Why choosing a WordPress theme is like choosing a wife
When contemplating what to put on this new fandangled blog of mine, I have to admit that I spent an unhealthy amount of time not creating actual content (which I am doing right now of course), but trawling the web looking for a WordPress theme that suited my rapacious needs.
It’s silly really, especially considering that the old adage “Content in King” couldn’t be more suitable than a site wishing to focus on writing.
But when it comes to beautifying your work online, it’s highly likely you’ll spend more time tinkering with CSS during those nascent first steps than creating the all-important content.
It was during this monotonous process that it hit me: selecting a new blog’s appearance is quite similar to another crucial and painstaking process – choosing that one special woman to spend the rest of your life with. Or until she tires of your crap and issues divorce papers.
The more I thought about it, the more I realised that there are more than just basic similarities between what a wife is, and brings to the table and your very own WordPress theme.
Hard to pick – the longer you leave it, the worse it gets
You’re in Vegas. Maybe you’re even on a roll. And through the alcohol fuelled delirium of “the best night of your life” she seems awfully nice. And willing. Fast forward a number of missing hours and you’re speeding towards Reno in a frantic quest for a drive-through divorce hopefully before throttling the new love of your life.
Similar to picking a WordPress theme, getting rid of an unwanted wife is fairly easy – if you catch the mistake early. Of course, consummating the union/installing any sort of new plugin, and things are going to be harder to annul.
Leaving a wife or a theme to fester and it can be extremely difficult to extricate oneself from their nefarious binds down the road. If you install a theme and immediately think “I’m not sure about this”, that’s a deal breaker. Deactivate it as fast as possible. Failure to acknowledge an incompatible theme early will only lead to a life-long struggle and abject misery. You can try and force a theme that wasn’t tailored for AdSense compliant to your monetising ways or hack its CSS to be more “flowery”, just like you can make a wife live in a shed or call you Daddy. It doesn’t make it right.
Just like wives, themes make life easier
Let’s face it. The main reason we install a theme/get married is because we need someone to control our lives. Delving into the intricate inner-workings of stylesheets, HTML and Javascript, most men will start to rapidly lose consciousness. Themes, like wives, take life’s abhorrent and mundane tasks and hide them in the background far from your easily distracted eyes. What? You thought the house/dog/children cleaned themselves?
The reason we place our hands firmly into the willing hands of a theme author is based on the same logic of why we beg a woman to come take care of us – half the time we have no idea what the hell we’re doing. And if we don’t manage to empower some other greater force who can promptly intervene, we just might end up hurting ourselves. Where would we be without wives? Probably with ugly content and a fridge consisting solely of stale bread and potatoes that now answer when you ask them if they’re OK to eat.
Not all themes are created equal
By wary of flash, pricy themes. Sure, they may promise the earth but get them home and they’ll boss you around to such an extent that your life/content takes a back-seat. You become a slave to your theme; constantly upgrading plugins and rogue pages, rarely focusing on what’s important – your content.
Some themes are also free but don’t do exactly what you want from the getgo. Like a great marriage, working with a theme is all about compromise. OK, so some of your widgets are a little temperamental and you need to tweak a few margins. Would you rather write a calendar plugin?
There’s plenty more themes in the sea
The amount of themes available right at this minute is staggering. Big themes, small themes, themes with colourful pasts and others that appear demure and straight-forward but transform into unwieldy beasts as soon as you look under their hood. Themes that come with a price, themes that, just like those popular girls your mother warned you about (and your father taught you how to spot), have probably been called into service a little too much. To each their own of course, but always remember – if you think you’ve found the theme of your dreams, it’s highly likely you’re not the only one.
The right woman for the right job
You know when your buddy shows up with his new girlfriend and, for whatever reason, you immediately think: “That’s just not right”? Such is the case with an inappropriate theme. If your blog is about technology, try to pick a theme that is clean, austere and functional. Just like your topic. Unless you’re specifically talking about technology no one gives two hoots about of course, then you can go wild. After all, no one is reading your treatises about the glory of the Acorn Electron anyway. If you’re writing about feelings or similar areas, feel free to go as bizarre as you like. In fact, the weirder the better.
Think about what you’re writing about and the obvious connections. Gardening blogs might want to show a flower or similar horticultural imagery. It’s not rocket surgery. The analogy with picking a wife couldn’t be closer. If you’re short, don’t Do A Stallone and marry a seven foot tall Elk slaying ice-maiden. If you like quite nights in … don’t pick a theme that requires a M.Sc. in Javascript to maintain.
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The most salient point is that your theme should compliment your content. A good theme will help you through the good times and the bad. In your blog’s sickness and also in offline mode. After all, you’ll probably want to tweak it and turn it into what what you really wanted in the first place anyway.
August 25th, 2009 at 3:40 pm
What happens if you make your own theme? what are your thoughts on that?
August 25th, 2009 at 3:41 pm
Then you don’t need a wife.
