Home again, looking for a home

Aug 19, 2012

I returned last night with the family — just Erin and the kids, no big Zuiker jamboree or Shaughnessy shindig for us this year — after a most enjoyable week at St. Augustine Beach, Florida. We spent mornings on the beach, and after afternoon naps (while thunderstorms rolled over), went to the Castillo de San Marcos or the lighthouse or miniature golf or Marineland. Dinners at Mango Mango’s and Cap’s on the Water were delicious (and see the wine we enjoyed, labels in my my Flickr set).

The highlight of this very relaxing vacation was seeing osprey dive for fish just 10 yards from where I was playing in the surf with Anna and Malia.

Amid the fun and frolicking, I learned that the father of my good friend, Bridget McGuinness, had died. Jim McGuinness was a wonderful family man and devoted deacon, and was so kind and funny and generous.

I also learned this week that my lifetime web hosting account with Joyent is being terminated. I was the 20th person to pay into the original VC200 round, and my $199 has been adequately returned in the hosting I’ve received in the eight years since (the space and bandwidth and other logistics actually ballooned through the years, too). The parting of ways has been a bit heated and acrimonious — not everyone has been happy about how the covenant, i.e. hosting for as long as the company is around, has been broken at will, but most of us realize the situation is complex and we’ve gotten a great return on investment through the years.

There’s more to learn in the days ahead, but it looks as if I’m looking for a new home for my many websites, and will be moving to a new web host soon. So, I’ve started to make a plan about how to back up my files, pare my list of domains and sites, and refocus my online activity. This coincides with my active exploration of the OPML tools that Dave Winer is developing, and the Back to the Blog conference I expect to announce this week. This will be a gathering of the minds to explore the trends in blogging. In fact, while I was on vacation last week, announcements about Medium (by Ev Williams, but at the moment only a whitelisted blog network) and Branch, and a post by Anil Dash show that there’s a lot to be discussed.

It’s good to be home. Today was a rainy day, but I went out with Oliver and Anna to shop at the nicely renovated A Southern Season, and later I roasted a chicken and potatoes to go with the key-lime pie that Erin and Anna and Malia made. We had a family dinner with my mother, then I ironed five shirts for the week while listening to The Monti podast (episode #38: ‘triumph of’ versus ‘triumph over’), followed by chasing and being chased by Oliver as crocodile or tiger. Now I’ve written this blog post, and I’ll read a little more of the book I started at the beach, Cloud Atlas), before sleep and the start of a new work week.

Anton Zuiker ☄