I am upgrading to WP 2.7 so things may go out of whack for a few hours.
I did a manual upgrade this time (have used Fantastico in the past), and it was painless and quick. Was able to do it while waiting for the dinner to be ready, with time to spare. And the new admin interface looks great.
If you are looking for a blog platform, you can’t go wrong with WordPress – either using their free hosting system at www.wordpress.com or installing WP with your own domain name and using a paid hosting service.