Normal service to resume shortly

Apologies for the "down time", folks.

The triple whammy of 'real life' being insanely busy of late, the fight to get my blog back up, and the worst flu I've had in years has taken a toll on me and kept me out of action and contact for a good few weeks. Add to that the sad news of the passing of an old friend whom I'd lost touch with a year ago, and I've not felt much like blogging or making art of late. :(

But I'm now recovered from the flu, got my blog restored (for now, anyway!) and hoping to pay tribute to my friend (a fellow spanko) here sometime soon.

I've got a bunch of new stuff to post, including a very special (and very hot!) guest contribution, a new topical art piece (hint: done to commemorate a very special day in April that should not have passed without celebration), and another new art piece that I've been working on for a while involving... actually, I think I'll make that a surprise... ;)

Again, apologies; I look forward to emailing all I owe replies to (you know who you are... and I'm sorry) and thank you all for your support while my blog was down, too. I hope you'll all continue to comment here on my art, stories, fantasies and other silly stuff... I love reading your feedback (and they do influence what I make and post).

Oh, and newcomers here? Please don't ever think a post is "too old" to comment on... unlike a lot of other blogs, this one is intended to be more of an open discussion forum, gallery and library with all posted material as relevant today as the day it was posted... so don't forget to browse through all the past posts and comments, or you'll miss out on some of the most fun stuff here! :)

Finally, a special mention: I want to say how sorry I was to see Otto's wonderful art blog had been seemingly removed by Google. I don't know the story behind it, but Otto is a talented artist and I hope he can get his blog back up - or find another option - to host Aunt Blaine and her delightfully strict and sadistic friends again soon.

EDIT: Sorry... it's also now that time of the month again for me. :(

Gone again, back again!

Yes, Google decided my blog was "malicious" again, just before Easter.

It got restored today, after (like before) I appealed the decision. Again, thanks to Nitecruzr on the Blogger forums for forwarding my appeal (I think the poor dude is the only person who's actually working at Blogger, and he's a volunteer!).

Again, there was no concrete reason given why, though I am guessing it has to do with the changes I made (see previous post, made minutes before my "deletion")... the fact that others seem to be able to tweak their blog's code to their heart's content and that whenever *I* touch mine, the blog gets flagged as "malicious script" is confusing and nonsensical... but I get the feeling that's Google these days, sadly.

I was told "Sometimes spam detection is unfair, but until the spammers go, we're stuck with it". But it's not the false positives that bother me, it's that they make their mistake my problem, and then take so long to fix it, with no apology or even information given. How can I avoid this happening again? No idea... they won't tell me. Also, having to chase hard-working volunteers on a help forum isn't how this should be resolved. Heck, they don't even notify you when it's been restored!

Sadly, what this means is that to be safe, I won't be taking chances again by improving my blog's layout/features anymore, since doing so seems to be what trips Google's "you're a criminal" robots... a shame since I've worked hard to make this "more than a simple blog" in terms of interactivity, fun features, etc.

But enough ranting... I'm back, folks!

And I'm feeling artistically inspired, at least, by the relevant theme of "guilty until proven innocent"...