Ummmm … in my world, it’s a bad sign when a web hosts own web site doesn’t load, especially after a major security breach and hacker attack. I think the forums are finally loading, but it’s slow as hell. My site is loading slowly too. Maybe I can find out what’s going on, if the forums ever finish making their way to my browser window.

Let’s just say, I feel I should remind you about my Livejournal, where I can always be found when I can’t be found anywhere else. You might want to bookmark it, if you haven’t already. I was going to sit tight at A Small Orange until the time I just paid for ran out, to give myself some time to find a good place to move my site to instead of doing it spur of the moment (and wasting money), but I have been through the implosion of web hosts before, and difficulty in getting to their own web site and forums to load is never, ever a good sign. Makes me jumpy.

So, if you stop by Just Orb, and it’s not where you expect it to be, go to the Livejournal to find out what’s up, what I’ll be doing about it, and any associated angry ranting. I’d be starting the angry ranting now, because the server status page just mostly loaded, and it looks like there are servers down all over the place, but I want to try to get this post posted first. The forums refuse to load. I don’t even know if this is going to post or not. Probably not. I’ll just keep trying until it does.

Looks like I’ll be moving Just Orb more hastily than I planned.

For the record, A Small Orange has now officially moved into the category of Web Hosts That Suck. I don’t know what’s going on, and I really don’t give a damn. Whatever is going on (and has been going on for a couple of weeks now), it’s a complete hosting failure, as far as I am concerned.

In case you aren’t in the habit of visiting my web site late at night or early in the morning, you may not have noticed that my web host was hacked late last night. Not my web site. Not even just the server my web site is hosted on. No, I mean the HOST, and multiples of servers were wiped clean and serving up a page offering a malware download that contained who knows what (for hours and hours — very disturbing). All of this mayhem was due to an employee signing in from a home computer that was compromised and his password to his A Small Orange employee account being grabbed … and used, because there were no security measures in place to make sure something like that couldn’t happen. Color me unimpressed with the security measures in place.

To say I am, at the least, distraught and pissed off would be a grand understatement. Their backup was recent enough that I didn’t lose anything but the last photo I uploaded (so far as I can tell at the moment), but when I discovered what was going on as I was headed to bed last night, every last one of my files was gone. Use your imagination as to my reaction, or go to my Livejournal and read the ranting I did over there as this hell unfolded.

As soon as I get done with all the real life, offline stuff I have to get done today, I will be sitting down to explore my hosting options. I have the feeling continuing to use A Small Orange is not currently on the table. I’ve not been all that unhappy with them as a host over the years, but I have had web hosts I would describe as being the very worst web hosts on the planet, and never once did anything of this scale happen. A whole bushel basket of “Kudos” can be wiped away quite quickly by one “Oh Shit” of this magnitude.

Anyway, I have to get going with my day. Everything should be fine with my web site, no viruses or anything. It seems the hackers just deleted everything and set up their crappy little download page and file on the servers they got into (many of them). I’m sure I’ll be ranting more on this later.

And as if this weren’t enough, our Time Warner cable box is having fits this morning and keeps rebooting on its own. My very last consumer nerve was worked over thoroughly when my host experienced it’s security failure last night, so TW better not push my buttons today. In fact, everywhere I have to go better give me good customer service, because this has been a consumer’s week from hell for me. I have run into too much stupidity and failure this week, and my meter is pegged and my limit has been reached. The next FAIL I encounter will not go well for whoever is responsible.

The list of complaint emails I have to write grows longer each day. Ugh.

I am never going to get caught up on my email and blog/journal comments. OK, I will eventually get caught up, but it’s going to take some time. If you emailed me or commented somewhere to something I said, I’ll respond (hopefully before Monday). I was already behind when I left for Mom’s and now I am really, really behind!

Just thought I’d let everyone know I heard you, and I’m not ignoring you. I swear I got more email in the last five days than I do when I am at home checking it every day!

The post I made a mere few hours ago looked odd when I checked that the new post I just wrote had posted to my blog and formatted correctly. I went into the editor, thinking I had perhaps been not quite awake and made an awful typo without noticing (it happens sometimes, when I haven’t had my coffee yet). No, a spammy link had been injected into the post … the post I just posted this morning. I simply cannot find how this happens or how to stop it. There appear to just be inherent weaknesses in this version of Wordpress that have been terribly exploited.

I swear I am going to update my Wordpress and fix this problem once and for all (hopefully). I was hoping to widgetize my current theme and get used to the new back-end before I switched, but I can’t have this crap going on at Just Orb (and beyond, since it cross-posts all over the place). I promise to get this done ASAP, which means sometime before Monday. Since all my archives have been cross posted to Livejournal since the last time I will likely be dumping the archives over here and starting out fresh. Nuking the whole thing from orbit is the only way to be sure.

But I do have to make certain a few of my crucial plugins work with the new version or that suitable replacements can be found before I go all crazy on my web site. If something I use a lot doesn’t work with the new version, I will just have to live with it, but I at least want to test stuff first so there are no ugly surprises.

So I apologize now for any spamminess or weirdness you may encounter on my web site and elsewhere my stuff gets posted. I’m working on fixing it. I’ve put off upgrading long enough out of a reluctance to switch to a new way of doing things. I do tend to fall in love with a particular version of software and not want to change. Sorry. I also apologize in advance for any weirdness that may come in the next few days as I get everything updated and repaired. It’s always a little rough, but it always eventually has to be done. The time has come to move forward, no matter whether I want to or not.

Looks like it’s going to be another wet and nasty day today. The garden may be loving it, but I’m not. I’d really like to take my bright and nifty cushion and go lounge in my lounge chair while sipping a cold beer one of these days.

But, since it’s already been a wet and nasty morning, I updated my sandbox to the latest version of Wordpress. They seem to have fixed the things that drove me crazy with the last latest version, so once I am accustomed to where everything is on the back-end, have either switched my current site design to the new version or created a new design, and made certain my completely essential plugins work with the new version, I guess I’ll be upgrading the main site (or wiping it all and starting fresh). If the weather stays icky, may get done this week. If I drink enough coffee, may even get done today. Don’t hold your breath though. I don’t enjoy working on my web site as much as I used to enjoy it, so I am easily distracted by cats, art supplies, books, or sitting and staring at walls mindlessly.

For example, I am now feeling a strong urge to hover over my garden, even though it’s drizzling out there, and so I think I shall. With all this rain, things have really been growing … including the weeds!

Have I really only made one post today? Eh, it was a rainy Monday, and Lin was home all day. Sort of both busy and lazy … and not much time spent at the computer.

Someone emailed me to say that his virus checker said my site was infected with something. I found an odd bit of code, and there was some weirdness with Twitter recently which may have crossed over (or who knows what the hell happened), so let me know if anyone else has a problem or if it continues! I’m about to upgrade and redesign the whole site anyway. I may just bump that project up a bit … like start on it ASAP.

But not tonight. I’m tired. Too much rain and laziness. A whole lot of nothing to say. Maybe I’ve got some pictures to post on the camera. I’ve taken quite a few the last few days.

I rescind my earlier comment about the new server my site was moved to being zippy. Oh yes, it was completely zippy, right up until it stopped doing anything at all, and they had to reboot it. It had previously been rebooted a mere day before. This does not bode well for my continued business dealings with A Small Orange, and while I have had some good (even great) years with them, I do have to rescind my recommendation of them for hosting any web site you expect to be online reliably. And by reliably, I don’t even mean 99.99% of the time. I mean it’s there when you visit it more often than not.

Aaron server has been up for a whole 16 minutes now. Let’s see if it makes it through the rest of the day. Meanwhile, I’m going to back up all my files, learn how to point my domains at my Livejournal account, and start looking for a new host. I want to be able to move everything at the drop of a hat … or the failing of a server. If my site goes down again in the next 24 hours, I am gone. It’s as simple as that. I was merely aggravated. Now, I am fully pissed off about it all.

I don’t know when exactly it’s going to happen, and there may be a bit of time for the DNS to catch up to my site, but I’m about to tell them to go ahead and move my web site whenever they are ready to do so. Don’t worry! I’ll be back eventually!

In the meantime, any babbling I feel the need to do will be found over at my Livejournal. See you on the other side!

I’m backing up my web site, which is taking a while. Why am I backing up my web site? Well, aside from it being a good thing to do from time to time, I thought I should do a backup before I emailed tech support back and agreed that moving my site to a different server would be a jolly good idea. I”m sure nothing will go wrong and none of my data will be lost or corrupted, but let’s just say confidence is low right now. Better to be safe than sorry.

Anyway, my web site will be moving to a different server. I have no idea if that means it will be down a while, or the DNS will have to catch up to it, or what manner of issues this may cause. I guess we’ll all just have to wait and see.

I hope things improve and my web site stops having the problems it’s been having the last few weeks. I hate to change web hosts, but that is always an option. It’s just an option I would rather not have to choose.

You may or may not have noticed my web site has been mostly down today. All I am going to say about it for now is that I may or may not be looking for a new web host.

Oh yes … color me aggravated. Aggravated enough to finally sit down and write an actual email to my web host complaining about the situation.

I better hit post now, because I have the feeling my site won’t be responsive again shortly, and I have things to do today other than sit here trying (and failing) to post to my web site and dealing with tech support.

Just a reminder, while my web site seems to be working at this very moment, that I have a Livejournal where I post when my web site is not working (and cross-post all my blog posts as well) … and my web site has not been working much of today. I have no reason to expect that it will continue working for the rest of the day, because the server it is on has been hosed just about all morning. My confidence in my web host is currently not very high.

So, you may want to bookmark my Livejournal, just in case my web site takes a nose-dive again. I’m hoping it won’t, but it’s not been a good day for Just Orb.

And why do these horrible problems always happen right after I brag about my host to a bunch of people? I don’t take back the good words yet, but this goes on much longer, and I may have to do so.

I just noticed I never changed the stupid time stamp on my web site to compensate for the stupid Daylight Saving Time change. So … for the last week, everything you have been reading and I have been saying has been time-shifted one hour too early. Duh. There has got to be a way to automate Wordpress to do this for me. It happens every time we make a time change, and it always makes me feel like a total idiot.

Well, it’s not just my web site that gets thrown off my the completely ignorant time changes. I just set the clock in the truck today too, and I still feel like my entire life is running one hour off. I hate, hate, hate time changes!

The thought crossed my mind, about two minutes ago, that I had some domain names coming up for renewal soon. I searched my email for the reminders. The last one I remembered seeing was the 30 day one, and as it turns out, I missed the latest one. Eek!

I hadn’t really put any thought at all into whether or not I was going to keep the orbitweaver.com domain name. I have had it for a few years now, and aside from the odd temporary project, I haven’t really used it at all. It was a gift from someone though, and I didn’t really want to let it go … even though I don’t use it. Silly waste of money I suppose.

All the same, when I realized today was the last day to renew it, I made a panic purchase and bought it for another year. Yes, one more year to agonize over whether or not to keep it or to actually come up with something to use it for. Maybe I need to pass it on to someone else?

And next month I will be renewing orbizart.com, because that one I do have to keep, seeing as it is sort of my business name … you know, if I ever do have a business.

Two of my domains are coming up for renewal again. Oh, the annual anguish about whether or not to keep them! I think this year I will let Orbitweaver go. It was a gift, so I do hate to let it go, but I haven’t used it for much. Seems silly to keep paying for it. I have to keep Orbizart, no matter what. It was also a gift, which isn’t the reason I have to keep it. No, someday it’s going to be used for something. I swear, it will! It actually might be used for something as early as January. I have a project idea, and rather than try to come up with a new domain name (all the ones I have thought of so far are taken), might as well use it. The project is an artsy-fartsy one, so maybe that’s what I have been waiting to use it for all along!

And what is this project idea? You’ll just have to wait and see! I promise, it will be fun. Well, it’ll be fun for me, but I hope other people find it fun too.

In other non-news, the cats have been out of their minds all night and are even more feisty and frisky this morning. I’m going to blame it on the cold weather and the full moon. I can find no other reason for all the running around and being noisy.

I wish the craft store opened earlier. I’d love to go get my shopping done right now, while I still feel like going. I think I’ll blow off the craft store until next week and just go to the grocery store as soon as the sun comes up. It’s not like this house isn’t full to overflowing with craft and art supplies. I’ll just have to make do with what I have.

After 24 hours of being drugged on cold medicine, I am feeling better, but I am far from feeling great. It’s too cold to be spending too much time fussing around out in the world while having a cold. I have a ton of stuff to get done around the house anyway. I want the house somewhat neat and clean for the weekend, since I plan to do some crafty stuff and won’t want to do any housework.

And so ends another completely useless post…