Here is a cat:

My nonsense is now even more convenient

I’ve finally added an RSS link on the sidebar of the site. It should work in your favourite (or even most-hated) RSS reader, making it easier than ever to keep up with whatever rolls around in my noggin and ends up on this site. It’s like the Year 2000 all over again!

RSS link

This coincides with me trying to find another RSS reader myself and maybe stick to it. It could happen!

Also, this seems like a good random post to update on how I was looking into other options for my blog after all the WordPress drama of the past year or so. It turns out that trying to break out of a 20-year habit is hard (I started this blog on WordPress in 2005). And I always found something I didn’t like in the alternatives. But I am still looking in a casual kind of way, part of it being driven by the curiosity of what else is out there now for blogging.

I have once again mucked around with the colours on the site

Why? Because I can.

I also wanted to have a warmer look that is less business-like/bland. For reference (change is inevitable), it currently looks like this:

This may look different by the time you read this!

I’ve been reading a lot about old-timey blogs of yore lately, and the nostalgia hits hard. I don’t want to fully embrace all the sometimes questionable aesthetics of that era (late 90s, early 2000s) by having busy backgrounds, random MIDI files tooting on the home page and so on, but some actual colour might be nice.

Inevitably, I retreat from these changes and may do so again, but for now, enjoy a little green and yellow instead of the more standard blue and white.

Post 31 for July 2025

I don’t know why I posted so little this month. If I hadn’t been running and birding regularly, I’d have barely posted at all!

As often, I did crank out a bunch of posts right at the end of the month to at least get an average of one-per-day. I will reflect on my lack of gumption or whatever it is, and see if things change in August. If not, then I’ll just post lots of AI slop1!

  1. OK, I probably won’t. I won’t. I promise. Not even AI dogs playing poker. ↩︎

Should I go retro?

I’m mulling another redo of this blog’s look and I’m thinking of going all-in on retro. Not in a crazy way, like trying to simulate the <blink> tag or embedding MIDI samples, but something a little warmer, less corporate-looking.

I shall mull things like colour choices, fonts and assorted bits of whimsy. The downside of this is I am not a programmer and can’t just whip up some fancy CSS using my big brain, so the process will be slow, painful, etc. But possibly worth it.

I could do things like change from a basic white background. But should I?

I will ponder.

So long, doodlingsandnoodlings.com!

For a time I had the idea of a more purpose-driven blog and out of that I secured the domain for doodlings and noodlings.com.

I never used it, and I am passing on the opportunity to renew it, so anyone else who wants it, go get it!

The idea seemed sound at the time:

  • Take my two main creative interests, writing and drawing, and combine them into a blog that would showcase each.
  • I could use lots of old material to get the site rolling, so I wouldn’t immediately need to create new content.
  • I could opine about writing/art in general to “fill in the gaps”.

There were a few problems, though:

  • The URL, though kind of catchy, is long. Also, I could never remember if it was doodlings andnoodlings or noodlingsanddoodlings. This didn’t seem like a good sign.
  • My brain doesn’t seem to like being restricted to just a few topics, which is why this blog (creolened.com) covers anything that pops into my head.
  • I think part of me just wanted to do something more “worthy” than rambling about random things.

In the end, I realized I was not going to seriously pursue the site and chose to let the domain expire. It’s also why, as we start May 2025, I have not yet moved off of WordPress, despite a desire to unhitch from a platform that is apparently running largely based on the whims of a single person with, uh, interesting views.

I’m still not entirely ready to start up something new, but I will let the ideas just appear organically or something–which may mean never. And if it’s never, I can live with that.

Looks like I’ll be spamming a lot of posts soon

I am way behind on my two-posts per day minimum (which is an arbitrary number I made up, but my blog, my rules). Let’s do the math:

  • There are 31 days in March, so two posts per day = 62
  • As of this post, I have written 31
  • This means I must write 31 more
  • After today, there are four days left in the month
  • If you divide 31 by 4, you get 7.75

I must write 7.75 posts every day for the rest of March.

I’m not sure if I can do it this month, for reasons.

But I’ll try.