February 7, 2003

It is a good thing that I update this site everyday or I would completely forget what the date is. One week until Valentines Day!

I added stuff to my calendar first thing this morning since I added the Calendar button yesterday. I figured that it might as well be accurate. More work on the Web Server today. But it looks like we are not going to be able to go to DC this afternoon because of the really bad weather that we are expecting to be getting. Southern Pennsylvania started getting hit with a big winter storm early this morning and tons of snow is falling on the 81 corridor. After getting stuck in Hazleton just two weeks ago, we are a little gun shy of driving down there in bad weather. Eric and I got stuck in Scranton last winter. Only that little area have I ever been snowed into while traveling. Winter is starting to wear out its welcome around here. I am looking forward to spring already. I like the cold weather during the night and it makes my computer run better but other than that, I can do without it being this cold. This seems to have been an extra cold winter. Summer is too much but Spring and Autumn are okay for me. I am going to need to do something with my computer so that it doesn’t overheat once the warm weather starts to come. I have a couple of things that I want to try that might make a big difference. I need to re-grease the heatsink with better grease. The current heatsink is on with the factory grease which is never done very well. I may try installing a newer and better CPU fan and heatsink altogether. And I want to get round cable for the inside of the case that will allow for better airflow. Right now, I have the normal flat cables and they block most of the air that would flow through the case and that is definitly not helping anything.

I added SuSE Firewall to the new webserver today. That is step one in securing it. I have done my best to make it secure by default but it takes a lot to protect yourself these days. We once installed a test system in DC and it was hacked within two days. We had only ever logged into it remotely once and that was all it took for someone to grab the root password and take over the system. It is amazing how much people will do just to be able to send out spam mail (that is what seems to always happen when your computer gets hacked.) It isn’t like there is anything of value on these machines. Mostly they are just web servers and you can download all of the info that is on them anyway.

Well, my afternoon appointment got cancelled due to illness so I have ended up having the day mostly free. Maybe I will get that server all ready (but then I won’t be able to take it to DC because of the weather 🙁 Well, at least this will prevent me from delivering it to DC prematurly. Of course we cancel the trip to DC after I already pulled out the new Sue Grafton books on CD that we were going to get to listen to on the way. I was really excited about listening to “N is for Noose” because it is the only one that I have missed so far. You would not believe how much I love listening to those books. Yesterday I finished listening to Scott Adam’s latest Dilbert business book “The Way of the Weasel.” I don’t think that it was as good as some of his older ones like “The Dilbert Principle” or “The Dilbert Future” but it was pretty good. It also isn’t fair because I read those two and only got them on tape later. So they weren’t abridged when I first read them. The only one of the Dilbert books that I have left to read is “The Joy of Work” – which I have but just haven’t gotten around to reading yet.

I took some time and finished working on the computer that Bob put together. The final part came two days ago, the graphics card and I got that installed this afternoon. It was an easy installation and now that computer is all set so it is one more thing that I can get out of my hair. Too many computers around here, I can’t take it. I need more floor space. I think that they are multiplying, I don’t recognize all of them.

Emily stopped by around noon. It was nice to be able to visit, we have had so little time in so long (which is weird because she reads SGL everyday but we never get the chance to talk.) We hung out for about an hour and then Min called from work and we picked her up and went to Friendlys for some lunch. We had a really good time and Min got to play with the baby, which always makes her happy. After lunch, Emily raided the DVD collection and took off to run more errands.

Nate went out to spend the weekend in Perry and Zach is in Tully with his family. Tonight, it was just Bob, Loopy, Min and I – so we all went to the mall for dinner and then we did a little shopping. We went to Dick’s and Min and I tried out some different recumbent stationary bikes. We found one that we really like so we just need to compare it against the similar one at Walmart that we were thinking about before we decide what one we are really interested in. We walked by Borders and we noticed Eric (Eric that teaches with Nate and Bob) was playing with a band there (it is so nice that Borders has a place for live music – as much as Ithaca has live music, it doesn’t tend to have much of that style anywhere.) So Bob stayed there and watched while we did some more shopping. We eventually came back to Borders and Dominica noticed that Borders had the movie that I tried to exchange just a couple of days ago on the shelf and that they hadn’t contacted me about it and, of course, I didn’t have my copy with me because I hadn’t been told that they had got a copy in. So, I wasn’t very happy that they didn’t contact me and that they put the copy that I technically already owned on the shelf for someone else to buy. I brought this to their attention and they explained that Borders didn’t have the common courtesy to have an inventory control system so that they would have any way of knowing if I was waiting for something to come in or if it was really in the store anyway (this has been seen a number of times there with the system saying that they have things that they don’t and that they don’t have things that they do, etc.) So, they are now holding (for only four days, mind you – it isn’t like I already paid for it or anything) the copy that they have at the register so that I can come back and pick it up. We will see what happens when I finally try to pick it up tomorrow. Maybe they will actually give it to me. But there will probably be a hassle.

After shopping at the mall we all headed home and watched the original James Bond flik Dr. No which really isn’t very good but it is a classic anyway. Sean Connery was pretty young there.

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