Tag Archives: Blogging

Commenting allowed!

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Commenting allowed!

After putting up my last post, I noticed that commenting was off, for some reason.

Not just on the last port – but all posts, at least for a while back.

I guess, at some point, an upgrade to WordPress made this setting and I had no idea.

Well, now I’ve corrected it. I needed to go to Posts, tick all titles, select Bulk Actions -> Edit and up came a window with various options including allowing people to comment.

Of course, to stop this happening in future, I also went to Settings -> Discussions and ticked some boxes to allow comments.

So, it wasn’t my fault and, it seems, was some common problem.

Glad I noticed it though. At least, now, people can comment on the stuff I write.

In the meantime ……

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It’s not that I haven’t been writing.

It’s just that I haven’t been able to finish anything.

I don’t know – it’s a strange time. F has been away for almost a month now. I was joking with people the other day that I didn’t know who he was. Of course, the side-effect of this is that I have been incredibly busy, since I have to do everything at home. I don’t mind that, of course, but it all takes time.

There’s also another thing. Since I moved the blog and went through all the posts to delete some and ensure links still worked, I’ve become a bit more aware of the better writing and the boring stuff (this would go under the heading of “boring stuff”) and there’s a part of me that doesn’t finish the posts simply because I realise it’s not good writing or it falls into the category of “boring stuff”.

Of course, I should get over this. I can always delete posts later if they are really boring – like I did when I tidied things up after the move.

Also, because I’ve been so busy, there is also much less angst than usual and, as you will know, angst results in better writing. So, too busy = less angst = worse writing. A no win situation.

There have been many things that I’ve wanted to comment about, from the news, from life – but nothing really “strong”, nothing really important.

I am well. The dogs are well. F is stressed and tired but well. Summer is coming (it’s reasonably warm here if a bit temporal.)

So, that’s another thing – nothing is really happening.

Still, there ARE posts I want to finish so, who knows, maybe I will finish them soon.

In the meantime, apart from this post, I’ve been posting songs 8as you may have noticed) as a temporary stop-gap. Sorry.

Nearly there.

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So, to keep you up to date.

The blog move is completed. The posts have been updated and, with any luck, I haven’t missed correcting any links. Some posts have been deleted and some draft posts deleted. Other draft posts are now published or about to be published.

There’s just a couple of things left to do:

1. Redirect certain old posts on the old blog to this blog.
2. Delete the old blog, putting a “this blog is closed” notice up.

And, of course,

3. Promote the blog – letting you link to it and putting it on the other websites for it to get “noticed”.

Nearly there.

You also might like the new pages I’ve put up (see the pages bar at the top) to enable people to “find their way around” a little easier. I’ve amended About this blog, All about me and added My Best Writing, Most Popular Posts and Information for Tourists/Visitors to Milan – just in case you’d care to have a look.

It’s a long and sometimes winding road.

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Its a long and sometimes winding road

You may think that I’m not keeping this blog up to date any more but that’s only partly true.

When I moved the blog, all the links to the old blog had to be changed to the new one. I found a program that was supposed to do it. It did some of the links but not all by any means. So now I have to correct them by hand.

Also, I want to delete a directory that is, almost, a duplicate of another directory. It holds the pictures and photographs I use. This means going through each post and checking the right directory is used and that the photo/picture exists in that directory.

And, finally, during the various ISP moves that I’ve had some things got a bit mixed up and replaced with weird characters – so I wanted to fix them.

As a result, I’ve been reading through the blog from the beginning.

There are 84 pages of posts – around 1600 posts! It’s taking a while, as you might imagine. I am now on page 48 (i.e. I have 48 pages to go!!)

However, it has allowed me to see my life in a different way. Some of it heart-wrenching, some boring. I am amazed that some of you have kept up with me all the way along! I mean, some parts are just boring post after bloody boring post! Why on earth do you do it? Some posts have been relegated to the scrap heap because they were short and said nothing or because all the links failed to work!

I’m considering a way to permit people to navigate to the best writing (in my opinion), the most-viewed posts and the posts with something special to say – so, as I’m reading, I’m noting page numbers against categories. It almost makes me want to redesign the blog entirely. Or move certain posts to a different blog. In any event, I want the reader to be able to navigate to particular portions or posts more quickly. God knows, I wouldn’t want anyone else to have to labour through the boring posts!

Just last night, I went to dinner at A’s place and we discussed the blog move. A few things have become very clear to me whilst I’ve been reading the past posts.

1. This is NOT really the whole of my life in Italy. Some of it is (and those are very boring posts) whilst a lot of it are my thoughts which may or may not relate to Italy.

2. Most of the blog are my thoughts and NOT reality. It’s a look into my head – not always a fabulous place to be. However, it’s where the best writing is.

3. I am seriously a) paranoid, b) fearful, c) fucked up. All in my head, of course. On the outside I remain a) in control, b) sensible and c) normal. I’m not sure that these two sides of me should be so wildly different.

4. The shit/difficult times that seemed to last fooooor eeeever, actually lasted no time at all but, boy, do I write a LOT of posts during these shit times!

5. I wish I had written more, sometimes, about things that were happening. There are gaps that I can’t seem to fill very well. God knows what you lot thought at the time!

So, there you have it. Lots of work still to do and, apart from this post, I hope I’ll be filling the blog with more interesting stuff and much, much better writing, in future.

As they say in Italy – this is a hardly work!

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Hard work!

You will probably think that I’m not keeping this blog up to date since its move.

And, in part, you’d be right – but only in part.

I’ve been meaning to do this for a long while now and, with the move and needing to check that everything is still working (links, etc.), I’ve been going through all the posts I’ve made.

There are a LOT of posts! I have been correcting links, making sure pictures work and, occasionally, deleting posts that, in my view, are a complete waste.

I’m up to March of 2009.

This is just before I moved into the perfect-flat-on-the-perfect-street. It’s trying, reading these posts. I can remember it well. What surprised me was that I hadn’t really “let you in” on all my feelings. I thought I had. At the start (which I thought was November, 2008 but was actually only just before Christmas 2008), I told you nothing of my feelings. The blog seems to be so much lighter in tone than the reality was. There’s one post, towards the end of March, 2009 when I apologise for the blog being depressing – although, now that I’m having to read every post, it doesn’t seem that depressing at all!

Still, I have 6 years worth of blog posts to go before I get up to date. OMG!

But I have some things to tell you (about recent events) so I’ll try and do a couple of posts in the next few days to keep you up to date. I can only apologise for the lack of posting right now

And ………… I’m back!

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Well, I’m back and it didn’t seem to take that long.

There is one post that I wrote which is the one before this. And another that, unfortunately, got lost in the “move” although I will try to remember what I had written.

So welcome to Thesmediolanumlif – This Milan Life. New name but, sadly or happily, it’ll be full of the same old crap as it always was.

I’m now going to spend a little time tidying things up, deleting some of the old posts that didn’t have anything to say and changing things a bit. So, bear with me.

But, at least I’m back :-D

Blah, blah, blah

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There is a person that I really, really dislike.

I would almost go so far as to say “hate” but how can you hate someone you don’t even know?

There are two basic things “wrong” with this person.

1. They live here but, from what they’ve “said”, they hate/dislike so many things, I really don’t know why they are still here. Well, I do know why – it’s because they’re married to an Italian – but, really, why stay?

I don’t like everything here but, as I’ve said, many times, I wouldn’t be anywhere else. I love my life here and the things that suck are few and far between (and, if I don’t try and do anything official, it’s generally pretty fine).

This person complains. Pretty much all the time. And it’s annoying. It seems really difficult for them to see positive things, most of the time.

2. I really dislike it when people allude to “special powers” they have. In this case it’s “links to powerful people”. And, by “powerful people”, I don’t mean the Prime Minister of Italy, nor the local police chief but, rather, the local “mafia”. I remember a guy I once went out with who alluded to being part of the Israeli secret service. It was, of course, a complete load of bollocks – not least because, if he had been, he wouldn’t have gone on about it. Or someone I once employed who tried to convince everyone he had been in the French Foreign Legion. I thought he might make a good salesman but should have trusted my original instincts. He, of course, was lying about everything. And, I mean everything. Including a child that he said wasn’t his and the other women in his life. In the end, he married another employee of mine and I was quite sad about that – for her.

And, so, anyone alluding to some sort of secret connections/job that they “can’t really talk about” but do, really annoys me. I find these people to be, generally, untrustworthy and, so, don’t trust them.

Other than those two things, most of this person’s outpourings are, to be frank, utter bollox. A lot of hot air – or blah, blah, blah containing nothing of interest.

The problem is that I can’t quite bring myself to “get rid of them”. It’s like watching a car crash. Fascinating and hateful at the same time.

But, if I ever met this person, I would want to give them a really good slap in the face so it’s a good job that there is almost no chance of ever meeting them.

Still, I put up with colleagues that I dislike and are really stupid so I’m sure I can put up with this person.

But it’s annoying all the same.

It’s good to be back.

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Maybe, just maybe, it’s over …….. for now.

Which means that I can get back on track. It’s been over a month and it’s been tiring, to be honest. Still, it seems that this part may be done apart from one, smallish thing.

In the meantime, I’ve missed being able to comment on horsemeat, comedians in elections, UK elections, etc.

So, starting tomorrow, or maybe Tuesday, I’ll get back to writing a post or two.

It’s good to be back.

Transferring the site ….. and other things

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4/12

Well, it was all going rather well in day 2 of the GREAT MOVE.

I found that, on the new hosting company, I can work on it without it being ‘live’ – meaning the existing one can remain in place.

Except ……..

It seems that the SQL database I am using is, in fact, the existing SQL database!

WTF?

But, it seems a slightly bastardised version of the existing SQL database.

Time for a break whilst work takes over.  And then we shall see.

Update 1:  The support team at the new hosting company assure me that I have must have restored it/transferred the data otherwise, what I am experiencing “is not possible”.

However, I think it may have something to do with the fact that I created an alias in order to set up the blog before cutting the old one.

But, and this is where the really worrying bit comes, am I looking at the old database or the new one?  If the new one, how can the data have come across when I haven’t, as yet, tried to restore it?  If the old database, then how am I able to look at it if they are held on different servers?  And, what will happen when I cut off the old one?  Will the old database and the new database disappear?

And, even more worrying is: How safe is the data if it can “suddenly” appear in the “new” database without me having done anything?

Bugger.

Update 2 – 10/12:

We’re almost a week on from the above.  Nothing has changed.  My blog is still being hosted on the other servers.  However, today I found something that said it would be easy, so I updated the nameservers (pointing the blog to the correct, new servers), killed the database, restored the database from a backup and checked it was OK and, finally, transferred all the WP files from the backup I created.

Perfect.

Except, of course, not quite.

Not quite as in it didn’t work.  I checked all the passwords, made small adjustments where I found errors and ……..

Still problems.

Then, I suddenly remembered that, the reason I was going to do this at home, last weekend, was that home was where the full file download was.  Here, the copying of files kept timing out – at home, it was fine (except for 3 files).

So, now I can do nothing, until I get home.

So, given the fact that it was a long weekend you may ask why I didn’t do it.  Well, Friday, I did other things, including booking the meat for Christmas and Boxing Day and wandering around looking for presents.  Actually, having wandered around, I found some things but, in the end, I didn’t want to buy them because, for me, now, Christmas Eve is the time for these things and I really wanted to come back on Christmas Eve and do it.  Nowadays this is part of what makes Christmas great.

I did pop into Euronics to see if they had a turntable (the main present for F) as I couldn’t wait for Christmas Eve for this.  They didn’t but, whilst I was there, I looked at televisions (F wants to get me one for Christmas) and fridges (as mine is very old and, sooner or later, will die.)

Saturday, during the day, was mostly spent searching for, researching about and phoning around for the said turntable.  The one I wanted which was supposed to be ‘arriving soon’ at a very local shop, was, in fact, not arriving, they told me.  It was not arriving because it hadn’t been ordered.  However, I could have a different one for only a couple of hundred Euro extra.  I told them I’d think about it.

Then, on another site, I found one.  Not the one I had been looking for exactly but, whilst researching, it seemed that Technics was the make to go for and this was a Techincs.  I phoned them.  They had 2.  And, yes, they would be open on Sunday.

Sunday morning came and, after breakfast, I went to get it.  Perfect.  Whilst waiting for the bus back to town, I saw that someone had posted some crap post about me being 40% happy and thought, “You know nothing”.

And then I got home.

I had forgotten to put the chair against the power lead to the fridge.

Piero had part-chewed through the wire and, somehow, managed to short it without killing himself.  So, now I had no fridge.  I told F and we ended up at Euronics where, for Christmas he bought me a new fridge (to be delivered on Wednesday) and we (together) bought a new telly, which we took home straight away.

But, obviously, to put it up, we had to clean behind where the telly is.  And, so, in the end, I didn’t sit down at the computer until about 5.30 – which was too late to do the move.

So Sunday, was, in the end, a mixed day – although I would say that I was still more than 40% happy, maybe I wasn’t quite 100%.

So you still have to wait to read this.  I hope that, by tomorrow, all will be, more or less, back to normal.

Update 11/12

So, now it’s back up and running and almost done.

Of course, it didn’t quite go as planned.  I got home and uploaded the files.

Except, some were missing and I had no idea until I uploaded them.

So then I had to bugger about this morning – uploading new WordPress files, uploading the ones from work that I had deleted and then resetting the config again.

I did think it was going to be a real pain but, in fact, once I’d done that, all was OK.  Now to fix the picture at the top and we’re done.

Thank goodness.  And, just in time for Christmas too.

I’ll be along to view your blogs and catch up as soon as I can.

Ciao

Piero is nearly as big as Dino!

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Piero has grown.

In fact, everyone who hasn’t seen him for more than about a week comments on how fast he has grown.

And he has. His shoulders are now just a few inches below Dino’s. He hasn’t got Dino’s bulk (not that Dino is fat, jut muscled) nor power but he’s working on it. The games of ‘tug’ that they have every night prove this.

Piero is still very ‘cute’ though, even if he is nearly the same size.

And it got me to thinking about whether Dino was this big when he was seven months old. I thought I might have commented on it in the blog so went back a way to see if I could find out. I didn’t find it. Instead, what I found was the end of V and I (Dino was just about 10 months old at the time). I should go back, from time to time, to see what was happening then.

For example, I found the post where I had been to see the flat that I am now living in.

I found some posts that were quite well written. But then, a tortured mind seems to a requisite for good writing. Perhaps I should randomly go back and have a look at some posts I wrote? It’s interesting to see the change from a different year. After all, this blog has been going for nearly 7 years now and a lot of things have changed in those seven years.

Anyway, back to Piero.

He is cute, he is much bigger, he is more affectionate, he is very, very playful and he is a right little bastard.

But wonderful too.

However, Dino is still the best dog ever.

But I love them both, just the same. And, as my friend C, from London, wrote recently, F REALLY loves the dogs. So all is well.