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finally back up

Monday, June 1st, 2009

I finally took a few minutes this afternoon to get Apache back up and running.

It failed to come back after the server restarted a 2 weeks ago today. Why did the server restart you might ask. Because the collocation facility where it is house mucked up something with the back-up power. The story is they while doing a weekly test of the generator the switch back to main power failed and the UPS batteries failed before they could get the mains back online or the generators running again.

While I got the most critical functions of the server back as soon as I could (and it was non trivial thanks to an issue with my RAID 1 mirrored config and a corrupted boot file) and restarted critical functions (my mail server and a 2nd mailserver that is relied on for a business). The web server and blog could wait. And wait they did all the way until today.

Now it is back and I am happy.

Oh and two other things the power outage claimed 1 server immediately and I hold it responsible for a firewall failing last week. And I have to say I am no fan of software RAID 1 mirroring on this machine. It made recovering about 10x as hard b/c I had to unmirror the root partition.

Posted in Customer Service, Random, Technical | No Comments »

New Camera

Wednesday, July 9th, 2008

As mentioned in my previous post Peppers in Bloom I got a new camera today. I had been considering getting one for a while but couldn’t justify it to myself since my current small portable camera was just fine. The tipping point came after my trip to New Mexico. Danielle forgot her camera so I gave her my Konica-Minolta so she could take her own pictures. As it turned out she liked it more than her old very basic Canon A310.

My first thought was just buy another Konica-Minolta like mine (Konica Minolta DiMAGE X50) and give her the new one. After researching it a bit it turned out that the you can no longer find that model as cheap as I did (approximately $200 refurbished). So my though was get a Canon or Nikon since I have personal experience with Canon and like them and no one I know with a Nikon has been disappointed with their purchase. I was still looking when I was in a Best Buy this past Saturday and saw the Fujifilm FinePix Z20fd. It was roughly the same size as my Minolta with a greater resolution and some additional features. After checking out thew reviews for it on Amazon I made my purchase.

The camera arrive today thanks to Amazon Prime. I took a couple low light shots and was pleased with the results. This was one area where the MInolta did not perform as well as I would have liked.

Update:There is one thing I miss, an old fashion optical view finder.

Posted in Random, Technical | No Comments »

Peppers in bloom

Wednesday, July 9th, 2008

After this afternoons rain I too my new camera out to take some pictures in my garden [i.e. the 3 strips of dirt surrounding my concrete slab]. And some os my peppers look to be doing very well.

cayanne peppers green bell peppers some other pepper

I’m looking forward to my tomatoes coming in and making some home made salsa.

Posted in Baltimore, Random | No Comments »

Car v Mass transit commute

Monday, July 7th, 2008

I live and work within one mile of a MTA light rail stop. After reading today’s Getting There column in the Sun I decided to look into what my commute would be on public transit.

The quickest route would involve me walking to the Light Rail stop at Woodberry, taking light rail to the Airport Business District stop.

Total cost $3.20 (roundtrip)

Total travel time (estimated by MTA): 1:13 each way.

Now if I took my car, I’d travel 25.2 miles round trip (which is about 1 gallon of gas) but only take 26 minutes each way. (it actually averages out to be more like 30 minutes each way b/c the commute home is longer due to more traffic in the city center as well as HORRIBLY timed lights) If we use the IRS’s new milage rates of $0.585/mile that indicates that my commute costs $14.72/day by car.

On the face of it it looks like taking transit makes economic sense. $3.20 v $14.72/day. Except that doesn’t account for the extra 1.5 hours a day I would be commuting by transit. An hour and a half of my life is far more valuable than the $11.52 I might save a day using the Light Rail.

So unless gasoline gets significantly more expensive or becomes scarce expect me to keep driving. Although I’m going to make it a point to try and work at least 1 day a week at home to save a little money and time commuting.

Posted in Opinion, Random | 6 Comments »

engaged

Thursday, June 19th, 2008

the (too big) antique (1920s) ring on Danielle’s finger:

Posted in Random | No Comments »

A fun documentary: King of Kong

Friday, May 30th, 2008

Last week I got a copy of “King of Kong” from Netflix. I got it for me, but Danielle was interested so we both watched it and very much enjoyed it. It was a fun look into a sub culture I never even considered existed: Classic Video Game records and competitions. If you have cable or satellite you don’t have to wait for a DVD from Netflix since G4 has decided to air this at 5pm this Sunday (1 June). Give it a try you might like it.

Posted in Opinion, Random | No Comments »

Colorado Springs

Wednesday, April 16th, 2008

Is a pretty nice place. We had wonderful weather yesterday and got to go check out the Garden of the Gods park which is right down the road from where I am working this week. We knew it was going to be picture worthy to the extent that a co-worker had us srive across town so he could buy a new digital camera to take pictures. Here are some of my better shots from yesterday: 

PICT1241
PICT1257
PICT1279
PICT1294
PICT1311
PICT1314
PICT1323

Posted in Random | No Comments »

When you own the home you’re the landlord,

Sunday, April 6th, 2008

so when you walk down to the basement and find water on the floor near the hot water heater you can’t just ring up the landlord and have them fix it. And of course this happens on a Saturday before you’ve invited friends over for dinner.

I’m lucky that it was not a catastrophic failure but merely a small leak. As such I was able to deal with shutting it down and draining it without much trouble. The task of dealing with getting a new one on the weekend was something I decided to forego though. I have an alternate location I can shower fo rteh next day or two and not rushing it will allow me slightly more time to figure out what I want to do. Minimally I will replace the current water heater with the most efficient one I can get. I’m also toying with getting a tankless system. That will largely depend on if my plumber can deal with that and/or overall cost.

And to add to the bad timing I can’t deal with having one installed Monday since I have a meeting I HAVE to be at in the middle of the day. I also can’t ask Danielle to take a day off and help because she has to be at work too. So I probably won’t get a new unit installed until Tuesday (provided the plumber can do it that quickly).

[update]
Oddly enough the hot water heater in Danielle’s apartment has failed in a very similar fashion this weekend (we discovered this tonight). Luckily she rents so a call to the apartment complex will probably result in a new hot water heater installed tomorrow.

Posted in Home Improvement, Random | No Comments »

Sneaking liquids past TSA just got easier….

Monday, February 18th, 2008

If you are a woman at least.

The Wine Rack will let you bring 25 fluid ounces and increase your bust size at the same time.

Posted in Random | No Comments »

Why I won’t be buying an HDTV yet

Friday, February 1st, 2008

The bottom line is it would cost me more than the purchase price of the TV to be able to truly enjoy it. Sure I could buy the TV and stick an antenna on the roof and get over the air HD content BUT then I’m again at the mercy of TV programmers for when I have to watch a program. If I want to stay with my current TV provider (DirectTV) and get HD content, I will need to get a new receiver ($99) and pay extra for the HD channels (+$10/month). I’m still at the mercy of programmer then though. So I’d need to add a DVR to the mix. I could get one from DirectTV or upgrade to a HD Tivo. Since I am a fan of TiVo that is the route I would take. That would add $300 upfront to to the cost of going HD. So the cost of HD would be $400 more than the cost of any TV I buy.

So I’m just going to wait longer. Prices should continue to fall so the longer I wait the better. Plus who knows maybe I can wait long enough so that all the DRM silliness now associated with HD sets disappears.

Posted in Opinion, Random | 1 Comment »

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