Narrowboat Alacrity

I  noticed this morning when doing my usual scan of incoming links (people who have linked their posts to my blog) that the Blog Meister Andrew Denny of Granny Buttons had mentioned in his post “How to start your own website or Blog” that I had learned the self taught hard way.

Remember that Matthew Stibbe is an expert. If you want advice from someone at the self-taught-the hard-way end of things, you might ask John of NB Alacrity. He seems to have taken this same route to getting his blog going including buying the book, so would be a useful second opinion. 

Yes I bought the book, its a good guide but if you use “Wordpress” as your blogging platform their support on the web is second to none, if you are more of a try it and see person who learns hands on like me give it a go.

I found that if you are contemplating your own blog or website the first thing to do is find a domain name.

What you have to remember that it will be the first thing people will see and what seems a good idea at the time may not seem so good in 5 years so “choose wisely” (as the knight said to Indiana Jones).

For us Boaters try looking up nbyourboatname replacing the yourboatname with the name of your boat with no spaces as in nbalacrity you will probably find it available for use.

As Matthew Stibbe suggests use 123 reg to check that your intended name is not in use. Don’t do what I did and register the name and buy a hosting package then find the package doesn’t cover what you want. I tried using the free blog registration from Wordpress.org but found it to limiting in the themes you could use, so I went independent.

I chose  VARiHOST to host my blog on the basic package  they are so helpful and will sort you out in no time, just read what other people say about them. VARiHOST will register and manage your domain name and provide space for your blog and give you your own email addresses for £3.99 a month (no I don’t get anything for this plug I just believe that they offer best value for money).

If you go the independent route you can customise your blog how you want and have total control of what you see on your blog, yes it’s hard work getting it how you want it and yes you may want to throw your PC into the cut but blogging is addictive, fun and all yours, gripe if you want, your blog is your voice on the web……………………………………………………….

If you want any help or advice on starting your own boating blog use the contact page, I will try and help if I can..

Well I’ve been slaving…….(whose he kidding)… over a hot keyboard today trying to set up a better gallery for the blog. The plugin for wordpress was straight forward but altering the coding in the page template for the gallery took some doing for a non savvy person like me.

I will be running the two galleries in tandem for a while just to see which on suits the blog better.

If you look in the lefthand sidebar under the pages tab you will see Test-Gallery click on this and see the new gallery the Slideshow also in the lefthand sidebar is generated from this.

Well I just wanted to share with you that NB Alacrity’s blog just had its 1001 visitor at 18:10 today.

 I know that other blogs have had more but it’s special to me.

One of my favorite stretches of canal is on the Kennet and Avon from Pewsey Wharf to Honey Street

We decided to travel home from Dorset cross country and called in at the Waterfront Bar and Bistro at Pewsey Wharf for some lunch.

The Wiltshire Ham & Egg was great, but shame about the chips……………………..

Having decided to walk off the lunch I spotted Ten Bob Note, I always read their blog and love the pictures of their travels.

I only was able to say hello as I  passed, Ernie was deep in the bilges servicing the engine and gearbox (I know how annoying it can be to be stopped when doing something important) and I didn’t want to disturb him working……………..

Well having just picked up the cats, done the shopping and visited Vi (my mother-in-law) I decided it was time to update the blog.

Whilst I was away I had read a few books on Linux (alternative computer operating system) I had sort of decided to try Ubuntu a variation of Linux, Having downloaded the programme I decided to load it.

It loaded like a dream and recognised all my hardware it even went on to start downloading the updates……………….Phutt…………….Sod all happened…..ok ok so I should have left well alone, But as you all know I never learn……..The upshot is that the power supply has gone faulty and yes its £89.00 to replace.

So while waiting for it to arrive I’ll have to use my laptop………………

My Blog may be all over the place at the moment as I’m playing around with Plugins and learning more about Wordpress  trying to make the blog more mine so please bear with me.

Today the SWMBO decided to spring clean “Take Cover” The cats, fur ruffled shot out the cat flap, me being more rotund wouldn’t fit through so I was captured…………….what I had realy wanted to do was work some more on mastering Wordpress. This was not to be………………

So I was put to work de-scaling the shower head and spraying something toxic into the oven that was reputed to be the holy grail of cleaners, as I was coughing and spluttering the cats sneaked back and did what they do best and bagged the warmest place the in the conservatory and were instantly asleep.

Rosie (on the left) is 15 and Katie (on the right) is 13 both came from the Woodgreen Animal Shelter at Godmanchester near Cambridge.

Don’t let the picture deceive you although they look as if butter wouldn’t melt they are a pair of con artists and whoever said that “Dogs have Masters and Cats have Servants” was very right.

Well having earned enough “Brownie Points” I have escaped to the study (posh name for the small bedroom) to continue to try and wreak havock on my blog.

Well today has been my own SWMBO has been at work so I’ve had some peace and quiet to get to grips with Wordpress and its plugins.

Being an engineer by trade I’ve always learned with a hands on approach so I like to read how to do a thing then figure it out how they work for myself. Well on Friday my copy of “Wordpress for Dummies” arrived from Amazon  so I sat down to read through it in conjunction with this Blog………………yes well….. one day later and I’m not too further on, I guess age has something to do with it.

 Joking aside I did have a lot of problems getting the plugins downloaded off the Wordpress site to work, I tried to sort it out myself but had to admit defeat, one quick email to Richard at VARiHOST and a few minutes later a reply with a solution “Thank You Richard” now theres service for you.

“Practice makes Perfect” In my case maybe not so perfect yet, but I’m not giving up……………………………….

Welcome to my first blog entry.

I have had the thought of starting a blog about my life and the inland waterways for some time now and allways found reasons to put it off. Well I bit the bullet and started…………..so many choices of theme……….First thing was to move my hosting to VARiHOST as my original host didn’t offer MySQL in the package. Richard at VARiHOST was most helpful and my hosting was transfered,Wordpress loaded and turned on in less than 12 hours.