Didn't I say I would? So here it is.
A casual pet project for the last week or so is the hard drive I've hacked up and re-sealed with plexiglass so that you can watch the sucker work while it, uhhh...works.
Crystal is supportive of my projects in general, but at times less than understanding. When I showed her the finished product, she was clearly under whelmed, and couldn't resist asking why I had been driven to do such a stupid thing.
The simple answer is that while I may or may not end up with something cool, I do almost always pick up a new skill or two. The new skill for this project was working with plexi. I actually made two plexi windows for this hard drive mod, and there was a huge qualitative difference between the two. The first was made of an old piece of plexi that I dremelled out of a larger sheet of it. The edges were rough and not at all pretty, and the plexi was the kind that gets stress fractures inside the material from just basic handling, making in more or less opaque.
The second window was made from new plexi, cut with a plexi knife, so it had straight, pretty edges. And it's nothing approaching opaque, so that's a plus.
I also learned how nice a dust mask can be when dremelling steel. As I understand it, steel can be bad stuff to inhale. So I minimized the risk of that as much as I could. I've already learned the lesson of wearing goggles while dremelling (a few more times than I should), so I had quite the getup on my face when cutting steel.
I also had to do some basic electrical work to get the 12/5V wall wart adapter to properly power the molex connector that was to plug into the hard drive. This was easy but satisfying, as soldering always makes me feel geeky.
I'm seriously thinking of re-doing DENTSERVER. Yes, again. I just can't leave well enough alone. I want to turn my four independent basic discs into one big RAID 5 with Striping and Parity Dynamic Disk.
This will serve a few nice purposes. First, it will help performance in terms of file access, because you're pulling parts of each file from each drive instead of waiting on one drive for the entire file.
Second, it will make the situation such that a drive failure won't mean that all the files are blown away with the drive. All I have to do is pop in a drive with equal or greater capacity and tell the dynamic volume to reconstruct the lost drive from the Parity codes on the remaining drives, and off I go!
And third, let me tell you, it's a pain in the butt keeping all of those drives straight, and when I have to add a new share, figuring out where it should go based on what's already where is yet another pain in the buttocks. Having one huge 1TB+ disk to work with would just simplify the hell out of things, and tickle me pink. Then I can pull tricks like creating a single folder 600 GB in size, even though there isn't a single drive in the system that has that kind of capacity.
Toywatch: I got a new Lexar 2GB flash drive. I'm sure it'll fill up right quick. Oh, and by the way, when it comes to flash memory, I'm a Lexar man now. My last Lexar (1GB) was a fast little sucker, and this one seems to be living up to that legacy. I highly recommend Lexar for this reason. My Kingston was fast too, but it might as well have been a banana in my pocket. It was huge.
The lab is closing on me, so I've got to wrap it up.
Monday, November 07, 2005
Catching You Up!
Good heavens, I'm tired. And this is a pretty average day. I was up at 3:00 this morning, and now I'm at the University waiting for an 8:30 PM WEA meeting. I'll get home just in time to fall into bed too late to make up any part of the sleep deficit I'm already running on, so I'll just have to keep looking forward to my Friday afternoon nap. I'm not as young as I used to be. Here's to running on fumes.
One thing that will help, though, is that I was released from serving the Teachers' Quorum on Sunday, thank God. And I don't say that lightly.
I played Half-Life 2: Lost Coast for about 10 minutes the other day, and thinking that I probably had about that much to go, I re-started the movie that had been playing because the wife was staring me down. Yesterday I went back into the game and found that I had about three minutes left in the demonstration level. It was a let-down at the end on more than one level. If you've played the Coast yourself, you'll understand this joke.
The LAN party of a couple of weeks ago was a good time for all. There were some small issues, such as not everyone being able to attain basic network connectivity. Overall, though, it was a good party. The food was good, the planned movies and MCM2 matches were forgone for a straight Half-Life death match, and the pool was good practice for the tournament that Jeff and I played in the next day.
So Jeff and I played in a 9-Ball ring tournament the next day. And boy was it a long day of 9-Ball. I played in four qualifying rounds of 10 racks each before I moved on to the semifinals. Ten more racks in semifinal mode, and I was done. Five or so practice racks before things began, and 50 more racks in tournament mode makes for avid fans considering swearing off the game. I was grateful to make it to the semis, though, and I did meet some fun people.
Jeff, poor guy, just had a lot of bad racks, plain and simple. I felt bad for him, but there wasn't a thing I could do about it. I'm pretty sure he played four qualifying rounds also, and he just couldn't gain a foothold.
My final qualifying round was quite funny, and I'd have laughed about it more heartily at the time if it wasn't pretty much all at Jeff's expense. There were about four racks out of the ten in that round where Jeff took care of the 6, 7, and 8 ball and then scratched, leaving me an easy shot on the 9. I was winning without Jeff's help, but his repeated assistance had me widening the gap by such a margin that I was unstoppable, and I closed the round with 17 points...a nine point lead on my nearest competitor, and by far the single greatest margin of victory in the entire tournament. Leon showed up right in the middle of this round, so his view of the entire tournament will naturally be skewed. That's ok, though. Let him convince you that I'm really that good.
After the tournament, Jeff, Leon and I went to McGrath's for a bowl of chowder and a pissing-and-moaning session. The food was good, and I think Jeff felt better about things afterward.
I want to post about my technical activities, but I think that had better be a seperate post.
One thing that will help, though, is that I was released from serving the Teachers' Quorum on Sunday, thank God. And I don't say that lightly.
I played Half-Life 2: Lost Coast for about 10 minutes the other day, and thinking that I probably had about that much to go, I re-started the movie that had been playing because the wife was staring me down. Yesterday I went back into the game and found that I had about three minutes left in the demonstration level. It was a let-down at the end on more than one level. If you've played the Coast yourself, you'll understand this joke.
The LAN party of a couple of weeks ago was a good time for all. There were some small issues, such as not everyone being able to attain basic network connectivity. Overall, though, it was a good party. The food was good, the planned movies and MCM2 matches were forgone for a straight Half-Life death match, and the pool was good practice for the tournament that Jeff and I played in the next day.
So Jeff and I played in a 9-Ball ring tournament the next day. And boy was it a long day of 9-Ball. I played in four qualifying rounds of 10 racks each before I moved on to the semifinals. Ten more racks in semifinal mode, and I was done. Five or so practice racks before things began, and 50 more racks in tournament mode makes for avid fans considering swearing off the game. I was grateful to make it to the semis, though, and I did meet some fun people.
Jeff, poor guy, just had a lot of bad racks, plain and simple. I felt bad for him, but there wasn't a thing I could do about it. I'm pretty sure he played four qualifying rounds also, and he just couldn't gain a foothold.
My final qualifying round was quite funny, and I'd have laughed about it more heartily at the time if it wasn't pretty much all at Jeff's expense. There were about four racks out of the ten in that round where Jeff took care of the 6, 7, and 8 ball and then scratched, leaving me an easy shot on the 9. I was winning without Jeff's help, but his repeated assistance had me widening the gap by such a margin that I was unstoppable, and I closed the round with 17 points...a nine point lead on my nearest competitor, and by far the single greatest margin of victory in the entire tournament. Leon showed up right in the middle of this round, so his view of the entire tournament will naturally be skewed. That's ok, though. Let him convince you that I'm really that good.
After the tournament, Jeff, Leon and I went to McGrath's for a bowl of chowder and a pissing-and-moaning session. The food was good, and I think Jeff felt better about things afterward.
I want to post about my technical activities, but I think that had better be a seperate post.
Wednesday, October 26, 2005
Howdy Strangers! (LAN Party Directions)
So I haven't posted in a while. Sue me. Ok don't.
This post is mostly for Scott's sake, as he's coming to the LAN party from Salt Lake (or thereabouts), and he's got no clue where Leon's house is, and I'll be including directions in this post at some point. But not yet.
Do you know what I love about our blog? The name. I love the damned name. Yes, no one except about three people on earth can spell PHISCHKNEGHT from memory, and that's a really good thing, because if you type "directions phischkneght" into the address bar of Firefox and press "Enter", do you know what Google gives you? The best match in the entire world for your query, which is a post on this very blog dated 22 December 2004, giving directions to the LAN party that was coming up on New Year's. I dig that.
Now, don't go there unless you'd like a history lesson, because I'm posting an updated version (I promise) below, and you'll get bad info from the old one.
In other news, on Saturday, Leon, Jeff and I will be playing in a 9-ball tournament at the Layton Hills Mall. I'm rather excited to be playing, as it's my first billiards tournament. I intend to have a good time, and if that means getting my sorry butt whipped, then that's fine.
But I'd really like to win, too. I'm thinking of dragging along my MP3 player and making a special playlist to keep me pumped. This approach seems to work nearly as well at Leon's house as getting someone to irk me a little bit so that I can play annoyed and clean them up. And I really do. But lately I've just been mostly tired. So the music may help with that.
Oh, did I promise directions? Yeah, I'll get to that...
I guess you could call this a brain dump post. I'm going to try to catch the blog up on my life in 3,000 words or less. Ready?
In August I got a new job at a company in Salt Lake called Unisys. I'm outsourced tech support without the funny accent or odor of curry. I've been there eight weeks now, and I'm doing well, but they like me at my desk by 6:00 AM, and the drive to Salt Lake takes a while in the morning and afternoon when I get off work, so I wake up early these days, and go to bed early, and I'm still tired all the time because:
And I truly am. I just wear a Leatherman instead of a fancy dagger. But given the right dagger, I may be convinced to make a transition.
I've decided to begin studying for the Certified Ethical Hacker certification. Wahoo. Now we're talkin' malformed packets, baby! Oh, when you talk like that, it really makes my buffer overflow.
Oh, and I have a new phone. It's an Audiovox PocketPC 6700 with service from Sprint, which means that from now on when you call me on my cellular, you no longer have to cope with crappy Nextel service, which has never been a paragon of quality in my case. I love this phone, and maybe I'll write more about it later.
Ok, down to business. Following is a lightly edited version of the directions given for the previous party noted above. Most of what's new is the Google Maps directions link and my newer email address. Cheers!
Here isLeon
350 N. Seemore Drive
Directions: From I-15, take the Kaysville exit. Coming off of the exit, turn West onto 200 North. If you're coming from the South, that's a left turn. If you're coming from the North, it's a right turn.
You should pass a car dealership right by the freeway as you head West.
Further down on the right, you'll see a nice park. This means you're going the right way. There's another park right next to the first one. Yes, two city parks right next to one another. Welcome to Kaysville. Keep heading West.
This post is mostly for Scott's sake, as he's coming to the LAN party from Salt Lake (or thereabouts), and he's got no clue where Leon's house is, and I'll be including directions in this post at some point. But not yet.
Do you know what I love about our blog? The name. I love the damned name. Yes, no one except about three people on earth can spell PHISCHKNEGHT from memory, and that's a really good thing, because if you type "directions phischkneght" into the address bar of Firefox and press "Enter", do you know what Google gives you? The best match in the entire world for your query, which is a post on this very blog dated 22 December 2004, giving directions to the LAN party that was coming up on New Year's. I dig that.
Now, don't go there unless you'd like a history lesson, because I'm posting an updated version (I promise) below, and you'll get bad info from the old one.
In other news, on Saturday, Leon, Jeff and I will be playing in a 9-ball tournament at the Layton Hills Mall. I'm rather excited to be playing, as it's my first billiards tournament. I intend to have a good time, and if that means getting my sorry butt whipped, then that's fine.
But I'd really like to win, too. I'm thinking of dragging along my MP3 player and making a special playlist to keep me pumped. This approach seems to work nearly as well at Leon's house as getting someone to irk me a little bit so that I can play annoyed and clean them up. And I really do. But lately I've just been mostly tired. So the music may help with that.
Oh, did I promise directions? Yeah, I'll get to that...
I guess you could call this a brain dump post. I'm going to try to catch the blog up on my life in 3,000 words or less. Ready?
In August I got a new job at a company in Salt Lake called Unisys. I'm outsourced tech support without the funny accent or odor of curry. I've been there eight weeks now, and I'm doing well, but they like me at my desk by 6:00 AM, and the drive to Salt Lake takes a while in the morning and afternoon when I get off work, so I wake up early these days, and go to bed early, and I'm still tired all the time because:
- I still have to be Daddy to my kids.
- I still have to be SuperHubbyJake (TM) to Crystal.
- I still have to be V.P. of Communications to Weber Entrepreneurs Association.
- I still have to serve my Ziff Computers customers.
- I still have to go to activities with and teach lessons for my ward's Teachers Quorum.
- I still have to participate in regular hygenic activities, such as showering and brushing teeth, which takes a little time every day, but really adds up.
And I truly am. I just wear a Leatherman instead of a fancy dagger. But given the right dagger, I may be convinced to make a transition.
I've decided to begin studying for the Certified Ethical Hacker certification. Wahoo. Now we're talkin' malformed packets, baby! Oh, when you talk like that, it really makes my buffer overflow.
Oh, and I have a new phone. It's an Audiovox PocketPC 6700 with service from Sprint, which means that from now on when you call me on my cellular, you no longer have to cope with crappy Nextel service, which has never been a paragon of quality in my case. I love this phone, and maybe I'll write more about it later.
Ok, down to business. Following is a lightly edited version of the directions given for the previous party noted above. Most of what's new is the Google Maps directions link and my newer email address. Cheers!
Here is
350 N. Seemore Drive
Directions: From I-15, take the Kaysville exit. Coming off of the exit, turn West onto 200 North. If you're coming from the South, that's a left turn. If you're coming from the North, it's a right turn.
You should pass a car dealership right by the freeway as you head West.
Further down on the right, you'll see a nice park. This means you're going the right way. There's another park right next to the first one. Yes, two city parks right next to one another. Welcome to Kaysville. Keep heading West.
You'll see an LDS church on the left. Then you'll see a Baptist church across the street from the LDS church, also on your left. Keep heading West.
Take the next right. It's called
Here's an aerial photo of Leon's neighborhood, and here's a zoomable Google Map that assumes you know how to get on I-15.
If you have any problems, questions or other concerns about the party, you can email me at slybevel (at) gmail (dot) com, or you can call my cellular phone at nine four oh, fifteen oh six. Got that? If you don't know the area code, go away.
Tuesday, October 25, 2005
Things I forgot to talk about in my last post
This post is for things players ought to know about the LAN party I didn't mention.
One, those of you with microphones or headsets, BRING THEM! Jake and I were playing around and have discovered that voice messaging in Half-Life is fun and easy. Plus, it'll be easy to talk to teammates with it.
I also forgot to mention that in addition to the games I mentioned, we plan on having Halloween-type movies to watch, as players may get fragged out. Nightmare Before Christmas and Beetlejuice top the list, but there may be more than that.
I will probably update this post as I think of other things.
One, those of you with microphones or headsets, BRING THEM! Jake and I were playing around and have discovered that voice messaging in Half-Life is fun and easy. Plus, it'll be easy to talk to teammates with it.
I also forgot to mention that in addition to the games I mentioned, we plan on having Halloween-type movies to watch, as players may get fragged out. Nightmare Before Christmas and Beetlejuice top the list, but there may be more than that.
I will probably update this post as I think of other things.
Sunday, October 23, 2005
Yet Another Pre-LAN Party Post
Ok, the LAN party is this coming Friday so first off, w00t! Here's a refresher for everone coming.
What everyone should know about the party: it will take place this Friday, starting at 2:00 and ending PROMPTLY at 11:00 at the Walker residence. Music will be turned off at 9:00 pm, and headphones are mandatory for games such as Half-Life. There is a $15 cover, as we are having Garcias cater.
Guests are expected to bring their own computers, monitors and other peripherals (keyboard and mouse). Tables will be set up in the basement where you can jack in to the network.
We will be playing the following games: Half-Life Death Match, Counter Strike, Half-Life 2 Death Match (if there are enough players), Motocross Madness, You Don't Know Jack, Mortal Kombat and pool. Also, with the computer games, we appreciate people having the computer games already loaded on their boxes, and if you don't now, I urge you to grab a copy (the HL Platinum pack was $15.00 at Walmart last I checked). If you don't have these games come Friday, we can take care of it, the exceptions bein YDKJ (one computer can handle lots of people) and HL2 (you must have your own copy)
Finally, these are the people we are expecting. If I have forgotten anyone or if anyone here isn't coming, I need to know by Tuesday when we order food.
Krys
Jake
Leon
Gary
Andy
Mikey (Andy's buddy)
Myself
Brad (Krys' brother)
Stan
And I guess Eric isn't going to be showing up. Too bad. Here's looking forward to Friday.
What everyone should know about the party: it will take place this Friday, starting at 2:00 and ending PROMPTLY at 11:00 at the Walker residence. Music will be turned off at 9:00 pm, and headphones are mandatory for games such as Half-Life. There is a $15 cover, as we are having Garcias cater.
Guests are expected to bring their own computers, monitors and other peripherals (keyboard and mouse). Tables will be set up in the basement where you can jack in to the network.
We will be playing the following games: Half-Life Death Match, Counter Strike, Half-Life 2 Death Match (if there are enough players), Motocross Madness, You Don't Know Jack, Mortal Kombat and pool. Also, with the computer games, we appreciate people having the computer games already loaded on their boxes, and if you don't now, I urge you to grab a copy (the HL Platinum pack was $15.00 at Walmart last I checked). If you don't have these games come Friday, we can take care of it, the exceptions bein YDKJ (one computer can handle lots of people) and HL2 (you must have your own copy)
Finally, these are the people we are expecting. If I have forgotten anyone or if anyone here isn't coming, I need to know by Tuesday when we order food.
Krys
Jake
Leon
Gary
Andy
Mikey (Andy's buddy)
Myself
Brad (Krys' brother)
Stan
And I guess Eric isn't going to be showing up. Too bad. Here's looking forward to Friday.
It's not a free lunch
It doesn't look like I'll be making it to the LAN party this week, although if I need a break from all the other exciting things that will be going on, then maybe I'll come join you for a while. It's that or go to some 1840's period dance.
I do have a bit of news. We spent the weekend painting, and with carpet coming tomorrow, everything is in place for us to move next week. We'll be spending all day Friday packing and what not, and we plan to have a large truck here to move everything on Saturday, starting shortly after 8:00, until we're done. If any of you are interested in helping, let me know and I'll give you details. We plan to feed you, and if enough people are here, it will be easy enough work.
Of course, if you're busy or just not interested in heavy lifting, that's fine too.
Have a fun LAN party.
I do have a bit of news. We spent the weekend painting, and with carpet coming tomorrow, everything is in place for us to move next week. We'll be spending all day Friday packing and what not, and we plan to have a large truck here to move everything on Saturday, starting shortly after 8:00, until we're done. If any of you are interested in helping, let me know and I'll give you details. We plan to feed you, and if enough people are here, it will be easy enough work.
Of course, if you're busy or just not interested in heavy lifting, that's fine too.
Have a fun LAN party.
Thursday, September 15, 2005
Has this ever happened to you?
Has this ever happened to you?
You answer your door to find a neighbor standing out there with a wagon full of squash and not just any squash the dreaded zucchini in all of its greenness. What do you do send them away and possibly hurt their feelings? Maybe you develop a sudden allergy or do you accept just to throw it away later. Well here is a solution for you. It tastes good and tastes even better the second day.
Bacon – Zucchini Soup:
Serves 6 – 8
8 cups unprepared zucchini
6 strips of bacon cut into pieces
1 can (10 ¾ oz) chicken broth
½ tsp salt (optional)
1 tsp season salt
1 tsp basil leaves
¼ tsp pepper
¾ cup chopped onions
Croutons and or parmesan cheese for toppings (optional)
Directions:
Chop zucchini and set aside.
Fry bacon until crisp remove from pan
Sauté onions in bacon grease.
Combine zucchini with bacon, onions, and remaining ingredients in large pot and cook until zucchini is tender adding water as needed. And allow to cool. (Side note I personally cook the bacon in the large pot and leave the grease in the soup and leave out the salt. This way I only get one pot dirty.) Put cooked mixture in blender and blend until very smooth. Heat for serving and top with croutons and parmesan cheese if desired.
Tuesday, September 13, 2005
Thank you Leon. I know Andy can be a Dink and I appreciate you taking the initiative.
The new specs for the party should work out just fine. I certainly don't have a problem with it and if anyone does, let me know.
Now that it's official, I want to put a few things out there. First, I'd like to do some Half-Life Mod games. I'm thinking Opposing Force, Team Fortress, and possibly Counter Strike and HL2. I'd like to know how people feel about doing this and if there are enough people with those games to make it worth while. Second, Jake has been pointing out more and more with each LAN party that Half-Life Deathmatch is fun, but it gets old after a while, as does mototag. To help with this, he has reccomended a black jack tournament and for the last party attempted a dedicated Mortal Kombat computer. I would like any other suggestions for new and exciting games to play.
Here's looking forward to our Halloween LAN Party!
PS: Thank you again, Leon, for taking initiative.
The new specs for the party should work out just fine. I certainly don't have a problem with it and if anyone does, let me know.
Now that it's official, I want to put a few things out there. First, I'd like to do some Half-Life Mod games. I'm thinking Opposing Force, Team Fortress, and possibly Counter Strike and HL2. I'd like to know how people feel about doing this and if there are enough people with those games to make it worth while. Second, Jake has been pointing out more and more with each LAN party that Half-Life Deathmatch is fun, but it gets old after a while, as does mototag. To help with this, he has reccomended a black jack tournament and for the last party attempted a dedicated Mortal Kombat computer. I would like any other suggestions for new and exciting games to play.
Here's looking forward to our Halloween LAN Party!
PS: Thank you again, Leon, for taking initiative.
Sunday, September 11, 2005
LAN Party: Power Trippin
Due to a lack of motivation or desire from my brother, I have finally pushed the subject of the LAN party with my parents. Here are the details they want.
- October 28th is the day they prefer, this is a Friday we will start accepting people at
- At
- At
- Head phones for your computer are mandatory.
- Finally I (Leon) am in charge of the basement. Not Andrew because:
- I worked it out with my parents.
- They trust me.
If there are any changes you would like let me know ASAP and I’ll try to get it worked out. My parents enjoy the fact that you all like to come and play. I like to see they and their home are treated with respect. They are very nice despite what the above may seem to indicate. I just like to get to the point.
Thanks to all of us and let’s make this work!
Leon Walker.
Saturday, September 03, 2005
RE: RE: [Phischkneght Forum] The Next LAN Party(A Reply From Phoenix)
Alright, alright, maybe I did jump the gun, but I would like to point out a few things. For starters, nothing is for certain right now. My post was more to announce that that was what we wanted to do, though in my excitement, things sounded more concrete. We did intend to speak with the heads of the Walker household and Leon before proceding. Also, we set the date far enough in the future to hopefully avoid any scheduling conflicts, and of course, should any major ones occur, we are ready to change it.
Anyways, my appologies. I will have Andrew bring up the subject tomorrow and I will speak personally with Leon at the soonest possible time. So hopefully things will go more smoothly and we won't be "DENIDED" anymore.
Anyways, my appologies. I will have Andrew bring up the subject tomorrow and I will speak personally with Leon at the soonest possible time. So hopefully things will go more smoothly and we won't be "DENIDED" anymore.
Thursday, September 01, 2005
RE: [Phischkneght Forum] The Next LAN Party(A Reply From Phoenix)
Well I am glad you are gung ho about a LAN party but until it is cleared on the house owner side you are SCREWED! I am not trying to be mean but you need permission from both my mother AND father for this type of thing to fly. Having my father next to me and saying this is the first he has heard of it is not a good indicator. After you get permission then start a guest list. Our family meetings occur every Sunday after dinner. Andrew needs to bring up the proposition then and make sure he has it cleared. We may or may not have something else planed as a family of just my parents but just expecting them to drop every thing and rearrange life to fit you is rude. Point 2 just who do you think this house network belongs to. I personally demand that some one asks to use my things before assuming they can and inviting others to do so. So until I hear otherwise this location and equipment have been DENIDED.
p.s. I like the idea of a LAN party but only if the proper channels are followed.
p.p.s I believe in repentance and forgiveness.
Leon Walker
V.P. of the W.F. Corporation.
The Next LAN Party
I have been talking with Andy, and we have agreed that a LAN party is in order. Here's what we're thinking: October 29, from noon to midnight. Cover will probably be in the area of $15, and the party will be at the Walkers'.
As it stands, here is a preliminary guest list:
Jake
Leon
Gary
Krys
Stan
Eric
Andy
Myself (Jeff)
We are going to look into Garcia's again since that has proved popular, but if anyone has suggestions for menu changes, people I forgot to invite, or any other changes, let me know. I will be checking this blog often.
As it stands, here is a preliminary guest list:
Jake
Leon
Gary
Krys
Stan
Eric
Andy
Myself (Jeff)
We are going to look into Garcia's again since that has proved popular, but if anyone has suggestions for menu changes, people I forgot to invite, or any other changes, let me know. I will be checking this blog often.
Wednesday, August 31, 2005
A Tale of Data Recovery
Monday morning, I woke up and found my computer hung up on the POST screen. It was blathering on about a hard drive failure. Rebooting did nothing to help. Unplugging the system drive later that day got the system to POST, and so I was stuck with a bad system drive.
This drive has a capacity of 80 GB, and over two partitions, it contained all of my user data, personal documents, and VCD files, in addition to every picture I took with my digital camera since Christmas and an extensive email archive. I was devastated.
To make matters worse, I just went through this weekend and threw away every old backup disc that I didn’t have a good reason to keep ("just in case I want to restore some files from the previous installation" wasn’t a good enough reason). I tried to create a new backup of the C drive (where all this critical data was stored), but it crashed halfway through. I should have taken that as a warning.
But I was also quite busy. Tuesday, I managed to spend about 5 minutes with the machine, during which I found that the drive was having trouble, and that was all I could do. Today, I got a bit more time, but it’s been a few minutes here and a few more there. Fortunately, I’ve made some progress today.
I tried plugging the hard drive in with another cable (on the vain hope that it was a cable problem). That didn’t work until I changed the jumper on the drive. Then, it would start to boot to Windows, but then crash and reboot before it got to the welcome screen. The good news was that it was POSTing, and that the drive still had some valid data on it.
I promptly booted to Knoppix, and after figuring out where Samba was and all that, I started copying files to my other machine. I now have all of the desirable data backed up, and I’m ready to start doing some serious diagnostics on the suspect drive.
This drive has a capacity of 80 GB, and over two partitions, it contained all of my user data, personal documents, and VCD files, in addition to every picture I took with my digital camera since Christmas and an extensive email archive. I was devastated.
To make matters worse, I just went through this weekend and threw away every old backup disc that I didn’t have a good reason to keep ("just in case I want to restore some files from the previous installation" wasn’t a good enough reason). I tried to create a new backup of the C drive (where all this critical data was stored), but it crashed halfway through. I should have taken that as a warning.
But I was also quite busy. Tuesday, I managed to spend about 5 minutes with the machine, during which I found that the drive was having trouble, and that was all I could do. Today, I got a bit more time, but it’s been a few minutes here and a few more there. Fortunately, I’ve made some progress today.
I tried plugging the hard drive in with another cable (on the vain hope that it was a cable problem). That didn’t work until I changed the jumper on the drive. Then, it would start to boot to Windows, but then crash and reboot before it got to the welcome screen. The good news was that it was POSTing, and that the drive still had some valid data on it.
I promptly booted to Knoppix, and after figuring out where Samba was and all that, I started copying files to my other machine. I now have all of the desirable data backed up, and I’m ready to start doing some serious diagnostics on the suspect drive.
Sunday, August 21, 2005
O say can you C++?
Some time ago, a fellow contributor was interested in learning to program. I offered him a book of programs, and copies of most of the stuff I'd written, but I don't think he got what he wanted from it. Then, we all forgot about it, and a lot of time passed.
Lately, I've been delving into programming again, and revisiting some things that I've written before in an effort to either reuse them or improve them. As part of this, I (finally, after over 5 years) went through the Wrox Press C++ Tutorial that came with my copy of Visual C++. I've got to say that it was very helpful, although as someone who already knew a lot of the material, I can't say just how helpful it would be to a beginner. Also, there were some stylistic things that they did that I disagree with, like putting endlines at the beginning of lines instead of at the end or prefixing all pointer variables with a 'p', and some language issues that I had with them, like not using built in .h headers (this reflects a difference between C and ANSI C++, and since I was taught to use the .h headers whenever available and the .h headers are better for backward compatibility with C, I still use them).
My point is that it was a very helpful tutorial, and if any of you out there have a copy of Visual C++ 6.0 and still want to learn some programming, give it a shot. I can provide some extra help if you get stuck, and even provide some code examples if you need it. In fact, I've been meaning to write an entry here about fractals, which would include pictures of fractals and also copies of my code used to generate them. I'm glad that I haven't done that yet, because a lot of that code has been revised and cleaned up lately.
On another note, are we going to try for a Labor Day-ish LAN party, or wait until Constitution Day, Columbus Day, Halloween, Veterans Day, or some other holiday?
Lately, I've been delving into programming again, and revisiting some things that I've written before in an effort to either reuse them or improve them. As part of this, I (finally, after over 5 years) went through the Wrox Press C++ Tutorial that came with my copy of Visual C++. I've got to say that it was very helpful, although as someone who already knew a lot of the material, I can't say just how helpful it would be to a beginner. Also, there were some stylistic things that they did that I disagree with, like putting endlines at the beginning of lines instead of at the end or prefixing all pointer variables with a 'p', and some language issues that I had with them, like not using built in .h headers (this reflects a difference between C and ANSI C++, and since I was taught to use the .h headers whenever available and the .h headers are better for backward compatibility with C, I still use them).
My point is that it was a very helpful tutorial, and if any of you out there have a copy of Visual C++ 6.0 and still want to learn some programming, give it a shot. I can provide some extra help if you get stuck, and even provide some code examples if you need it. In fact, I've been meaning to write an entry here about fractals, which would include pictures of fractals and also copies of my code used to generate them. I'm glad that I haven't done that yet, because a lot of that code has been revised and cleaned up lately.
On another note, are we going to try for a Labor Day-ish LAN party, or wait until Constitution Day, Columbus Day, Halloween, Veterans Day, or some other holiday?
Friday, July 15, 2005
"In London, April's a spring month"
I think I won a major battle over spyware this week, but I can’t really claim victory because I nuked before I really had time to verify my success.
The story is that a coworker’s computer was badly infected with spyware. She is close to a technical illiterate, and so it was a bit of a puzzle in itself to try to find out what was wrong before I actually sat down at the machine and started looking around. It was also a puzzle figuring out what had caused the problem in the first place.
As far as I can tell, she got a popup one day saying that she either had a virus, or that she should install some program. She apparently hit the window and installed whatever came up. She thought she was installing her ISP’s anti-spyware package, and instead whatever she installed had a distinctly pro-spyware agenda.
There were dozens of different spyware packages running on her machine, but that didn’t turn out to be the problem. I could remove those easily enough, partly with the help of anti-spyware programs (legitimate ones downloaded from their respective authors) or by manually removing their startup keys and executables. This required booting to Safe Mode and sometimes to BartPE (thanks Jake for motivating me to make a disc last week).
When I thought it was all clean, I tried running Windows update, and suddenly the popups were back, along with a fresh load of spyware, only this time they were accompanied by the installer for MS Office (yeah, what the heck!?). All that work, and things hadn’t improved. So, I uninstalled Office and tried to refresh the IE files (MS doesn’t make this very easy). But there still were a couple of programs starting up that I couldn’t even find. The files just weren’t there, and neither were the registry keys, and yet they were there.
Eventually, I found them, and then promptly formatted the whole thing and install a (legitimate this time) copy of XP Home. So, the thing’s fixed and it’s out of my hands. I did what I could, and it was quite an adventure, even though in a way it was a tremendous waste of time. The point is that I learned a lot. And I think I’ll get a lunch out of it.
The story is that a coworker’s computer was badly infected with spyware. She is close to a technical illiterate, and so it was a bit of a puzzle in itself to try to find out what was wrong before I actually sat down at the machine and started looking around. It was also a puzzle figuring out what had caused the problem in the first place.
As far as I can tell, she got a popup one day saying that she either had a virus, or that she should install some program. She apparently hit the window and installed whatever came up. She thought she was installing her ISP’s anti-spyware package, and instead whatever she installed had a distinctly pro-spyware agenda.
There were dozens of different spyware packages running on her machine, but that didn’t turn out to be the problem. I could remove those easily enough, partly with the help of anti-spyware programs (legitimate ones downloaded from their respective authors) or by manually removing their startup keys and executables. This required booting to Safe Mode and sometimes to BartPE (thanks Jake for motivating me to make a disc last week).
When I thought it was all clean, I tried running Windows update, and suddenly the popups were back, along with a fresh load of spyware, only this time they were accompanied by the installer for MS Office (yeah, what the heck!?). All that work, and things hadn’t improved. So, I uninstalled Office and tried to refresh the IE files (MS doesn’t make this very easy). But there still were a couple of programs starting up that I couldn’t even find. The files just weren’t there, and neither were the registry keys, and yet they were there.
Eventually, I found them, and then promptly formatted the whole thing and install a (legitimate this time) copy of XP Home. So, the thing’s fixed and it’s out of my hands. I did what I could, and it was quite an adventure, even though in a way it was a tremendous waste of time. The point is that I learned a lot. And I think I’ll get a lunch out of it.
Monday, July 11, 2005
The Case of the Wardriver
Last April, in Florida (why does almost every news story these days happen in Florida?), a man was arrested for accessing a residential wireless network without the permission of the owners. He will soon be going to trial, and I am interested to find out how this case turns out.
On one hand, the guy admits to using network resources that did not belong to him. The owner of the network that he connected to had paid for the network hardware, internet connection, and other associated maintenance costs. Depending on the wording of the law, the guy may be unarguably guilty of unauthorized access to a computer network.
That said, I do not expect him to be found guilty. Aside from the unfairness of punishing one person for an act that is so ubiquitous these days, it is not altogether clear that he was an unauthorized user of the network. If an individual makes some extraordinary effort to connect to a network (splicing wires, stealing passwords, circumventing security measures), then the access would clearly be unauthorized. In this case, the network connection was being broadcast to anyone within range of it. The man charged in this case was in a public place (on the street), and (most likely) had not circumvented any security measures to access the network.
My point is that having an unsecured wireless network is an open invitation for anyone within range to connect to it. In fact, most wireless enabled computers will automatically connect to an unsecured network within range, with little or limited action from the user, making such “illegal” activity unavoidable. It is akin to having something on a web page that doesn’t require authentication to log on (most web pages are like this), except that the range from which it can be accessed is much, much smaller (100 feet, versus world wide).
I worry that this will create an undue state of paranoia among the technically illiterate. Already people are talking about how people use unsecured networks to perpetrate terrible things, like distributing child pornography or sending threatening emails. While this certainly happens, it is unlikely for any specific wireless network to be so abused. The limited physical range of a Wi-Fi network makes it difficult for malicious users to take advantage of it. But most people don’t know enough to realize this, and are likely to be driven by fear of prosecution for something they didn’t do.
I fear that, instead of leading people to be more diligent about securing their wireless connections, this will drive people to create legislation making innocuous war driving a specifically criminal offense. This will not make the naïve technophobes, or their data, any safer, but it will occasionally save them from having people leech indiscernible amounts of bandwidth from their high speed web connections that they barely use. (Seriously, what good is a connection faster than 256 Mb/s if you never download any big files?)
For the record, I have a wireless network, and have at times been responsible for another one. I am very careful about making sure that my networks are secure. As long as most people don’t secure their wireless networks, passing people looking for an easy Wi-Fi fix will not bother with my network. It’s not worth the trouble of breaking into Fort Knox when the bank next door doesn’t ever lock it’s vault or post any guards.
On one hand, the guy admits to using network resources that did not belong to him. The owner of the network that he connected to had paid for the network hardware, internet connection, and other associated maintenance costs. Depending on the wording of the law, the guy may be unarguably guilty of unauthorized access to a computer network.
That said, I do not expect him to be found guilty. Aside from the unfairness of punishing one person for an act that is so ubiquitous these days, it is not altogether clear that he was an unauthorized user of the network. If an individual makes some extraordinary effort to connect to a network (splicing wires, stealing passwords, circumventing security measures), then the access would clearly be unauthorized. In this case, the network connection was being broadcast to anyone within range of it. The man charged in this case was in a public place (on the street), and (most likely) had not circumvented any security measures to access the network.
My point is that having an unsecured wireless network is an open invitation for anyone within range to connect to it. In fact, most wireless enabled computers will automatically connect to an unsecured network within range, with little or limited action from the user, making such “illegal” activity unavoidable. It is akin to having something on a web page that doesn’t require authentication to log on (most web pages are like this), except that the range from which it can be accessed is much, much smaller (100 feet, versus world wide).
I worry that this will create an undue state of paranoia among the technically illiterate. Already people are talking about how people use unsecured networks to perpetrate terrible things, like distributing child pornography or sending threatening emails. While this certainly happens, it is unlikely for any specific wireless network to be so abused. The limited physical range of a Wi-Fi network makes it difficult for malicious users to take advantage of it. But most people don’t know enough to realize this, and are likely to be driven by fear of prosecution for something they didn’t do.
I fear that, instead of leading people to be more diligent about securing their wireless connections, this will drive people to create legislation making innocuous war driving a specifically criminal offense. This will not make the naïve technophobes, or their data, any safer, but it will occasionally save them from having people leech indiscernible amounts of bandwidth from their high speed web connections that they barely use. (Seriously, what good is a connection faster than 256 Mb/s if you never download any big files?)
For the record, I have a wireless network, and have at times been responsible for another one. I am very careful about making sure that my networks are secure. As long as most people don’t secure their wireless networks, passing people looking for an easy Wi-Fi fix will not bother with my network. It’s not worth the trouble of breaking into Fort Knox when the bank next door doesn’t ever lock it’s vault or post any guards.
Sunday, July 10, 2005
Whoa, that moved fast...
Lots to catch up on.
There was the LAN party, back on June 24-25. I think it's fair to say that everyone who attended had a good time, and went away very tired. I went away very, very tired. We did in fact stay up all night (except for Leon...he slept twice), and alternately played Half-Life, played billiards, and watched our movie, "Poolhall Junkies."
Eric gave "Poolhall Junkies" a thorough panning, even though he hadn't seen the movie before, and then admitted that it was pretty ok afterward.
We never did get to Slurpees. There were times that a couple of people wanted to go, but the rest of the group didn't, and then an hour or so later a couple of other people would want to go, with the majority still reticent. No biggie.
Overall, it was a fun party between a pretty tightly-knit bunch of friends. And the food was really good. And I'm pretty sure that no one will die of heart break if we don't do an overnighter again. At least not like that. It was pretty rough at the end.
Independence Day and my birthday came and went, and oh my, did I have a good time.
First, we went to Logan for USU's annual firework show there. Leon and Jeff and I went early to get good seats, and of course, eat at Logan's old-timey A&W beforehand. I've eaten at other A&Ws, but they never seem to be as good as that one. We also wanted to visit Willow Park, but there simply wasn't time. So we drove up to USU stadium and staked out a place in line. Leon and Jeff passed the time by beating up their Gameboys, and I listened to an audio book.
The audio book was "A Walk In The Woods", by Bill Bryson, narrated by the author, and not, as I first thought, by John Malkovich. Yes, really. They sound exactly the same, weird cadence and all. Y'all know by now that I don't link to products that don't impress me. "Walk In The Woods" was a really great listen. I highly recommend it.
And John Malkovich, if you're idly Googling yourself and you stumble on this post, please do consider looking into voice work for audio books. An unusual voice helps keep the audio book interesting, and it certainly helped an already excellent work in this case.
Logan, sadly, has Homeland Security Paranoia Shit (hereafter referred to as HSPS) going on. You can't bring in a glass bottle in a cooler, but I wore a knife on my hip right through the gate, and it could very well have been a gun and no one would have noticed. Granted, the knife is my treasured Leatherman, and not really an ideal choice if you're looking to let massive amounts of blood, but the airlines are afraid enough of my Leatherman, so you tell me.
Folks, when can we start to be clueful about this again? Searching people does not make me feel more secure, it makes me feel less secure. And your plainclothes guys walking around, trying not to look conspicuous? Yeah, right. Can you tell me what's more secure than a stadium full of law-abiding citizens packing weapons (be they knives, guns, or broken bottles)? I bet you can't.
The Logan show is sponsored annually by Fireworks West, a Utah outfit that designs for and supplies professional fireworks shows. Fireworks West likes to show off their new stuff at the Logan show, and this year we saw shells burst into giant smiley faces. I know, not that impressive, but they've debuted more exciting things in the past.
The long and short of it is that the Logan show has been declining in the last few years, and I'm not sure that I'll keep the family tradition next year and attend. For one thing, tickets are now $6 per person, for a show that's been shorter every year for the last five shows.
The entertainment is getting more, well...unbearable. They've clearly been spending as little as possible to get someone on stage who at least knows what a guitar is, and invariably, this person also tries to hold and play a guitar, which is a big mistake. They also did away with the sky divers. I liked that part as a kid, and they just don't do it anymore.
Here. Take the Clearfield show as a study in contrasts.
On the nights between the Logan and Clearfield shows, Jeff, Krys, Andrew and I lit big floral shells in my back yard. We had four tubes running at a time, and with great effect. I found a way to stake down the tubes, so we didn't have to worry about them knocking each other over this year. Last year, we had a tube fall from the force of its launch. It knocked over the tube next to it, and that tube launched its shell about 3/4 of a second later...at my house. Fortunately, the shell bounced off of the roof and broke over the road in front of the house. No harm done, but scary.
The PVR Build Log over at PhischX will have momentous news when I next post. Here's your preview if you read this first: The PVR works. It records, it rewinds, it pauses live TV, and it's all good. There's still work to do, and of course there are details to write about, but that's the gist of it.
And speaking of previews, Does anyone here read Cringely? Well you should. He was blogging long before anyone (even himself) knew what that was. These days he's the resident technology writer for PBS, and he's about to launch something that you will hear about, and probably be part of.
So go here and read about it.
There was the LAN party, back on June 24-25. I think it's fair to say that everyone who attended had a good time, and went away very tired. I went away very, very tired. We did in fact stay up all night (except for Leon...he slept twice), and alternately played Half-Life, played billiards, and watched our movie, "Poolhall Junkies."
Eric gave "Poolhall Junkies" a thorough panning, even though he hadn't seen the movie before, and then admitted that it was pretty ok afterward.
We never did get to Slurpees. There were times that a couple of people wanted to go, but the rest of the group didn't, and then an hour or so later a couple of other people would want to go, with the majority still reticent. No biggie.
Overall, it was a fun party between a pretty tightly-knit bunch of friends. And the food was really good. And I'm pretty sure that no one will die of heart break if we don't do an overnighter again. At least not like that. It was pretty rough at the end.
Independence Day and my birthday came and went, and oh my, did I have a good time.
First, we went to Logan for USU's annual firework show there. Leon and Jeff and I went early to get good seats, and of course, eat at Logan's old-timey A&W beforehand. I've eaten at other A&Ws, but they never seem to be as good as that one. We also wanted to visit Willow Park, but there simply wasn't time. So we drove up to USU stadium and staked out a place in line. Leon and Jeff passed the time by beating up their Gameboys, and I listened to an audio book.
The audio book was "A Walk In The Woods", by Bill Bryson, narrated by the author, and not, as I first thought, by John Malkovich. Yes, really. They sound exactly the same, weird cadence and all. Y'all know by now that I don't link to products that don't impress me. "Walk In The Woods" was a really great listen. I highly recommend it.
And John Malkovich, if you're idly Googling yourself and you stumble on this post, please do consider looking into voice work for audio books. An unusual voice helps keep the audio book interesting, and it certainly helped an already excellent work in this case.
Logan, sadly, has Homeland Security Paranoia Shit (hereafter referred to as HSPS) going on. You can't bring in a glass bottle in a cooler, but I wore a knife on my hip right through the gate, and it could very well have been a gun and no one would have noticed. Granted, the knife is my treasured Leatherman, and not really an ideal choice if you're looking to let massive amounts of blood, but the airlines are afraid enough of my Leatherman, so you tell me.
Folks, when can we start to be clueful about this again? Searching people does not make me feel more secure, it makes me feel less secure. And your plainclothes guys walking around, trying not to look conspicuous? Yeah, right. Can you tell me what's more secure than a stadium full of law-abiding citizens packing weapons (be they knives, guns, or broken bottles)? I bet you can't.
The Logan show is sponsored annually by Fireworks West, a Utah outfit that designs for and supplies professional fireworks shows. Fireworks West likes to show off their new stuff at the Logan show, and this year we saw shells burst into giant smiley faces. I know, not that impressive, but they've debuted more exciting things in the past.
The long and short of it is that the Logan show has been declining in the last few years, and I'm not sure that I'll keep the family tradition next year and attend. For one thing, tickets are now $6 per person, for a show that's been shorter every year for the last five shows.
The entertainment is getting more, well...unbearable. They've clearly been spending as little as possible to get someone on stage who at least knows what a guitar is, and invariably, this person also tries to hold and play a guitar, which is a big mistake. They also did away with the sky divers. I liked that part as a kid, and they just don't do it anymore.
Here. Take the Clearfield show as a study in contrasts.
- It's free. Did I mention it's free? This is a big deal. My whole family went and the only expense was dinner. Free.
- There are firemen and police everywhere, but they're there to help instead of stare at you and pretend they're not staring at you.
- They allow vendors in for a reasonable price, giving the event a well-rounded selection of food and other crap to buy (I didn't, but I like choice).
- Nobody searches anything. But if you do something stupid, the cops will be there in a heartbeat (see my post about cops for a fun story involving this show).
- There are no damned "entertainers" to fight to ignore, so I can talk to my family, or ponder the sky, or listen to my audio book in peace.
- Grass. Bare feet and grass and a warm day and my own, comfy folding chair. AHHHHHHHhh.
- Room (and grass, mind you) for my kids to run around and have fun.
- A huge fireworks show. Longer, bigger, and better in every way that matters than the Logan show. For free.
- They put fireworks down on the grass in the stadium, and that's cool, but I'd rather sit down there, where it's cool and soft, than in a hard seat up above. Either open up this area to seating, or bring back the sky divers and let them land there again.
- Get real on vendor prices. How do I know anything about this? Do you remember the first five years you had light ropes? That was my family you contracted with, and you raised the commission on us every year until we couldn't afford to do it anymore. It was fun and we didn't mind paying for the privilege, but you've got to ease up on the greed quotient.
- Find a better way to entertain us before the fireworks, if you must. I remember when the organizers of a fireworks show would broadcast the program on an FM radio station. Perfect. Give us a choice whether or not to listen.
- Finally, trust your public and trust your public servants. Get the damned surveillance van out of there. Be clear about what you expect and have your cops take care of it if a few people mess up.
On the nights between the Logan and Clearfield shows, Jeff, Krys, Andrew and I lit big floral shells in my back yard. We had four tubes running at a time, and with great effect. I found a way to stake down the tubes, so we didn't have to worry about them knocking each other over this year. Last year, we had a tube fall from the force of its launch. It knocked over the tube next to it, and that tube launched its shell about 3/4 of a second later...at my house. Fortunately, the shell bounced off of the roof and broke over the road in front of the house. No harm done, but scary.
The PVR Build Log over at PhischX will have momentous news when I next post. Here's your preview if you read this first: The PVR works. It records, it rewinds, it pauses live TV, and it's all good. There's still work to do, and of course there are details to write about, but that's the gist of it.
And speaking of previews, Does anyone here read Cringely? Well you should. He was blogging long before anyone (even himself) knew what that was. These days he's the resident technology writer for PBS, and he's about to launch something that you will hear about, and probably be part of.
So go here and read about it.
Wednesday, July 06, 2005
Send in the Pundits
Saturday, to celebrate his birthday, I watched recorded TV shows with Jake. It was fun, especially since I got to watch some recent Daily Show episodes. I’ve missed Jon Stewart’s coverage of world events, which I used to watch regularly back in my college days (it was a great way to start my night).
One guest we watched was Howard Dean, the former Governor of Vermont and Presidential Candidate, as well as the current DNC chairman. I have never liked that man. I’m not sure why anybody trusts him with anything, or why they talked about trusting the country to him (I suspect that it was a complicated ruse to draw attention away from the legitimate candidate until later in the campaign, while drawing attention to the party). (I also admire his ability to draw people to him, especially since I don’t understand what it is that draws them.) I’m not sure just where Jake stands, politically, although I know that he very much wanted Bush to lose the last election (I think it was due to Michael Moore’s feature length editorial), but he definitely has right wing leanings too.
I digress. The point is that I wanted to give some answer to every thing that came out of his mouth, and the only thing keeping me back was a desire to not offend my friend and host. I was thinking about this, and how during the last election I spent all evening, into the night, watching the punditry and commentary on CNN (a respectable, but decidedly left-leaning group), and I realized that I like this sort of thing. I like addressing the vague statements, overgeneralizations, straw men, and demagoguery that comes out. In all fairness, I don’t just tackle liberals. I’ll take on O’Reilly’s bull too. I just enjoy it, that’s all.
One guest we watched was Howard Dean, the former Governor of Vermont and Presidential Candidate, as well as the current DNC chairman. I have never liked that man. I’m not sure why anybody trusts him with anything, or why they talked about trusting the country to him (I suspect that it was a complicated ruse to draw attention away from the legitimate candidate until later in the campaign, while drawing attention to the party). (I also admire his ability to draw people to him, especially since I don’t understand what it is that draws them.) I’m not sure just where Jake stands, politically, although I know that he very much wanted Bush to lose the last election (I think it was due to Michael Moore’s feature length editorial), but he definitely has right wing leanings too.
I digress. The point is that I wanted to give some answer to every thing that came out of his mouth, and the only thing keeping me back was a desire to not offend my friend and host. I was thinking about this, and how during the last election I spent all evening, into the night, watching the punditry and commentary on CNN (a respectable, but decidedly left-leaning group), and I realized that I like this sort of thing. I like addressing the vague statements, overgeneralizations, straw men, and demagoguery that comes out. In all fairness, I don’t just tackle liberals. I’ll take on O’Reilly’s bull too. I just enjoy it, that’s all.
Wednesday, June 22, 2005
Life, don’t talk to me about life. (and party stuff)
Yeah I finally took my first real paid vacation. One whole week of course I had to save the time up for three years to get there but I finally did it. Nothing fancy just caught up on the little things I wanted to do. You could say I did nothing and it was everything I thought it could be.
On to the LAN Party.
1) The cover will be $15.00
2) There will be some basic rules to follow.
a. Have fun. We are here to relax and enjoy the company of others. I am really a nice relaxed guy don’t let the following deceive you.
b. Don’t be stupid. You are to treat every one here with respect and kindness. Trash talking is the exception but don’t take it too far.
c. Cursing is not allowed. This is my personal rule.
d. Any violations of these rules will be reviewed and enforced by me.
e. If my mother would disapprove don’t do it. If you are not sure if something is permitted ask.
3) Thanks to every one who has offered to bringing equipment, things worked better because of it.
4) Thanks to my parents for the use of the house.
5) And finally thanks to Jake for bringing this all together.
Monday, June 20, 2005
more of my input
COOL! It's a good thing we're going all-nighter because my new job is keeping me out pretty late lately. Unless I work out something amazing or take that day off, I probably won't make it to the party until at least 10:30. I hate to miss any second of a LAN party, but I wouldn't miss it for anything.
What I'd like to know, and I realize it's probably still up in the air, but how much will the cover be? Cash has been a bit short for me, what with buying Jake's old monitors off of him, and the sooner I know how much I need, the easier it'll be for me to plan for/save/obtain the necessary ammount.
Finally, Leon, for what it's worth (and it probably isn't worth much), I have a Hub which I will place at your disposal if you can't get enough switches.
What I'd like to know, and I realize it's probably still up in the air, but how much will the cover be? Cash has been a bit short for me, what with buying Jake's old monitors off of him, and the sooner I know how much I need, the easier it'll be for me to plan for/save/obtain the necessary ammount.
Finally, Leon, for what it's worth (and it probably isn't worth much), I have a Hub which I will place at your disposal if you can't get enough switches.
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