What I’m watching (no spoilers!)
Well… the end of Happy Valley! What did you think?
The series writer Sally Wainwright receives a lot of well-deserved praise for her depiction of strong female characters, her ability to create conflict and ramp up tension and her characterisation and dialogue (“I might have singed one of your crochet blankets”).
I would be grateful for teeny-tiny percentage of her writing talent.
Oh, and did you know that George Costigan (Happy Valley’s Nev Gallagher) and Siobhan Finneran (Clare Cartwright) have acted together before? In a certain 80s comedy-drama also set in the north.
Click the button below if you want to see the NSFW clip.
What version of WordPress do you use?
Do you use the premium or business versions of WordPress, and what are the benefits and drawbacks?
Many of you who are reading this are also bloggers. I use WordPress’s bog-standard free version because it meets the majority of my needs, however I pay an annual price for the domain name.
WordPress for business is expensive—£240 per year (about $292)—for a lot of features I won’t use or need, though signing up for some of the premium services would also mean that the adverts and WordPress branding would be removed, giving the site a more professional appearance. I can also upload videos directly if I want to.
If I want to sell books straight from this site, which I do, the only option via WordPress is the business because you can install the required plug-in.
For the time being, I can link folks to my Payhip store, but best practise dictates that if you’re attempting to sell something online, you should make the transaction as simple as possible, i.e. one click.
Amazon will always account for most of my sales. Will this site generate £240 in book sales per year? Doubtful…
What WordPress version do you use? What would you want for your website if you could buy individual components rather than having them all grouped together in a plan?
Baked with Love
My latest book—Baked with Love—is now available for pre-order! Here’s the blurb…
Can lifelong baker Lissie turn down a last-minute invitation to appear on the popular TV show Best Baker UK, even though her ex-boyfriend is one of the contestants?
Not a chance…
Her current boyfriend isn’t thrilled, and Lissie’s decision to put herself under the intense pressure of a reality TV show while spending so much time with the man who broke her heart six years ago appears to be a recipe for disaster…
But could Lissie uncover the truth about what happened all those years ago, prove herself to her grandmother, keep her boyfriend happy, and win Best Baker UK, forever changing her life?
A spellbinding, warm-hearted read for romance and Great British Bake Off junkies, Baked with Love is a thoughtful, unforgettable story with characters you will love about second chances, forgiveness, and the search for true love.
You can read a short extract from the book here.
Emma Baird - author 
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Hi Emma,
I can’t remember exactly when, but it may have been about six or seven years ago I went from the old WordPress.com to WordPress.org and self-hosted using a hosting company. It gave me more flexibility for the inner nerdy geek. The truth is, it’s a costly way of seeing money spent, and the return I get is lovely comments from fellow bloggers like you.
I’ve scaled down many plugins and other things, and now I hope to cancel the expensive aspects and return to bare bones.
Being a procrastinator, this may take me a while.
Thanks, Gaz. That is useful. It is supposed to be good practice to self-host but when there are so many things to spend money on, you have to rationalise.
Hi Emma,
The geeky nerd in me enjoyed playing around with this and that but things don’t turn out well all the time. I think it’s good discipline to make the most out of what you can comfortably afford.