A new face, Last live

So for awhile I have been getting warnings from GoDaddy that the version of PHP that was running on my WordPress sites was officially out of support range and was a potential security threat. Well no one wants that so as soon as I saw the message I tried to update my site to PHP 8 which is as easy as clicking a button in the GoDaddy console. However after clicking the button it caused my site to immediately crash and burn. I was able to push the button again to revert the change and all was well again, albeit with an outdated version of PHP up and running. I tried this upgrade several times and had the same results so I put it off, until yesterday.

So yesterday I was determined to figure out what the deal was. One of my sites was corrected by me disabling all plug ins, doing the PHP upgrade, and then reenabling the plug ins I needed. However this blog site still would crash when running PHP 8, even with all plug ins disabled. I placed a call with GoDaddy support to assist my troubleshooting. After some trial and error it was determined that the theme I was using for the blog was causing the crash. I probably should have been able to figure that one out on my own considering this theme is very old and has not been updated for around a half decade.

So now that I knew the problem I had to find another theme. I did not take tons of time to do this, I just wanted to find something that worked, which is what you are looking at currently. It’s a fresher, more modern look but has some bugs for me to still work out. One annoying bug for me is it appears the classic editor does not play nicely with this theme so I have been forced to write entries with the “block” editor which I have avoided up until this point despite it being out for years. It may grow on me.

So don’t be surprised if you tune in here and see a different theme in the future in case I decide I am not set on this one. In a way it’s appropriate that the look and feel of the blog changes after such a long time, considering all the other upheaval going on in my life right now.

Last night I had my last live stream ever in my current house. I talked about PEV things, the house transition and life in general. I had good audience participation that stretched the stream out to almost 3 hours. It will be interesting to see how/where streaming will take place at the new house.

Speaking of the new house, yesterday I contacted a lawn service that apparently services other homes in the area I will be living. I asked for a quote to maintain my yard. I was very pleased with the answer. For $160 a month they will come weekly to mow, weed whack, and trim bushes as needed. I instantly hired them. Not having to worry about keeping the yard in order is worth $40 a week to me, easily. It also dramatically reduces my need to keep anything other than simple yard maintenance equipment, a good thing with my new less spacious arrangements.