Tea and Dragons

I am forging ahead with the new site.  

Long-time readers have requested the reposting of a few stories that were only available on Light in the Mirror.  My updates are kind of random, but so far I have put up Breakfast at Grissom’s (CSI, GSR) and both parts of It (Iron Man, Tony/Pepper).  

Please note that these are both NC-17 (which is why they weren’t on FF.net).  

If there’s something else you want to see, drop me a note.  Ditto for AO3; I’m porting things over there gradually, and I must say that the download function is extremely useful.   

Well, I've solved the biggest hurdle on my attempt at a new fic site.  Now, I may yet encounter one that makes me throw up my hands and quit Weebly, but for the moment I am going ahead on putting stuff back up. 

So on that note, I will point out (for you long-time CSI/GSR fans) that Breakfast at Grissom's is posted again.  I don't think I'll be announcing every repost here, but a few of 'em were available nowhere but on my Light in the Mirror site, including this one, so for anyone who was looking for it... 

Please note that it is rated NC-17.  

I'm pleased to boast that my Website has now passed a million hits, present total standing at 1,000,063.  Wheee!  I'm sure the total is higher, since the site was up for a while before I put in the counter, but it's still nice to have the visual confirmation, as it were. 

I figured I'd pass the million mark sometime this year, but I wasn't expecting it until next month at the soonest.  Light in the Mirror has been up for 4.36 years, according to Freeservers, which puts it at sometime in 2004, I guess--I can't remember precisely.  I do know it was after I started posting CSI fanfic on Fanfiction.net, so that seems to match. 

Thank you so much to everyone who has gone to my site to read my stories all this time.  I know, it's only fic, but it means something to me.  *beam*  Thank you for your patience and feedback and recommendations and just for coming back! 

Hey, if anybody out there has time--can you get to my site?  I keep getting timeout errors but I'm not sure if it's the site or my work. 

Thanks!!

ETA: It's up now. Thanks everyone for checking!

Brass has hang-ups and Grissom is fruity.

Should I apologize?

Note to self: accidentally erasing a line of the guestbook code will, in fact, eliminate spam, but it renders the whole thing rather useless.

*smacks self*

For no discernable reason, it appears that I can now get onto FF.net at work again. I still can't call up my own domain name, though I can access all the site pages (the domain name redirects to the pages). I have no reason for this; the best I can guess is that Biometrics likes to screw with access sometimes.

Of course, they have a perfect right--FF.net has nothing to do with work. But usually they just put up a big "Access Denied" page instead of letting the loading trail off into a "nonresponsive server" notice. The first time that happened with my domain name I had a nice little panic moment...

But if I can get FF.net at work again, posting there becomes much less constrained. I'll take it. *grin*

I have a guestbook on my site--a simple one, but it does what I want it to, which is to provide an easy way for visitors to leave feedback. (Yes, it hasn't been working recently--my fault--it's fixed now). It came with the site template, and I'm glad, because I don't know nearly enough to create or even modify one.

The trouble is the spam. I have bots depositing ridiculous numbers of posts on the thing, often obscene ones, which is very, very irritating--it means I have to go clean it out almost on a daily basis. Not difficult, but tedious. The site host does catch and block some of them, but not all.

I've looked around the help section and the forums for my host, and it doesn't seem to be a solvable problem at the moment. The bots apparently get around blocks, or at least there are so many new ones that the blocks can't keep up. I'm not blaming my host for this--it's a nuisance the host is not responsible for, and the guestbook feature is a free one. Yes, I pay now for extras, but it's still ridiculously cheap.

I don't know what to do. I've looked into other guestbooks, but I can't seem to find one from a service I would actually trust at a price I can afford (which is admittedly low), and I haven't the expertise to create one from scratch nor, at the moment, the time to get that expertise. Or probably the required software, either.

Those of you who read this thing--advice? Should I put up with the spam, go on clearing it out, to leave people the easy click of instant feedback? Should I dump it, given that my e-mail address is on my main page? Is there a way to scramble the link somehow so that someone can manually correct it in their location bar (still easier than a separate e-mail)? Am I putting too much thought into this? :P

Thanks...

Okay, this is totally self-centered, but I'm so boggled by it.

I got the title for "Proud Flesh" from Cinco; it's an equine medical condition, I'd heard of it before but hadn't thought of it for use as a title. Now, according to the stats for my Website, my story by that title comes up fifth or sixth on a Google search for the term, with or without quotes...

Out of about 3,450,000 results.

*insert jaw-drop here*

No doubt it will change later. But in the meantime I can be stunned.