Monthly Archives: April 2007

There Will Be Time

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After the Virginia Tech tragedy, there will be time for all of these things:

  1. For the anti-gun crown to use this case as cause for more stringent gun control.
  2. For the armchair administrators to cuss and discuss why campus wasn’t locked down after the attack at the dormitory.
  3. For the armchair police officers to ponder why a University police force is leading the investigation.
  4. For the “It takes a village” crowd to encourage everyone who’s flunked a test, lost a girlfriend or whatever to get “counseling”.
  5. For the “more security” crowd to encourage turning college campuses into gated, fenced camps.
  6. For every vendor of whatever kind of security product to be hawking their wares to universities and colleges.
  7. For the Congress people to ponder what type of Federal legislation would help.

Oh, wait. Everything but the last item has happened already, on Paula Zahn’s execrable program on CNN last night.

My view is that there is time to address all of the above, but that we better be aware that there will be some tremendously overreaching proposals in the days and weeks to come. For right now, let’s pray (if you’re so inclined), or at least think about the families of the victims as they go on with their lives as best as they can.

God be with them all.

-k-

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NASCAR HotPass Line up on DirecTV

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THe drivers line up thusly, for the running of the Samsung 500 from the Texas Motorplex:

  1. 795 – Tony Stewart (#20)
  2. 796 – Jimmie Johnson (#48)
  3. 797 – Juan Pablo Montoya (#42)
  4. 798 – Clint Bowyer (#07)
  5. 799 – Dale Earnhardt, Jr (#8)

Clint from Kansas, and is on my fantasy race team. Channel 799 is all-Earnhardt-all-the-time for sure.

-k-
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RIP, Don Ho

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Don Ho, the iconic singer who made Tiny Bubbles famous, has passed away at age 76. And as I write every time I remember someone who has passed on, I had no idea about his life beyond what I heard on the radio or saw on the teevee.

When he returned home and took over his parents’ struggling neighborhood bar, Honey’s, he put together a band and started performing at his father’s request.

“I had no intention of being an entertainer,” Ho said. “I just played songs I liked from the radio, and pretty soon that place was jammed. Every weekend there would be lines down the street.”

Serendipitous things sometimes happen.

Tiny bubbles in the wine,
make me happy, make me feel fine,
tiny bubbles make me warm all over
with a feeling that I’m gonna love you ’til the end of time. 1

-k-

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1 H/T: lyrics

Happy Birthday, Tatiana

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My youngest grandchild turns 6 today. She was also born on a Friday the 13th. It was also on the Good Friday of biblical renown.

I wish I had all my equipment back here in tbbs World HQ1; I’d post a picture of the little darling. Here before long, I’ll get that done, and post a picture of the whole family.

In the meantime, Happy Birthday, Tatiana Cheyenne2

-k-

1 SWMBO and I have moved very slowly in restoring after the remodeling, so part of the HQ gear is stranded upstairs yet.

2 Love that middle name, too!

Burnin’

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Nothing like a Friday night, sipping a cold one, and burning CDs of RedHat 5, and Solaris x86. These will be tried on the raven node in the test lab later in the weekend.

-k-

Update: Oh, and the pizza is on order. And wings. mmmm…. wings.
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Pismires

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One of the worst features of my shabby workplace cubicle this time of year is the black ants which are now making their annual invasion. I moved to this shabby cubicle from another equally shabby one at the tail end of Pismire Season, 2006, and was able to repel the critters with a good clunk from the heel of my hand.

This year, they’re evidently seeking shelter from the abnormally cold spring we’ve had thus far1 So, the other day, I put out a few ant traps, in corners of the desk surface, along the window ledge.2 For a few days, all was well. Today, there was a thundering herd of the varmints on my desktop. I used paper towels, and raked them off to oblivion, and used the heel of my hand to dispatch several others. When I got home tonight, I noticed a little tenderness in my left wrist. I thought my bad keyboard posture was the cause, then it hit me: The pain is in my pismire-killing hand.

Maybe it’s time for some more ant traps. Or, more likely, maybe I should learn not to leave a badly-resealed pack of Girl Scout coookies in the middle of the desk. It’s gotta be one of those things.

-k-

1 This has been the first year since 1898 that we have had five consecutive days in April where the high temperature was less than 50o. The weather rivals only Major League Baseball in keeping detailed stats on every imaginable scenario.

2 The window is great; it provides such ambience and thermal goodness. If you like cold in winter, hot in summer, that is.

Saturn of Sterling Still Doesn’t Get It

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Retrieved from the mail-o-gram spam trap:

Hi Ken Nelson,

We have been out of a contact for a while and I want to make certain I have provided all the information you required to make an informed buying decision. Our inventory has changed since we last spoke, and I realize your needs may have changed as well.

If you have any questions, please let me know. My commitment is to provide you with pricing information that is clear and direct, and to make your Internet buying process hassle free. I welcome any comments or suggestions from you regarding how I could improve my sales process.

If you have purchased a vehicle elsewhere, just drop me a note and I will update my records.

Thank you.

Matt Young
Internet Sales Manager
Saturn of Sterling
703-XXX-YYYY

In spite of links to this weblog in my initial communique, they still think I’m interested in a new car. And they had sent precisely bupkis regarding anything prior to this. And, the CRM mail robot sent this at 02:30 in the AM. Gotta love the personal touch, right?

We took the car to Reston Automotive, who referred us to a good transmission shop, whereupon we plunked down $1325.001 to cure SWMBO’s “check engine” woes.2 And SWMBO loves her green ’98 again. And Reston Automotive is now The Official Automotive Repair Place of tbbs-land.
-k-

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1 Pressed the Amex plastic, to be perfectly precise.

2 OK it’s more than SoS quoted. I trust Reston Automotive. I don’t trust SoS.

Chief Morale Officer

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I have a colleague, good friend, and beer-drinking buddy who returns to work today after a Caribbean cruise. For the last week, he’s dined lavishly, basked in the sun, and enjoyed delicious tropical beverages.1

He called me last night, to see how things are going at work. I assured him the place is the same cluster-eff it’s been since time immemorial, and that he would still recognize the place.

So, my and the workplace’s goal for today is to make him forget he’s ever had a vacation.

I mean, what are friends for, if not for encouragement?

-k-

1 A cerveza or two, at least.

The Sound of One Node Clapping

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Late the week before last, node 1 of the tbbs-land Linux Test Lab was delivered.

After some futzing around with my KVM setup, and compiling the driver for the on-board gigE ethernet1, the machine has been christened raven, because of its beautiful black case. I’ve installed Red Hat ES 4.0, update 4, and will probably repartition the 250G disk, to have a Red hat 5, and a Solaris x86 partition as well.

I’d like very much to rave about what an absolute computing mensch I am. Truth is, I stand yet again on the shoulders of giants. And this stuff just works.2

-k-

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1 An Attansic ethernet card, now popular on Azus motherboards, and soon to be included in Red Hat and Ubuntu distros, if the scuttlebutt is to be believed.

2 With a little help from The Google.

5000 in 19 days

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I marked the occasion of my 5000th spam comment with this post. And today, thanks to the efforts of the get prescription drugs at home people, a new resurgence of the porn people, and contributions by the free ringtones and online poker camps, Akismet has now protected tbbs-land from over 10000 spam comments.

Ba-whoosh! And not a false positive in the lot of them.

-k-
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