In Christ Alone is on a lot of readers’ lists of favorite hymns; and I’m posting it here because I’ve almost used up the first list of Your Favorite Hymns and I want to invite all readers to come up with another. Don’t be afraid to suggest more than one hymn. It’s not like we’ll ever run out of them.
I know, I know–with anything like this, the pattern always is: a few people act and a lot of people watch. I’d like to see more readers participating, but if I knew how to draw you in, I’d probably be rich and arrogant. So all I can do is hold out the invitation.
Twenty-four hours after initiating a routine maintenance chore, the computer I normally work with is still out of the saga, hors de combat, non-functional, doesn’t freakin’ work, etc. etc. It is still configuring! Can you say “configuring”? I have no idea what that means in computer lingo; plain English won’t help you out of that labyrinth.
Patty is cautiously optimistic that it’s almost done having a breakdown or whatever else you call it when you approve an update and the whole thing turns into Nadler. Well, that would be wonderful indeed if she were right. Then I could go back to trying to get my Share button back.
I’d like to put up a couple more posts today; but I’d also like to go outside and have a cigar before it starts to rain.
Meanwhile, we can all be thankful that no one is serious about basing public policy on computer models. Especially just before an update.
This morning I have no Facebook connection at all. When I try to reconnect, WordPress tells me it’s “not allowed.” What?
Is this all to force me to use their shiny new “block editing”? Well, I can’t use it! And I don’t want to use it! I’m here to write, not sod around with computers.
WordPress acts more like an adversary than the provider of a service. But of course if I leave I’ll lost an archive numbering thousands of posts.
No wonder I’m down 120 views a day.
P.S.–Jill has found other Facebook buttons I can use, so at least I can go back to sharing my blog posts on my wife’s Facebook page. The only drawback is that the new buttons don’t tell me how many readers have shared the post. Maybe it’s a WordPress glitch that’ll go away. I don’t know.
Ragnar the Happy Puppy, once a business associate of Byron the Quokka, has found that the “301 Whatsit Permanently Moved” message that used to scuttle my Facebook posts is now gone as mysteriously as it came; and also the little “share” buttons now have numbers in them again (WordPress blames that glitch on Facebook).
I would like to know, now, if my readers are able to share my posts with others on Facebook. I’m sure some of you have given up trying. But the only way I’ll know if it’s working is for readers to share my posts. The more it gets shared, the higher the little number in the button. Sorry, but that’s about as hi-tech as my language gets.
For that matter, yes, I do know that many of us have learned to despise Facebook, and for good reason. But for the time being, that’s what I have and that’s what I must use.
Meanwhile, I’m short 100 views a day, or more–still haven’t solved that mystery. But if a bunch of you each share two or three posts, at least I’ll know it.
P.S.–Since I wrote this, all the little numbers in the blue buttons have disappeared again. You could just scream.
Meanwhile, Re-Farmer has reported that she was able to share my posts on Facebook if she visited the blog through Google Chrome instead of Firefox.
The numbers are in. Calloo, callay, oh frabjous day.
Compared with the first six months of this year, our blog has lost 100 views a day, these past three months. Do I know why? Nope. Do I even suspect why? Nope.
This is the year the locust has eaten down to the ground.
Well, two hymn requests have come in this morning, and I think I’ll post them. Why not?
I just noticed that we’re now 50 items down the list of Your Favorite Hymns–which I think means it’s time to load up the wagon again. They’re not stopping us from posting hymns yet, and that’s how I like to start each blogging day.
The idea is to post hymns that readers want to hear. This is open to everyone here, even if you’re just a casual passer-by–and you can name as many hymns as you please (because nobody has just one favorite hymn!), and I’ll put them all on the list. And I’ll use ’em all, too.
One of the things we ought to do, as Christians living in an evil and distressing age, is sing louder! It really bugs the living daylights out of the devil, and it’s a good thing for us all to hear.
We’re getting censored here and censored there–but this shop is still open, the bad guys must’ve overlooked it. Walk right in and request a hymn! Or five hymns, if you want. Especially if you haven’t done it before. Yo, everybody, we’re making a statement here! Join the happy throng! Okay, okay, it’s a few thousand bodies short of being an official throng, but we’re working on it.
I have for years enjoyed sharing, with my readers, posts by other Christian bloggers. It pleased me to think I was widening their audience, and you all seemed very happy about it.
But now I can’t share your posts, and it’s not my fault.
First WordPress took away my Reblog function. Something about “you’re on a business plan, you’re not allowed reblog.” Then I discovered the “Share” button, that little symbol that looks like this >, and as long as I was sharing Christian posts that appeared on my Reader, it was just as good as a reblog.
But yesterday I was told I don’t have “Share” anymore–because the hoozit isn’t shebangled with the booscus and a hay-na-nonny and a ha-cha-cha. Oh, they’d let me have “Share” if I used their brand-new totally-impossible-to-understand “Block Editor.” I’ve seen it. I couldn’t use that if my life depended on it.
I have tried to explain to the WP Happiness Engineers. “This is your technology, not mine. I am just a passenger–and you don’t ask the passenger to come out of the plane and do maintenance on the jet engine. You need to be more user-friendly!” They say they’ll see what they can do, to allow me to Share even if I’m using the standard editing format that I’ve used for years. Betcha if their boss told them to find a way or else, they’d find one. But I’ll be very much surprised if they actually solve my problem for me.
So, guys, that’s why I’m not sharing your posts anymore: I want to, but I can’t. They won’t let me.
All I can do is keep pestering WordPress about it.
I feel like going back to bed. Or just sitting on a lily-pad all day.
My allergies have decided to drop in and kill me for a while, and my knee still isn’t right.
Democrats are bragging about how they’re gonna wipe out our republic, and nobody does anything about it. Attorney General Barr acts like he’s got all the time in the world to see to this. But we all know he’s almost out of time.
I pick up new followers every day; and yet every day my blog readership shrinks a little more. Or a lot more. The numbers are back where they were in 2016. This is disheartening. Work hard, be creative, try to give the readers what they want–none of it has any effect at all. If I were a business, I’d be going under.
The virus panic and *The Great Quarantine Of Healthy People* has gotten to me, I guess–and gotten, I don’t doubt, to hundreds of my readers. If I still have hundreds left. We feel so blaaaaah! And it doesn’t help our morale knowing that mail-in vote fraud is going to do to us what Hitler and Tojo couldn’t do. Gentleman Johnny Burgoyne and all his Hessian mercenaries couldn’t do what mail-in voter fraud can do. And once they’re back in power, they’ll make sure we can never vote them out. One way or another, they’ll make sure.
Did I mention that something or someone has removed all my Facebook shares going back years into the archives? I guess they’re really, really mad at me for not begging for a ticket on the transgender express. You’re not allowed to have that opinion anymore.
I really hoped we’d have a comment contest winner yesterday, but it didn’t happen. And today, so far, we have zero comments!
Did I mention the winner, the reader who posts Comment No. 65,000, gets an autographed paddle ball? Like this:
And of course this gigantic picture comes up when I was shooting for just a little-bitty one. Looks like it’s going to be that kind of day.
Or you can win an autographed copy of Lee’s new book, His Mercy Endureth Forever.
If nobody comments, then no one will win either of these fantastic spiffy prizes. I told him the prize ought to be a bicycle: he’d be combin’ comments out of his hair this morning. I told him, but does he listen? Crikey! At the rate he’s going, this blog’ll disappear altogether by Saturday. And there’ll be no one left to help us open Quokka University.
Good morning and g’day! Byron the Quokka here, with my kid cousin, Faizy, getting ready to announce the winner of our current comment contest–because there are only 47 left to go to reach 65,000, and I’d like to see it done today!
The winner who posts No. 65,000 will get either an autographed copy of Lee’s new book, His Mercy Endureth Forever, or an autographed paddle ball toy complete with rubber band, whichever prize you want. The book has giant hyenas in it. The fli-back doesn’t.
And now I’d better scarper out of here because I just erased the video he had loaded up for this morning.
I hope to be back later today to announce the winner!
