So I'm actually not new to blogging--I blogged for about a year from 2003-2004 and, though it may lead to embarrassment, I'll even link to the old thing, which is still up: Pleonastic Ephemera. (I've also participated in several private group blogs for sharing writing with geographically-dispersed friends.)
Pleonastic Ephemera was on Blogspot, which is a great tool for getting blogs up quickly with ease and minimal back-end configuration, while this blog represents my first foray into the more complex WordPress platform. WP is built around PHP scripts, which I've haven't worked with much before, but it's easy to pick it up thanks to WordPress's copious documentation.
I've played around with a few themes, and chosen this one for the moment, though I'm still looking for one that really grabs me. I've customized this one a bit and will probably do more of that, which is part of my larger goal: to bring my web development skills up to date with some contemporary languages and platforms. PHP and WordPress are a first step in that direction, but I'll post much more about my background, motivation, and plans next week.
_(Photo from here)_