Author Archives: David

It snowed!

And boy did it snow. Probably 8″ last night.

Luckily it was pretty light weight, so the snow blower was able to deal with it. There were some parts where it was struggling though. I’m thinking that we’re going to get a more heavy duty snow blower for next year. Definitely a two stage with an electric start. Probably four stroke engine, so I don’t have to deal with the oil / gas mixture.

After clearing the driveway & sidewalks, Ginny and I went cross country skiing. We went out to Busse woods in Schaumburg. Nobody else was skiing yet, but there were a few snow mobilers (ptooey!). We were out for about 45 minutes before the wind started blowing pretty hard and made it less fun.

I did achieve my ‘Zen’ state for a little while … this is where I have a good rhythm going and I zone out of any heavy thought … just listening to the swish of my skis, the crunch of my poles, and the sound of my breathing. It’s quite relaxing.

Of course, about that time, a snow mobiler zoomed past and ruined the moment.

At least there are more four stroke snow mobiles out there than there used to be. Much quieter than the old kind.

Tonight is going to be fairly busy … my niece’s birthday is at an ice skating rink (indoors I hope … especially since Dan has asked me to take pictures) and then Ginny’s friend Katie is having her big five zero birthday.

One thing I did find out is that my contact lenses … well, my right contact lens, prescription is no longer valid. I like to be able to wear my sun glasses when I ski, so I have to wear my contact lenses. When I put the left contact lens in, I had no problem … but my right lens was all fuzzy. I’ll have to go get an eye exam soon. Maybe tomorrow.

Update 1/23: Well, turns out the prescription for my right eye was not invalid … as the new lens prescription I got was the exact same one as I had before. I suspect the lens was defective. I need to verify that stuff earlier on next time.

Control your children!

Oh man … talk about a scene …

I was at Galyans after work today to see about getting some stuff for our upcoming vacation.

Also at the store was a family … a mother and 3 children. Two of the children were fine… but a third (the youngest, I think, probably around 10) was absolutely pitching a huge fit. Screaming and yelling, running around, and generally carrying on. The mother was absolutely oblivious to it. She was calmly browsing through the racks of gear & clothes, without paying the slightest bit of attention (or, it seems, even noticing) her kid that was making a nuisance of herself.

As it happens Galyans doesn’t carry Teva’s or swimsuits when it’s off season… so I left. Had I not left when I did, I was sorely tempted to go up to that woman and yell at her to CONTROL YOUR DAMN CHILD.

I swear, that kid needed a good slap. The mother too for that mater.

Open source on the brain

I think I have open source on the brain.

This morning, as I was getting ready for work, I was listening to WBEZ … and they played a promo for Fresh Air … Terry Gross was saying “On the next Fresh Air” … but I heard “On a LINUX Fresh Air”.

Oh the tricks the mind plays on us.

Of course, every time I hear Yellow Submarine on the radio my mind translates it into “Yellow Subroutine“.

Who’s crazy now?

Online Pizza

I just ordered a pizza online for the very first time.

Both Ginny and I had pretty rough days … and I was kind wiped out from my workout, so we decided to order a pizza from Johnny D’s KoKo Café.

We’ve ordered from them before and like their pizza … but we’ve always ordered on the phone. Today I decided to try their online ordering.

It was pretty slick … although it didn’t work in Firefox, which was annoying. I’ve been very successful at being IE free for a long time.

Partnership?

I just got an email from a UK terminal emulation company … they were complementing me on my website and talking about how they were really interested in ‘partnering’ with me.

Correct me if I’m wrong … but I really don’t see how a terminal emulation company could partner with me in any way. It’s not like we’re in the same line of business.

Unfortunately, I was kind of short with the guy … I really should have at least found out what kind of partnership he was interested in. I tend to view such email contacts with quite a bit of skepticism. Heck, I almost reported the email as spam.

Back to work

Tomorrow I’m back to work again … it’s been a fairly nice week off, although I didn’t get everything done that I had wanted to.

  1. Run system shutdown test on server. This took me about 4 hours to do because there really isn’t a way to simulate a system shutdown without actually shutting down the system. Luckily the software behaved exactly the way it’s supposed to.
  2. Work on slides for server training session.
  3. Empty drawers and put paperwork in filing cabinet.
  4. Clean-up basement.
  5. Write program / script to scrub remaining email addresses from archives.
  6. Work on prototype web app for Implementer

Of course a few unplanned items came up …

  1. Major back spasm that seriously effected my mobility. I don’t know what caused it … they are usually caused by stress, but I’m on holiday right now. Maybe I’m getting stressed out about going back to work? Of course, right now, the only thing that’s giving me stress is my back pain.
  2. Tivo going wonky … see previous post.
  3. New hard drive & DVD-RW for my laptop arriving. This is where I learned that it’s not a good idea to leave the original laptop drive in the removable drive bay when you boot up the new drive. System gets kind of confused and screws up the new drive. Luckily it doesn’t effect the original drive, so I was able to re-image the new drive.