How Many Hours Before I Yell “UNCLE!”?

This might seem like a very silly post but I said right from the git go that one of my goals with starting this blog was to become familiar with the WordPress blogging program since I have a couple other projects I’d like to use it for. Well, I hit my first roadblock last night.

I’ve got a couple of blogs on Blogger that I try to keep up with and it just seemed like the program was so easy to learn. When I wanted to learn how to add an image to my post it was a snap. When I wanted to add links — even easier. And when I decided it was time to figure out how to add an RSS feed, I was able to add it to all my sites within an hour (maybe two, but no more than that!)

Since I’m about as non-technical as you can get, that’s really saying something. Even more impressive (at least to me, I’m sure no one else probably cares) is the fact that I figured it out myself. No calling the PCWT (Personal Computer Whiz Team –a.k.a. my kids) or sweet-talking my husband into doing it for me or even walking me through it. Nope, I did it myself.

I figured that all blogging programs were the same, maybe a few minor differences, but overall it would be same old, same old.

Not true. I started out pretty good, creating this blog , getting my sidebar set up, listing a few categories and so on. I was feeling pretty good. I liked this new blogging program. The templates are great; it certainly seemed simple enough. And then last night I decided to add a picture to one of the posts I had written. It did not go well.

Actually, if you bother to look, you’ll see there are no images in any of my posts (at least not at this writing.) I just couldn’t figure it out. I couldn’t get the picture to load, then when I finally did get it to load, I couldn’t get it to insert where I wanted it. I finally gave up in frustration. Time invested: 1.5 hours (and no picture.)

Later I decided to do a little reading and add the RSS link. I found instructions and finally figured out how to access a “text widget” as the instructions stated, but damn … no little RSS icon was showing up. Finally I sent a desperate request for help to the support desk and called it a night. Time invested: 2.5 hours (and no RSS feed.)

When I got up this morning, I was happy to see a reply from the support desk with instructions on what to do. Actually it contained a link to where I could go for more help. Guess what? It was the same page I’d spent the better part of my evening with last night. Arrghh… I’m fairly certain that I mentioned this particular page in my email — mentioning that I couldn’t figure out what I was doing wrong since I was following the sketchy directions on this page as best I could. So I was back to being frustrated.

But then I went and looked at the blog and saw the RSS feed had miraculously appeared. I don’t know how and I don’t know why. And at this point, I don’t really care either. Maybe the Blogging Fairy showed up after I went to bed and tapped her magic wand on my sidebar. Who knows? The point is that it was there. Still, I needed to make a few changes (I had just a little icon and I wanted it to be a little bigger) but they were easy and done very quickly. So maybe this isn’t going to be so tough after all.

This morning I decided to try to figure out how to add links. It took a couple of minutes but I considered myself an old pro after only about 15 minutes of focused attention. I think this is starting to get a bit easier.

What’s left? Figuring out how to add images. Adding a Blogroll. Trying to decide the best way to add tags that can be picked up by Technorati (I have no idea if that is what I actually want to do but I think I’m using the right terms!) … I know this will all take time. I know there will be a learning curve. I know that once I get it all figured out it will all make sense and I’ll look back wondering what the big deal was. But I’m not there yet.

In the meantime I hope the Blogging Fairy continues to do a fly by of my computer at night.

Until the next post …