There is just something about Panera Bread and me that do not get along. For the longest time I thought my laptop was the problem — maybe just some weird hardware quirk or incompatibility that resulted in the wifi signal lagging or being dropped altogether. But that can’t be it, because here I sit, using my brand new HP Mini 311, and the same issue is happening.

It’s frustrating, to say the least.

Since I don’t have many plans today besides Do As Much Work As Possible, I think I’ll head over to my mom’s during the lunch rush, as she needed help setting up her home network, and then I will head over to the other Panera Bread on the other side of town. I remember being there last May, and if I can recall correctly I didn’t have any internet issues. So maybe I’ll have better luck there? I can only hope!

I just rejected three paid opportunities in a row. Sure, each one offered $6.00, but the advertiser (same one for all three; each opp was to go on a different blog of mine) demanded three links per opportunity. Are you kidding me? Three? Haha. My personal standard is no less than $5 for one link, and if you want an exceptionally written post, you can expect to cough up $10 or more. My time is worth something, as well as my blog space and the potential link juice I’m passing your way.

Anyway, right now I’m just trying to wrap up any miscellaneous tasks and opportunities that would be quick to take care of, including a quick article on why even the most effective diet pill has risks. I’m having an endoscopic procedure today, so I’ll be sedated, and then pretty out of it for a good chunk of the day while the sedation meds work their way out of my system. I’ve been looking forward to/nervous about this procedure for nearly two months now (this was originally scheduled for February 11th, but then I came down with pneumonia and had to postpone it).

Whenever I go to Panera Bread for some kid-free work time I always bring along my Sprint wifi card. Why? Simple: my local Panera Bread’s network connection (wifi, of course) is very spotty. It’s on-again, off-again, rinse and repeat. It doesn’t matter what time of day I go to the restaurant or where I sit. And considering that I pick up wireless networks just fine at home, at my mother’s house and in public places, I seriously doubt the problem is on my end.

You’d think for as much as they charge for bottled waters, cookies, muffins (not even a WHOLE muffin; the top is sliced off and sold for over a dollar WTF???) and their entrees that they’d be able to do a little better with the internet connectivity.

Let me tell you, researching men’s tuxedo shirts (my husband is going to be attending a wedding in May), attempting to install WordPress or even just trying to blog can be very frustrating and time-consuming if your internet signal keeps getting dropped! *steam*

A client whose blog about weight loss supplements I sometimes help out with recently lost nearly four months worth of posts, thanks to a Yahoo Webhosting snafu. I felt bad for them, but at the same time I couldn’t help but wonder why the heck they didn’t bother to have backups on hand. I use WordPress Database Backup, which I can set to do daily or weekly backups and email them to the address of my choice. I can even specify the tables I want to be saved in the backup!

Seriously people… as easy as WordPress is to use and customize, why can’t you install one simple little plugin that will save you so much potential hassle and grief later?

I was recently asked to update an online store’s blog. Not a big deal, right? They run WordPress, so bringing it up to date should be as easy as logging into the administrative area, going through the 1-click upgrade process to upgrade the core installation, and then going back and updating any plugins that are out of date. But in the case of the client’s blog, the WordPress installation was so old (2.0.x) that I had to manually upgrade WordPress. Still not a big deal, right? Simply download the new files, FTP them into place, run the upgrade.php script, and we’re good to go.

But given my luck this weekend (I’m sick as a dog and I seriously can’t wait to make an appointment with someone in a lab coat tomorrow!), of course it couldn’t be that easy. It turns out that the very old installation of WordPress left the blog very vulnerable to attacks, and it was hacked a few times. I cleared out the infected files, themes and plugins, and replaced them with new ones, but now I’m awaiting information on how to access the MySQL database (the site is hosted with Yahoo webhosting), so that I can manually remove infected code from that as well.

Ugh. People… it’s so easy to avoid problems like these, so why even let them happen to begin with?!

Last summer I wrote about Math Comment Spam Protection. It’s a WordPress plugin that requires commenters to answer a simple math question before submitting a comment. It’s very quick to install, and takes just one little snippet of code to get it working in the blog.

However, lately it hasn’t been working properly, unless all of my commenters have sudden lost the ability to add seven and eight (fifteen, for those of you playing along at home). I’m annoyed because now I’m getting spam comments about Viagra, manufactured homes and Percocet. And these comments are winding up in the moderation queue as well as the spam queue, so I have more comments to sift through. Plus there’s the issue of legitimate comments not getting through.

Unfortunately, with so much to do every day of the week I haven’t had the chance to look into things. And while I do have the chance to tonight, I’m very tired, and would much rather go to bed! But I’ll keep my eyes peeled, and I did email the author, so hopefully a solution will be provided asap.

I recently wrote a product review about a sex toy on my personal blog, jenn.nu. When a representative from the adult toy initially contacted me, she told me she understood if I would prefer to review something a little less sexual, such as a piece of lingerie or massage oil (as if those don’t scream sex, lol. But I suppose they don’t scream it quite as loudly as a vibrator does!). But I was more than happy to go for a sex toy. Besides having something fun to add to my collection, I’m all for being open with my opinions, even if they don’t necessarily mesh with the image most people have of a mother.

But you know, that’s the thing about being a mother, and a mommy blogger in particular. I’m somehow expected to put away the sexual, feminine side of me, and just be a mother. Of course I’m a mother, and of course I have a responsibility to my children, but that doesn’t mean I can’t be me. And just for your info, you know how my children got here in the first place? BY ME HAVING SEX. Yes, sex!

Conservatives to the left, kthnxbye!