texxgadget | Early June

My calendar says 2nd Sat Starport Party.
Reading my LJ, it seems the party was LAST Sat, so Ive missed 2 in a row (grumble)

Ive managed to stay somewhat busy. Im 9 months into my 3 month gig. I am NOT COMPLAINING about that!
My current client is the 4th fastest startup in the valley. They have hit that exponential growth curve
that both drives everyone mad and is the most fun in the evolution of a company at the same time.

This morning, I accepted a business card with 1 hand and Ive spent the rest of the day trying to kick
myself in the butt over this. ALWAYS use * 2 * HANDS when accepting a card !!!
BAD TEXX !!! STUPID TEXX !!! BAD STUPID TEXX !!! (BONK BONK BONK)

The company is heavily staffed by Asians & Indians. I used to avoid chopsticks when food was served
in the breakroom because I could use them but my technique I knew was wrong. Im finally over that.
Bad technique nonwithstanding, Im still pretty adept. I realized this when I perfected eating yogurt
with chopsticks.

Last Saturday, I was on another public service event. The local scout council has a 20 miler every year
in the hills of El Cerrito & Berkeley vaguely following a hike that Pedro Fages & his men made when surveying
the Bay Area for Spain. I drove to the lunch stop and arrived in the rain. As I set off from the trail head
to reach my station on the hill above the steam train ride, the rain got worse. After slogging up the trail,
which was like walking upsteam in a muddy creek, I arrived. I discovered that one of those captains chair in a bag things with me in a large poncho worked out well. The poncho covered me and the chair and was almost
like a small tent. Except my feet, I managed to stay dry. I wore my knapsack ovefr my chest rather than back
and that allowed me access to my radio, clipboard, water bottle etc. (Water bottle in the rain ???)

Longtime gripe about LINUX:
It assigns thew lowest network interface numbers to the PCI cards rather than the ones on the motherboard.
One of my machines the motherboard interfaces are eth5 & eth6 while the removable cards got eth 0 - 4.
I finally figured out how to fix that. Let the install run, then go into /etc/udev/rules.d and edit the
persistent rules file there. Then reboot and everything is how you want it.

Ive been messing with UPS lately and discovered that I can get an APC to trigger an external alarm via the
DB-9 plug when it goes to battery, another alarm when the battery is low, and some models I can force the
UPS to shutdown or come back from a shutdown all by the pins on that plug.

My sister was a Course Marshall for the Tour de California, and Im waiting to hear how it went.
Up until now, Ive been the person working in the bike community and Im thrilled to have her join us.

The other night, I was trying to make El Cerrito by 8pm after work.
Unfortunately some rock band, (U2 ?) had a concert at the Colliseum.
This means traffic was snarled all the way into Hayward.
Then along near 98th st exit, drivers started letting passengers out as the start of the concert neared.
We had traffic like a parking lot with kids running up the freeway.
Finally, right at the Collisseum exit, all 4 lanes had cars at 45 degree angles trying to get to that exit.

At least the baseball fans know to get over early.
Yet another reason to hate rock & roll & its ilk...

I went to the Carnegie Mellon Disaster Management Institute workshop recently.
It was cool. Id like to see next years program become a bit more "meaty", though.
While sitting there catching the presentation about the California Nat Guard response to Katrina,
at that exact moment, Joplin MO got shredded. When I caught the news the next morning, it Was rather surreal.

Mom continues to amaze & educate us.
Recent visits, Ive realized a few of those noises she makes to be actual words.
The most important lesson of all ? "Living forever is NOT whats its cracked up to be".