I’m Baaaaack….

After a few days waiting while the site transferred, I’m back, live and active. Boy do I have a lot to say that I’ve been holding in while the admin stuff was churning away… but I won’t say it all now… 😉

If you encounter an “internal server error” while reading my posts, refresh the page please – the port seems to have been imperfect and needs some tech tweaking to figure out why that’s happening. Sorry about that…

I got an interesting call this week from Hostpapa’s CEO, Jamie Opalchuck, after I posted my piece about moving from Hostpapa because of bad customer and technical service. He was very candid and sympathetic. I was quite impressed that the CEO himself took the time to call an irate customer.

We chatted about customer service, my particular issues, and Hostpapa’s growth (and the challenges that growth creates). It was very good. He says they are remaking their customer service and their customer relations model to focus more on the people who matter – the customers. He hopes to see a turnaround to a more customer-centric business, and asked permission to use my post as an example to his staff. It gave me some confidence for their future.

He also admitted that the problems with my site were – as I knew all along – not my fault but rather that the new server location settings had not bee properly set when the domain was migrated. I appreciated that admission.

Had we talked before I gave up in frustration, I would have chosen to stay and ride it out to see how they progressed. I actually prefer Hostpapa’s cpanel admin pages than GoDaddy’s and when my site was working, I had few (but not no) complaints.

However, by that time I had already made the commitment (and paid the money) to make the transfer. I will, however, consider moving some of my site contents over – and maybe start a new blog – to a new domain under Hostpapa, once I get organized and some of my many (many!) interior pages redone. I still have two uke reviews to add, as well. That is – depending on how Hostpapa handles my refund for prepaid hosting costs.

I took a bit of time to start the long overdue renewal of my pages, starting with the portal page. I’ve been meaning to come up with a new layout theme for a while and I like this one. I’m going to see how many of my current pages I can port over to this layout (it’s not 100% compatible with my previous themes, but I think I can make it work for many). I like the clean look and the responsive CSS design.

It’s not my own work – I just used an existing GPL template, and have been customizing the CSS and HTML. I like the clean, crisp look. Gives me some exercise in working with CSS so I don’t get rusty.

Meanwhile – have you checked out the new Centennial Pool yet? The landscaping is nearly done, and it’s looking fabulous. A few naysayers will never appreciate the facility, but the rest of us do. Inside, it’s even nicer. I’m looking forward to the programming changes in the fall that provide adult swim times during the day. Official opening: August 27. Be there (hint: it’s also an anniversary date).

The new Fire Station official opening is in September – another facility we should be proud of. Be there Sept. 14.

Will have more details on both on Facebook, maybe Twitter too. Check www.facebook.com/CouncillorChadwick for more.

So many books I’ve been reading when I haven’t been blogging this past week – finished Perlstein’s excellent Nixonland. Not only a great expose of dirty American politics, but some local parallels kept coming to mind. Nixon: autocratic, sneaky, suspicious, paranoid, cunning, underhanded… reminded me of a former politician… Been watching West Wing, too, and seeing the parallels there.

I also read further into the two Arabian Nights translations I’ve started (it’s slow when you’re trying to read two at once; sometimes the differences are only a few words), started Pagels’ book on the Gospel of Judas (which meant picking up Robinson’s book to see his notes, too), dug deeper into MacCullough’s History of Christianity, reading Friedman’s The Next 100 Years, started Lanier’s Who Owns the Future?, Christopher Moore’s semi-comic Sacre Bleu, and an odd scifi novel I picked up at a book sale earlier this summer. Plus of course, the Encyclopedia of Hell, some Gnostic scriptures and other odd-n-ends. Plus preparing material for my upcoming talk in Toronto on social media and politicians.

Then there’s the continuing saga of acclimatizing our new, hyperactive terrier, Bella into our home with four cats and an elderly dog. You know that Beatles’ line, “I’ve got to admit it’s getting better…”

Lots to write about in the near future.