This is a rant - so those not inclined to read such might as well just give it up.
I don't understand why a person would pass on the right on a ramp after coming from the expressway and not entering, then jam his way back in one car further up. It isn't like that few milliseconds will make a damn bit of difference when he gets there (wherever there happens to be) and it endangers him and those around him.
I don't understnad why it is that when nobody is behind me at all in my lane that someone just has to pass me in the lane next to me only to slide in in front of me where there is not really enough room - making me slow down. Some days I wish for a paintball gun full of yellow paintballs....
It's not legal to shoot at these sorts, or even to make angry gestures - and it doesn't anger me except for the part that threatens my safety - but some of these folks shouldn't be permitted to reproduce (if indeed they can without three helpers....)
I see all sorts in the morning on the way to work. Soon, I'll be seeing them better - I always seem to see better from the saddle of my motorcycle than I do from the chair inside my Volvo cage - something about glass and pillars, I guess - or maybe it's the air rushing by.
Watch Wild Hogs again last night - I needed some laughs, and it supplied some. EVERYONE ought to see it, but not take it too seriously - although the guys do resemble some fellow riders.
Suddenly I don't feel like ranting any more, so that's all there is for this one. I feel a political rant coming on, but dunno if it'll show itself today or not.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Friday, March 6, 2009
He's back!
I did not die. I did have a birthday and another anniversary. My lovely wife and I are working on year 42, having put year 41 to bed. Congratulations are not in order, at least not until we get to 50 years. But, having finished 41 without any really deep scars, we might well be good for another 15 or so.
I have a small confession to make - depression has got more of me than usual and I have not felt like writing anything except for rants - and those, once started, degenerated fast into unreadable nonsense, so I decided to just hold off on everything until we got more sunlight, I could get out the motorcycle, or the depression magically Went Away.
Well, the days will be getting longer this weekend, I got the motorcycle out today and, having little to do at work once I arrived I have been amusing myself rebuilding my media server at home - resupplying it with music, TV shows, movies, and other things that will turn one's brain to cottage cheese, or so Alec Baldwin would have us to believe. But what does he know? He just plays various people in movies.
I did rediscover today on the way to work just how the presence of a motorcycle brings out blindness, deafness, abject stupidity and outright homicdal behavior on the part of cagers (which is what some of us call folks who go about in their steel cages but choose to call them automobiles.) The pipes on my motorcycle are so loud right now that they would cause folks to fall out of windows if exercised in a big way on a narrow street - but cagers seem not to be able to hear them. Another wonder of the world, or the times.
Speaking of the times, everyone around here is scrambling to get hold of some of that stimulus money to go out and Buy Cool Things that would Make Policing Easier/Better/More exact pick one or several. Most of these things are not things planned for, but ways of using the money so nobody else gets it. Kinda like the kid that has a large box of candy and doesn't wanna share - so when he's had all he can possibly eat, he throws the box on the ground and pisses on it. I need a couple of monitors, but we can't spend less than enough for about 257 monitors - and we don't need that many so we will get something else - and I will eventually get good and pissed and go out, spend $200 or so and buy my own monitor. This isn't how it is supposed to work, but I have got used to paying for my own upgrades, if only to be able to get useful work done. My colleagues, at least those under Civil Service wonder why I bother, particularly since I'm a couple of years past what they figure to be retirement age, but as long as I am here I try to earn my keep once in a while.
Tell you what, though - fiber optics to the home is the greates things - HDTV to as many sets as we have, and internet that is so fast it would probably burn copper wire to an ash. It is almost impossible to use all the bandwidth - unless, of course, you know about binary newsgroups - and even then the only way to use the bandwidth that fiber supplies is to go out and get a newsgroup robot (NewsBin being my favorite) and invest in a premium newsgroup supplier (GigaNews being the one I use) and try to get a plan with no limits on data accumulated - otherwise you'll go through the maximum 25 igs or so in a couple of days, leaving the rest of the month for to withdraw, or to spend one hell of a lot starting next month (and next month(and next month)) just to get your fix of binaries again. Of course, if you do go unlimited, you'll be spending your life somewhere burning data to DVD - or you'll buy a new terabyte drive each week or two until your spouse meets you at the door one evening with a package holding another new drive and saying "WhattheHELL has got into you?"
But it is fun, and keeps you busy and out fo the beer and snacks while it lasts. It even makes it possible for your wife to watch Professional Bull Riding and Dog theBounty Hunter without your profane commentary. EVERYTHING has its positives.
I'm losing my train iof thought here, so I think I'll pack up and go home. I'll try not to stay away quite as long next time. Be well, y'all.
I have a small confession to make - depression has got more of me than usual and I have not felt like writing anything except for rants - and those, once started, degenerated fast into unreadable nonsense, so I decided to just hold off on everything until we got more sunlight, I could get out the motorcycle, or the depression magically Went Away.
Well, the days will be getting longer this weekend, I got the motorcycle out today and, having little to do at work once I arrived I have been amusing myself rebuilding my media server at home - resupplying it with music, TV shows, movies, and other things that will turn one's brain to cottage cheese, or so Alec Baldwin would have us to believe. But what does he know? He just plays various people in movies.
I did rediscover today on the way to work just how the presence of a motorcycle brings out blindness, deafness, abject stupidity and outright homicdal behavior on the part of cagers (which is what some of us call folks who go about in their steel cages but choose to call them automobiles.) The pipes on my motorcycle are so loud right now that they would cause folks to fall out of windows if exercised in a big way on a narrow street - but cagers seem not to be able to hear them. Another wonder of the world, or the times.
Speaking of the times, everyone around here is scrambling to get hold of some of that stimulus money to go out and Buy Cool Things that would Make Policing Easier/Better/More exact pick one or several. Most of these things are not things planned for, but ways of using the money so nobody else gets it. Kinda like the kid that has a large box of candy and doesn't wanna share - so when he's had all he can possibly eat, he throws the box on the ground and pisses on it. I need a couple of monitors, but we can't spend less than enough for about 257 monitors - and we don't need that many so we will get something else - and I will eventually get good and pissed and go out, spend $200 or so and buy my own monitor. This isn't how it is supposed to work, but I have got used to paying for my own upgrades, if only to be able to get useful work done. My colleagues, at least those under Civil Service wonder why I bother, particularly since I'm a couple of years past what they figure to be retirement age, but as long as I am here I try to earn my keep once in a while.
Tell you what, though - fiber optics to the home is the greates things - HDTV to as many sets as we have, and internet that is so fast it would probably burn copper wire to an ash. It is almost impossible to use all the bandwidth - unless, of course, you know about binary newsgroups - and even then the only way to use the bandwidth that fiber supplies is to go out and get a newsgroup robot (NewsBin being my favorite) and invest in a premium newsgroup supplier (GigaNews being the one I use) and try to get a plan with no limits on data accumulated - otherwise you'll go through the maximum 25 igs or so in a couple of days, leaving the rest of the month for to withdraw, or to spend one hell of a lot starting next month (and next month(and next month)) just to get your fix of binaries again. Of course, if you do go unlimited, you'll be spending your life somewhere burning data to DVD - or you'll buy a new terabyte drive each week or two until your spouse meets you at the door one evening with a package holding another new drive and saying "WhattheHELL has got into you?"
But it is fun, and keeps you busy and out fo the beer and snacks while it lasts. It even makes it possible for your wife to watch Professional Bull Riding and Dog theBounty Hunter without your profane commentary. EVERYTHING has its positives.
I'm losing my train iof thought here, so I think I'll pack up and go home. I'll try not to stay away quite as long next time. Be well, y'all.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
On aging
One of my least favorite things is the topic of this rant - getting old.
It is something I am doing, albeit just about toally without any grace.
This week, I turned 67. The next day, my wife and I marked the end of our 41st year of marriage. Frankly, I have no explanation for how either of these milestones was reached. I guess I'm just lucky. Somehow I have survived all these years, and my long-suffering wife has found it neither useful nor necessary to kill me.
I am still working full-time - retirement is a happy thought, but it is not going to happen, at least not this year. For one thing, I don't know quite what I would do with myself, and for another the cost of retirement is a definite modification in the direction of moderation of lifestyle - and I am not quite ready to become moderate - I still like to do things that cost money, and my retirement income will be perhaps 30% of my current income - not impossible, but definitely sparse. I must have thought I'd never get old - I definitely did not do much of a job of planning for it. And no, I have no advice for those who've not yet entered their dotage on forestalling my discoveries. As is the case with so many other events in my life, I recognize where I have arrived, but have no idea whatever how I got here.
So I'll work a few more years, put away money, draw my social security because I can and bank as much of it as possible, and when I've been married 50 years, maybe we can both retire and enjoy what years remain in some retirement community like the one into which my parents retired lo these many years ago.
Life is, however, pretty good so I have no complaints. Have a fine day, y'all.
It is something I am doing, albeit just about toally without any grace.
This week, I turned 67. The next day, my wife and I marked the end of our 41st year of marriage. Frankly, I have no explanation for how either of these milestones was reached. I guess I'm just lucky. Somehow I have survived all these years, and my long-suffering wife has found it neither useful nor necessary to kill me.
I am still working full-time - retirement is a happy thought, but it is not going to happen, at least not this year. For one thing, I don't know quite what I would do with myself, and for another the cost of retirement is a definite modification in the direction of moderation of lifestyle - and I am not quite ready to become moderate - I still like to do things that cost money, and my retirement income will be perhaps 30% of my current income - not impossible, but definitely sparse. I must have thought I'd never get old - I definitely did not do much of a job of planning for it. And no, I have no advice for those who've not yet entered their dotage on forestalling my discoveries. As is the case with so many other events in my life, I recognize where I have arrived, but have no idea whatever how I got here.
So I'll work a few more years, put away money, draw my social security because I can and bank as much of it as possible, and when I've been married 50 years, maybe we can both retire and enjoy what years remain in some retirement community like the one into which my parents retired lo these many years ago.
Life is, however, pretty good so I have no complaints. Have a fine day, y'all.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
The bug bit me
I've been down with some naso-respiratory bug for the last week or so. Usually something like this gets me once a year, and I really don't get better, I just get less lousy over time until after a while I stop noticing just how crappy I feel. Usually I go back to work before that, because being at home, the things I am not doing weigh heavily on me.
While at home I got the home network server back alive, using Windows Home Server - and along the way have made most of the available mistakes, because instead of reading the book,, I built a server based on what I know about other windows servers - and this pup is different.... But I managed to emerge with something that seems to work well, satisfies me in terms of recoverable redundancies, and still has enough to be tweaked that I'll not get bored for a couple of months or more.
I cam back to work today, and so far have managed to do nothing at all useful - there were no requests for me, nobody called and demanded something (except that I move my car, about which more later) so I spent the bulk of the day doing the Windows Home Server research that I should have done before starting the build.
I also discovered that I have managed to trash something in my router setup, and will have to put it back to factory defaults this evening and then let WHS reconfigure it so some other stuff will start to work.
I did get my binary robot working - and if you are lucky enough to have the Verizon FIOS connection, you can fill up all the disk space in the known universe far faster than you can categorize what is being pulled in there. I started it up one night, told it to scan the binary newsgroups for Eureka, Hopalong Cassidy (I'm old, so sue me!), Highlander and a few other old TV show episodes - and filled up a 250 gig drive before I got back to check it a day or two later!
I have to learn how to make the filters tighter on Newsbin - or I'll end up deleting 80% of what I pull down. But I guess that isn't a bad problem to have.
So for tonight, I have to get out the book and get web services started so folks can find the place again - and so that I can get in from work and watch what's going on.
I also have to get some other stuff working, or else get myself decommitted from it. We'll see which happens first.
One of the nifty parts of WHS is that it will back up PC's on the network - so I also have a few laptops at home to start backing up. I'll have to record NCIS and watch it later...
I was hoping for a few motorcycle days this week - but it looks like disappointment will be my fate. Maybe next week. By this time next week, I'll have turned 67, and will be starting my 42nd year of marriage to my first (and only) wife. We'll probably celebrate the following weekend, since the days involved are some of the busiest for both of us. Celebration will no doubt consist of dinner and a return to watch the bull riders, although maybe a movie instead - if I can find anything we'd both like to watch - or maybe we'll do a movie night at home, since I have a couple on the DVR that have been there since almost this time last year waiting for a night when we could watch them together without one or the other of us going to sleep. As we get older, energy tends to run out earlier in the evening.
More folks here at work are departing, some I am certain under duress. Alas, some of the departed are those that should have been kept and elevated to better positions - but I guess that's a universal truth, and I've been watching it happen here for a long time. I'd like to work through 2012 (or maybe a bit longer if I can) if only to increase pension amounts, but I'll go earlier if Phyllis decides to retire, too. As long as she works, I might just as well work and soak up the money. Besides, I still want to get that sidecar for my Honda, and maybe get a new cruiser to replace the big Kawasaki before the days for buying those toys are eaten up by reality. I'd kinda like a new Harley - but I'm not holding my breath.
It's within an hour of going-home time, so I'd better get some real work done, or I'll think badly of myself.
Have a good one, y'all - more on WHS tomorrow or the next day.
While at home I got the home network server back alive, using Windows Home Server - and along the way have made most of the available mistakes, because instead of reading the book,, I built a server based on what I know about other windows servers - and this pup is different.... But I managed to emerge with something that seems to work well, satisfies me in terms of recoverable redundancies, and still has enough to be tweaked that I'll not get bored for a couple of months or more.
I cam back to work today, and so far have managed to do nothing at all useful - there were no requests for me, nobody called and demanded something (except that I move my car, about which more later) so I spent the bulk of the day doing the Windows Home Server research that I should have done before starting the build.
I also discovered that I have managed to trash something in my router setup, and will have to put it back to factory defaults this evening and then let WHS reconfigure it so some other stuff will start to work.
I did get my binary robot working - and if you are lucky enough to have the Verizon FIOS connection, you can fill up all the disk space in the known universe far faster than you can categorize what is being pulled in there. I started it up one night, told it to scan the binary newsgroups for Eureka, Hopalong Cassidy (I'm old, so sue me!), Highlander and a few other old TV show episodes - and filled up a 250 gig drive before I got back to check it a day or two later!
I have to learn how to make the filters tighter on Newsbin - or I'll end up deleting 80% of what I pull down. But I guess that isn't a bad problem to have.
So for tonight, I have to get out the book and get web services started so folks can find the place again - and so that I can get in from work and watch what's going on.
I also have to get some other stuff working, or else get myself decommitted from it. We'll see which happens first.
One of the nifty parts of WHS is that it will back up PC's on the network - so I also have a few laptops at home to start backing up. I'll have to record NCIS and watch it later...
I was hoping for a few motorcycle days this week - but it looks like disappointment will be my fate. Maybe next week. By this time next week, I'll have turned 67, and will be starting my 42nd year of marriage to my first (and only) wife. We'll probably celebrate the following weekend, since the days involved are some of the busiest for both of us. Celebration will no doubt consist of dinner and a return to watch the bull riders, although maybe a movie instead - if I can find anything we'd both like to watch - or maybe we'll do a movie night at home, since I have a couple on the DVR that have been there since almost this time last year waiting for a night when we could watch them together without one or the other of us going to sleep. As we get older, energy tends to run out earlier in the evening.
More folks here at work are departing, some I am certain under duress. Alas, some of the departed are those that should have been kept and elevated to better positions - but I guess that's a universal truth, and I've been watching it happen here for a long time. I'd like to work through 2012 (or maybe a bit longer if I can) if only to increase pension amounts, but I'll go earlier if Phyllis decides to retire, too. As long as she works, I might just as well work and soak up the money. Besides, I still want to get that sidecar for my Honda, and maybe get a new cruiser to replace the big Kawasaki before the days for buying those toys are eaten up by reality. I'd kinda like a new Harley - but I'm not holding my breath.
It's within an hour of going-home time, so I'd better get some real work done, or I'll think badly of myself.
Have a good one, y'all - more on WHS tomorrow or the next day.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Tuesday
A week ago I left the office early, feeling rather ragged.
I was right - today I am starting to feel human again. About once a year or so a respiratory bug gets hold of me and shakes its head and bounces me around.
I did see a doctor who prescribed Amoxycillin, which I have taken and continue to take, although I have no real reason to think it has done anything except make my stomach unhappy with me for a time. Mostly I have slept - in my bed at night, then in my chair in the living room during the day. I have always been able to sleep, but when afflicted with some bug or another my sleeping ability increases exponentially. My usual signal that the bug has left is that I can get bored in my chair with my computer on my lap, and not fall asleep and drop it on the floor. I know the but isn't finished with me yet because I still can be sitting here and suddenly note that an hour or more has passed, or that I suddenly really need to get up and go to the bathroom.
Being sick sucks, and it sucks worse as I get older because it stays around longer. For a week now I have not been back downstairs to beat on my Home Server project, although I have gone after the machine using Remote Desktop, it just isn't the same as being right there and putting my hands on the things inside it. Maybe this evening I'll go and do some of that.
I had my annual eye exam this morning, only about two years late. I need new glasses (what's new) and grumbled a bit at the doc who told me that he was in the business because it was a human fact of life that the lens in one's eye stiffens with age, requiring continuous changes to correction, thus assuring him of a lifetime of clients. I thanked him for the educational information, and we proceeded onto more important conversational items - he told me about his new Harley Davidson motorcycle, and I told him the tail of my getting hit last year on mine, whereupon he told me of a similar incident that he had on his. Funny how much stuff there is to share sometimes.
I'm thinking tomorrow may be the last day for staying home. I did start the motorcycle the other day and do a couple of errands on it - and tomorrow is supposed to be perfect motorcycle weather, so if I feel like going out tomorrow, I guess I'll have to feel like going back to work on Thursday. Maybe in the next life I can plan better and be independently wealthy by the time I reach this age.
I need to go and find some lunch. This is a good sign; when I feel really rotten I don't notice missed meals, so I guess I am getting better.
Have a good day, y'all....
I was right - today I am starting to feel human again. About once a year or so a respiratory bug gets hold of me and shakes its head and bounces me around.
I did see a doctor who prescribed Amoxycillin, which I have taken and continue to take, although I have no real reason to think it has done anything except make my stomach unhappy with me for a time. Mostly I have slept - in my bed at night, then in my chair in the living room during the day. I have always been able to sleep, but when afflicted with some bug or another my sleeping ability increases exponentially. My usual signal that the bug has left is that I can get bored in my chair with my computer on my lap, and not fall asleep and drop it on the floor. I know the but isn't finished with me yet because I still can be sitting here and suddenly note that an hour or more has passed, or that I suddenly really need to get up and go to the bathroom.
Being sick sucks, and it sucks worse as I get older because it stays around longer. For a week now I have not been back downstairs to beat on my Home Server project, although I have gone after the machine using Remote Desktop, it just isn't the same as being right there and putting my hands on the things inside it. Maybe this evening I'll go and do some of that.
I had my annual eye exam this morning, only about two years late. I need new glasses (what's new) and grumbled a bit at the doc who told me that he was in the business because it was a human fact of life that the lens in one's eye stiffens with age, requiring continuous changes to correction, thus assuring him of a lifetime of clients. I thanked him for the educational information, and we proceeded onto more important conversational items - he told me about his new Harley Davidson motorcycle, and I told him the tail of my getting hit last year on mine, whereupon he told me of a similar incident that he had on his. Funny how much stuff there is to share sometimes.
I'm thinking tomorrow may be the last day for staying home. I did start the motorcycle the other day and do a couple of errands on it - and tomorrow is supposed to be perfect motorcycle weather, so if I feel like going out tomorrow, I guess I'll have to feel like going back to work on Thursday. Maybe in the next life I can plan better and be independently wealthy by the time I reach this age.
I need to go and find some lunch. This is a good sign; when I feel really rotten I don't notice missed meals, so I guess I am getting better.
Have a good day, y'all....
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Wednesday
I missed choir tonight - whatever respiratory thing is going around I seem to be getting, and it showed up today with earache, scratchy throat, and general malaise. I feel lousy - achy, headachy, tickle cough - just crappy.
I don't deserve this - and so I am visiting a doctor tomorrow to see if it needs an antibiotic or patience. I'm hoping for an antibiotic, because if I get a good slug into me, I'll be able to keep a commitment to sing in another church with our daughter, Elizabeth - if it's a patience thing, she might get to do a couple of solos instead of a couple of duets with me - and she'll have to pick them on Saturday. She's perfectly capable, but I do so enjoy dueting with her, and we don't do it all that often.
Feeling crappy will also keep me from Sammy, our newest grandchild - and he always makes me feel better. So tomorrow I'll dog it in the morning, visit with the doctor in the afternoon and then decide what Friday will bring as far as work goes.
I have spent no time downstairs - Arnold is behaving but I need to get bumping on the mail, web and FTP server aspect(s) of what it has. I also have to get into the router and convince it to play nice with Home Server - and I am still waiting on RAID cards to get the array working before I cover it up and start ignoring it.
I should do the taxes this weekend, and hope I feel good enough - they need to get done, and I fear the feds are going to get a big piece of my butt because I started taking Social Security. The money has been nice - it killed off some old credit card debt, but I didn't reckon with the Feds taxing it on me. Being old is not all it is cracked up to be - trust me on that. I have a feeling I'll have to work even longer than I thought before retiring - unless I want to adopt a monastic lifestyle, without motorcycles, computers, fiber to the internet, etc.
Speaking of fiber - if you can get it and you use the internet, especially for file transfers or remote work, you'd be silly not to do it. I put a bunch of stuff on one bill since Verizon has my cells as well as my landline, internet and TeeVee - and their fiber internet service is so fast that it is hard to saturate it. I put up my favorite robot and started rebuilding some of the stuff I lost in the last big drive crash - and pulled something like 30 gigs off the internet in less than 24 hours (binary newsgroup service mostly, using GigaNews as my supplier, NewsBin as my collection robot, and using all 20 connected sessions) and had NewsBin showing throughput between 18 and 19.2 megabytes per second, on a connection rated at 20 megabytes. Bloody amazing - and even with that extreme internet load my HD televisions continued to work just fine - and it all comes in over one little piece of glass fiber.
And to think that I can remember when a fast print device for a network was an IBM Selectric that ran at 134.5 bits per second....
I should be going to bed, but I'm staying up so my wife can sleep. I have to take some nyquil, and will probably sleep with the TeeVee tonight and off and on tomorrow. Hope this bug, whatever it is, goes away fast - I don't much feel like feeling like this for the next week or so.
Goodnight all - tomorrow will be better.
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Home Server Doings
Y'all are probably bored with this, but I'm close to done with it. Arnold the Windows Home Server is once again alive - I have learned a few more things that I didn't know (funny how that seems to come up - something gets screwed up, and I learn something that I didn't know before, usually after breaking something I thought I knew all about.)
Now, I have four out of the five big drives that I thought were dead back alive, but the RAID adapter that was supposed to run the new SATA drives and get me the fault-tolerant storage array that I wanted so that when the next drive croaks, nothing gets lost - that's what RAID arrays are all about) apparently is toast, so I have to go and get another one.
So right now, Arnold is alive with old drives, and I am learning how to make him useful (which may take the rest of my life) and get the music database repopulated and reloaded, and get the media streaming stuff working throughout the house again. I will use one of the old drives to liven up the robot to get the music collection reestablished, and when I get a new SAT RAID adapter and get the RAID array working, I'll make it part of the storage pool, and gradually retire / relocate the old drives into less critical locations - or at least put them to uses that aren't likely to have a bad effect on the overall network.
One of the reasons I write this stuff is to help me be sure I know whatthehell I'm about to do. Sometimes I find I do, sometimes I don't - but the writing always helps.
On another topic, I was off today - I ended up working Saturday here at home, and Sunday night got called in until the wee hours of this morning, getting home again around 4:30 AM. It isn't as easy as it was when I was younger, but it is a part of what I do, to be prepared to take the off-time to correct. I spent some time today looking in and rechecking what I had done, but it was all good.
I think now it is time I went to bed - the morning comes so early, and I have to get one grandson to school before I can take myself to work. I thought that by the time I hit 60 life would be calm and boring, but I reckoned without the help of my children, who have conspired to keep life ...interesting... for Phyllis and myself. Both sets of parents are gone, so we find ourselves in the position of venerated elder authority and foolish parents whom you can't take out without being embarrassed - sometimes both at the same time. It'll keep us young and/or nuts.
I'm going to bed. Next rants will probably be less about hardware, and more about Things of the Heart. Be well, y'all.
Sunday, February 1, 2009
I should have gone to bed earlier.
Last night, that is - I stayed up nearly all night working on Arnold, and discovered this morning that while I was asleep he lost his mind. Motherboard will not allow a boot. Maybe it is time to just break down and buy a damn server and be done with it.
I hate it when things go wrong repeatedly. I thought I had it all ready, and then I tried to add in the RAID array and everything turned to poo. I did not even watch the Super Bowl for sleeping this afternoon, not that it would have made a difference in whatever the outcome would have been. I think maybe tonight I'll swap in the last motherboard and see if it turns to crap again, or if this time it actually does something useful. My patience is waning, and I need to get this server built and working to go forward with the streaming entertainment for the house.
Technology is wonderful stuff, but it has made life rather more complicated than it used to be. Before cell phones there was such a thing as privacy, and quiet time. I'm old enough to remember the time before television - radio was something that required a lot of thought and imagination - but it was actually pretty good, and my imagination was at least as good as that of many screenwriters in the early days of TeeVee. Then there were the obligatory trips on Saturday to the movies, the weekly serial (Sky King, Tarzan, RocketMan and others) that always ended in a cliffhanger to suck you into coming back the next weekend. Several of us from the neighborhood, aged 5 to 8, would get on a bus each Saturday, armed with the price of admission, bus fare, and a soda, and go to the matinee to get our weekly fix. We went by ourselves, rode a bus for 20 minutes, went to the theater alone and returned alone, and nobody ever worried about us because it was safe for kids our age to do those things.
Times must have changed a lot.
What has this got to do with Arnold, the recalcitrant server? Damfino - I think I'm rambling.
Now, it's time to go downstairs and have at Arnold some more, and see whether he gets turned on or turned into a target for my pistol....
Be well, y'all
I hate it when things go wrong repeatedly. I thought I had it all ready, and then I tried to add in the RAID array and everything turned to poo. I did not even watch the Super Bowl for sleeping this afternoon, not that it would have made a difference in whatever the outcome would have been. I think maybe tonight I'll swap in the last motherboard and see if it turns to crap again, or if this time it actually does something useful. My patience is waning, and I need to get this server built and working to go forward with the streaming entertainment for the house.
Technology is wonderful stuff, but it has made life rather more complicated than it used to be. Before cell phones there was such a thing as privacy, and quiet time. I'm old enough to remember the time before television - radio was something that required a lot of thought and imagination - but it was actually pretty good, and my imagination was at least as good as that of many screenwriters in the early days of TeeVee. Then there were the obligatory trips on Saturday to the movies, the weekly serial (Sky King, Tarzan, RocketMan and others) that always ended in a cliffhanger to suck you into coming back the next weekend. Several of us from the neighborhood, aged 5 to 8, would get on a bus each Saturday, armed with the price of admission, bus fare, and a soda, and go to the matinee to get our weekly fix. We went by ourselves, rode a bus for 20 minutes, went to the theater alone and returned alone, and nobody ever worried about us because it was safe for kids our age to do those things.
Times must have changed a lot.
What has this got to do with Arnold, the recalcitrant server? Damfino - I think I'm rambling.
Now, it's time to go downstairs and have at Arnold some more, and see whether he gets turned on or turned into a target for my pistol....
Be well, y'all
ARNOLD Lives!!!
It's 4:45 in the morning. I must get up in 5 hours. I did not go to bed when I thought I might, instead I mauled Arnold a bit more, and he is alive.
The RAID array is not even being seen, but the server is alive and working, and even letting me introduce it to my laptop! Will wonders never cease?
Now all I gotta do is get the data off the old server's drives, then get the RAID array working, then make it available, then take out the old server drives and reserve them, and then, well, probably go to work, dammit!
Weekends should be longer.
Happy Sunday, y'all - it looks like the motherboard is good, and will hold the load.
The RAID array is not even being seen, but the server is alive and working, and even letting me introduce it to my laptop! Will wonders never cease?
Now all I gotta do is get the data off the old server's drives, then get the RAID array working, then make it available, then take out the old server drives and reserve them, and then, well, probably go to work, dammit!
Weekends should be longer.
Happy Sunday, y'all - it looks like the motherboard is good, and will hold the load.
Home server rant continues
Alfred is dead. I killed him. I enjoyed it - the SOB just would not behave. Old motherboards sometimes make life hard, and this one just wouldn't continue beyond ten minutes after bootup.
I reused the case, so Arnold looks like Alfred, but isn't - there's an AMD dual processor motherboard in there, and Home Server is rebuilding as I write. After that, it looks like I scrambled the SATA connectors to my RAID cage, so I can look forward to around 30 hours of RAID array formatting during which time nothing will get done. After that it should be clear sailing and I can start rebuilding my music and video databases for the home network.
If, on the other hand it is still unstable I shall call RAID a bad job and go to conventional storage. I don't want to do that because it is so hard to recover a loss in a terabyte or so of music and such. Some days you eat the bear, other days you're his lunch.
So now it is waiting time. I guess I'll know more in the morning before I head for church.
But I did take a break this afternoon and call an old friend on the phone - one I've not seen since around 1972, but whom I have known since the late 50's. He's a bit older than I am at 75, but our lives have touched several times over the years, both here in the US and during the time I was in Germany, as he was a teacher in a military dependant's school while I was serving in the Air Force and we spent many pleasant weekends wandering around Germany, sampling wines, and generally being single and carefree. I don't recall if we returned at the same time, but he went home to Minnesota and I ended up here in Maryland. We got together in 1972 when I drew a trip of a couple of months to Minneapolis for schooling, but after a few weeks I decided I should bring my wife out, so visiting got somewhat curtailed.
But we've stayed in touch all these years, sharing memories and other friends, and it is a little hard to think of him as being 75 yet I know that he is every bit of that age, just as I am every bit of almost 67 - but those numbers seem unreal to me. I promised myself never to grow up or to get stodgy and set in my ways and I think I've been moderately successful at that - but my knees hurt, my shoulders creak like an old maple tree, and I can sleep wherever I happen to be. But I still love to motorcycle (although I no longer love it enough to go out when it is below about 50 degrees - and I used to ride all year round regardless of temperature) and to go and see things I haven't seen yet.
I just looked at the bottom of my screen and it is now February. It just kinda sneaked up on me. I hate it when that happens! But after February comes March, and by mid-March the weather is getting good for riding once again, and I can count on more and more motorcycle days.
Tomorrow I have to get going on our taxes - it is my least favorite yearly task, and when I can retire I get to do less. Near as I can tell, retirement will come sometime around the age of 74 for me - but maybe not then. I have the rare good fortune to like what I do, and as long as someone will pay me to do it, I might just as well. We still have one of our kids with us, and a grandchild, so the responsibilities will not decrease until she marries and leaves, or maybe just leaves.
Somehow life did not go the way I thought it would when I was young and still knew everything. The path is still changing, and it is anyone's guess where I will end up (although some of the more fundy-oriented folks I know are sure that they know) or when.
It's funny where life goes. I was born here in Baltimore, then moved to Hatboro. From Hatboro I went into the service and went to Texas, Syracuse, Texas and Germany. I stayed an extra year in Germany; I don't recall just why although I have been told a German girl might have had some influence, and when I returned my family was back in Baltimore, so I came here and despite grand ideas of taking a company move or something like that I have been at this address for 36 years. I do a number of things that were too far-out for even science fiction when I was in high school, trying to imagine what I would be when I grew up.
So, what have all these years given to me as revelations?
I reused the case, so Arnold looks like Alfred, but isn't - there's an AMD dual processor motherboard in there, and Home Server is rebuilding as I write. After that, it looks like I scrambled the SATA connectors to my RAID cage, so I can look forward to around 30 hours of RAID array formatting during which time nothing will get done. After that it should be clear sailing and I can start rebuilding my music and video databases for the home network.
If, on the other hand it is still unstable I shall call RAID a bad job and go to conventional storage. I don't want to do that because it is so hard to recover a loss in a terabyte or so of music and such. Some days you eat the bear, other days you're his lunch.
So now it is waiting time. I guess I'll know more in the morning before I head for church.
But I did take a break this afternoon and call an old friend on the phone - one I've not seen since around 1972, but whom I have known since the late 50's. He's a bit older than I am at 75, but our lives have touched several times over the years, both here in the US and during the time I was in Germany, as he was a teacher in a military dependant's school while I was serving in the Air Force and we spent many pleasant weekends wandering around Germany, sampling wines, and generally being single and carefree. I don't recall if we returned at the same time, but he went home to Minnesota and I ended up here in Maryland. We got together in 1972 when I drew a trip of a couple of months to Minneapolis for schooling, but after a few weeks I decided I should bring my wife out, so visiting got somewhat curtailed.
But we've stayed in touch all these years, sharing memories and other friends, and it is a little hard to think of him as being 75 yet I know that he is every bit of that age, just as I am every bit of almost 67 - but those numbers seem unreal to me. I promised myself never to grow up or to get stodgy and set in my ways and I think I've been moderately successful at that - but my knees hurt, my shoulders creak like an old maple tree, and I can sleep wherever I happen to be. But I still love to motorcycle (although I no longer love it enough to go out when it is below about 50 degrees - and I used to ride all year round regardless of temperature) and to go and see things I haven't seen yet.
I just looked at the bottom of my screen and it is now February. It just kinda sneaked up on me. I hate it when that happens! But after February comes March, and by mid-March the weather is getting good for riding once again, and I can count on more and more motorcycle days.
Tomorrow I have to get going on our taxes - it is my least favorite yearly task, and when I can retire I get to do less. Near as I can tell, retirement will come sometime around the age of 74 for me - but maybe not then. I have the rare good fortune to like what I do, and as long as someone will pay me to do it, I might just as well. We still have one of our kids with us, and a grandchild, so the responsibilities will not decrease until she marries and leaves, or maybe just leaves.
Somehow life did not go the way I thought it would when I was young and still knew everything. The path is still changing, and it is anyone's guess where I will end up (although some of the more fundy-oriented folks I know are sure that they know) or when.
It's funny where life goes. I was born here in Baltimore, then moved to Hatboro. From Hatboro I went into the service and went to Texas, Syracuse, Texas and Germany. I stayed an extra year in Germany; I don't recall just why although I have been told a German girl might have had some influence, and when I returned my family was back in Baltimore, so I came here and despite grand ideas of taking a company move or something like that I have been at this address for 36 years. I do a number of things that were too far-out for even science fiction when I was in high school, trying to imagine what I would be when I grew up.
So, what have all these years given to me as revelations?
- Hatboro was a pretty good place.
- Going to college to please someone else is a waste of time.
- Military service, properly managed can be educational and even fun.
- No matter how hard I tried, Germany made beer faster than I could drink it.
- Speed limits are a revenue-producing tool, not a safety enhancement.
- Getting married is easy; staying married is hard.
- Riding a motorcycle will teach you lots about paying attention and being gentle.
- An hour at the pistol range will clear your head better than a week at the ocean.
- My children will do what they deem fit. They do not have to make my failures good.
- When your state is altered, your competence to determine your competence Goes Away.
- Music is wonderful, and cannot be explained - you get it, or you don't.
- Living in a foreign land, learning the language, is more valuable than books
- Foreign languages are different - and you must never translate an idiom.
- I think I'm rambling. Again.
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Home Server Part 2
Well, I have become less cheerful - Alfred is fighting me every step of the way. I finally figured out that I had to just let the RAID card do its format and leave it alone - for something like 38 hours! Large disks take a while to stripe, I guess. Hope I never have to replace 1 - it'll take 15 hours just to rebuild, during which time probably nothing else will do anything.
I finally got the RAID right, and started the maintenance tool to add the disk capacity - and Alfred went nuts and refused to talk to me. I have a bad feeling that I am about to get to scrap his motherboard, and demote his function to a single-processor machine that I have laying around doing nothing,which will tick me off as I have a couple more multiprocessor motherboards, but just don't feel like doing one of those agonizing swaps today, although I may change my mind. I really need to get this pup working and stable, so I can get the rest of the house's computers to cooperate and play nice - and start rebuilding my music library.
If anyone wonders, RAID is not what we use to kill software bugs - it is an acronym for Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks - which means that it takes a bunch of cheap disks and rearranges the way data is stored so that the failure of one disk in the array will not result in complete loss of data. Really clever idea - the net is less space that is useful, but less likelihood of all of it getting to be useless at once. Unfortunately, I had been watching RAID arrays built with relatively tiny disks, and it didn't seem that it took that long to recover when a disk failed. I am using disks 50 times as big as what I used to watch, and forgot that things would take 50 times as long to recover and rebuild. We live and we learn.
So for now I have a server that works, albeit not well, and is useless by virtue of its refusal to talk to anything but itself. Time for a restart, I think. Time to put that old monster out to pasture. Time to put Alfred down.
Time to start building Arnold. I'll keep y'all apprised....
I finally got the RAID right, and started the maintenance tool to add the disk capacity - and Alfred went nuts and refused to talk to me. I have a bad feeling that I am about to get to scrap his motherboard, and demote his function to a single-processor machine that I have laying around doing nothing,which will tick me off as I have a couple more multiprocessor motherboards, but just don't feel like doing one of those agonizing swaps today, although I may change my mind. I really need to get this pup working and stable, so I can get the rest of the house's computers to cooperate and play nice - and start rebuilding my music library.
If anyone wonders, RAID is not what we use to kill software bugs - it is an acronym for Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks - which means that it takes a bunch of cheap disks and rearranges the way data is stored so that the failure of one disk in the array will not result in complete loss of data. Really clever idea - the net is less space that is useful, but less likelihood of all of it getting to be useless at once. Unfortunately, I had been watching RAID arrays built with relatively tiny disks, and it didn't seem that it took that long to recover when a disk failed. I am using disks 50 times as big as what I used to watch, and forgot that things would take 50 times as long to recover and rebuild. We live and we learn.
So for now I have a server that works, albeit not well, and is useless by virtue of its refusal to talk to anything but itself. Time for a restart, I think. Time to put that old monster out to pasture. Time to put Alfred down.
Time to start building Arnold. I'll keep y'all apprised....
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Cheer up, self!
Well, color me a little less displeased with myself, and add a shade of feeling silly. I finally got around to starting the build on the big server in the basement - and realized that I hadn't even remembered its name properly - in my last post I called it Arnold, when in reality its name is Alfred. I think it knows, and hates me for it.
The first Home Server install stalled on me - I didn't have the RAID array properly done, and got an hour into the install and the damn computer stalled and refused to do anything except sit there and grin at me. Well, I couldn't stand for that, so I cleaned it off, got the RAID array properly configured and and restarted the installation cold. It got going, and I walked away from it, secure in the knowledge that it will either go on properly, or I'll go downstairs before I go to bed and have yet another reason to hate MicroSoft and its software.
But I did look at the other 3 machines down there, started up the two that are not run normally and they seem healthy, or at least the hardware does. One of them has a nice DVD writer with LightScribe that I will transfer into the IBM machine I got last year and haven't used yet - may get to that by the weekend.
I'd love it if we got a hard freeze - it would keep me home (I brought my laptop home tonight just against that eventuality,) so I could work tomorrow here if I had to, rather than go out in the old Volvo and play on the ice. I don't mind a couple inches of snow, but ice on the roads gives me the crawls.
By the weekend I should have the server built, the new mail services running on it, the 2 terabyte shared storage array usable throughout the house and be ready to start on phase 2 - starting up the IBM super workstation that I got for me, getting the DVD writer installed and maybe even getting the three older machines shut down, cleaned off and ready for disposal. That'd please my wife a whole lot. She's a real dear about my slowness to do stuff, but she does have a limit, and I really don't want to know where it is.
I started working with the beta version of Clarion 7, which is the development tool I use to do most of my programming, and it is a major change for me, but I like what I see so far. I also have to get going with Clarion# (I bought that for me - 7 is for the office) and within the coming weeks may actually make some progress there, if folks at work don't break a bunch of stuff in the meanwhile. I need to upgrade my high school class database and put it on the new web server as soon as I can get to it, hopefully before the next reunion (which will be the 50th - the thought of which makes me feel old!)
Speaking of which - I am looking forward to the 50th and I have our 41st anniversary coming up - believe it or not, one woman has put up with me for 41 years and is still here! It can be done.
Well, I have to go downstairs and check on Alfred - see if he's still being built or if he's choked again. Tomorrow is Wednesday - choir rehearsal if the weather cooperates, or a day working at home if the weather decides to be horrid. Of course, I won't know which it is until after I am awake and walking around tomorrow with no chance just to go back to bed. There's just no justice....
Have a great day, y'all!
The first Home Server install stalled on me - I didn't have the RAID array properly done, and got an hour into the install and the damn computer stalled and refused to do anything except sit there and grin at me. Well, I couldn't stand for that, so I cleaned it off, got the RAID array properly configured and and restarted the installation cold. It got going, and I walked away from it, secure in the knowledge that it will either go on properly, or I'll go downstairs before I go to bed and have yet another reason to hate MicroSoft and its software.
But I did look at the other 3 machines down there, started up the two that are not run normally and they seem healthy, or at least the hardware does. One of them has a nice DVD writer with LightScribe that I will transfer into the IBM machine I got last year and haven't used yet - may get to that by the weekend.
I'd love it if we got a hard freeze - it would keep me home (I brought my laptop home tonight just against that eventuality,) so I could work tomorrow here if I had to, rather than go out in the old Volvo and play on the ice. I don't mind a couple inches of snow, but ice on the roads gives me the crawls.
By the weekend I should have the server built, the new mail services running on it, the 2 terabyte shared storage array usable throughout the house and be ready to start on phase 2 - starting up the IBM super workstation that I got for me, getting the DVD writer installed and maybe even getting the three older machines shut down, cleaned off and ready for disposal. That'd please my wife a whole lot. She's a real dear about my slowness to do stuff, but she does have a limit, and I really don't want to know where it is.
I started working with the beta version of Clarion 7, which is the development tool I use to do most of my programming, and it is a major change for me, but I like what I see so far. I also have to get going with Clarion# (I bought that for me - 7 is for the office) and within the coming weeks may actually make some progress there, if folks at work don't break a bunch of stuff in the meanwhile. I need to upgrade my high school class database and put it on the new web server as soon as I can get to it, hopefully before the next reunion (which will be the 50th - the thought of which makes me feel old!)
Speaking of which - I am looking forward to the 50th and I have our 41st anniversary coming up - believe it or not, one woman has put up with me for 41 years and is still here! It can be done.
Well, I have to go downstairs and check on Alfred - see if he's still being built or if he's choked again. Tomorrow is Wednesday - choir rehearsal if the weather cooperates, or a day working at home if the weather decides to be horrid. Of course, I won't know which it is until after I am awake and walking around tomorrow with no chance just to go back to bed. There's just no justice....
Have a great day, y'all!
Monday, January 26, 2009
Aging
I am getting old. Actually, I think I already got old, and somehow managed not to take note of the fact as it was happening. I have another birthday in a few weeks, number 67. In another three years I will be 70. My grandfather was old at 70 - I am not ready to be old, but I'm almost 70.
Phyllis and I had dinner with our youngest child, her husband, and their 6-month old - and we had a great time. It was a relaxed pleasant evening, with lots of laughs, some supplied by a cheerful curious baby and some by silly adults. There is something about spending time with our daughter and her husband that makes gloom go away. I'm depressive by nature, and after some time with Liz, James and Sammy my whole day seems brighter. For one thing it is impossible to be anything but happy and silly with a happy baby. For another, our youngest child is so great with us, her wonderful husband and the rest of the world.
I guess one thing that helps is that with her in command of her quarter of the world, we can relax secure in the knowledge that the world is a better place with her and her husband in it - and the child is just a bonus.
For myself, I should open a chapter of the Procrastinator's Society just for me - I am so far behind in just about everything that it is really not good for depression. I have a bunch of computer hardware cluttering up my house, some of which arrived a year ago that I have not yet assembled and put to work, and it needs done. My part of the basement is a disaster area, needs stuff cleaned up, thrown out, upgraded, overhauled and generally sterilized, cauterized and replaced. I need to do it and do you think I can get my arse in gear to get started? I dome home at night, and end up in front of our (admittedly lovely large LCD HD) TeeVee, read mail, write things once in a while and generally become immobile, eventually going to bed, and get up tired in the morning to go to work. I can't retire, and really don't want to yet, but my energy lever is subterranean these days, and it is pissing me off!
Maybe tomorrow I can at least get that RAID array into Arnold (all my PC's have names, and Arnold is the big server downstairs that does the mail and such....) and get Home Server loaded and get the network restarted in a functional manner.
But I did get some neat stuff for when I get It together - some good wireless toys, a print server or two (USB) that will make some of our remote printing and scanning awhile lot more flexible - and a few things that are just neat toys that I'll have fun with.
The weather is supposed to turn to absolute crap - I should have gone out on the motorcycle last week on the one warm day, because between snow and frigidity the weather is conspiring to keep me off the bike. Doesn't help that my knees are at least 30 years older than the rest of me, either....
Maybe I'll take off a few hours Wednesday and go over to see Liz & Sammy - and let the baby make me laugh some more. I forgot or maybe never noticed just hos delightful babies can be - when we had them around here that were ours, we were too busy trying to make sure we did things right and that everything was in order - with Sammy, that's Liz and James' problem - we can just enjoy Sammy, make faces at him and laugh with him.
I guess I'm not so depressed any more - at least until the weather report comes along in a few minutes.
G'night, y'all.
Phyllis and I had dinner with our youngest child, her husband, and their 6-month old - and we had a great time. It was a relaxed pleasant evening, with lots of laughs, some supplied by a cheerful curious baby and some by silly adults. There is something about spending time with our daughter and her husband that makes gloom go away. I'm depressive by nature, and after some time with Liz, James and Sammy my whole day seems brighter. For one thing it is impossible to be anything but happy and silly with a happy baby. For another, our youngest child is so great with us, her wonderful husband and the rest of the world.
I guess one thing that helps is that with her in command of her quarter of the world, we can relax secure in the knowledge that the world is a better place with her and her husband in it - and the child is just a bonus.
For myself, I should open a chapter of the Procrastinator's Society just for me - I am so far behind in just about everything that it is really not good for depression. I have a bunch of computer hardware cluttering up my house, some of which arrived a year ago that I have not yet assembled and put to work, and it needs done. My part of the basement is a disaster area, needs stuff cleaned up, thrown out, upgraded, overhauled and generally sterilized, cauterized and replaced. I need to do it and do you think I can get my arse in gear to get started? I dome home at night, and end up in front of our (admittedly lovely large LCD HD) TeeVee, read mail, write things once in a while and generally become immobile, eventually going to bed, and get up tired in the morning to go to work. I can't retire, and really don't want to yet, but my energy lever is subterranean these days, and it is pissing me off!
Maybe tomorrow I can at least get that RAID array into Arnold (all my PC's have names, and Arnold is the big server downstairs that does the mail and such....) and get Home Server loaded and get the network restarted in a functional manner.
But I did get some neat stuff for when I get It together - some good wireless toys, a print server or two (USB) that will make some of our remote printing and scanning awhile lot more flexible - and a few things that are just neat toys that I'll have fun with.
The weather is supposed to turn to absolute crap - I should have gone out on the motorcycle last week on the one warm day, because between snow and frigidity the weather is conspiring to keep me off the bike. Doesn't help that my knees are at least 30 years older than the rest of me, either....
Maybe I'll take off a few hours Wednesday and go over to see Liz & Sammy - and let the baby make me laugh some more. I forgot or maybe never noticed just hos delightful babies can be - when we had them around here that were ours, we were too busy trying to make sure we did things right and that everything was in order - with Sammy, that's Liz and James' problem - we can just enjoy Sammy, make faces at him and laugh with him.
I guess I'm not so depressed any more - at least until the weather report comes along in a few minutes.
G'night, y'all.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
WE had an inauguration!
This has been an interesting week to work in an interesting place. I work in a police department, and this week we had holidays, new almost-presidents making speeches, crowds downtown to look at the new almost president and (perhaps) listen to what he had to say, and then to wave at him as he got back on the train to Washington, DC.
The next day, Washington, DC turned into a crowd scene worthy of Cecil B. DeMille - and some of our cops were there, including the motorcycle guys. Even with electric suits, I imagine they were plenty cold....
I have been through a number of inaugurations in my life, and I don't recall one so well attended, so well secured, or so flashy. Lots of people, secure in their jobs now for a time had a lot of things to say. Included in those things were glittering generalities, promises that will not be kept, expectations that will never be met, and lots of feel-good stuff, positive-sounding, but somehow giving me at least the feeling that the folks there were determined to look out for me and mine regardless of my wishes, and convinced that they already knew what was best for me and mine regardless what we might happen to think about what they think they know.
I have been distressed about all the time given to a black man who is our next president. I saw a man who was properly elected and frankly, to me, he looks more Arabic than black, and anyhow I had truly hoped that we were beyond the point that simple appearance qualified or disqualified one for higher office.
Now, I am not wholly convinced he was the right choice - but he's there now, and it is part of my job to help him all I can, in whatever way I can to excel - because if he does things well, my life goes well. Nothing like a little enlightened self-interest here. Frankly, I was and remain impressed by Mr. Obama - he is obviously bright, speaks well, does his homework or has good people to do it for him and he listens well to them, and either is sincere or one hell of an actor - and I prefer to believe that he is real.
I don't have a clue what the future holds for the nation as a whole. I'd like to think that it will go on and that we as a people will grow to be better than what we are. In many respects, even though he wasn't my choice, I'm pleased that he was elected - his very election proves that most of us are beyond a particularly ugly point in our history (although I have to tell you, Colin Powell would have had my vote in a New York minute) and that we as a people are growing in understanding and in tolerance (or at least most of us are and that's the best I can hope for.)
So we are once again embarking on an adventure in this great nation. We do this each four years, and I would wager that nobody gets exactly what they want or expect out of the four years that follow - but it will be interesting, educational and occasionally scary and at the end of four years we'll either throw him out or put him back for another four years - and hopes and expectations will be dashed no matter which way it goes because there's no way for one man to deliver on all the promises, particularly once he starts interfacing with legislators who have pork with which to woo votes.
Meanwhile, the nation will muddle through and things will change - sometimes for the better, sometimes not. It has been written that a nation gets the government it deserves and I'd like to think that we're headed for a good patch.
I'm not fond of socialist programs - and in Europe, which apparently some think is the source of all that is good, the folks are finding that socialism costs too much and delivers too little.
I get upset at treating illegals like citizens, particularly when they become thereby entitled to breaks and programs that citizens don't get offered. Maybe I'm old and cynical, but free lunch draws parasites - and Europe has been busily proving it for decades.
I don't believe that we can do anything good about terrorists by appearing weak - and yet that is exactly the posture that many would have us take in its face. That way lies madness. Predators will take a weak victim if available, and terrorists are nothing if not predators - preying only on the helpless, shrinking from anything resembling a fight.
But I have faith that somehow we'll be all right. We live in the best place in the world to be, and it will only get better. And no, I'm not whistling in the dark - if I were, I'd be headed either for Germany or New Zealand.
My misgivings notwithstanding, I think I'll watch a while - I could always get a nice surprise; it wouldn't be the first time, and surely won't be the last. It's what keeps life interesting.
The one thing that is certain is that things will change. Have a nice day, y'all.
The next day, Washington, DC turned into a crowd scene worthy of Cecil B. DeMille - and some of our cops were there, including the motorcycle guys. Even with electric suits, I imagine they were plenty cold....
I have been through a number of inaugurations in my life, and I don't recall one so well attended, so well secured, or so flashy. Lots of people, secure in their jobs now for a time had a lot of things to say. Included in those things were glittering generalities, promises that will not be kept, expectations that will never be met, and lots of feel-good stuff, positive-sounding, but somehow giving me at least the feeling that the folks there were determined to look out for me and mine regardless of my wishes, and convinced that they already knew what was best for me and mine regardless what we might happen to think about what they think they know.
I have been distressed about all the time given to a black man who is our next president. I saw a man who was properly elected and frankly, to me, he looks more Arabic than black, and anyhow I had truly hoped that we were beyond the point that simple appearance qualified or disqualified one for higher office.
Now, I am not wholly convinced he was the right choice - but he's there now, and it is part of my job to help him all I can, in whatever way I can to excel - because if he does things well, my life goes well. Nothing like a little enlightened self-interest here. Frankly, I was and remain impressed by Mr. Obama - he is obviously bright, speaks well, does his homework or has good people to do it for him and he listens well to them, and either is sincere or one hell of an actor - and I prefer to believe that he is real.
I don't have a clue what the future holds for the nation as a whole. I'd like to think that it will go on and that we as a people will grow to be better than what we are. In many respects, even though he wasn't my choice, I'm pleased that he was elected - his very election proves that most of us are beyond a particularly ugly point in our history (although I have to tell you, Colin Powell would have had my vote in a New York minute) and that we as a people are growing in understanding and in tolerance (or at least most of us are and that's the best I can hope for.)
So we are once again embarking on an adventure in this great nation. We do this each four years, and I would wager that nobody gets exactly what they want or expect out of the four years that follow - but it will be interesting, educational and occasionally scary and at the end of four years we'll either throw him out or put him back for another four years - and hopes and expectations will be dashed no matter which way it goes because there's no way for one man to deliver on all the promises, particularly once he starts interfacing with legislators who have pork with which to woo votes.
Meanwhile, the nation will muddle through and things will change - sometimes for the better, sometimes not. It has been written that a nation gets the government it deserves and I'd like to think that we're headed for a good patch.
I'm not fond of socialist programs - and in Europe, which apparently some think is the source of all that is good, the folks are finding that socialism costs too much and delivers too little.
I get upset at treating illegals like citizens, particularly when they become thereby entitled to breaks and programs that citizens don't get offered. Maybe I'm old and cynical, but free lunch draws parasites - and Europe has been busily proving it for decades.
I don't believe that we can do anything good about terrorists by appearing weak - and yet that is exactly the posture that many would have us take in its face. That way lies madness. Predators will take a weak victim if available, and terrorists are nothing if not predators - preying only on the helpless, shrinking from anything resembling a fight.
But I have faith that somehow we'll be all right. We live in the best place in the world to be, and it will only get better. And no, I'm not whistling in the dark - if I were, I'd be headed either for Germany or New Zealand.
My misgivings notwithstanding, I think I'll watch a while - I could always get a nice surprise; it wouldn't be the first time, and surely won't be the last. It's what keeps life interesting.
The one thing that is certain is that things will change. Have a nice day, y'all.
Monday, January 19, 2009
11 days
I can't believe it has been that long and I could find nothing to say! I'm losing my touch.
Actually, it's been pretty quiet - the boss was away for a time, work was pretty quiet, no crises at home, and no recalcitrant vehicles with which to deal. I was off last Friday and today, so I have not worked that many days, and generally nothing new has been started since so many people are not around.
This past weekend was a music weekend for my wife and myself - we spent a day at a church in Hanover, Pennsylvania previewing choral music. For thos unfamiliar with the activity, a bunch of people get together in a good-sized venue with a prepared stack of music (200+ anthems in our case) that will be directed by a clinician and sung by a choir composed of the attendees - in this case, over 600. Now unless you are a chorister, you probably can't appreciate the trill that accompanies one of these sessions - not because the music is done so well; often it is difficult and not done perfectly, but all the folks there try, and the result can be quite beautiful.
These sessions are normally available to choir directors, but many mere singers go, also - some as friends of the director (I go as the director's driver) and often these extras help the director to choose new things for the choir to do. It's a thankless task, sometimes, bit it is a great way to pass a day for a singer - and some of the newer writers are doing some really neat stuff that can only be heard in these clinics. An additional bebefit is that the clinitians are often the writers of the music being previewed, and they tend to be really interesting people.
After the music, I had hoped for a brief visit with an old friend, but it was not to be - so Phyllis and I wandered over to visit our younest and her baby and generally whiled away the afternoon playing with an infant - and it was good!
Tomorrow I have to go back to work. The server didn't get built that I had intended to build over this 4-day weekend. Some computer trouble at church did get fixed, but some more is still waiting. I never got the motorcycle out to get the fork lock installed, but then again as cold as it was, I wasn't looking for an excuse to start it up.
Right this minute I am watching Necessary Roughness, a football movie that I have seen more times than I can count, and I still enjoy it - something that makes no sense whatever as I do not follow sports at all and never have. Odd that another favorite is The Natural, a baseball movie. Some days I make no sense to myself.
I had a traffic rant ready last week after a particularly crappy trip in, but realized that there was nothing new in it, so I pulled it beforeI published it. I maintain that most traffic accidents could have been avoided either by not raising the last two glasses, or by exercising a little courtesy - but casual observation shows nobody to be listening. Maybe someone will piss me off next week and I'll let it go then.
We had yet another organizational change last week, but as best I can determine, it will not mean much of anything to much of anyone in the long run - we'll still have the same meaningless numbers collected and displayed as if they have some deeper meaning. I somethings think that we in Information Technology have done ourselves a disservice by collecting all the data we do - it gives folks the urge to compare disparate numbers and think that they may relate to other numbers (that make them look good, of course) when in actuality they are more like apples and mongooses. This can be hard to explain to folks in a position of authority over you, especially when it is not anything like what they wanted to hear.
It snowed today. My grandson thought he'd died and gone to heaven, but it looks as if it will not last - at least not enough to keep him home from school tomorrow. Disappointment reigns.
I have a kitchen to clean up, and a server to build - enjoy the balance of the day, y'all.
Actually, it's been pretty quiet - the boss was away for a time, work was pretty quiet, no crises at home, and no recalcitrant vehicles with which to deal. I was off last Friday and today, so I have not worked that many days, and generally nothing new has been started since so many people are not around.
This past weekend was a music weekend for my wife and myself - we spent a day at a church in Hanover, Pennsylvania previewing choral music. For thos unfamiliar with the activity, a bunch of people get together in a good-sized venue with a prepared stack of music (200+ anthems in our case) that will be directed by a clinician and sung by a choir composed of the attendees - in this case, over 600. Now unless you are a chorister, you probably can't appreciate the trill that accompanies one of these sessions - not because the music is done so well; often it is difficult and not done perfectly, but all the folks there try, and the result can be quite beautiful.
These sessions are normally available to choir directors, but many mere singers go, also - some as friends of the director (I go as the director's driver) and often these extras help the director to choose new things for the choir to do. It's a thankless task, sometimes, bit it is a great way to pass a day for a singer - and some of the newer writers are doing some really neat stuff that can only be heard in these clinics. An additional bebefit is that the clinitians are often the writers of the music being previewed, and they tend to be really interesting people.
After the music, I had hoped for a brief visit with an old friend, but it was not to be - so Phyllis and I wandered over to visit our younest and her baby and generally whiled away the afternoon playing with an infant - and it was good!
Tomorrow I have to go back to work. The server didn't get built that I had intended to build over this 4-day weekend. Some computer trouble at church did get fixed, but some more is still waiting. I never got the motorcycle out to get the fork lock installed, but then again as cold as it was, I wasn't looking for an excuse to start it up.
Right this minute I am watching Necessary Roughness, a football movie that I have seen more times than I can count, and I still enjoy it - something that makes no sense whatever as I do not follow sports at all and never have. Odd that another favorite is The Natural, a baseball movie. Some days I make no sense to myself.
I had a traffic rant ready last week after a particularly crappy trip in, but realized that there was nothing new in it, so I pulled it beforeI published it. I maintain that most traffic accidents could have been avoided either by not raising the last two glasses, or by exercising a little courtesy - but casual observation shows nobody to be listening. Maybe someone will piss me off next week and I'll let it go then.
We had yet another organizational change last week, but as best I can determine, it will not mean much of anything to much of anyone in the long run - we'll still have the same meaningless numbers collected and displayed as if they have some deeper meaning. I somethings think that we in Information Technology have done ourselves a disservice by collecting all the data we do - it gives folks the urge to compare disparate numbers and think that they may relate to other numbers (that make them look good, of course) when in actuality they are more like apples and mongooses. This can be hard to explain to folks in a position of authority over you, especially when it is not anything like what they wanted to hear.
It snowed today. My grandson thought he'd died and gone to heaven, but it looks as if it will not last - at least not enough to keep him home from school tomorrow. Disappointment reigns.
I have a kitchen to clean up, and a server to build - enjoy the balance of the day, y'all.
Thursday, January 8, 2009
Back to work
I was off from the day before Christmas through Monday. By off, I mean not obligated to go to work - some folks will tell you I'm off all the time, but they're just being unkind. At least that's what I think. Anyhow, I made it in Monday, and forgot that the boss was still off, so there wasn't much on Monday to elevate my blood pressure, and it wasn't a bad day as days go except, of course, for the weather that was so bad it could not even be said to suck.
I finally had a good day last week, and got the motorcycle out to get the last little bit of fixing done. At least that's what I told myself - the truth is I really wanted a reason to ride, and I really did enjoy getting out to ride. After I got back in the evening I dropped an email on one of my riding pals, and was more than a but chagrined to learn that he had spent part of his holidays having a pacemaker/defibrillator implanted in his chest. He's at least 6 years younger than I am, and has already had cardiac surgery many years back. Getting old sucks. But by the spring I'll bet he's ready to ride again. Meanwhile, maybe I can talk him into an afternoon of music making....
I need to get some more weight off - at least another 100 pounds, although another 20 would take care of the 18 I have gained back and then some, and make me feel good. I'm really pretty grumpy right now, and people at work are starting to avoid me. I'm antisocial enough that this is good to a point, but when folks tremble and walk sideways against a wall to get past me I begin to wonder if I'm not just a little bit more incendiary than I need to be.
Maybe I just need to spend a day with my daughter and let her baby drool all over me and giggle at me a while. That'd be cheaper than a weekend away at a gambling resort or somewhere like that. Of course I could always take a train to Chicago for a day - the overnight trip there is really great, a day wandering wouldn't be bad, and the overnight train back is wonderful - and nobody would do anything to disturb me at all during the whole trip. Now all I need is a business reason for it....
I've been finding classmates and other friends on FaceBook. Everyone should get a FaceBook page! Some of what's there, like what's on YouTube, is reprehensible - but some of it is pretty good, and even the ads can be useful. I probably spend more time at this than I should, but sooner or later it'll get old and then I'll be more productive until the next thing comes along.
I found a ShoutCast station that plays nothing but The Blues Brothers. They did some stuff I never heard and it's pretty good. There are a couple that specialize in solo piano, and it really is nice. I have to introduce my wife to this - maybe for some good music she'll touch a computer - particularly if I buy one for her, maybe....
I think I've had all the fun I should have on any one day, and it is pushing 6 PM pretty hard, so I will clean up here (or at least hide most of the crap in desk drawers) and head for home. Y'all be good, y'hear?
Sunday, January 4, 2009
Sunday, January 4
Getting up this morning was really not easy. Getting up almost two hours earlier than I would have on most Sundays was even harder. Somewhere along the line I agreed in a weak moment to be music at our 9:30 church service. Normally I am a choir member for the 11:00 service and, while I have been known to be a soloist it is not usual for me to get up early just to do that. The particular piece for this morning is one in which I had a solo over part of it, but there was a choir part where I would normally have sung the tenor part, and I had to read the melody line instead, so I had something to learn quickly before the service started. Phyllis had played it for me the previous day and then we went off to see the bull riders.
In any event, the music went well, everyone was complimentary (although I don't think anyone would be otherwise, just because) and after the second service I went home and died, sleeping through what ought to have been dinner. It seems two nights downtown watching bull riders extracts a big toll on old fat guys - and my old arse was just worn out.
Then this evening we had a reception at church for two members who are leaving the area, and I have to say that they will be missed. Employment does strange things to people - this couple had come to us before and after a while was sent to Australia for a year on business, after which they came back and went to California for a while and returned to this area. Now, business acquisitions and the need for employment have them moving to Birmingham, Alabama in order to be employed. Frankly, I don't recall having had someone leave before that had such an effect on me - already I miss both of them. I must be getting maudlin in my old age.
Tomorrow I have to go back to work. Pardon me for lacking enthusiasm - the past ten days have been welcome down time - and, unfortunately, the few things I did intend to do did not get done. I need another week....
Be well, y'all -I gotta get some sleep.
PBR Redux....
Well, we went back into town this evening for the second round of Professional Bull Riders, and for the championship round for this event. It was worth the trip.
I hate the arena that is used - it was built 40 years ago, and apparently people were a lot smaller then. The seats grab me hard enough to leave me with numbutt after an hour, and the rows are so close together my legs get jammed against the seatback in front of me. In spite of this, I will subject myself to this venue because the PBR puts on a really good show.
The attendance was much better this evening than last evening - even the nosebleed sections were pretty full. The crowd was noisy, and they were obviously enjoying the event. This is a good event for Baltimore - and for the PBR as the season opener it was a bit of a Big Deal that it was to be done in Baltimore - in past years, Madison Square Garden in New York City got the nod for this - this year, they get the second event of the year. Maybe one year before we die Phyllis and I go to New York City, and stay at the old Loewe's Summit or something for a couple of days and take in the bulls at MSG and maybe a broadway show.
Maybe next year even.
For anyone out there, if the PBR gets close to you, or even if there's something less big, go see some bull riding. Everyone I know has enjoyed it, even those that were plenty skeptical. Check your preconceived notions at the door, head inside, and enjoy the spectacle - and marvel at just how fast, strong and athletic both the cowboys and the bulls are.
Saturday, January 3, 2009
PBR
January 2, 2009 - the first event in the Professional Bull Riders 2009 tour was held right here in Baltimore. It is quite a spectacle - and I realized after the show that Phyllis and I have been following Bull Riding for at least 5 years, although it took a couple of years before we actually went to see it anywhere but on the TeeVee in our living room.
It may seem a bit incongruous that this would fascinate us, but it does. The bull riders themselves are an interesting lot - cowboys, but not the stereotypical cowboy that we tend to believe we see. Many of the riders are from other nations (Australia and Brazil being big contributors) but they are just about without exception interesting, and smarter than you might expect someone who voluntarily gets on top of 2000 pounds of beef expecting to stay there for 8 seconds. There are some really abrupt moves involved, and some fairly specific rules about what may be done in the process of the ride.
One thing becomes obvious in a hurry - they guys are tough. A ride typically ends with the rider launched from the bull onto the arena floor - sometimes in a high looping arc, sometimes like a lawn dart into the ground. Broken bones are not as common as in normal people. Bull riders occasionally get stepped on and sat on by the bulls, which typically weigh from 1300 to 2400 pounds. I have to believe that when a bull steps on your foot, it hurts - for about a year - but the riders get up and walk away -and come back in an hour and ride another bull.
The bulls themselves, well, they buck. You have to see it to understand it, and then see that they are not predictable. The job of the bull is to shed the rider - the job of the rider is to frustrate the bull in that effort for 8 seconds. Some of the "professional" bulls stop stock still as soon as the rider is gone - their job is at that point finished. Others continue to dance about the arena. Some others will chase the unseated rider as if to do him harm - and some manage that.
There are support players, but one of the most important for the PBR is a guy named Flint Rasmussen - he's a clown, a cheerleader, a crowd-pleaser, an acrobat, and lots of other things - and by the look of it, all unscripted. His comedic timing is amazing, his strength and stamina something to behold, and without his intermission playing, throwing things at the crowd, and interrupting the commentators it might even get a little dull.
The truth of the matter is that on TeeVee you see the ride better - because the video folks have all the cameras, angles, and recorded bits - but on the TeeVee you miss out on Flint and other things that make the live show.
So as unintellectual as it might seem, I remain a fan - and encourage everyone to go once and see bull riding take place live and in real time. You too could end up being a fan.
Thursday, January 1, 2009
Happy New Year
It looks like we survived yet another year. Today is the first day of the rest of your life and the first day of 2009 - which you and I will both get wrong on checks and other documents for at least a week or so.
Looking back on 2008, it has been an interesting year -
- Our baby had a baby.
- Our son went back to Australasia.
- I managed not to drop a motorcycle on myself, although I did get to pick mine up a couple of times, no damage accrued to anything besides my ego.
- New school for our other grandson with a relatively trauma-free change.
- Second year of new employment completed and they still put up with me.
- No health aberrations like the GI bleed from 2007.
- HD TeeVee arrived and it is great!
- New boss at the office; mixed returns on this one.
- New working quarters - definitely not thrilled about this one.
- Really great reunion of old cold warriors in Texas - folks I had not seen in many years were there, and it was good to meet (and to re-meet) some of them.
- Added to the library several books written by folks that were in Security Service with me, and learned a lot more about intelligence operations of that era.
On the whole, interesting but relatively devoid of significant aberrations. May there be more like this past year.
No really interesting New Year's Resolutions, save for one not to make them any more since it feels so bad to fail to meet the expectation. I do have plenty of tasks for the coming year, but right now it is too soon to start enumerating them - and they'd probably shortly become a truly frightening heap.
The coming year will bring network upgrades and changes here at home - the advent of the HD TeeVee gives a monitor good enough to actually use a computer attached to it, and the media center PC will be doing that duty upstairs. The gaggle of machines downstairs will be replaced by a Microsoft Home Server (something Gates&Co managed to get right), and the flaky mail server will be replaced by different software running in the home server. My new desktop will be fast enough to be useful, finally - and to the rest of the hardware may be added a laptop or netbook for Phyllis - that part is still pending. We'll bring her into the electronicized fold yet!
We are using Skype and Facebook to keep up with our wandering son, and Picasa forphoto resources. It is all working together nicely and as long as he doesn't get too busy to do maintenance we always have new pictures and storis to tell folkswho ask. As yet we have no idea how long he will be staying there, but I'm sure he'll let us know when the time is right, whatever that means. Maybe some Australian girl will manage to tie him down.
I've been finding high school classmates on FaceBook and MySpace, much to my surprise. Most folks my age don't want to be bothered but apparently many of us are still with it enough to take on the challenge. Reconnecting with some of these folks after so many years has been a real eye-opener in many ways - helps keep me sharp, I guess. It is always interesting to reconnect and see if I still recognize anyone.
Well, everyone have a Happy New Year.
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