Blogger Down

Well, hasn't this been special?

Since about 1 PM on Wednesday, Blogger has been down. At around 7 PM Thursday, Blogger removed all posts on 5/11 and went into "read only" mode.

I just came home from a lovely afternoon with an old friend to find that Blogger is back online.

Well, the last message is this: "We're still working on restoring some of the data."

Whatever.

No explanation about why we were without service, just that we seem to be back up and running while the good folks at blogger continue to restore some of the data.

All I can say is that it must have been a Very Serious Glitch.

Several folks have suggested rather strongly that I switch to Wordpress. I don't know. I tend to be an intensely loyal person. Hey, I'm a Red Sox fan, right?

You don't turn tail and run just because of one disappointment.

Or five. Or ten.

Years.

But, that's another post for another time.

In terms of switching from Blogger to Wordpress, well, this is the first major glitch I've encountered and I've been on Blogger since June of 2006. I figure, the devil I know is better than the devil I don't know.

Actually, I started on Blogger at the suggestion of my Parish Administrator who actually set it up for me.

I had been to General Convention 2003 and, at that time, had sent a daily email to my Wardens and Vestry, so that they would have a better understanding of the way the Church does its business, once every three years.

I later discovered that they had been forwarding and/or printing out my emails so that the whole parish could read them.

"Why don't you set up a blog, this time?" asked my Parish Administrator.

"Sure," I said, "What's a blog?"

He sighed deeply and 'splained it to me. I really thought that the only people reading it would be the members of my congregation.

Hand to Jesus! That's really what I thought.

Imagine my surprise when I started getting comments not only from around The Episcopal Church, but the Anglican Communion.

I was stunned.

Oh, I've made some mistakes over the years. Printing things and making comments that did not exactly reveal my best side. I've learned some things, over the last five years.

One of them is 'restraint'. Another is 'patience'. Yet another: 'graciousness'.

Except, of course, when the situation can only be responded to with a good, old fashioned, unrestrained rant.

Call me a graduate of the School of Hard Knocks with a degree from Cyberspace University - Blogger School of Communication.

Oh, I've still been writing. It's part of my spiritual discipline. Believe it or not, I just don't always publish what I've been writing in my journal.

Expect something tomorrow. Promise.

Right now, I've got to catch up on reading some of my favorite blogs.

Thank you, all the folks at Blogger, who worked so hard to put us back online.

I don't know what the problem was, and I'm sure I wouldn't understand it completely, even if you told me, but I'm grateful someone knows what they're doing in Cyberspace.

Well, mostly.

Just don't play games with my loyalty, okay?

Only the Boston Red Sox are allowed to do that.