Oh, To Be A Techie Celt!

I apologize to all those who have tried to access my blog only to receive an error message.

My site has crashed and burned on many occasions over the past week. I promise I am trying my best to set this right, and hoping and praying my best will be good enough.

But alack and alas, I am no Techie Celt

I started blogging because I love to write, not realizing a little background in computer programming might be helpful along the way.

Of course, I didn't pick a simple blog layout.

No! That would have been the safe way. Instead, I chose a complicated, graphic-rich, plug-in laden, server-resource-loving template. I think my adjectives really show I should stick to writing rather than trying to be a computer geek.

Anyway, the long and the short of this story is that I must discover how to optimize my website. When I phoned the helpline for my server host, they advised me to contact my webmaster.

"My Webmaster?" I asked.

"And who might that be?"

"The person who developed your site, and does your programming?" came the reply.

"Speaking!" I said. "But I am afraid this master or mistress of the web is not very masterful."

The support guy explained that website development is not part of their provided service. At least he gave me some links to check out, all on this scintillating topic of "optimization."

It all sounded good to me. I rolled up my sleeves, focused on my computer screen, then typed in the first recommended url. A few latent synapses fired in my foggy brain, as I read the introduction.

By the time I reached the third sentence I had completely forgotten what on earth I was supposed to be researching. Something about MySQL servers, HTML, optimization, caching, spam-bots, query limits, kilobytes, hits, page views, traffic......

Did someone say traffic?

Yes, blog traffic! That's what I want!

But to handle all this increased traffic, I need to know what on earth I am doing.

Hosting and Chaching

I think my host company knew we were in trouble when I phoned to ask about caching last week.

"Do I need to caché ?"

I asked in my best French accent, with a lovely, long "eh" sound at the end. It really is pronounced just like cash.

Anyway, the long and the short of this story is that I am on a very steep learning curve. In fact, there is no curve at all. It's just one massive steep slope, and I am starting right at the bottom of the hill. This computer lingo is Double Dutch to me. With zero dollars in my development fund, I have no choice but to get to the bottom of this mess.

My writing and posting have been put on the back

burner for a few days, while I try to figure out this

whole server crashing business.

So please, if you try to reach my page and get an error message, don't give up. I am evolving into a techie Celt, an Irish American geek, who will hopefully become the master of her own domain any day now.

And so all I can ask is for your patience and understanding. Please do come back and visit. Don't give up on this confused and frustrated Irish American Mom.