Switching Things Up

I intended to chat with y’all on Friday about the design changes we’ve made ’round here.  A chat followed by a celebratory toast with the TGIF drink of the week.  Only my tummy had something else in mind, namely keeping me chained to the bathroom with an oh-so-pleasant bout of the stomach flu.  The good news:  I lost six pounds in two days.  Yes!  Almost as healthy as a Kardashian QuickTrim diet!  The bad news:  The bathroom imprisonment forced me to stay off of my computer, something that hasn’t happened since a little thing called labor — and even then I was back on my computer several hours after giving birth.  (Well, how else was I going to google “black tar poop” and Tweet about the State of My Vagina?)

So, yeah, this note is a little belated:  Hey, guys!  Welcome!  We’ve made some changes ’round here!  (No sh*t, Kirby.)

After a lot of back and forth, and polling some helpful folks, I decided to return to a more typical and simplified blog layout.  I had originally gone with the magazine-like layout because it gave the site a different look and distinguished it from some other blogs, BUT… turns out, a surprising number of people didn’t know that I had additional stories underneath the featured ones on top.  Including my own mother, who visits this site quite frequently to see if I’ve written anything about her.  HI, MOM!  YES, I’M WRITING ABOUT YOU! She kept asking me why I hadn’t posted a story in days, confusing the hell out of me when I’d posted a ton of stories, until it finally dawned on me that she hadn’t freaking SCROLLED DOWN FAR ENOUGH.

“Oooohhhhh!  Look at all those stories!” Mom exclaimed when I told her.

*Sigh*  This made me feel great, as you can imagine, considering I’ve been writing on this site for a year.

That’s not the only reason.  Some of my stories and ideas didn’t translate as well in an excerpted fashion, as it appeared on the homepage, so oftentimes I wouldn’t post them at all.  Now I can post whatever the heck I want.  (That’s trouble.)  Also, previously, you couldn’t see how many comments were posted — now you can.

This is all just an experiment, so we’ll see how things go.  I’m trying to evolve the site and play around with things to make ’em as easy as possible for you.

You may also notice that I’ve tweaked the header to reflect that The Laughing Stork is a family humor site — and to ax the (cheesy) cartoon stork, much to Mr. Candy’s chagrin.  R.I.P. Cartoon Stork.

Many thanks to Emily at Swank Web Style for her consistently great design work.  Seriously.  I’ve worked with a number of designers over the years and she is head and shoulders above the rest.

Okay, back to writing about important Laughing Stork matters, like my daughter’s poop and boys getting slapped in the balls.

~Candy