You say Halo, I say goodbye

It's been on the cards for a while, but I've finally done it. I've moved!

I've been using self-hosted Wordpress for my professional blog and it's just so nice to use, I love it, but moving my three-legged cat blog to a new home seemed like too much trouble, so I left it where it was and prevaricated. I'm good at that.

Enter Haloscan/JS-Kit/Echo. Things have been rumbling on over there for a while, but the bottom line is that it's finally decision time. I haven't had my 'pay up or clear off' email yet, but it's only a matter of time.

It's not the prospect of paying for a service that bothers me, that's fair enough (and I did originally pay for Haloscan). The problem is that I'm simply not won over by Echo's commenting system - I've tried it on a couple of sites and it's slow and a bit lacking in user friendliness. I've always used Haloscan because I wanted something really simple.

I'd probably have stayed with Blogger, but unfortunately as far as I can tell, no-one has created a method for moving comments from Haloscan into Blogger.

However, I did have a Baldrick moment. I formed a cunning plan. Oh yes.

My cunning plan involved pulling all my posts across to a temporary Wordpress blog and using these instructions to grab all my Haloscan comments. That bit worked like a dream.

Then all I had to do was import everything back here, via a quick bit of trickery (because Blogger doesn't seem to want to talk to the other blog platforms) and all would be well. Except it wasn't. That bit did not work. Not at all.

So I found myself with a perfectly functioning Wordpress blog, with all my comments. I also have a perfectly functioning Blogger blog, soon to be without all my comments (unless I sign up for Echo, or Disqus). Should I give up on the comments and stay with Blogger? No, I think that was the push I needed to go it alone.

So I've moved. Please feel free to visit me at my new home: www.three-legged-cat.co.uk

I'm giving it a day or two, then I'm going to attempt to set up a bit of magical redirection, which should whisk you away to my new home automatically. Assuming that I'm better at redirecting than I was at importing. Time will tell.

See you soon - I hope!

(Incidentally, since my comments will shortly vanish from Haloscan, I've removed the comment links from this site. If you want to leave a comment on this post, you'll have to do that over here.)


Photo: Cardboard Box by ahhyeah. Used under Creative Commons Licence.

They don't make 'em like they used to

I was impressed with the finest snowman in Crookes last year; now some of his relatives have mysteriously arrived on our street.

I liked making snowmen when I was a kid, but I never made anything like these two. Snowmenpeople with legs. And arms. Wow. And strategically placed bottles. Hmm.

Still, I think they're great.

Perhaps I should try to build them a snow cat. (Three-legged, of course.)

All quiet on the Sheffield front

1. I'm on holiday - woohoo! Actually I've been on holiday for a little while - school broke up last Thursday - but I have been hiding under a duvet and sleeping. As you do.
2. I have caught, fought and mostly got rid of the traditional Christmas holiday cold. Go me. (Yes, that's why I was hiding under the duvet.)
3. Mr TLC has now caught my cold, except according to him it's man flu. He is not hiding under a duvet, but is playing his guitar, so I think he may be exaggerating.
4. It's snowing, but frankly, there isn't much of it. Yet. Mind you, there's still enough to warrant staying indoors and curling up in front of the fire with a book. Especially since Mr TLC has that terrible man flu. :-)

Anyhoo, enough of my blithering. How are you?

Today's Tweets

• 18:06 Woohoo! Just ordered tickets for Cirque de Soleil in Sheffield. It's not until next May & I'm excited already! #
• 22:06 Scooby Doo moment: the three-legged-cat pulls off her not very cunning disguise bit.ly/70rlPO #

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Not down a well, but possibly in a small hole

Oh my, I've been rather quiet here of late. Can I blame work, or shall I go straight for a plea of insanity?

Anyhoo, I haven't evaporated/been kidnapped by aliens/fallen down a well. I am perfectly fine, just doing too much for my own good (as usual).

However, I am going to be making a few changes here, so be warned. I am also going to blither on about them, but I imagine you expected that by this point.

1. I have come up with an overly elaborate plan to retrieve my comments from Halosc@n. I'm going to attempt it this weekend. I'm not entirely convinced it will work and I may completely mess up my own blog, so bear with me. I'll fix it up eventually. I hope.

2. I'm giving up my three-legged alias. Just about all of Y10 have found me, so I'll just have to bore them into leaving :P

Actually, the real reason for this is nothing to do with my students. It's because I've goofed. How very precedented!

I've always used my own, actual, genuine real name for professional stuff, so that means two Google accounts, two Twitter accounts etc. Then I finally got an invite for Google Wave and rushed to sign up. Except I signed in with the wrong account. Doh! Now I seem to be trying to interact with my fellow professionals as a three-legged cat. How embarrassing.

It's official, I'm an idiot. (I know, I know, you worked that out ages ago.) So there you are, I'm not down a well, but I am busy digging myself into a small hole.

After much dithering (Move the blog? Rename the blog,? Just brazen it out and let my colleagues and the rest of the world know that I'm a crazy cat lady?), I've come to the conclusion that the simplest thing is to admit that I was never that anonymous anyway and update my Google profile to represent me.

So there you have it. The blog name remains, but I'm giving up on pretending to be a kitteh.

Lois.

PS I may even write some actual blog posts! Not just the ones that are here.

Today's Tweets

• 14:55 Happy Birthday from me too! Hope it's a good one - and that there is cake :-) RT @willkay: HAPPY BIRTHDAY @mariarocio #

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Today's Tweets

• 22:26 Royal harpist? bit.ly/6jCjo9 What kind of job is that? Sometimes I think I've entered one of those weird parallel universes. #

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Today's Tweets

• 21:57 Mr TLC nips outside - and comes back wearing some rather fetching #snow Bah! (It's more rain than snow, fortunately) #
• 22:40 RT @markw29: Anyone know any decent (but not hideously expensive) hotels in central London for a Sat night - struggling to find availability #
• 22:48 A friend of Mr TLC just texted to say he's in hospital with gammon flu. (He went in with swine flu, but they cured him.) #

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