A million little pieces

This is one of those updates posts where my brain goes off into 300 tangents. Hang on!


The first thing I want to get feedback on is Wanton Wednesday. After the move I hope to get back into participating myself more frequently, as well as trying to get more people to play. (Any ideas on that, btw? It’s not really caught on like HNT but then I didn’t exactly expect/want it to be that big, being that big comes with its own set of dramas and issues). The other day I noticed that Insatiabear changed up how he does his linking for his Flash Fiction Friday weekly meme posts. He’s using this thing called Mister Linky, just an in-post widget that allows someone to put in their name and their post link, and then there’s a link right there in the post. More visible than being in the comments section. Problem is…..it’s reallly limited when you’re using free WordPress, which WW is. So that means in order for me to make a small part of it better and easier, I’d have to go through the hassle of moving WW. I’d really rather not go back to using Blogger, so this means one of two things: I either pay to have WW at it’s own domain name OR I set it up as a sub-domain of this site (as in wantonwednesday.dangerouslilly.com) and sub-domains mean it can look and be totally separate from the original domain so it won’t be like you’re just visiting my site.

But as all bloggers who’ve done The Move know, moving your blog can be a pain in the ass. However, since WW has no advertising and isn’t linked to from anywhere huge and has only a small group playing….maybe it wouldn’t be so bad? Thoughts? Is this meme even worth the trouble? Can it be better?

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e[lust]…..since I’ve had no offers to take over elust duties for the month of May, I’ve decided I have to forgo the May edition because of my move. I think though that after that, we might go back to doing it every other week. Your thoughts? Which do you prefer, once a month or twice a month?

Edit: Unless I can get the problem worked out with the contact form, twice a month won’t even be able to happen. Here’s the sitch: I use this great contact form that I paid for, as I had tried a bunch of others and had consistent problems with entries not being received. Now, an entry not being received at all is very, very rare – but the set-up that makes my life a fuck of a lot easier is the notifications portion of the form. I have it set up to automatically email out each person when the form receives their entry (this took up a lot of time in the past, doing it myself); and I have it set to email ME their entry. The email to me comes with all the pertinent details, shows as coming from the submitters email address (which makes adding them to the mailing list for that edition much easier) but I also have code in there that combines the Title and the Permalink so that I receive a working hyperlink all ready to go – to be copied as-is to the judges email, and to the edition itself. Also, when it’s sent to gmail, I have filters set up so that I can view only one category at a time. When I don’t get these emails, my work quadruples. I’ve tried the host, who tells me it’s not a problem on their end. I’ve tried the form support people who say it’s my host and not them. And I don’t know enough on my own to fix this. So if anybody out there thinks they can help fix the existing form (not just tell me to use a new one) PLEASE email me or comment here, thank you.

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On to more personal babbling….

I’m starting to feel like the “problem child” in the community, just because I refuse to be fake and I speak out when I see bullshit. To be honest, the speaking out I’ve done is actually mild; I’ve held my tongue on many things (you have nooooo idea the shit I’ve not talked about openly, for reals). But I’m not a super-positive reviewer who loves everything she’s given, I don’t like being taken advantage of, I can’t stand bullshit melodrama from people on forums who are as about anonymous as one can be online. A small scuffle with a reviewer taking a comment too personally seemed to have led to WAY more drama than was ever necessary; yet I’m the bad guy and the bad seed and seen as a pot-stirrer by some. But even by just writing out my feelings here and all I know I’ll just be digging my own grave even more. Yet it’s my blog and I want to say what I wanna say….ya know?

Seriously? I’m no angel. this we all know. But I think I have done enough in the “good girl” category to not be demoted to black sheep.

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So remember when I was bitching about the barrage of emails from Bondage Radio with nary a way to escape their grips? It was like bein in the fuckin mafia. I finally went on to Fetlife and tracked down the site owner and messaged him about this. I’d thought that it was obvious from my email where I detailed all the many ways I tried to get their daily shit to stop coming to me, he didn’t go in an unsubscribe me. BUT at least now there is a proper (dare I say finally now legal?) unsubscribe link in the footer. Which I used gleefully this morning when yet ANOTHER of their emails made it past Spam and into my Inbox.

Wait, no, I lied. They sent me a “Join us on Facebook!” message and the unsubscribe button is from FACEBOOK. GRrrrrr. Off to write another email. (He’s JarlMezentius on Fetlife btw if you ever need to contact him, as contacting people through BR is tougher than a rubik’s cube.)

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After Friday is over, I will have 7 weeks left at my job. That’s less than 2 months. It’s really not all that long when you look at it rationally but when you hate it day in and day out with a passion…..it’s feeling like forever. We’re still in that stage of “can’t really box up shit because there’s no place to put boxes” and looking around wondering where to even start. The other big wonder is how to move the Liberator shapes, particularly the ramp/wedge combo. Those of you who own it or have seen one in person know that the ramp is HUGE. It won’t even fit inside our black garbage bags. I’ve got all my sexy books boxed up and marked as “personal” so that I know not to let anybody unpack them and to keep them with my bags of sex toys.

Oye.

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My mind’s all cluttered and I’m finding myself unable to finish posts, or think of good ones consistently. So……any questions for the Ask Lilly column? Anything?

7 Responses

  1. TheSinDoll says:

    I love the Wanton Wednesday idea! That sounds like something fun to participate in.

  2. Psycosis says:

    Two things on the WW Blog. First, if you want to move it to its own site I recently started a personal blog over on DreamHost. If you use the promo code “777” then the first year is $10. After that it goes back up to the full $100 or so. I think it’s only good for new sites not transfers. Second, if you do the move by exporting then importing you’re going to lose categories and tags. I don’t remember you using them a lot so that should move smooth just using the xml file. Really, when I was combining 3 blogs it was redoing all the categories that was a pain for me.

    As for the drama, I hear you. It’s pretty much why I don’t say much under this name anymore. Harder and harder to bite my tongue and once I start social filter and self censoring is out the window. If you need another vent I use the same name on twitter.

  3. Violet says:

    Adding a Linky to Wanton Wednesday would be really cool, Since taking over as temporary hostess my life has gotten so busy I haven’t had time to add previous weeks links or even participate myself. But I think that if those who participate want to take it bigger and better it really could be amazing. I would be more than happy to purchase the domain and hosting for WW if you would like to take it down that track – just send me an email :)

    As for you speaking up – I love it and hope you will continue too. Im currently watching your twitter conversation with a company that you used to review for. I love this side of you and only wish I could speak up like that when things upset or displease me. I’m still trying to find my voice as a blogger and truly do appreciate everything you give to our community, your rant style posts included.

  4. Bob Brown says:

    What plugin are you currently using for the e[Lust] website? I might be able to test it for you and see if I can get it to work.

  5. Vixen says:

    I think the ability to add your link and name to a meme is always a bonus. But having to move…not so much. Have you researched possibly WP widgets that might do the same thing????

    That sucks about the contact page glitch. I wouldn’t mind seeing e[lust] twice a month if it’s a possible for you.

    xo

  6. Molly says:

    Hi Lilly

    WANTON WEDNESDAY

    I love wanton Wednesday and I am delighted with the new readers it has bought to my blog as well as the blogs I have discovered from it. I think with some work on Twitter and some other blog promoting sites it would be possible to increase the traffic even more. I am happy to help out if you would like. Feel free to contact me if you would be interested.

    I have asked my techincal wizard about your form issue and he says…. Sorting out coding issues like this can be very complicated, especially as both sites claim it is not their fault. In order to even get started you would need to look at the server logs on your hosting server and it may well require access to your cpanel on your blog.

    As for Elust…I have just submitted my first post. I am excited to be involved and so I have no real feeling on the twice monthly/monthly issue. I guess it depends which is the most managable for you really.

    Mollyxxx

  7. Bella says:

    Would LOVE to see e[lust] published more often. I know it’s a ton of work, but it does so much to unite the sex blogging community! As for the submission form issue you’re experiencing, so sorry. Got an idea, though! I’ve had similar issues with forms, and just stumbled upon the wonder that is Google Forms via GoogleDocs. You set it up as a spreadsheet, but they have all these pretty templates and you can embed directly onto your site. Take a look at Bombshells & Rockstars — I have two forms up currently, if you want to see some ideas. I’ve had 100% success with receiving email notifications for every new form submission, and GoogleDocs even keeps a handy-dandy record of it for you. I know that there is a way to customize what message is given to those that submit to the form. Not sure about email confirmation, though, but I’m sure the folks @ Google would be happy to direct you to that feature if it’s available, or take feedback for it. Best of all? It’s not only reliable, but FREE, too. xoxo