captbrando’s log

So Randy & I are driving to the client site this AM and we are flipping radio channels. Some radio show pops up and they have the editor of “ATM & Debit Newsletter” on there!?? Who the hell needs a newsletter for ATMs? I almost spit out my coffee.

Weather is coming in here, so hopefully we can get past it without being delayed home. Back in D/FW shortly….

We had a fun power outage at the house yesterday, and the weather recording system did not start. Weather Data is once again being populated. Graphs will look funny for a little bit of time, but they will get better.

Wow, screw spring. We’re going to fast forward right to Summer it appears. Why is that? No, not because it got to 98.7 degrees at the house, or because the Heat Index was 105. It’s cause we had to call the HVAC guys out! New house, new A/C, thing just not running right. Little bit of freon and some superclean on the outdoor units (I got schooled on how to do it now) and wheeeeeeeee, so far so good. Back down below 80 upstairs. Hopefully with some new filters we can cut that electric bill WAY down. This upstairs unit has been running nonstop.

I updated the weather page a bit, we have some highs and lows now! whee..

Time to fix broken computer systems….

Slowly starting! I’ve gotten the cable nest a bit more trimmed back. My new wireless keyboard & mouse is very tasty. Still working on the KVM issues though. I believe I might have come across a solution. I’m going to try and use a different kind of feed cable for the monitor. I’m using one with ferrite beads right now, but I’ve heard those can still cause problems. We’ll see if the super shielded Belkin one can stand up.

I’m also re-coding the weather portion of the site. I’ve hacked up the Vanprod perl script by Stan Sander to move values to a database. The database is something I’ll be needing to watch over At any rate, I’ve been collecting and things are working well so far. I may need to find a way to sample more to get better graphs, but right now there is data for every minute. Do you want to know more?

Here’s to hoping the landscape guy shows up tomorrow to give us a hand in reshaping our flower beds…

This week was interesting for sure. From the wheelchair incident to the fire department getting called out early yesterday (next door) to the grandmothers here, it’s been fun. This weekend affords me little by way of relaxation (until Sunday afternoon most likely), but that’s ok. Mother’s Day is worth celebrating and giving up some free time for.

Chris deserves her Mother’s Day gift (which you will just have to wait and see about), and much more. Wish money was not an option, she’d be treated like the queen she really is.

So she’s in bed right now, and I have to work for another hour or so. I quit drinking a while back so I should be lucid enough to convert this firewall, but we’ll just see…. Enjoy the weekend!

Ok… BEFORE you answer….

So I’m in the D/FW Airport yesterday, coming home from a quickie down in Houston, and we pull up to the A-2 terminal. Some of you are saying “What the hell is A-2?” Others are saying “OOOoo… I feel your pain.”.

It’s this tiny little satellite terminal built just for American Eagle flights, i.e., those tiny puddle jumpers that the pilots fly the same way a cocky 18 year old would drive a Vette, the one that is “out on the tarmac” and you have to take a shuttle to get there. The “jet bridges” are more like plastic wrapped scaffolding on wheels and are just wide enough for one person to squeeze through to get down to the ground level. It was definitely an experience, and I sure as hell did not feel like I was a D/FW Airport. More along the lines of say an airport you might find in Fargo.

So here’s the asshole part. Let’s just pose a situation for you and see what you think. Say for instance, that your means of rapid movement limited your options to a wheelchair in an airport. You can shuffle your feet, but moving 10 feet takes about 2 minutes (Yes, I clocked this). If this were you, would you…

a) Board the plane first with those that need additional assistance and deplane last after everyone else has left?

or

b) Board the plane first, and use the FIFO method of deplaning, thus holding up EVERYONE behind you as you move to the wheelchair?

Personally, I know if I were in that situation, I would ensure that I chose “A”, thus causing the least amount of inconvenience to any traveler in general, much less those in a hurry to reach connecting flights. Not this guy. We were foiled by him TWICE. Second time was getting off the bus to get back to the main terminal! Wow, how frustrating. I think the worst part was when he was standing in the doorway of the bus, TALKING to people before getting out of the way.

If that makes me an asshole, well, I’m probably already in that category regardless of this incident.

I did get home safe and sound, that is the important part. Played with the kiddo for a bit while Mama went to Wal-Mart (don’t wanna hear it James). Then hit the Gaylord Texan for a quick beer or two with Leslie. Back at home today, and still reeling from the server room fun from yesterday. That was a blast.

Funny, cause Dad always likes to jab me a bit when it comes to reading the paper. “Oh, you wouldn’t know because you don’t get the paper,” and “There is some really important stuff in there, you really should get the paper.” Phoooey. But after all the kicking me in the balls, there is an article that should have caught his attention that did not.

I met a neat reporter from the Dallas Morning News as he is covering a bill that is trying to be passed around Broadband over Power Lines, or BPL. Well it passed through the Texas Senate, and it is now going to the House. Anyway… I talked to Sudeep about it and this article (oh quit complaining, use bugmenot.com) was on the front page of the Business section of the Saturday Paper. You might notice a couple of quotes from someone you know…

Anyway… I’m off to get on the outside chores, so I can then work on the INSIDE chores!

So Randy, Jeff & myself are up in St. Paul this morning and we decide that since nothing is really tying us to the St. Paul office, we’ll try to catch an earlier flight home. After extricating ourselves, we head back (and hit EVERY damn light on the way) to the airport and go through all of those silly motions (rental car, check-in, stand-by, security checkpoint, etc.) and get on the stand-by list.

Oh hehe, Randy got stopped this time through. Apparently we Texan’s sometimes forget that when we get a new belt, it might respond like a Glock .45 would. Oops.

Before I continue, I should note a few things. This was a quick trip. All of my luggage was carryon. One of our consultants is from Canada and we were doing an exchange of sorts. I was bringing him some special spices, and he was going to bring me some beer. So, I’ve got a 6-pack of beer now in my roller board that I’m going to carry on the plane.

We get there and sit down for a quick bite. Then the gate agent shows up and I run up there and see how bad the stand-by list is. It’s bad. Even with gold status, it’s not looking promising. Boarding time is 1:46, but they say they will hand out passes to stand-by folks after 2:00. Flight leaves at 2:16. Ok, whatever, they will board late.

WRONG

They boarded the ENTIRE flight, and THEN assigned stand-by. What does that mean for Brando? His approved roller board gets checked! I’ll be damned if I’m checking a bag with 6 bottles of tasty beer in it. I personally like my luggage dry.

Well….. I get called and am the last stand-by to get on. Sorry Jeff & Randy. Hosed. So I get all the way down the jet bridge and unzip my suitcase, whip out the 6-pack, and zip back up.

Why does everyone INSIST on being a comedian when some dude walks on an airplane carrying a 6-pack of beer? “Generic Joke Here!” and “Haha, generic jab there.” Jeebus…. I stuck it up in the overhead compartment, took my middle seat and read home. Boy did I want to crack open one and just chug. Screw paying $5 for a beer in coach.

Anyway… I made it home, safe & sound. Got my new IOGear MiniView KVM switch. Still playing around, but so far, digging it

Yeh, I changed again. N5BX. Nice 1×2 ring to it. Think I’ll stick with this one.

Anyway, if anyone out there can recommend a good 4-port Ethernet card & a 4-port Modem card, lemme know. I’m in the market.

Wow, one of those longer weeks. Not long and tough by comparison to many in this world, but certainly an interesting one. Denver was fun, though it sleeted on me while I was there. The next morning was absolutely glorious though; Golden is so beautiful. Of all of the places I have traveled to (and no, it is nothing that amazing, but I’ve been a few places in the states), I think that is the only one I could consider living.

Hey, anyone wanna buy a Jabra Bluetooth Headset?

Anyway, off to the weekend. Filled with chores, but I’ll find time to relax

You know, working from home I get to be removed from the Office Space like fun of the cube-farm. On the rare occasion I am placed in one for a client (I personally prefer conference rooms), it always amuses me what people say. It’s worse than standing in line at Starbucks around smoke-break time.

Sitting next to me today (THE WINNER IS…..), there is some project manager who is totally bitching at someone over the phone and has been for the last 20 minutes. Even the refuge of the iPod has not totally drowned her out. Her voice kinda has that trashy-hot ditzy tone, but I’d prefer not to really run into her because I know I’d just get a kick out of messing with her, and that is probably not a classy professional consultant thing to do.

(Turning up iPod volume again)

Jeez. Oh and speaking of winning the prize, on the flight up here today there were a couple of groups of folks flying together. One group was comprised of a gaggle of women in their 30s-40s that I have no idea where they were off to. I’m watching down the isle as some of these people board and all the sudden I see a lady with these oversized novelty star sunglasses. And I won apparently, because she sat next to me! whee. Luckily, I was pretty engrossed in catching up on my reading and she did not take too much opportunity to chat.

(the bitch fest continues)

Anyway… I’m off to enjoy someone else’s cube for another few minutes before quitting time.

Need anything? Hopefully the 2 feet of snow is melted!

Yep, I was banned from ladders for 6 months, but dammit if I needed to get the anemometer cable situation all taken care of. The way we left it was pretty bad. Although the long cable idea was halfway working, I think Dad was right about cable length. There just did not seem to be the voltage on the line to get the full signal back to the unit. I solved my problem by getting a wireless addon to just the anemometer which is now hanging on the chimney facing south (solar powered).

So I threw an A-Frame up there (I will still stay away from extension ladders for a while) and got it all fixed up. No more phone cable strewn across the lawn or through gutters. It’s all happy day now.

My shoulder is still pretty sore, but other than that I’ve just got a colorful reminder of my fall from a measly four feet. I was not even doing anything cool. Bummer.

This week is not nearly as busy as last, but we hope to complete the week by getting the antennas up on the house. I’m ready for this nice radio I bought to receive more than just TheTicket. Otherwise, right now it’s just a VERY expensive AM radio. I painted the tripod black yesterday with some semi-gloss Rustoleum and it looks sweet. Going to do the antenna today. Would have done it yesterday, but I ran out of daylight. Sucks that the primer I bought is the same color as the antenna, white. I’m going to have to sand it down a bit I think.

Anyway… out for now.

Please punch me in the arm. Hard. But only my right arm right now. Why you ask?

Well… I got a weather station and was putting the anonemeter up on the house. I was on the roof, everything was fine. I go around back to staple the cable to the house and after a few ladder moves, I am up on the house one second, and on the concrete the next. I only fell 4 feet so it was not enough time for me to do anything other than think “What??”

So after running to the horsepistol, it seems that I have only sprained my wrist & shoulder on the left arm, and finger on the right. Nice lesson to learn, though I won’t get to test out my new found ladder knowledge until 6 months goes by apparently. I’ve been banned.

The anonemeter seems to work, but I need Matt to help me route cabling today. Maybe sometime soon Kevin can come help me put this antenna on the roof since I will have no means to get up there for a while.

Sitting around waiting for clients to finish is fun isn’t it?

I talked to Chris earlier and she is feeling MUCH better. She went to the park around the corner today with her sis and kiddo and that can only mean things are better. I am positive yesterday was horrid, I went through it Monday and am just now confident enough to eat some mexican food (which I did today).

High-Five to Leslie who is sticking it to the man and quitting her job! That hell-hole she was in deserves to get the shaft. It pays long term to take care of your good employees. Successful businesses know this.

Ok.. back to more waiting…

Well, I’m better from my illness, but Chris got it. I’m away from the “Hot Zone” right now on business, but hopefully by the time I get back it will be entirely disinfected and no one else will catch it. I’m wrapping things up here and hope to finish by the end of the day. Since my altered flight was so expensive, I’m going to camp out here another day instead of getting flights altered to get home early. I will try to catch an earlier flight on Friday, but no big changes.

Everyone send some love to Chris. She is hopefully feeling a little bit better by now, but having horrid sickness and feeding a baby every few hours is NO fun. I expect to find an exhausted momma at home tomorrow. Extra thanks to Teri for hanging out in the hot zone and keeping her sane. Love you lots.

Ok, out to the client…

No, this is not the kind of post I am sure some of you think it is. Oh boy, here is another wacky post about some ass-clown who can’t drive while he/she is on the phone. YES he/she, although it seems like there are more SHE problems than HE. Sexist driving comments aside, I think I might have seen the most ridiculous scene while walking from one concourse to another in the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport this morning.

You know those carts they have that can drive you from terminal to terminal (or if you are like me, from gate E10 to gate E11–neener, I’m a bastard)? Some chick was driving this thing and talking on her cell phone!! How ridiculous is that? And guess what, she definitely could not master the pat/rub like actions that are required for navigating a battery operated cart and dishing about how fat Sherry is getting. She tapped a trash can, and about ran down a surprisingly hot flight attendant that was rushing to G concourse.

As I was speed-walking for my life, I heard some other chick ask if she could “catch a ride” on the slow-crash-mobile. While I’m thinking I don’t want to be involved in any sort of accident that might cause me to be delayed because of an insurance inquiry (what am I talking about delay… I’m here at the airport now and this was about an hour ago), this chick is thinking, “Hrm… this will be just like when I drive and talk on my phone! I’m safe!” Whatever.

Looking forward to heading home to see the kiddo and I’m hoping to take tomorrow slow so I can hang with family and help Dad with the boat.

Heh, some guy just about wiped out in front of me. Silly bastard.

On that one, I’ll see you back in Dallas.

So far, its been pretty nice. Had some quality kiddo time and got the bills paid. Chris went to the store for stuff and I’ve gotta run to the bank when she gets back. Ash is going to help out here at the house tomorrow and Chris is going to a Party Lite thing at her sister’s place. We’ve got lots of folks coming by on Sunday to see the kiddo so we are looking forward to that!

Oh also, the baby has his own website! ABabyCarrot.com (NOT ababyruth.com James), go check it out

Thank you Verizon! They only missed 2 appointments (was supposed to be hooked up on Thursday), but it’s all working fine now. I’ve just got the base package (15 down/2 up), but I’ll be looking at possibly moving up in the world to the 30/10 just for fun. It comes with Static IPs etc and I might be able to use that flexibility. I’m pretty close to major exchanges too, only about 3 hops where with Comcast it was more like 9.

When I called to cancel the Comcast, they asked why I was cancelling. Instead of just letting the guy have it, I said “I’ve just not been happy with the reliability of the service lately, and Verizon just dropped fiber in my house for less than your cable.” Surprisingly enough, the guy did not ask any other questions, but just asked if someone would be home this friday so they could pick up their equipment. Heh, you betcha!

So now I’ve been milking the VPN connection between Dad & I for all it’s worth. I’ve got his 5 gig on a regular backup schedule now, and I’m transferring my stuff over there. Guess I need to pay attention to his network security too

Yes, I am a semi-pro photographer. Yes, I have taken several pictures of our new baby. Been a little busy and have not put many online anywhere for folks, mainly email. I was able to capture this precious little shot the other day and wanted to share with everyone!