Plus fors - and againsts

What ho, everyone!  I trust we're all fully in the festive spirit now and having a tip-top time of things?

In the vintage blogosphere I do believe things have never been better and I myself have an idea for a couple of what I hope will be cracking posts before Christmas and the New Year, involving classic Yuletide tunes and recently-acquired knitting patterns(!).

I'd like to take a moment first, though, to apologise for any technical problems you, dear readers, may have encountered lately when trying to leave a comment.  You see, I recently finished creating a Google+ account for m'self and linked this blog to it.  Seeing as Google appear to own most of the Internet (and who knows where that will end...?), particularly my usual haunts of Blogger, YouTube and Google Search, it seemed a good idea at the time to have a profile to keep them all in one place.  Little did I know that by linking this blog to my Google+ profile I would be changing the commenting system to Google+ Comments, for which apparently anyone wishing to leave a message must have a Google+ account themselves.  Took me a while to cotton on to the fact too, seeing as I'm still very much an amateur when it comes to the internal workings of Blogger.

I then spent a day or so toying with the idea of leaving Google+ Comments in place until I decided yesterday evening that it is not for me to force anyone into creating a Google+ account just to post a comment and despite that firm's ubiquity there are probably more people reading this with just a good old Blogger account (or similar) then there would be on Google+, so to cut a long story short Blogger Comments have made a welcome return to Eclectic Ephemera.  Of course during that time of confusion and indecision some of you had left comments using Google+, which have now disappeared into the æther (they must be floating around somewhere, because if I switch back again they magically reappear and some of them are on my Google+ page) and I wanted you to know that I haven't forgotten them and that I value every one.  Jessica, garofit, Mim, Jennie, anyone else I've missed - sorry for faffing you about and I hope you will continue to comment in the future.

In fact, I hope everyone and anyone feels welcome to continue to comment.  I can't tell you the kick I get out of seeing "n message(s) awaiting moderation" when I open my Dashboard and reading the wonderful thoughts you've been kind enough to share with me.  In fact, there's another reason why I went back to Blogger comments, plus I can see all the messages in one place (and moderate them if - very rarely - necessary) which is something - unless it's passed me by - you can't seem to do so readily with Google+.

I will still be keeping my Google+ profile and posts published here on Blogger will continue to appear automatically on Google+, so please feel free to leave comments here or there.  I read and appreciate them all and they make writing this blog all the more worthwhile.  Sorry again for any bother; normal service has now been resumed!