A few months ago, our friend Smallchou gchatted me in the middle of the day:
“If there was ever a time to buy pseudostoops.com,” he said, “this is probably it- there’s a craaaaazy sale going on and you can get the domain plus a year of hosting for practically nothing.”
Well, whenever Smallchou tells me to do something tech-related, I usually obey. After all, the man created an iPhone app that got featured on those ubiqutous ads that are on the back pages of all the major magazines and newspapers these days.
Suffice it to say, he knows a lot more about this stuff than I do. Plus, I like shopping for things on sale.
So I bought pseudostoops.com, then didn’t think too much more about it. I sort of mentioned to John that I aspired to learn how to code in WordPress, so that I could build my own site, but I knew that project was going to (a) take a long time (b) be very frustrating for me and (c) probably end up looking sucky, so I didn’t do anything about it for a while.
Fast forward to four weeks ago: my birthday. John is an exemplary birthday-planner, and when I woke up on my birthday, there was a neatly-wrapped stack of presents sitting by my bed. He told me to open them in order, starting with the top. So I opened, in order: socks (tradition: he always gets me socks for every occasion, a carryover from my teaching days when my personal fashion sense was expressed largely through silly socks); an amazing fleece jacket to replace the one I had that was literally falling apart; and a duffel bag (he called that one a “Homer bowling ball gift” because we’re both using it for an upcoming trip- we really needed a new bag).
Then, at the bottom of the stack, I noticed a note.
“Open my laptop right now,” it said.
Puzzling.
I started to get out of bed, and he reached down to his side of the bed and pulled out his computer. I opened it up, and what should I see?
This website, fully built.
I mean, seriously, is he a champ, or what? He figured out how to use wordpress.org, he designed it, and he even put “happy birthday to pseudo” in the tagline. He doesn’t blog, doesn’t always get why I like doing this, but he knew it was important to me, so he secretly spent hours building something I’d offhandedly mentioned that I wanted. He’s going to have a hard time topping this gift next year.
For the past few weeks, we’ve been playing around with some small changes, figuring out how to migrate the archives over here, and this weekend, we decided it was ready to go.
So now here we are! Welcome to the new pseudostoops! We’re going to be making some minor adjustments, probably, as we go forward, but from now on, this is where you’ll find me. Change your feed readers, bookmarks, etc. And feel free to leave a comment for John telling him what a nice husband he is for doing this.
What an amazing gift! I’m so happy for you. And I love the tagline (feel like I’ll be paying it off forever).
That is an awesome birthday present! Hope you enjoy your new “home”!
WAHOO! I’m so happy for you! And dude, John totally wins for Most Awesome And Thoughtful Birthday Present EVAH.
Love the new digs!
WOW. First…the website is soooo pretty. Second….John is so super thoughtful. What an awesomly special birthday gift!
Congratulations on your beautious blog!
Oh it’s so pretty and I believe you might have the world’s most thoughtful husband…does he do lessons?
Woooo Hoooo!!! Looks great and your husband deserves major props for this gift! So, if I’m going to update my Google Reader with this new feed, I think you have to update your blogroll with my new blog. The one I moved to a month ago!!!! =) (I know, you’ve been busy! No hard feelings!!!!)
How sweet! Too bad my birthday was just a couple months ago because now I’ll have to wait until… Christmas? to demand this same gift from Torsten.
It’s gorgeous!
oh my, NICELY DONE john!! lovelovlove the new place, it looks gorgeous!
That is a fantastic present! Great job, John!
John is a rockstar!
That is so awesome! John is awesome. This site is awesome! Everything is awesome! Wa-hoo!
You are a rock star husband!! And the site looks great! I’ve changed my reader and I’m ready to go!!
Wow, you must be quite amazing in bed!
What a nice gift. I love to read stories like this.
Awww what a cute story!
You have a fab husband and he did a great job.
I can’t decide what I’m more impressed with: the rockin’ design at the top or YOUR HUSBAND.
Both are stellar!
Oh, he is SO NICE! What a great present!
The site looks fantastic – and consider my reader updated.
That is an amazing gift – especially when it was an offhand remark like that and awwwwww… so awesome!