I’ve got a new header. That’s what I did to vent my frustration over my blog’s technical problems last night. That’s my way of looking at the bright side.

Last night, I was really feeling less than bright. Felt really annoyed actually. The first time I’ve felt that way in a long time since I’m normally patient with most people and things. (I’ve got two toddlers, I’ve got more than enough patience training!)

See my blog was loading really slow early last night. As in more than one minute slow. I tried not to be alarmed at first and just did the routine: exit browser, clear cache and restart browser. After four attempts, my blog was still as slow as a turtle.

Finally, I decided to log into my hosting provider Hostgator’s live chat. I’ve had good experience with them before and this is the first time my website has lagged ever since I transferred my sites to them so I was anticipating we could resolve this easily. I got connected quickly with a chat technician who tried to diagnose my site’s problem.

There were a lot of waiting periods throughout our chat but I didn’t mind. I felt the technician was sincerely trying to help. But we were approaching the one hour mark and there was still no resolution. I did a shoutout on my Twitter page asking for @hostgator’s help. (I assumed the one operating the twitter account would be higher up.)

BF who was then responding to the tweets quickly replied and asked for the usual details. BF even followed me so I can direct message @hostgator on Twitter. At the same time, the chat technician asked for my blog’s username and password so she could take a look inside the dashboard.

Before I knew it, she already changed my blog’s theme to the default theme and informed that it was loading faster this time. I didn’t mind at first, just a little concerned that the problem was with my theme.

But when I switched my original theme back on, the layout went all askew. I was so miffed! It took me hours of hard work ( and I really mean hours) to work on my layout and it was messed up with one click.

Granted I gave her my login details, what ticked me off was the fact that she did not ask for my permission first before switching my theme. If she had done that, I wouldn’t have been so annoyed because I allowed it. But I didn’t!

I tweeted my disappointment and @hostgator was quick to respond to my status update. At first FB was defending the technician saying the switch needed to be made to diagnose the problem, but later on apologized while admitting the technician really should have asked my permission first.

As you can see, the issue preoccupied me well into the night. Even while watching Dora the Explorer.

Anyway what really surprised me was how strong the whole thing affected me. I mean it’s just my blog. Well I guess, my blog isn’t just a blog for me now. It means so much more to me, like a real extension of myself. If it wasn’t that important, I wouldn’t have stayed up all night just to get it fixed. (Okay, BLOG ADDICT warning lights now glaring on my chest.)

I’m just relieved it’s all over and my blog looks lighter and prettier. I had my blog diagnosed through this web page analyzer and there were warnings all over my results page.

Apparently, I had too many images and javascripts running. I had to remove some plugins and other add – ons on my sidebar which I suspected were the culprits. I also removed the teasers at the bottom and just increased the number of latest posts at the sidebar. I’m set to work on minimizing my CSS files this weekend. (Okay, the warning lights say BLOG GEEK and this time they’re on my forehead.)

So yeah, there’s still a lighter side to all this blog brouhaha. Now I’m going back to regular programming. I’m sure this weekend is gonna be awesome.

Have a cool weekend!

Tagged as: Blogging, Hostgator