Let's give this a try

Let's give this a try and see if Blogger has corrected their problems.* I don't know if they have or not, but I would like to find out. It seems that they offer more customization than WordPress does (at least the customization that I prefer), and the free customization that I am used to with Blogger is $15 per year with WordPress.

* - For those out of the loop, click here.

$15 per year?!? I'm too cheap for that! Why should I have to pay $15 per year to fix a few problems with default templates that I don't love, when I can come to Blogger and do pretty much whatever I want for free?

Well, there is the part where Blogger ate my other blog. But, I'm willing to forgive and forget, if Blogger is willing to cooperate with me and not eat this blog. I do see that they've added a pages feature - I may have to give that a try.

Hopefully this works, because I miss my friends at Blogger. (More on this later.)

* * * *

I've moved all my posts from WordPress to Blogger, and will now continue my blogging journey where it started. I just can't stop thinking about the fact that I would have to pay $15 per year just to change a few default settings on a blog template. The more I think of it, the less I like it, and the more I wanted to move back to blogger.

I know what you're thinking: "But dude, it's only $1.25 per month." Well, that's not entirely true, because I have two blogs at WordPress, so it would be $2.50 per month, and that's not even the point. The point is: I don't want to pay for something that I can get for free. Do I have the money? Of course I do, but why spend it on something as minor as a blog when I can spend it on more important things? And, why do I make such a big deal out of a few settings on a blog template? I'm glad you asked...

In short: It's the principle of the matter. Blogger offers something for free that WordPress charges $15 per year for. And, when comparing the two blog platforms, it comes down to four essential qualities:

• Ease of Use
• Look/Feel of Template
• Total Cost
• Cool Extra Stuff

When comparing the two side by side, blogger wins in three of the four categories. (I must admit, WordPress has the upper hand in cool extra stuff - like the automatically post to Twitter and Facebook feature, and the tracking that's built into the blog - but I can get by without those things. When it comes down to the real nitty-gritty, items 1-3 are the most important, and Blogger wins in those areas.)

It's not just about the $15. In fact, my wife took the time to convince me that it wasn't even that much money to spend on the blog for one year, so the amount of money really isn't the issue - it's the fact that I have to spend the money in the first place. Template customization should be a free service (I mean come on, we're only talking about a few font color settings here). And, with Blogger, template customization is free, so in the end, it's not really that hard of a decision to make.

Also, Blogger gained a lot of bonus points by adding the really cool "pages" feature, for those of you scoring at home.

* * * *

But what about the whole "Google ate my blog" issue? Well, I thought about that for a while, and came to this conclusion: I've been blogging for almost 2 years now, I've had three blogs with Blogger (I used to write about the Red Sox until I deleted the blog, and I have a blog that I use for my Panthers blog that I create charts and graphs in and store them for future use.), and I've never had a blog deleted other than the one incident that drove me away. None of my other blogs were affected, and none of the blogs of my friends were affected, so it wasn't a "Google problem" - if it were, then surely I wouldn't have been the only one in all the blogs I read to experience the problem, right? Apparently what happened was I hit a button or changed something inadvertently and didn't figure out what it was, and the end result was my blog being screwed up beyond recovery - and I didn't feel like trying to get Google to help me because it's pointless (if you've ever dealt with customer service, you know what I'm talking about).

So, I'm pretty confident that I won't have the same issue this time around. My Panthers blog is still there, and there's nothing wrong with it (yet). In fact, had I not already spent the $15 to upgrade my WordPress Panthers blog, I'd move it back to blogger too (I'm going to wait until the upgrade expires since I've already paid for it, and it's non-refundable).  So I think I'll be okay. (But, I'm keeping my WordPress blog active just in case something bad happens, because you can never be too cautious.)

* * * *

Now, to my friends. I've not been as attentive to some of my favorite blogs as I should be, and I know that this is a lame excuse, but part of the reason is because when I moved to WordPress, I stopped signing in to Blogger because I wasn't blogging there anymore, and I didn't see the updated feeds from the "blogs I follow" widget on the Blogger dashboard (WordPress doesn't have one of those, btw). I know that it's still my fault for not reading, but at least now you know part of the reason why, because for some reason I don't click on blogs if I don't see that they have a new post, even though I know that most of you write something every day. It's a flaw that I need to work on, I admit that, but now it shouldn't be a problem because being back at Blogger means I don't have an excuse any more.

* * * *

Overall, I think that I'm making the right decision, primarily because since I moved to WordPress I really haven't had the desire to blog as much because I can't get over the dislike of the blog templates. If I don't like the way my blog looks, I'm not going to have a desire to write (as was evidenced by my lack of posting over the past few months).

I know you're probably thinking: "But, your blog is so plain and simple, what's the big deal?" Well, I know it's plain - but that's the way I like it. I like the font, the font color, the link color, the design - everything about it is what I want, and WordPress can't provide it for me. All of their templates are either girly, gay, or ugly (not that there's anything wrong with that). The few that are similar to mine all have things about them that I don't like (and I'm very picky - just ask my wife), and it's enough to make me not want to use them. The template I had was the one that I hated the least of all the ones available, and there are at least three things that I don't like about it, so I think it is best for my blogging psyche to just move back to Blogger where I can change the blog as many times as I want and not have to pay a single penny for the privilege.

Anyway, I'm sure you're getting tired of this rambling mess, so I'm going to stop now. I'm glad to be back here where I belong, and I look forward to sharing my thoughts with each and every one of you.

Thanks for reading.