Cats and Trails and Garden Tales
Musings on cats, travel, gardens and life
Is that you WordPress?? How Cheeky of You!
Yesterday when I started a new draft post, these shadow words appeared:
“Share five things you’re good at.”
“Who are you?” I thought to myself. “And what are you doing on my blog??”
Definitely creepy. I ignored it and went on, saving the draft.
Today I started another post and the shadow asked me this:
“Do you have a favorite place you have visited? Where is it?”
Too weird for me – queue the Twilight Zone music!
Is this happening to anyone else or have I been infiltrated??
Okay, so there used to be WordPress sponsored Prompts and Challenges, both daily and weekly that you could participate in. And I did. Here’s one from five years ago and my resulting post. Prompt was: Cheeky
Cheeky Benji
I must admit that ‘cheeky’ is not a word I use (does anyone?) Still, for this week’s photo challenge, I give you the always adorable, and oft times cheeky, Benji.
Simple enough. Respond to post, insert their link, be featured in the photo grid.
But this seems a bit more intrusive. In fact, I’m hoping the shadowy words really are nothing more than WordPress resurrecting its prompts. (Wouldn’t it be nice if they warned you?)
So if it’s you, WordPress, it worked this time, though not as you might have imagined.
And if it’s not you, I have bigger blogging problems and need to log a case.
How about the rest of you?
~ Susanne
Cats and Trails and Garden Tales 
I had that yesterday too! I just assumed that they had changed their ‘start typing here’ to something a little more engaging but sounds like the language is something they have done before?
I’m glad it wasn’t just me! When I first saw it, I thought I might have been hacked! You’re probably right. Maybe they thought it would be helpful to give us suggestions on what to post, instead of the bland ‘start typing here.’ Still, it seemed peculiar to me and rather invasive. Their other prompts back in the day, didn’t show up on your empty draft unbidden!
Yes, you would have thought they might have warned us beforehand. That said, I also thought that last week when I noticed that they had changed the opening ‘my site’ screen to a mass of large fonted statistics!
Right? It seems like the software changes daily without any warning or release notes, except for the really big changes.
Let us hope they have no more changes planned! 😉
Talk about speaking too soon! WP just changed my ‘Reader’ view!! I now have a long column down the right-hand side showing when followers last visited/posted! Bunches the rest of the screen unnecessarily! 😦
Arghh! I had to go look. My Reader view is also different today but not quite like yours! I still have the posts in the center as before, but a column listing the blog names I follow on the right, and the search bar stuck in a column on the left, so the actual space for the posts has definitely shrunk. I’m going to fiddle around with it and see if there’s a way to restore the old view. Sigh. 😦
What fresh hell can we expect tomorrow!? 😉
She’s a lovely cat! Or he, sorry, Susanne. Lots of people here use the word Cheeky as do the British folks. After all, we are in many ways the same people. ❤️🇬🇧🇺🇸
Thanks, John. Benji’s a ‘he’, but he’s not that sensitive about pronouns! I think you’re right about, ‘Cheeky.’ It’s a fun word and much more British.
Sorry, Benji! I hear Americans using that word too but not too often. 🇺🇸🇬🇧
I saw the same message and thought it was weird. Benji is so cute. Cheeky is an old-fashioned British word. We don’t use it in Canada.
I’m relieved to know this is nothing more than a new WordPress “feature.” It seemed so strange to me like a ghost! 😉 I think cheeky is a fun word, though I do consider it British as well, and don’t hear it here much in the U.S.
🙂 What you encountered in your Block Editor is WordPress’s Daily Prompt.
Every day, you will be presented with a new question.
Apparently so! Unbidden and without any warning. Oh well.
My Irish friends use “cheeky” and I’ve adopted it as a useful and cheery word, especially as applied to my cat Cholla.
An Australian friend introduced me to “wheelie bin”, another term I find descriptive and fun, much better than trash tote or garbage can.
And yeah, the prompts are more annoying than encouraging. I don’t open a new post unless I have something to say. Heaven knows I don’t need any encouragement!
I found ‘cheeky’ fit Benji nicely too. 🙂 And ‘wheelie bin’ is great, I hadn’t heard that before. And I definitely agree the new ‘prompts’ are peculiar especially when they showed up without warning! 🙂
Yes, I have noticed the same thing when I go to make a new post. However, I think it may be a good thing if I happen to get writer’s block while doing blogmas! PS. Your cat has beautiful eyes!
Thank you! I may get some value out of it eventually, but was just surprised when it showed up on my page the first time. 😊
Cheeky is widely used in England, on a daily basis. 🙂
Others received those prompts, but I am happy to say I did not. (So far…)
Best wishes, Pete.
I would love to hear cheeky on a daily basis but alas, not here! Funny you didn’t see the prompts. They’re kind of weird since they’re unexpected. I thought a ghost might be inhabiting my blog! Are you using the block editor or the classic? Maybe that’s the difference. At least you’ve been warned if you see words on the page before you’ve typed anything! 😉 🙂
I’m still on the Classic Editor, Susanne. Maybe that’s why I haven’t been pestered. 🙂
That’s probably it. They’re probably not messing with the ‘classic’ anymore so at least you’ve been spared this intrusion.
I think that cheeky is very popular in the lingerie catalogs! 😉
😄😄
My UK friends sure use “cheeky” a lot, or it could be my imagination. It’s rather a good way to describe something. Benji is better than cheeky! Yes, I’ve seen those prompts too (who needs ’em?) and even tried to delete it the first time.
It’s a fun word, and I thought it fit Benji pretty well! 🙂 I used to enjoy the old WordPress prompts but this new thing of words showing up on your draft post is too weird for me!
Benji is a cutie. I haven’t had that happen on WordPress.
Aw thank you! Do you use the block editor? I think it doesn’t happen with the classic version. But at least if it does happen, you won’t be too surprised like I was! 🙂 🙂
It isn’t just you. All the Block Editor users are having WP insert writing prompts in their posts when they first open them… I think universally it is irritating!
So invasive and creepy, isn’t it?
I’ve been getting these for a week or so. Very annoying at first as I had no idea what was going on. I didn’t know whether they’d show up unless I deleted them! Now they’re just mildly annoying.
It was so startling at first, I thought I might have been hacked. Then I realized it was probably a new (unasked for) ‘feature’, and so I agree its now just mildly annoying.
Oh, my. Benji’s gaze reveals his sense of humor! How about “cheeky” used this way. Three adult chickens simply showed up at my little farm over Thanksgiving weekend. And stayed! Never had chickens, just horses and dogs. So, ensued a mad scramble to find out (and buy) what they eat, how often, and what they shouldn’t eat. And build a roost. All three are very adept at making their culinary and roosting desires known – who knew chickens could be so cheeky! The one I’m formally addressing as “Cheeky” has generously puffy “cheek muff” feathers and luxurious feather neckwarmer too. As I am clueless re chicken gender identification, Cheeky will do nicely for that one, and the other two are Kerry and Ashley, unisex names, right? BTW your blog site is now demanding I log in with Twitter or Facebook, which, actually, I am ignoring as I want little or naught to do with social media.
So you have some cheeky chickens! 🙂 As far as logging in, I’m curious if you are an email follower of my blog, or do you just go directly to my website? I haven’t changed anything myself but there are sometimes WordPress glitches. And I have noticed the phone app version does behave differently.
I think I’m an actual email follower on the blog but often the security system on my desktop pc blocks images so I click on the title of the post. Perhaps that is what takes me to the actual website? Leaving this reply via email, I’m not seeing the prompt from twitter or facebook or whatever the “W” in the circle refers to. One of the reasons I decided not to do my own blog about country life here in western Oregon was the frustration of dealing with websites and service providers. You do a great job and your commitment to a beautiful and very enjoyable blog is stellar. But if I had one, probably I’d be the one abandoning hope after the first ten or twenty glitches!
Ah, okay. As an email follower you only get the beginning of my posts, and then you have to click on ‘read more of this post’ or the title and that takes you to my blog’s website. Most of my followers are other wordpress users so I think it’s easier for them to follow and comment. I would love to see your blog about western Oregon, but I understand not wanting to take on the technology part. I’m no expert but I did work in business technology for many years and so I don’t mind working through any glitches.
I saw the same thing the other day and I didn’t like it. For a minute I thought I had stumbled upon a writing prompt but didn’t know how I had gotten there. I agree, it is weird.
Yes, weird. Especially without any warning!