We (Jeanie, Jamie, and I) drove down on Friday and arrived a little before 9:00 PM. Robby didn't get to go because he had just started a new job and couldn't get the time off. We alternated between between talking and listening to the third Harry Potter book - Harry Potter And The Prisoner of Azkibar. The book, and regular rotations of drivers, made the gruelingly long drive bearable.

The reunion was really nice. Many of the family did not get to make it due to health reasons or last second emergencies (like flooded houses), but many people did make it.

As expected, the food was incredible - both in volume and in flavor. My new low carb lifestyle was severely interrupted for a day.

After the reunion, we went back to the house and visited. Then I spent a few hours working on Mom and Dad's PC.

After breakfast, church, and a quick lunch, we bid our farewells, and headed home.

We had decided to take interstates the entire way, and couldn't resist the urge to drop in to visit Jeanie's brother and his wife. Conveniently, it we arrived right around dinner time. ;-)

After a yummy dinner, it was back on the road.

We arrived home around midnight, but didn't actually enter the house until more like 12:30 because there was just a little more to listen to to finish the book.

Maybe I'll get around to posting the pictures more promptly than my last set...

Today is the last day in my "old" job.

Tomorrow, I start a one week vacation, and when I return I will start my new job.

Given the hell my old job has been for the last eighteen months, I should be jumping for joy.

But, I am a little melancholy.

Jeanie says part of it is just that I deal poorly with change. Part of it is that as tough as the job was, I hate leaving my people and my customers behind.

Granted, I also get to "miss" the toughest part of the migration, and I get to "miss" having to let a bunch of folks go at the end of June. But, I have never been one to shirk my responsibilities, or shy away from a difficult assignment. And I hate not finishing a task, and not being there for my folks.

But, I saw the writing on the wall, and I truly believe this new job is a position I have been preparing for for the last twenty years. And it sounds like my version of the "perfect" job. It helped a little to know that had I not been transfered now, that I would have most likely lost the opportunity. As my new manager told me, there was a small window in which I could transfer, and that window was rapidly closing.

I think I'm also a little down because today was Jamie's last day of her visit with us. I always hate having to say good bye to her.

Life would be so much simpler if all I saw was the half of the glass that was full. But, I guess if that was the case, I wouldn't be me. Hopefully, being able to see the other half of that glass allows me to bring some extra value to the universe. At least I hope so...

Yes, I know some of them appear very similar, and some of them have a fair variation in color - I was feeling artsy...

Turns out I wasn't quite finished setting up the webmail.

Reading worked just fine, but sending didn't.

Turned out I had to replace 'localhost' in the webmail configuration file with the fully qualified name of my server. A two second change, that took two hours to figure out...

First, I wanted to get Outlook Express configured on my notebook so I could check my mail remotely.

My preference was to not open more ports on the firewall. I remembered that SSH has a feature which allows you to tunnel or forward ports through the SSH connection. Unfortunately, I didn't remember exactly how to do it.

After much Googling and hacking, I finally figured it out. The key is to configure the SSH connection for local forwarding, and then to configure the application to point to localhost rather than the actual server you are connecting to. I set up a profile to forward ports 25:localhost:25 (SMTP), 142:localhost:142 (IMAP), and 993:localhost:993 (IMAPS). I configured Outlook Express to connect to the server "localhost" using IMAP with SSL. After establishing the SSH connection to the server, I fired up Outlook Express, and it actually worked!

Not content with stopping there, I decided I also wanted to set up webmail in case I want to check my mail from a browser anywhere any time.

The first package I installed was EMU. The installation was fairly straight forward, but I couldn't log in. The ultimate solution required me to recompile my IMAPD server to use a different authentication scheme for EMU.

I then installed SquirrelMail via an RPM. It was pretty straight forward too, although, as with EMU, I had to do some detective work to figure out which files had to have their permissions changed to what to allow everything to work.

Finally, I decided to try to resolve the warning I get regarding the self-generated SSL certificate. After many hours of beating my head against the wall, I finally realized that I had to recreate the server certificate in order to get the proper information to flow to the imapd certificate. After creating a new server certificate with the correct information, and then creating a new imapd certificate, I finally had things running fairly smoothly.

The last little trick was installing the new certificate into IE so that my system would recognize "me" as a trusted CA.

I think I'll take a rest from hacking for a while now...

Should have been simple, right?

Heh!

The primary issue was that WordPad was not working. Every time anyone tried to launch it, Winderz would respond that Wordpad had caused an error in mfc42.dll So, I figured a quick google would find the answer, right?

Heh!!

Some of the hits suggested I reinstall Wordpad. Seemed like a reasonable suggestion, but when I went to control panel, add/remove programs, windows setup, accessories, details - guess what? No wordpad option to uninstall!

So, looking some more, some of the hits suggested that maybe the dll was corrupt. After lots more searching, I found a Microsoft technet listing that had a link to a download of speu.exe which had a current mfc42.dll. Installing the new dll fixed the problem right?

Heh!

So, I thought, why not just download a free word processing program, and just forget about trying to fix wordpad.

I did a search, and one of the top options was Abiword - a very popular open source word processor, quiet popular in the Linux community. Even at 44k, it was a fairly quick download. The install was simple. It seemed nicely featured. One problem... every time I tried to print, the output went to the bit bucket rather than the printer!

Google yielded no results when looking for a solution to that particular challenge.

After uninstalling Abiword, it was back to trying to find a solution to the wordpad challenge...

Only after guessing that maybe the problem wasn't a corrupt dll, or wordpad.exe (yes, I updated that too - manually), but a corrupt registry setting, did I finally stumble onto the correct solution - Microsoft Knowledge Base Article - 218632. Deleting the registry keys, rebooting, then launching wordpad proved to be the trick.

Next problem...

In my attempts to fix wordpad (I guess), dial-up networking lost the password, and the ability to check the box to remember the password.

This time, Google had lots of suggestions - unfortunately, the first four that I tried were wrong!

Among the wrong suggestions were: delete the MS dial-up adapter in network properties and re-install, add the Novell client, delete and re-install the microsoft client, and delete all of the *.pwl files.

Of course, not only did it take time to perform each of these procedures, but each required at least one reboot.

The final fix was another registry hack, documented in Microsoft Knowledge Base Article - 148925.

Of course, the Microsoft support seach yielded neither of these solutions directly. Thank goodness for Google! Even if it didn't always provide the right answer, at least it offered the correct one eventually.

Actually, Google isn't to blame - it is the well intentioned folks who published incorrect information.

Well, maybe that's a little harsh... I guess it worked for them, or they wouldn't have published it - it just didn't work for me.

Even though the fixes took about five hours all told, it was an invigorating set of challenges, and I was more than happy to help my in-laws, since they are wonderful people, and the best in-laws anyone could ever hope for.

A Kershaw 1620ST Ken Onion Scallion with a partially serrated blade.

I purchased it from Outdoor Superstore. I found them via Froogle. I am very pleased with my transaction. They had a very competitive price, reasonable shipping, and the knife arrived only two business days after I placed my order.

Here's a link in case you want to see what it looks like.

It is very similar to my SOG flash. It is just about the same length, and also has an assisted opening mechanism.

The assisted opening can be accomplished either by starting the blade open via the thumb stud, or by pressing on a tab at the back of the blade with the index finger.

The handle is a little wider than the flash, and the knife weighs an ounce or two more due to having full metal liners.

The locking mechanism is also different than the flash. Rather than using the unique slide lock of the flash, the scallion uses a Walker-style liner lock.

Overall, the knife has a little more heft than the flash, and feels a little more robust.

Out of the box, it is probably one of the sharpest knives I have ever purchased, being, literally, razor sharp.

The tough choice now will be deciding whether to carry the flash or the scallion on a daily basis.

Somehow, I misplaced my compact flash reader that I purchased just a few weeks ago from Amazon.com. I spent a few hours looking all over the house for it - no luck.

So, I decided to just purchase another - heck, it was only $16 and change.

Well, I did a Froogle search and found that Buy.com was selling the very same SimpleTech FlashLink reader for only $14 and they offered free shipping!

I ordered the reader on Saturday, and it was sitting on my doorstep this afternoon.

Now that's service!

Time to donate another pint of my red, red krovvy to the American Red Cross.

As usual, my friends Bill and David joined me. As usual, we engaged in fluid replacement after our donation. As usual, I had a wonderful time.

Some of the stunts and action scenes were really good, and there were a few "laugh out loud" moments, but overall, the movie was mediocre at best. Not a total waste of time or money, but not a great use of either either.

I've always been frustrated that when I'm on the road, I can't easily access my e-mail. I can access it, but the web client Roadrunner provides isn't very good, and if I set up a pop client on my laptop, then I don't have the ability to store any messages I want to save on my home client.

The ideal solution would be to use my Linux server as an intermediary. Then I could pop the mail to it, and then use an imap client to read the mail off the the Linux server. Using imap on my own server would allow me to read and delete the messages I didn't want to keep remotely, and move the messages I did want to keep to my home client, since they are not automatically removed from the server when they are downloaded as with POP.

Well, I'm 1/2 way there...

I installed an imap server from University of Washington and got it working. It took more doing than I had anticipated, since I had to learn about xinetd and tcp wrappers along the way. I also had to wade deeper into sendmail than I would have hoped, since I ran into a really frustrating little challenge where I could send mail out from the Linux box, but could not send mail to the box. Turns out that the default sendmail.cf file has a "protection" feature that disables incoming SMTP connections.

Thank goodness for Google, and the many people who provide such helpful tidbits on the Internet.

Unlike some of the hacking I've done on MT, this time, I took great pains to carefully document everything I did in a document, so that if I have to redo the work, I won't have to figure everything out from scratch again.

Since I will be opening up another port or two to the Internet, I also took the opportunity to upgrade sendmail and kerberos, since there were known vulnerabilities in the versions I was running. I don't worry about attacks from my LAN but, the outside is another story...

So, now I just need to get fetchmail installed and running, and I should be good to go.

Wonder when I'll get around to that, and how long that will take me?

We received the power transfer system as a rebate when we purchased the generator. As I had noted earlier, it took a while to get around to calling around for estimates.

We ended up having four companies come give estimates. Wiggins was the next to the lowest bid, gave us a written quote, and was familiar with the Generac unit, all of which combined to allow them to "win" the job.

They came with three people, and did a very neat and professional job in just a couple of hours.

Their installation even included firing up the generator, hooking it up to the unit, testing the circuits, and showing us how to do it all.

Happily, everything worked just fine.

Now that we have everything all set, we figure there will never be another extended outage as long as we live in this house ;-)

Flight Attendant's Spiel

Thanks to a retired Delta Captain for sending this "paraphrase" of a memorable safety PA from their Flight Attendants. In his own words....

[I was flying to San Francisco from Seattle this weekend, and the flight attendant reading the flight safety information had the whole planelooking at each other like "what the heck?" (Getting Seattle people to look at each other is an accomplishment.) So once we got airborne, Itook out my laptop and typed up what she said so I wouldn't forget. I'veleft out a few parts I'm sure, but this is most of it.]

Before takeoff... Hello and welcome to Alaska Flight 438 to San Francisco. If you're going to San Francisco, you're in the right place. If you're not going to San Francisco, you're about to have a really long evening.We'd like to tell you now about some important safety features of this aircraft.

The most important safety feature we have aboard this plane is... The Flight Attendants. Please look at one now.

There are 5 exits aboard this plane: 2 at the front, 2 over the wings, and one out the plane's rear end. If you're seated in one of the exit rows, please do not store your bags by your feet. That would be a really bad idea. Please take a moment and look around and find the nearest exit. Count the rows of seats between you and the exit. In the event that the need arises to find one, trust me, you'll be glad you did. We have pretty blinking lights on the floor that will blink in the direction of the exits. White ones along the normal rows, and pretty red ones at the exit rows.

In the event of a loss of cabin pressure these baggy things will drop down over your head. You stick it over your nose and mouth like the flight attendant is doing now. The bag won't inflate, but there's oxygen there, promise. If you are sitting next to a small child, or someone who is acting like a small child, please do us all a favor and put on your maskfirst. If you are traveling with two or more children, please take amoment now to decide which one is your favorite. Help that one-first, and then work your way down.

In the seat pocket in front of you is a pamphlet about the safety features of this plane. I usually use it as a fan when I'm having my own personal summer. It makes a very good fan. It also has pretty pictures. Please take it out and play with it now.

Please take a moment now to make sure your seat belts are fastened low and tight about your waist. To fasten the belt, insert the metal tab into the buckle. To release, it's a pulley thing -- not a pushy thing like your car because you're in an airplane -- HELLO!!

There is no smoking in the cabin on this flight. There is also no smoking in the lavatories. If we see smoke coming from the lavatories, we will assume you are on fire and put you out. This is a free service we provide.There are two smoking sections on this flight, one outside each wing exit.We do have a movie in the smoking sections tonight ... hold on, let me check what it is .. Oh here it is; the movie tonight is Gone with the Wind.

In a moment we will be turning off the cabin lights, and it's going to get really dark, really fast. If you're afraid of the dark, now would be a good time to reach up and press the yellow button. The yellow button turns on your reading light. Please don't press the orange button unless you absolutely have to. The orange button is your seat ejection button.

We're glad to have you with us on board this flight. Thank you for choosing Alaska Air, and giving us your business and your money. If there's anything we can do to make you more comfortable, please don't hesitate to ask.

If you all weren't strapped down you would have given me a standing ovation, wouldn't you?

After landing... Welcome to the San Francisco International Airport. Sorry about the bumpy landing. It's not the captain's fault. It's not the co-pilot's fault. It's the Asphalt.

Please remain seated until the plane is parked at the gate. At no time in history has a passenger beaten a plane to the gate. So please don't even try.

Please be careful opening the overhead bins because "shift happens."

Why the interest in what a 1975 dollar is worth today?

Because, one of my aspirations has always been to make as much money as my father did. Yes, I know, it either demonstrates such deep insecurity, or my intensely competitive nature (or both). I just vividly remember one day in 1975 thinking "if I can ever earn X, then I'll know I will have succeeded."

In order to figure out if I had attained that goal, I had to be able to adjust for inflation between then and now.

And the answer?

Well, I don't know exactly what his annual salary was, but I think I'm close.

And, because of the grace of age, I realize that money is not the true measure of a man, or his "success." And with that frame of reference, I realize that I long ago surpassed the "success" of my father.

For the search that led to the previous entry, Ask Jeeves actually did a better job.

Just goes to show...

I know there is a great pearl of wisdom that this shows... I just can't seem to get it put into a concise little phrase.

Here are a couple of other sites with different formats but the same basic calculation:

AIER

WestEgg

And finally, leave it to NASA to provide an entire page of links to various calculators.

If you want to wade deeper into the theory, I found the links on this page.

The ring ranks #19 in number of sites with twenty-seven active, and #5 in traffic with 2195 hits, in the Computers & Internet > Cyberculture > Virtual Communities webring subgroup.

It is nice to feel that I've given something back, even if it is just a little something...

Ultimately, the basic math of weight loss/gain is going to prevail. That is, if you take in fewer calories than you use, you will lose weight; if you take in more calories than you use, you will gain weight.

So, you have a couple of options.

The first option is to use more calories per day. You can do this through formal exercise, and/or through increasing the amount or level of your daily activities. For example, you could choose to park farther away from your office each day, or to take the stairs rather than the elevator. You could also engage in either aerobic or anaerobic exercise. One advantage of engaging in anaerobic exercise is that you will build muscle. Pound for pound, it requires more calories to maintain muscle than to maintain fat. Another advantage of any form of exercise is that not only will the exercise directly burn calories while you are actively exercising, but the exercise will increase your metabolism for a period of time even after you stop actively exercising.

The second option is to ingest fewer calories. While being in ketosis has the effect of suppressing our appetite, we still have to retrain ourselves to eat smaller portions and/or reduce the consumption of high calorie selections. Although it is not "fun," many people find that maintaining a food diary for a few weeks helps to get a more accurate picture of how many calories they are truly consuming.

Unfortunately, the reality is that there is no "magic."

Administratium has 1 neutron, 12 assistant neutrons, 75 deputy neutrons,and 111 assistant deputy neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 312.

These 312 particles are held together by forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called peons.

Since Administratium has no electrons, it is inert. However, it can be detected as it impedes every reaction with which it comes into contact. A minute amount of Administratium causes one reaction to take over 4 days to complete when it would normally take less than a second.

Administratium has a normal half-life of 3 years; it does not decay but instead undergoes a reorganization in which a portion of the assistant neutrons and deputy neutrons exchange places. In fact, Administratium's mass will actually increase over time, since each reorganization causes some morons to become neutrons, forming isodopes.

This characteristic of moron-promotion leads some scientists to speculate that Administratium is formed whenever morons reach a certain quantity in concentration. This hypothetical quantity is referred to as "Critical Morass."

The richest outcroppings appear to be in urban areas near governmental structures and academic health care centers causing some to hypothesize that Administratium may not be an element but only a research waste by-product.

You will know it when you see it.

I truly appreciate the value of having ATMs seemingly on every corner.

I can remember the day, not too many years ago, when it was not so easy to get cash - at any price - especially if you were out of town, or it was after "banking" hours.

And even though I don't like paying ATM fees, I think it is reasonable to pay a reasonable fee for the convenience / service.

The key word here is reasonable<. I think $1.25 maybe even $1.50 is reasonable. I don't think $2.95 is reasonable!

That's what I had to pay today. Unfortunately, I didn't have much of a choice. I really needed cash, and were I not willing to acquiesce, it would have been extremely inconvenient.

Oh well, sometimes, I guess that's the price of convenience... and it could have been worse... the ATM could have been broken!