Just in case you’re using WordPress, the most successful combination I’ve found so far to Kill Spam Dead (in regard to Comment and Trackback spam) is this:
AuthImage for Comment Spam; I have had no problems with this. No comment spam has made it through since I implemented this. Yay.

Go here for trackback spam. It works. I started getting my first vomit-like chunks of trackback-spam today and I tried a few fixes. This is the only one that worked.

Today I doubled the RAM in my laptop. Glory be. I was getting completely clagged. What I really need is a bigger hard drive, but with some selective culling and my new half gig of RAM, everything is a little more zippy. Thank you ebay: I still can’t get over how cheap memory is, compared to how much it used to be. I got 256 meg of laptop RAM for $55, which isn’t bad at all. Also, my new USB hub arrived yesterday (thanks ebay – free postage to Australia) and only cost $14AU. It is totally worth it – I spent so much of my time swapping my printer plug, burner plug, palm pilot plug and mouse plug – not to mention my camera plug…the hub holds four USB 2.0 inputs – and I’m happy. Woo!

Every time I upgrade WordPress (the system that makes this whole thing run) something goes awry. And then I spend late nights getting few responses to my pleas on the help forums and nutting away at it myself. So. Comments are now working – if someone (besides myself) could leave a comment for me to make sure it works for people who aren’t me, that would be appreciated. If this is incoherent it’s because my eyes are so baggy I can’t see what I’m typing. Ack.

I have to report that I think I’ve finally (touch wood) got a handle on the comment spam. It is all due to the very awesome Spam Karma plugin for WordPress. Since I installed it a week ago (and removed those word-picture things that were so annoying) Spam Karma informs me it has eaten 641 809 bits of spam – and it’s still hungry. Fifty-eight IP addresses have been permanently banned from posting and are now members of the ‘Bad Guys Hall of Shame’. Nah nah nah nah-nah.

Miaow is going to be a bit short on pictures until we get this house sold. As I mentioned a few days ago – my camera has disappeared, and I think by now it is definitely gone. I have checked D & E’s car, D & R have checked their study, my sister has checked the boat, and I have rummaged through my bags. Sigh. If someone finds it, they will have fun looking at before and after shots of Boat, as well as some others I can’t remember. They will also enjoy my little 64MB SD card which I also used in my palm pilot, and has quite a few good tunes on it. It is only now that it’s gone that I realise how often I used my camera it is very sad. I do have a back up – but it’s a camera that uses proper film; so it’s much less immediate and I have to scan the pictures in. How quaint!

Holy hairy big fat THANK YOU. I have been like a ravening junkie the past four days, unable to blog. As you may have noticed, miaowthecat was D-E-A-D. And I couldn’t revive it – principally due to the fact that I didn’t have enough time to devote to poking around to find what was wrong. Finally, tonight – the first time I’ve been able to pause for breath – help desk Steve rescued me from my dire situation. I am still not sure whether the issue was dodgy old files or the movement of my server from New Jersey to Dallas, Texas… but I don’t care. It’s all better. I have so much to type about – gah.

1. Can anyone recommend a decent webhost? I am on a killer deal at present, it’s $80 per year for my miaow hosting and 256MB of storage – however I need more space! Are there any places that just provide space, and not all the bells, whistles and backends to go with it? I want to stick with my current host, but move all my mp3 files elsewhere…

…they have offered me 100MB more for $40 per year, which is starting to sound pretty good.