Moving to a new server sometime this weekend (Saturday night is the tentative plan), and the good folks at Hosting Matters are upgrading the WordPress version. Hopefully, that should take care of the connection problems, but I have to admit, we are all flummoxed as to what is causing it.
I am also thinking about doing a site redesign to make things load faster and to incorporate some new things (polls, etc.), and I got an estimate for $800.00. That will happen as soon as we raise the loot (hint, paypal to the right, and paypal is better than amazon honors because I can pay the designer with paypal, but either is fine) or I have $800.00 I want to spend on a re-design.
And the re-design will not be dramatic. It will look very much like it does now, just coded better and cleaner. I hate change, and am still mad they changed the Monk theme song after the first season, and we are in the 6th or 7th season of the show. So fear not.
So hold tight. We are working on it.
D. Mason
Obviously I will be glad to have things working more smoothly so thanks for taking the steps to keep providing such a great free service to us all. That being said, I like the site design… Even though $800 seems like a decent price for such a job I think it’s a waste of money. This site is one of my favorites partly because of the extremely simple and clean design.
jeffreyw
I’m in for 10.
Daniel
Just be aware that software estimates are notoriously unreliable.
Laura W
Quick! Take this down and put it back up around 10:10EST. Everyone will be so tanked and so giddy they will give you that $800 in a heartbeat.
I know I throw my money around like A DRUNKEN SAILOR when I’m drinking.
Comrade Cris Ivanov
Hooray! Thanks for putting up with all of us bitching about it for so long.
Comrade Cris Ivanov
Hooray! Thanks for putting up with all of us bitching about it for so long.
Ted
I just wish I didn’t have to look at Glenn Reynolds and Charles Johnson all the time on the left hand side of the page these days. But I know that’s under PeePee Media’s control.
Stuck in the Fun House
The surly occupants of the Funhouse are ecstatic at the prospect of a new BJ. It should make the dispensation of Hot Air more reliable for the clamoring masses.
Thelonious
I’ll give $25 just to get rid of the Pajamas TV advertising.
cleek
yay!
Comrade Cris Ivanov
$25 in the jar. And Griffin is the name of my 13-year-old cat.
binzinerator
Now, now. Your conservative roots are showing again.
anticontrarian
i got twenty bucks for you.
Sherrell H.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8__aXxXPVc
Jack Cafferty…telling it like it is!
Jess
Still a conservative despite drinking the MUP koolade…
(have we dropped the MUP label? too bad–it always gave me a giggle.)
binzinerator
$20 in the jar.
Laura W
I will never tire of watching Katie’s face in these clips.
OK, I made my paypal donation. Now I can start drinking.
Of course, if you post it fresh at 10:10 I will think it’s new and donate again, and a bigger amount. (hint hint.)
srv
I’m in for $50 if you shade the background for alternating posts.
Don’t any of you get tired of BLINDING WHITE ALL THE TIME?
JonChicago
Sherrell: Thanks for sharing. It is about time some one from the media steps up and really calls it like it is. She is not ready. Nice article today from Judith Warner talking about the empathy one feels when we see someone with so much hubris get caught over their head. We have all been there. We usually crawl home with out tail between our legs and bounce back the next day. Not sure if Gov. Palin will get a second chance after this debacle.
http://warner.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/09/25/poor-sarah/
Michael D.
I just sent $50, this is getting onmy nerves that much!!
srv
You know, I’m half expecting them to announce that tired of being Co-President, Dick will serve as Co-Vice-President until soccer season is over and she’s up to speed.
MikeL
The redesign will be fine as long as you don’t botch it like RedState did. Their site still isn’t fixed.
Svensker
Frabjous day!
I too have made a wee donation.
Comrade Dreggas
Fixed…you know I had too…
CountryFirst
I’m allergic to PayPal so I used Amazon, but whichever you choose, I urge all Juicers to open your wallets and support your favorite blog.
I like to chide people to put their money where their mouth is, but here is one opportunity where it really would be a good idea.
If anything goes wrong with the upgrade, John McPalin will suspend(tm) his campaign and fly in to Get It Done.
These are exciting times!
JonChicago
Hope my $30.00 helps. I’ll have to drink cheap red wine for a couple of nights. But your blog has been too much fun.
Comrade Warren Terra
Also in for $10, and eagerly looking forward to the improved Balloon Juice.
Note the Paypal link in your post didn’t work for me; I had to go find the button at the right. It seems like clicking the button opens a new session each time, with a unique URL. Still, anyone who’s willing to fork over is probably willing to keep trying after the blown link.
I’ll also take this opportunity to post a link to your Obama fundraising page
zuzu's petals
I sent $50 awhile back, will send a few to put it over the top.
Comrade Darkness
They should not be flummoxed. Turn logging on for mysql and turn process time logging on for apache. Look through the logs for queries and webpages that take too long to process. I got the sense from other posts that you do not have a dedicated db server. You or one of the other accounts sharing the db has a table that is damaged, lacking indexes, or just has code written by an idiot and making queries that tie mysql in knots. It should take 10 minutes of logging to find the problem area. Solving the problem once the page/queries are identified may take longer, but that’s different from flummoxed.
cleek
i gives ya a wee bit o the green
Comrade Warren Terra
Hey, waitaminute, Michael D. posts to the front page – now we learn that he has to pay for the privilege? And with the single biggest donation reported in the thread so far?
Sounds fishy …
Comrade Nicole
Worth every penny. Not to get all mushy, but thank you everyone for being so smart, funny and snarky. Some days I think this place is the only thing that keeps me from feeling like Kevin McCarthy in Invasion of the Body Snatchers- “Can’t you see?” And then I get a Word Press Error and the pod people explain to me once again how Obama accidentally referring to the 57 states was in fact a secret message to Muslim nations and a tiny piece of my soul dies.
So thank you for the new server.
cleek
crap. “wordpresserror.com” is already taken.
Laura W
I’ll bet John has his $800 by now.
If we are able to make requests in exchange for our donations (hey, that’s legal, isn’t it?) I would like to lobby for the ability to post photos. Of our pets. No kids.
Stuck in the Fun House
Yes, I know. Silliness is the only price for admission to the FH. congrats!
Comrade John Cole
At 350 already, which is kind of shocking. I will pull the plug as soon as we get to 800.00
I intend to start pet-blogging again as soon as we are stable again. Right now, I only use images when I think we can handle it, and use mostly video and stuff that goes to a third party (youtube).
Stuck in the Fun House
Yes, I know. Silliness is the only price for admission to the FH. congrats!
Comrade Ivan Fookinov (fmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
My wife and I got back from our trip last night and we broke even at the casino (the wife did all of the gambling as I would have lost everything) so I tossed in a 10 spot for the updates.
Now if WaMu honors it, you ought to be ok! ;)
KevinD
I tried to donate John, but it froze up for an hour then charged me twice.
What’s up with that?
LOL
Comrade jnfr
Will send next week. This blog deserves upgrades!
Comrade Ivan Fookinov (fmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
I think my use of the word c a s i n o or g a m b l i n g pissed off the BJ Mod Gawd.
HEP! ;)
Comrade Ivan Fookinov (fmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
Now I have two comments stuck in moderation! You can delete the second as it is only to note the first being in moderation.
Donating is a tough job here! ;)
Comrade RoonieRoo
Threw $40 in the jar for me and my honey the Grumpy Code Monkey. Thank you so much for working on this. Balloon-Juice makes our evening coversations so much better than the normal:
RR: How was your day staring at code?
GCM: Fine. How was your day staring at code?
We love ya John.
Eric
Ten bucks sent. Don’t blow it on strippers and booze.
Well…at least make sure it’s good booze.
Comrade Ivan Fookinov (fmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
Testing to see if my name change is tripping the moderation! This is only a test! If this posts, I have three other comments in moderation and you can delete the last two.
Dennis - SGMM
Just kipped in my ten.
You really have stopped being a Republican. :)
Laura W
Well, I was gonna suggest you let it go and give the overflow to Obama in the spirit of the evening, but it’s your site and all and such as.
I have an idea. Because I am so wanting to play the first drinking game EVER in my (long) life tonight, I will create my own.
I will give $1 to Obama every time “pocketbook” is said tonight. Which means, sadly, I’ll have to pay attention.
I would’ve given a lot more per utterance, but I’m a (non)starving artist who will have to get A Real Job soon, now that pique assiette mosaics are probably considered non-essentials. Hard on the dental work, dontcha know.
Mary
I’ll pitch in a few more bucks.
So can the server stand some liveblogging and drinking games tonight, or will the whole site go tits up?
Mary
FUCK.
Ted Kennedy has been admitted to the hospital. Just reported on MSNBC.
Comrade Warren Terra
Why stop when it hits $800? I can’t be the only faithful reader who’s never actually chipped in before …
I could totally see the occasional pledge drive post, elbeit not during prime candidate-donating season.
Litlebritdifrnt
I’m in for $20.00 wish it could be more considering the amount of enjoyment I get out of this site.
Stuck in the Fun House
Sarah Palin swimsuit competition with obligatory sexism protection. It’s part of HIstory.
I’ll get ya some, and bring em to ya.
Comrade Grand Panjandrum
Hail Comrade Cole. Anything for the proletariat and its righteous cause. Hail to the MUP–may we worship him (and his mighty vassal Comrade Cole) and sing praise to them forever. (OK maybe not forever but at least until I’m not to drunk to type.)
I will miss those WordPress errors. Oh and the never loading pages… gosh, parting is such sweet sorrow.
Tossed a couple of bucks in the kitty. Now I can demand around the clock outrage and more drunk blogging! Get to work Comrade Cole!
jhaygood
I’m not a regular commenter (reader or writer) here, but man, the writing on the front page of this site is some of the best, funniest most ‘what HE said’ writing out there. Thanks and don’t spend the tip all in one place…
The Grand Panjandrum
Pocketbook. (Can you hear me now?)
Pocketbook. (Can you hear me now?)
Pocketbook. (Can you hear me now?)
Pocketbook. (Can you hear me now?)
Pocketbook. (Can you hear me now?)
I’ve already started my drinking game. I believe I will name it “help Laura W spend all her money”!
zuzu's petals
Hey, I see B-J is almost up to $50K over at Act Blue:
Act Blue:Balloons for Obama
Yay team !
The Grand Panjandrum
Recall that ALL web design people are librulZ so they couldn’t anyone anointed by Jesus (or some shit like that) to do the redesign. Anyone remember why they had so many problems? I know part of it was that all web designers were librulZ but they had a few other doozies as well. (Aaaahhhh! A stroll down memory lane. Who knew Red State was still alive? If Obama gets elected RedState, MM, HotAir and the Freepers will all be on my Must Read.)
capelza
I sent it through Amazon, John. paypal and I aren’t seeing each other any more.
D. Mason
That’s what made me a regular here.
KRK
I’m in for $25. Should be more for the value of BJ, but Obama contributions are draining me dry.
I do worry that a fully functioning BJ will get overrun by trolls as it was a couple of weekends ago. Not my blog, obviously, but it’s just not as much fun to read in such cases. I don’t suppose you could have it crash every once in a while just for kicks?
Alan
I just sent $20 via Amazon.
Now off to buy some Newcastle Brown Ale to join in on the debate fun. :)
Wini
I’m in. Love this blog.
Annette
“Sharing the db?” I’m going to presume you meant “sharing the server”, since nobody is sharing any databases. I can only imagine the disaster that would be as people deleted each others’ table willy-nilly because they didn’t recognize something. It’s a nice attempt at being an armchair sysadmin, and we appreciate it, but we’d appreciate it more if you didn’t automatically assume things (i.e., that no logging is done, ever, that there are in fact all these other sites sharing the server, and so on). The only thing that makes this site special on this server is a) it’s running an older version of WP with a bunch of plugins, and b) it’s virtually the ONLY site on the server (pushing 93% of the total bandwidth usage of it), since we couldn’t very well leave other people on the server when this site creates the issues it does.
For those curious, the current server is a dual xeon 2.4 with 2G of RAM. The new server is a dual xeon 3.4 with 4G of RAM. This site will be the only site on that server until we nail down why this site creates so many issues that other sites, also using WP, and just as busy, do not, on servers with similar specifications. I had planned to try to sneak in the migration and upgrade tonight, but when it became clear that McCain was not going to stay in DC and rescue everyone, and that the debate would go off as scheduled, babysitting servers would be the primary duty this evening.
Your friendly admin, signing off to make massive amounts of coffee before the games begin…
LiberalTarian
Somehow it seems fitting that a $10 donation took an email to remember my password, checking a little used gmail account from my more used account that took 3 minutes to fetch and appear, lots of verifications that I am who I say I am, an apparently non-functioning link that kept telling me I appeared to be doing something wrong, and finally, getting it right to chip in on the newish page. Whew. I sincerely hope the new page works well. :)
LiberalTarian
Ah Annette, I could just HUG you. Thank you so much! Oh, and here, have a G&T. Actually, T&T … it’s tasty. :)
Stuck in the Fun House
Cole’s own Alice B Toklas speaks wisdom.
Tattoosydney
I’ve sent $50 via Paypal….
Coming from Australia, I’m not allowed to donate to Obama or any other politician, so I reason that I can channel some of the money I would donate (if I was allowed to) to supporting the great arts of snark, analysis and wingnut debunking by donating to you and Giordano …
Thanks for all the enjoyment I get out of Balloon Juice!
Tattoosydney
Anyone have any other ideas (legal of course – no breaching American electoral laws for me) as to where us foreigner overseas bunnies could donate that might help get Obama into the White House?
pikapicabi
I’m in. I can’t tell you how much your site has meant these last few months since I’ve discovered it. I went back and read a lot of your pre-shift posts just to see the distance you’ve traveled. Your writing, your passion, and, yes, the snark are all gifts. And I truly mourn the passing of the mighty dog.
L. Ron Obamanov
I, for one, donated in the spirit of our new socialist overlords.
Comrade Warren Terra
Tattoosydney, I’ve got very few ideas. Assuming you can hardly travel here and volunteer, you could phone-bank (assuming your accent and/or nationality aren’t a problem in conbecting with undecided voters, and unless you VOIP it’ll be pricey); and you might be able to help round up some American voters near you, or canvass sites likely to attract American tourists. I think 527s have the same donation requirements as candidates. I have seen individuals raising money to support their canvassing – gas and bus rentals from Illinois to Ohio, for example, in a Kos diary – and I suspect those people aren’t organized enough to be following reporting and eligibility requirements; but I can in no way guarantee the legality of your donating to such a group.
DrDave
$25 via PayPal. Well worth it for the amusement value alone. And to be able to say *FUCK* in my comments without concern for getting tossed.
Comrade Tax Analyst
I couldn’t get on the site, so I didn’t know you were collecting. Since you’ve raised the $800 already I will split what I was going to pitch in between the Obama campaign and the LA SPCA, the first because we REALLY need a reasonable, responsible, clear-headed person in the White House this time around, and the 2nd in memory of John’s terrier, Russell Cole, my long-gone feline friend, Loki and all the other wonderful pets who have given us special moments and memories in their sometimes too brief lives.
Too bad I’m posting this in a thread that appears to have gone to “Thread Heaven” (or Purgatory, perhaps).
Dustin
I see I missed the pledge drive :( Well… I don’t know who your designer is but considering all you’re looking for is streamlined code and a design upgrade $800 seems a bit steep. Hell if you asked I’d do it for free just to help out. Think I’ll shoot you guys an email after I get home from work about that; I’d hate to see you waste the greenbacks.