The way I figure it, on June 27th, this blog will officially be 20 months old. I understand that 20 months is when children often enter the “terrible twos” (I don’t have any children myself, so I have to rely on what I read on the web).

While browsing around to find out about what happens at 20 months old (yes, I know a blog is not a child, but hey, I thought it might be worth a laugh), I was stunned to come across this statement:

Look for new signs of assertiveness from your toddler. Hallmark behaviors to watch for: He may insist on doing exactly what you’ve told him not to do or throw himself down on the floor in a fit of temper if he doesn’t get his way. His demands may alternately frustrate and amuse you. At times, for example, he’ll likely ask for something that he doesn’t even want, just to see if he has enough power to get it.

Unfortunately, this pretty much describes my nearly 2 year old WordPress install just as well. Last week’s denial-of-service attack on my host’s server didn’t help matters any either.

For example, in the past month, deleting or approving comments would occassionally just break — which started out being kind of frustrating, but quickly turned into a somewhat-amusing “I-wonder-if-it-will-work-this-time” kind of experience.

While upgrading to the latest version of WordPress has certainly helped, I still notice a big difference in the performance of any new WordPress installs versus ones I’ve had to upgrade. This may on the surface sound like a gripe against WordPress, but I think it’s more of a general statement about any technology tool that you’ve had around for a while — it just starts to get old.

Not to mention the fact that I’ve made various customizations/edits/errors with this install, which certainly doesn’t help either. But I have noticed that this particular install has started to develop its own personality (and it’s kind of bad-tempered).

Much like a 20 month-old, when it doesn’t want to do something, there’s really not much I can do but wait it out. While WordPress is throwing a temper tantrum, I usually amuse/distract myself with other things, waiting for it to tire itself out.

I don’t know if my WordPress install is just growing up into kind of a jerk, or if it’s just learning how to be assertive. Maybe a bit of both.