BRAINPAN LEAKAGE

So, it’s no secret that this time of year is my writing time. Between January and July is when I toss words at the page as fast as I can, in order to meet manuscript deadlines and all that jazz…All you have to do is look at my tour schedule and see that it is blocked out and labeled as such. There was actually a time in my life when I used a Day Planner and knew where I was supposed to be and when. These days it’s a webpage and Outlook, and I  have no idea what’s going on. How times have changed…

But I digress, as usual…

Obviously, the “job” of tossing words at the page cuts into my “fun” of tossing words at the page, i.e. blogging time.

Well… That is kind of what I am here to warn you about.

By now, most of you should be well aware of the major move Brainpan Leakage made from Myspace to its current local WordPress platform. As I said in an earlier blog, I am pretty much having an illicit affair with this software because of its flexibility (different kind of flexible, kids… Minds up here out of the gutter please…)

Since I am able to write offline blog entries pretty much anywhere now, import them into the software, then schedule them to appear at some point in the future… Well, let’s just say I’m kind of oogly all over because of that. Therefore, I am taking advantage of the feature in spades.

Over the next days and weeks, you are going to be subjected to a blog “mini series”. Basically, a whole raft of consecutive blog entries entitled Mahwage, (yeah, Marriage but with the Princess Bride twist to it)… Each has its own subtitle that will hopefully make some manner of sense as you read along.

Basically, this mini series is the tale of how I came to be married to my lovely bride of 21+ years. I will forego further explanation at this point, because the first entry goes into more detail as to the why’s and wherefore’s of this story being told.

At any rate, it is my sincere hope that it will entertain you to some degree. I am more than willing to admit that not all of it is “laugh out loud” funny. Some of it is serious, some of it is sappy and sentimental.  Well, probably a lot of it is sappy and sentimental… But, yes, some of it is  definitely amusing… hopefully in not too much of a “had to be there” fashion if I have translated the events to the page correctly…

I’ve endeavored to leave out the drudgery, and definitely the stuff too personal for public consumption at all.

So, hopefully it will be worth the read…

Hey, it worked for Nicholas Sparks, so why shouldn’t I give it a try? With my own particular style, and a good bit of humor, of course…

More to come…

Murv

If this blog post seems a bit odd – as if I am not entirely sure to whom I am speaking – well, there’s a reason for that.  I am actually posting it in two platforms. Depending upon where you happen to have your browser pointed while reading this will determine your next choice.

Choose one:

• Here, on the fresh, new, WordPress incarnation of Brainpan Leakage, and over yonder on the old, rickety, Myspace version.
• Here on the old, rickety, Myspace incarnation of Brainpan Leakage and over yonder on the fresh, new, WordPress version.

Okay, now that we have the flowchart crap out of the way, let’s get down to business.

Some of you might be wondering about my decision to move my blog, so rather than field questions in email, I have elected to be preemptive about it and give you an explanation here.  First off,  given some of the email I have already received, I suspect I need to run down some of the basic points:

1. I will no longer be posting full-fledged blog entries on Myspace after the one you are currently reading. All of my blogging will be done via the new WordPress interface, and you can easily subscribe to it by surfing yourself over to www.mrsellars.com/mrblog
2. My Myspace page is not going to go away. Well, let me qualify that – I am not going to make it go away. If Tom hits the wrong key on his keyboard while adding a new video and accidentally tosses my page into the void, well, there’s not a whole lot I can do about that. Talk to him.
3. There will still be something resembling posts on my Myspace blog. Kinda… As I said in point number 1, they will NOT be full blown blog entries. What they will be is a snippet of text combined with a link to the WordPress blog entry. They will show up as a title in the blog listing, just like normal. An example of this is the entry just prior to this one, entitled Day-Jah-Voooo. Some of you have already discovered this and made your way over to the new blog.
4. It is up to you. The blog entries can still be read by going through Mysapce, dinking around with their link security, and ending up at the new blog. This, however, does add steps for you. It would probably be easier to simply subscribe to the new version and avoid the hassle. But, like I said, that is entirely up to you.

Now, I suppose I should address the burning question: Why the move?

Simple really. In fact, the title of this blog entry says it all. But, to take that compressed, dessicated gist of the answer and reconstitute it, I will borrow – and paraphrase – a Dr. Harold W. Smith line from the movie Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins…

“Myspace is a great social networking tool, my boy, but its blog interface doesn’t work the way it’s supposed to…”

Truth is, paraphrased or no, that may not be entirely accurate. The Myspace  Blog Interface might just work EXACTLY the way it is supposed to. However, the fact remains that it doesn’t work very effectively. In fact, it just plain sucks. While you are all probably well aware of this, I shall endeavor to explain anyway…

It all began a tad over two years ago when I started blogging in November of 2006. That is when I was dragged, kicking and screaming, into having a Myspace page to begin with.  I have yet to forgive either of my publicists for that, even though it was an incredibly wise and smart decision for them to knock me over the head and deposit me there/here (choose one). They often make wise decisions on my behalf, then force me to become involved whether I like it or not. That’s just how they are. And, while what they do is good for my career as an author, I can still hold a grudge like a cat who just got a bath.

But, I guess I am doing that digressing thing again…

So, anyway, while there have been many, many blog entries in the original incarnation of Brainpan Leakage, what you, the readers can’t possibly know, is that you have missed probably an equal number of entries that never made it to the screen. Why? See the above opinion about the state of the Myspace Blog Interface (or perhaps it would be easier to call it, the MBI).

In a nutshell, the MBI has unceremoniously gone into la-la land when I have tried to post entries, sending whatever inane ramblings I had just typed into the ether, never to be seen again. On other occasions, it has suddenly wiped the screen free of those nasty, annoying words right in the middle of me typing them – usually when I am about 3/4 of the way through with the entry. Given that typing is a big part of how I make my living, I’m pretty sure it wasn’t me that caused the sudden disappearance. I actually do know my way around a keyboard…

Now, I thought maybe I could circumvent this whole vanishing issue by typing my blogs in Word, or even notepad, then cutting and pasting. Well, that didn’t work out so good. You see, our friends at Microsquish love to embed control codes. The Myspace blog interface is not set up to handle them, and unfortunately no amount of editing – via wysiwyg or html – will allow you to remove them completely. They just keep reappearing and making the text of the blog go all fribble-dee-frabbit. (Yes, sometimes I make up my own words.)

On top of all that, even if you make the blog publically viewable, there are a ton of folks who A) Avoid Myspace like the plague under any and all circumstances or B) Don’t know that you don’t have to have a Myspace account to see a publically viewable blog, and therefore resort to option A.

The last straw, the one that broke the proverbial camel’s back, came just a few days ago when I typed in about 75% of a blog and it suddenly went poof right before my eyes. It was a long blog, but it was one that might well have entertained folks. It was yet another rambling about a clacking domino inside my head as my brain endeavors to download all of the memories I have stored there over my almost half century of existence. But the operative points here are long, 75% finished, and poof.

I was, to say the least, pissed. My calm was damaged. I said many very nasty words, more than once, and aloud. Loud aloud. I think I might have even called Tom a big doody head, what with him being the Myspace ambassador and all.

I suppose I could have spent time retyping it, which probably would have been more entertaining than what you are reading right now, but I didn’t. Instead, I opted to spend that time, plus a little more, to find a better way, in order that my calm no longer be in danger of getting damaged, and Tom could go on about his business without wondering if I was calling him names behind his back.

And, I believe I found one…

My new blog interface is extremely robust. It has autosaved drafts, so there’s no more silly losing of blog entries going on. It is incredibly customizable with widgets, skins, features, and has amazing editability. It is accessible by EVERYONE with an internet connection. It allows for not only common tags but customizable tags as well. There are pingbacks, feeburns, remarkable handling of images and links, notification emails, an easy to navigate dashboard… I could go on and on…and on some more after that…

Yeah, just slap a red wig and some high heels on it and I would marry the damn thing, I’m so in love with it…

And so, there you have it. I’m having an illicit affair with a piece of software. Don’t tell EK.

So, back to the slightly serious… I have now officially “migrated” all of the blog entries from the Myspace version, starting at the beginning posts from November 2006. Well, not ALL… Just the entries with good, timeless content, which worked out to somewhere around 3/4 of them. The rest were contest announcements and such which were dated and weren’t really worth  the time and effort to bother moving.

Hopefully, that answers the question(s). If it doesn’t, well, I am certain I will hear from you.

Okay… Now that the explaining is over I am going to go play with the dominos and see what kind of leak they manage to create this time…

More to come…

Murv