So Jessica and I decided to set up this website and blog page for our adventures. The website name is a story in itself; one day I will tell it. But when we decided to make the site about our adventures, we had to decide upon a template for it. Jessica was used to WordPress templates. I’m used to using html links and pages. Her choice would look more professional, mine would look more rudimentary. Hers would be more structured, mine would allow more flexibility. However, hers could be updated with relatively little effort, mine would require a bit of work (and require my laptop as opposed to a tablet or phone).
So, we went the way of WordPress templates.
First, their templates are really good and they offer a lot of choices, so I do recommend them for most sites. However…. here we are, sitting in a Starbucks in Las Cruces, New Mexico, having just published the website (obviously since you’re reading this) and trying to figure out what the heck we just did.
Basically the problem is this: because of the locked nature of parts of the template, it’s hard to allow the reader (you) to just read sequentially in a linear fashion. The template automatically links to other pages on the website in order of their posting. Kind of like using your favorite search term in Pornhub and ending up with a page about how to remove spackle from your smoke detector. Not that I have ever searched on Pornhub or accidentally spackled my smoke detector, but you get the idea.
And, in some cases, you (dear reader) are stuck in a loop; the next page link is actually the page you read three pages ago, which will lead you back to the page which links you back three pages, to get to the… You see the problem?
So we sit here, on our fourth cups of coffee, the code-key to the bathroom indelibly etched into our long-term memory cells, trying to find a way to clear it up.
Adding to that, the very terminology we each use doesn’t always match up. She’s new-age template savvy; I’m old school html traditional. Basically, we use the same words but have completely different dictionaries. If they ever have an Olympic category for blank stares and frustrated glares, you are reading posts from the Gold and Silver medal winners. In fact, it was one of those frustrated glares that led to this post. A post which I can write while giving my partner the silence she needs to rearrange things. And, honestly, I wish you could see the expressions on her face as she logics it out. She’s an author; many times her characters take hold of her actions. The same happens with logical reasoning. It’s similar to watching a Mime using facial expressions and gestures to go through the Greek alphabet.
Ah. I have just been informed that she may or may not have found a solution. If she has, continue reading! If not, please know I lived a good life and have no regrets.
