Now, I’m looking at this blog. “Fred Thompson for President” – heh… Seems it’s gotten a little bit out of date. I notice part 1 of a 3-part “2007 Year in Review” series – this won’t be finished. There is the conspicuous absence of a Martin Luther King, Jr. birthday post and a Sanctity of Human Life post – these will probably go undone as well. Feel free to browse the archives and remember what I’ve said in previous years – I still feel that way. (Of course, with Barack Obama and Jeremiah Wright out there, we may still have a race-based post before the year is out.)

The blog is now running WordPress 2.5, so it’s up to the latest and greatest version. Coming very shortly is a huge “Plagiarism Is the Sincerest Form of Flattery” post, which will catch up with all the interesting stuff we missed over the past several weeks. I’ll also get around to replacing Fred’s button with one more timely at some point.

• Archives, Categories, Daily Reads, and Search are now in drop-down menus on the top of the page.
• Verse of the Day is now the first “entry” on the main page. It isn’t shown on archive, category, or individual pages.
• Theme Switcher, Spam Count, Standards, and I Support are located at the bottom of each page.
• Feed Links and Blog Info are also in the footer of each page.
• Log In and Register can be obtained by clicking the “Admin” link.

As I did with my previous theme switch, the NightLight Idea theme will remain in the theme switcher. So, if you prefer it (or the Pool theme before it), you can view the blog with those themes. They continue to be supported, so if anything looks funky with any of the themes, just let me know. (I don’t do anything with the “WordPress” themes – they’re shipped with the software, and I upgrade them whenever a new version comes out.)

Enjoy!

UPDATE – 14 Jan 08: If you’ve ever used the theme switcher, you may not be seeing the new theme. Just click “Mimetastic” from the theme viewer to see it.

If you don’t care about the difference between tags and categories, you can stop reading now…

One reason it’s taken me so long to add tags to this theme is that I had a hard time wrapping my head around the concept of a tag versus a category. It may not be scientific, and there was no one moment where a light bulb went on above my head and I said “wow – that’s it!” But the way I understand it (and the way they’ll be used in this blog) is this; categories are broad and should be few, while tags are narrow and may be many. Basically, a category is where you would file the post, were you to print it out and put it in a filing cabinet, or make a card for it in the card catalog of a library – for this post, the category is “Site Info”. A tag is more a collection of keywords or topics that may appear or be referenced in a post. Look at the tag list for this post, and you’ll see what I mean.

And, by the way – I know I have some readers who are WordPress bloggers. Here’s how I did it – it was a piece of cake!

I’m sure you lurkers will welcome him the same way you welcome me. And remember too – this is my house. G-rated language and civility on both sides will be unapologetically enforced.

Also, seeing how potent Akismet is, I have changed the configuration to no longer require a registration to leave comments. If spam starts seeping through, I’ll lock it back down, but for now, if that’s what’s been stopping you, have at it. In fact, you can practice by leaving your comments about this new theme on this post!

Update (28 Sep / 1936 MDT) – I know the sidebar looks weird in IE6. Upgrade or change is my advice.

Update (28 Sep / 1945 MDT) – On the sidebar, there is now a section called “Choose Your Theme.” This will allow you to view the new theme (NightLight Idea), the old theme (Pool), or the two default themes that come with WordPress. You can still tell me in the comments which one you prefer. I made sure the theme switcher appears on all the themes, so you can switch back and forth at will. (Pool and NightLight Idea have been customized, while the others have not – so some features may not appear on the default themes.)

(Update – it’s done, and everything works swimmingly!)

The other two changes work together with each other, to enhance the comments. Check out the “Let Are Kids Walk” article, near the bottom where the comments start. The first icon is the flag of the nation from which the commenter posted (yes, I know where you live!). The next icons show the browser and operating system they were using. For links from other websites (which you’ll see a link from this post to that one), you’ll see the country where the blog resides, and the blogging software used at that site.

For those who want the details on these plug-ins, here are their names, linked to their home pages.

• Share This by Alex King provides the “Share This” box at the bottom of each post.
• IP 2 Nation by Ozh (based on the ip2nation project by Per Gustafsson) provides the flags.
• Browser Sniff by Priyadi Iman Nurcahyo provides the browser, OS, and blogging software icons.

Enjoy!

And now, back to your irregularly scheduled programming…

Last night I watched a report on Headline Line News regarding the basement democrats trying to keep their presidential aspirations alive (they are in the basement as far as the front runners are concerned). The station played part of a Chris Dodd ad where he states that we are involved in an Iraqi civil war … and I nearly threw my shoe through the TV set.

Senator Dodd, obviously you haven’t been paying attention for the last twenty-seven years.

He also has an article posted on Friday entitled “Do You Know?“, filled with interesting statistics…

Did you know that 47 countries have reestablished their embassies in Iraq?

Did you know that the Iraqi government currently employs 1.2 million Iraqi people?

Did you know that 3,100 schools have been renovated, 364 schools are under rehabilitation, 263 new schools are now under construction and 38 new schools have been completed in Iraq?

Signal94 is now listed under “Daily Reads” in the sidebar.