Redesigning your website is like getting a haircut. If it’s a good haircut, you walk out happier than when you walked in. You stand straighter, walk with a skip in your step, and maybe actually pay attention to combing your hair for the next week or so.

I’ve been meaning to redesign the site for a while, but with my crazy schedule, and other personal projects that just seem more important when I’m not sleeping, I never made time for it. I always thought it would be cool to redesign it with a transit map theme, even more so since I picked up Transit Maps of the World. I even have two or three half-finished designs that I never was happy with. But, alas, it was not to be. Not this time, anyway.

So, tonight I broke down and purchased a new WordPress template. I like the basic look a lot, though I’m sure I will modify it over time (the sidebar seems especially busy now), but at least I have a nice clean slate to start from. Gone is the Golden Gate Gothic in the masthead, aside from the logo “M”, and I like the idea of the random header pic, which I never had before, but I suspect I’ll be modding how that works soon enough as well.

It’s also really wide, and I’m not sure I like how it ignores the tenets of good grid-based layout. But anyway, it’s a start— a kick in the pants, if you will. Love it? Hate it? Give me another kick in the pants in the comments below.