Internal Affairs

Earlier today, a problem developed with the hosting account for ThinkingMeat. I emailed the provider, and owner Tom Koch responded quickly. He worked with me for several hours to track down and repair the bug.

My sites have been hosted at TRKHosting for several years, and Tom’s service has never been anything short of superb. I want to thank Tom for the unfailingly excellent support he provides, and offer my unreserved recommendation: If you need someone to host your website, call TRKHosting.

New commenter notjenna alerted me yesterday to an issue with the comment pages. Any attempt to leave a comment resulted in an “Error 404” page popping up.

I think I have it fixed, but if you see any further issues, please let me know. Thanks.

I’m experimenting with Twitter as a means of publishing shorter tidbits and comments that don’t rate a new blog post. The latest from my Twitter feed is displayed in the sidebar. This is an experiment, and I might decide at some point that it isn’t working and discontinue the Twitter account. We shall see.

My Twitter updates page is located at http://twitter.com/meatbrain.

The blog has been upgraded to the latest WordPress software, and I have also upgraded the Tarski theme that I use. There’s lots of new options in this theme, so please forgive any glitches you may observe over the next few days.

A database issue arose last evening, and the solution has required a reload of the blog database from a backup taken Monday morning. As a result, all comments made between 14 January 2008 02:00 AM EST and 15 January 2008 09:45 AM EST (the latter time is approximate) have been lost. I apologize for the inconvenience.

Wordpress should have emailed me copies of the comments made during that period, so if you want copies of your lost comments, just drop me a line. Feel free to repost any comments that have gone missing.

The database issue seems to have been caused by a problematical URL in a comment. Until I can work out a way to protect against a recurrence, all comments will be held for moderation. Anything that hasn’t got a suspect URL or isn’t spam will be approved.

The long silence here is not because I’ve fallen off a cliff (though there are no doubt those who would rejoice if I did), but because I have been dealing with the illness of a family member. The hiatus will continue a while longer, while I do some server cleanup and a long-overdue upgrade of Wordpress.

I’ll be back in due course. Play nice, children.

Hearken to me, all ye webmasters. I have a wondrous tale to tell.

Earlier today, ThinkingMeat.net went off the air for a while. Unbeknownst to me, the site had exceeded its bandwidth limit for the month. (Whoops!) I sent an email to my hosting company, TRKHosting.com, and it was answered promptly by Tom Koch, the proprietor. I’m used to that; I am firmly of the opinion that Tom has struck a deal with some dark power that enables him to answer emails almost before they are sent, and to go entirely without sleep.

What I was not expecting was that Tom would instantly increase my bandwidth limit to more than twice its original size! I thanked Tom most profusely and asked him what I owed him for this service. The answer: not a red cent. Tom informed me that “this change is permanent and won’t cost anything extra. As long as you stay a client that’s all I need”.

The only possible response, I think, is… “Holy crap!”. There is good service, there is great service, and there is service that astonishes. Tom Koch and TRKHosting have never once failed to deliver astonishing service, and I cannot recommend Tom’s firm highly enough for anyone who needs web hosting services. I’ve placed a link to Tom’s site in my sidebar, where it should have been long ago. Tom, you are a gentlemen, a scholar, and a true wonder. Thank you.

So why is this blog called ThinkingMeat?

Because that’s what we are, essentially, every last one of us. We’re creatures that have evolved the power of thought—maybe not a very well-developed power of thought just yet, but hey… we’re a work in progress. Read the rest of this entry »

I tired of Devenir En Gris quickly enough. Regulus has a nice look to it, and the CSS seems logically arranged and amenable to easy modification. I think I’ll stick with it for a while.

I’m playing around with themes for the site. Expect chaos for a while.

UPDATE: I’ve settled on Devenir En Gris for the time being. It’s a bit bland for my taste, so as time permits I’ll either adapt it to my liking, or create a custom theme of my own.

Find out more about WordPress themes at the WordPress Codex.