Switching to WordPress?

Dana at Common Sense Political Thought often nudges me to switch to WordPress. I'm not so much against it as I'm not that unsatisfied with Blogger. Sure, folks say migrating over to WordPress is superior, and most of the biggest blogs on the web use it (Dana Loesch, Hot Air, Instapundit at Pajamas, Jules Crittenden, Michelle Malkin, and RightWingNews, for some random examples). But I recall Ann Althouse writing about Blogger migration issues sometime back. She said she had no intention of leaving Blogger, mainly because of free hosting (and general dependability). It's not that she was being cheap or anything. It was that she had lots of stuff online. I recall she mentioned her podcasts at the time. They were just sitting there, not being used, and she was paying for it. With Blogger, as long as the company's in business your blog is parked, for free. I like that. (This is my second blog, and my first one's still over there, ready to raid as a resource from time to time.) My issue now is photo-hosting. It's the only thing I pay for, at Photobucket. I works pretty good, although Stogie got pissed with 'em for false promotional claims (they have this screwy "bandwidth" limit every month, and in fact that's why I went pro at the time). If I switch from Photobucket, my older pics now at American Power will deactivate. Still, it's something I'm thinking about. How's Flickr working out for folks?

Anyway, though, Smitty at The Other McCain was talking trash on how hot the WordPress makeover at Robert's blog has been, and he notes:

On a technical note, the power of WordPress to support these FMJRAs is astounding .... Two points: we should have gone to the WordPress platform sooner, and people still in the Blogger ghetto should consider switching to a WordPress site, if only for the joy of better trackback/pingback coverage. My, don’t we sound just a tad bit uppity now that we’ve got our own domain and stuff?

"FMJRA" is "Full-Metal Jacket Reach-Around" for those not familiar with "How to Get a Million Hits on Your Blog in Less Than a Year." But I think Smitty spoke a little too early (and I'm just ribbing him a bit), even though he was mostly kidding around. I was checking over there last night for some on-the-ground reporting from Massachusetts, where Robert's working the Scott Brown freelance beat, and I got this error message:

It says "If you can see this page, the people who manage this server have installed ..."

In other words, our server's crashed right now. Check back later. I haven't talked to Robert since he was covering the BCS championship, but this isn't the first time their blog's gone down. So, while it's hot and all that -- WordPress is working better as a technical platform -- it's kind of a bummer for regular readers and fellow bloggers when one can't get on the site. (That's a hosting issue, not WordPress per se, but still ...) That's of course hardly ever a problem on Blogger, although it's happened a couple of times. Since they redid the Blogger template a couple of years back, the program has been super dependable. I can only remember one or two times when I couldn't get on my dashboard, and the whole service has gone out maybe once. That, along with the pricing, is attractive for folks, and of course Blogger is EASY!! I'm still figuring out how to do stuff. So, yeah, one of these days I too will migrate to WordPress. I'd enjoy something with a way more professional look, especially if my blogging keeps going well and getting popular (as it has this last year or so). In the meanwhile, I'm cool on Blogger. But if anyone's got some ideas for photo-hosting I'm all ears!

Big Weekend for Visiting Friends and Family at American Power

Friday morning I wrote this on my Facebook profile:

Got a big weekend friends, grading, visiting a political scientist-friend from the East Coast at the Queen Mary tomorrow, visiting with my sister and her family tomorrow night ... Well, better get busy! :)

So, I thought I might as well share a little report of how things turned out.

The "visiting political scientist-friend" is Professor Daniel Nexon from Georgetown University. Dan was in town for the annual meeting of the Social Science History Association, held at the Queen Mary Hotel, at the Port of Long Beach. (The association website is here, the call for papers here, and the schedule of academic panels is here). Dan e-mailed me a month ago to give me the heads up. I picked him up yesterday at 9:00am to get some breakfast. Here's the shot of the liner as I was walking in:

The hotel's main desk is on the third floor. Here's the shot from the gangway as I was walking up:

Dan and I drove across the channel over to the Shoreline Marina in downtown Long Beach. As we we're walking back out after eating, I snapped a quick shot back at the Queen Mary from the parking lot:

I did not take pictures of Dan, for a couple of reasons: One is that I didn't really think about it until we were almost done having breakfast, and two is that this was the first time I'd met Dan in person, and I wasn't comfortable taking Dan's picture. We met online about three years ago. He left a snarky response to a comment I'd left at Democracy Arsenal. This was before I started blogging, although Dan was blogging at Duck of Minerva, an international relations group blog. Currently, Dan is on academic leave from his department and is now working as an policy analyst at the Department of Defense. Being how Dan's involved in fairly high-level policy work, I thought I'd hold off on personal pictures until later. Dan's Georgetown faculty page is here, in any case. And here's the Princeton University Press page for his recent book, The Struggle for Power in Early Modern Europe:Religious Conflict, Dynastic Empires, and International Change.

I might be seeing Dan at the American Political Science Association meeting next September, and if so, I'll check with him then about posting personal pics online.

In the meanwhile, this is my sister Tracy:

Tracy came to visit at my home last night with her husband and daughter. Tracy gave me permission to publish her picture. Recall that I'm being careful about posting family information, but I actually haven't had any problems since publishing my Halloween photo essay a couple of weeks ago. So, let's keep our fingers crossed for continued respectfulness among commenters here, etc.

Tracy has a show dog, a Doberman Pinscher, named Alex, who is almost two years old:

When Tracy first told me she'd gotten a Doberman I laughed with her about it. When we were kids we saw They Only Kill Their Masters, a 1972 crime-suspense flick with James Garner and Katherine Ross.

I think we were actually really scared of Dobermans for a while after seeing that, LOL! But if Alex is any indication, Dobermans are just the sweetest, most gentle animals you'd want to be around. Alex is well trained and not rambunctious at all. He's gentle and playful, and loves kisses and petting. I didn't have time to ask my sister, but Alex has done well in dog show competitions. Also, this is a breeding dog, so Tracy's spoken to me about breeding inquiries she's received.

So, that was my big Saturday. The only thing I've left out is the grading!

In fact , I need to read about a dozen semester paper assignments today, and I'll probably watch some football. I'll be online later this morning and afternoon, as usual, for some hot blogging. And check back for my hot Marisa Miller entry tonight for sure!

*****

P.S. I just noticed the second shot of Alex includes Barack Obama's mug on my TV in the living room. That TV is a 20-inch Magnavox. We had a big Sony Bravia Widescreen, but my youngest son -- during a tantrum a year or so ago -- threw a big hard-plastic Incredible Hulk toy into the screen, the impact of which pierced the television and destroyed the picture. Those things are expensive! So, hopefully we'll get another 32-incher in there pretty soon.

More tonight!

Halloween 2009

Okay, this post is a special treat and thank you for American Power readers.

I periodically get requests to see family photos; but considering how much hate mail I get (or hate e-mails and comments at the blog), including occasional death threats, I've been careful with how much family information I post online. But yesterday my wife and I took our boys over to the local pumpkin patch, AND, my wife said it'd be okay to share some family pictures, so enjoy this: It might be a one time shot, or at least a once-in-blue-moon Douglas family photo-album.

Okay, that's yours truly below. We visit the Johnson Brothers Pumpkin Patch, which is an area tradition. After Halloween, the location goes up as a Christmas tree lot in mid-November. Lots of good stuff, including farm animals and pony rides:

I'm 5'10", so their "How Tall This Fall" sign is accurate. No measurement on the waist, but I'm a 36" in work khakis, although I'm totally saggin' in my Urban Pipeline shorts here [UPDATE: 8:00pm and doing a bit of laundry ... turns out I'm a 38" in the waist, as per my Nordstrom slacks for work tomorrow!]:

This is my youngest boy, 8, in one of the bounce houses. Ain't he a darlin'?

Here's the big turkey. The farm animals are out next to the pony rides:

She came out of their little barn for a drink of water. It's been hot in Orange County - Santa Ana wind-weather, in the mid-80s:

It felt good to be out and about:

Okay, here's the moment you've all been waiting for: The full family portrait! My oldest boy is 13. He's shy and didn't really want to take pictures. And that's my wife of 15 years. You've already met my youngest son at the bounce-house above:

Here's a couple of the headstones lining the side of the Haunted House area:

My oldest again, checking out some additional "grave markers." He's never without the iTunes headset:

Okay, back at home a bit later, my youngest is getting ready for Trick-or-Treating. He's "Optimus Prime," from Transformers 2:

My boys made these artsy-pumpkins a couple of weeks ago. We placed them on the front porch. Lots of parents took their very small children Trick-or-Treating. I love that (we had some big kids too, but the babies are so fun - they'll walk right in your front door and grab a whole bunch of candy from the bowl):

Remember when you were little?

No comment needed here - only a reminder to keep both your faith and your children close:

Holiday season's almost here, notwithstanding the hot temperatures. Here's wishing folks the best this season, with love from my home to yours.

Picture of the Day, 6-8-09

From today's Los Angeles Times, "Pakistan military campaign has broad support, but for how long?":

Taj Mina, 10, in blue scarf, and Mariam, in brown, line up for food at the refugee camp dubbed Little Lahore outside Swabi. Residents queue for hours for supplies in extreme heat, without water or electricity.

Support for the military offensive against the Pakistani Taliban in the northwest has been widespread, cutting across economic and ethnic lines. But that support hinges precariously on how Pakistan manages the massive humanitarian crisis created by the war's displacement of an estimated 3 million Pakistanis.


About 200,000 of the displaced people, nearly all ethnic Pashtuns, are crammed into sprawling tent camps in Mardan and elsewhere in the country. The rest have sought refuge with relatives or friends. At Sheikh Yaseen, more than 7,600 people live in 1,485 tents.

The Pakistani military launched the offensive in April after Taliban militants based in Swat began to assert control over adjoining districts, one of them just 60 miles from the capital, Islamabad.

The broad support for the military campaign could be undermined if the flow of displaced Pashtuns to other regions and cities triggers ethnic tensions. Thousands of Pashtuns have sought shelter in camps and homes in the southern port city of Karachi, where political leaders of the majority ethnic Sindhi population have vehemently opposed their influx.

Photo Credit: Carolyn Cole for the Los Angeles Times.