10:33 – We just moved a bunch of stuff up from the garage into the attic over the garage. Today, we’ll install more shelves in the garage and move stuff onto them. We also have a 50-pound bag of flour to transfer into empty one-gallon Costco water bottles. Two-liter soda bottles are fine for sugar, rice, corn meal, and other free-flowing materials, but their narrow mouths make them a PITA for flour and other materials that jam in the funnel. We still have a bunch of old 3-liter bottles down in Winston that are currently full of water. We’ll empty those and re-purpose them for flour. That leaves us with hundreds of 2-liter bottles that we’ll rinse with dilute chlorine bleach and fill to 1.8 liters with water, in case they freeze.
Tuesday, 8 March 2016
64 Comments and discussion on "Tuesday, 8 March 2016"
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Iran: We just might leave this nuke deal. Thanks for the billions.
Obola: Gulp. Oh, wait, Cankles will inherit this. I’ll also blame Buuuuush!!!
“With SQL Server Heading to Linux, What’s Next?”
https://www.petri.com/sql-server-heading-linux-whats-next
Interesting. Scary.
Sacrificing the desktop for the cloud.
Just another day in the craziness that is known as Houston. We had a naked 300 lb woman dancing on top of a wrecked 18 wheeler yesterday on the 290W freeway.
http://www.chron.com/news/houston-traffic/article/Naked-dancing-woman-on-top-of-big-rig-ties-up-290-6874674.php
“We just might leave this nuke deal. Thanks for the billions.”
It’s all just a gigantic racket for the wealthy and powerful to play games with our blood and our money.
“Oh, wait, Cankles will inherit this. I’ll also blame Buuuuush!!!”
Cankles is gonna inherit a gigantic shitstorm and no one better for the job. Naturally she’ll not only blame the two Bush regimes, which could be true anyway, but she’ll throw her old boss Obola right under that bus in a hahtbeat, too. There is bad blood between the Obamas and the Klintons. The Klintons and the Bush junta get along famously, though, both main parties being former CIA and heavily involved with drug-running. Yes, old man Bush was/is a piece of criminal shit, too. As are all the sons. Actually, the only two Presidents of fairly recent years who come off not half bad are Carter and Nixon. The rest were absolutely awful.
“Sacrificing the desktop for the cloud.”
Yup, the Borg invasion is now working in reverse. We shall see. I have an interview coming up for a server admin gig with the state down in Montpeculiar, mainly Winblows servers but also Linux. I told the guy I’m a Linux drone but he was not fazed by that and thought it would “transfer” right over; probably via Powershell dominance now for Windows server admins. I doubt I’ll get past that interview, though, once they see how friggin’ ancient I am.
I doubt I’ll get past that interview, though, once they see how friggin’ ancient I am.
I take it that you did not put the years that you graduated from high school and college in your resume ? That is usually a good place to look and see how old someone is.
I took that stuff off the resume and Linked-In a while back. For F2F interviews I may shave off the facial hair; I can grow it all back in a week anyway. The rest of my wunnerful dark auburn hair stays.
What will torpedo this, besides age, is our state tax mess; the state does background checks for ALL positions and this will rear its ugly head. If the interview goes well and there is solid encouragement, we can probably finagle something with the state tax people in the meantime.
And now the GOP elite are having secret meeting with Silicon Valley execs to figure a way to stop Trump. http://www.thewrap.com/gop-and-tech-leaders-hold-secret-meeting-to-stop-trump/
I heard on the radio today in each of the primaries that have been held about 70% of the vote has been split between Trump and Cruz yet the elite are hoping to steal it from them in a brokered convention. If they do this they are messing with fire. The middle class has about had it with what is being done to this country. I don’t know how it will play out, but I’m betting it won’t be pretty.
I predicted a good while back that the Repub hierarchy would do anything in its power to dump Trump and they’re not done trying yet, not by a long shot; the convention in July will probably tell us what’s what, finally. I’m also guessing that those voters who would have voted for Trump and then can’t, won’t have much trouble just voting for Calgary Teddy. That won’t be enough to set off any kind of revolt, which will probably take the Big Hurt kicking in good and hard for tens of millions of people, store shelves empty, ATMs and EBTs kaput, juice brownouts and blackouts, and the State making examples of troublemakers publicly.
Mrs. OFD is in pretty much normalcy bias mode and doesn’t think much bad is gonna happen; so it’s tough getting her on board with prepping stuff. She even sounds like she thinks it’s nutty. It will take a major smack upside the head for her and LOTS of peeps like her to realize that shit is starting to spray that fan faster and faster this year.
I would be happy with either Trump or Cruz sitting in the White House. But Trump will eat Cankles alive. Or Biden. Cruz, I just don’t know and all split decisions go to the DemoRats nowadays.
No matter what, the insurgency or civil war won’t happen until they start collecting guns. Any elected gun grabber will cause a Rule 308 violation.
Now if we have a grid collapse and massive equipment failure, it is every man for himself. Gonna be a long time before the grid gets back up. And reliably.
Rush thinks that it is a going to be a hot summer in Cleveland, “Trump Voters Will Descend on Cleveland If RNC Thwarts Will of the People”:
http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2016/03/08/trump_voters_will_descend_on_cleveland_if_rnc_thwarts_will_of_the_people
I’d be happy if YOU were sitting in the WH instead of ANY of the supposed candidates.
There will be insurgent activities when the Hurt starts to gain traction; it’ll cause mass civil unrest and riots, followed by more State repression, followed by more riots, etc., etc. It’s hard to say what role firearms will play; we’ll be in completely new historical territory with a country this huge (third largest in pop and no slouch at the geography, either) and with so many guns out here, hundreds of millions of them. I don’t see how they can even get away with the frog-in-boiling-wotta scams; peeps are getting sick and tired of being lied to and screwed over.
Large or total Grid collapse for more than a week or two and yep, we’ll be havin’ us some fun out here. The cities will explode. Don’t be in or near one.
Temps in the fotties and fifties up here this week, with several days of the sun teasing us. Mrs. OFD lost my phone during her gig in NH about ten days ago and just told me today; got me another iPhone, though, meanwhile. And she dropped her own, shattered the faceplate and then lost that one, too. I’ve gone many years without losing a phone…hmmmm….Princess has lost phones, chargers, etc., countless times….what is it, a chick thing???
“Rush thinks that it is a going to be a hot summer in Cleveland…”
They’ll have major security in place for that caper; any noisy and pesky citizens who try to exercise their First Amendment rights will be kept FAR away from events. The Elites reserve the privilege of nominating whom they please and fuck you very much.
I’ve yet to ever apply a job where I didn’t fill out a job app. Even after I got my MCSE (for NT4) from SMU and tried to get a gig with that. I get what OFD is saying about being too old…. when the guy interviewing me is maybe 25 and I’m 37, old enough to be his father! So, they get the years of graduating HS and college anyway. But, NO!, asking your birth date is a no-no. WTF?
Anyway, on Feb 1, at 2 months shy of 12 years at HEB, 10 as Cash Controller, I gave the boss my key to the cash control office told him good bye. Perhaps not the best career move I have ever made. I left almost 6 weeks of vacay and company holidays and “personal days” on the table. And my cube-fridge along with a few other things I can live without. Yeah, should have given notice, but sometimes ya gotta just walk out. Whatever. I’m taking the summer off. I have almost 12 years of stuff to do on this 25 acres. I’ll start looking in October or November. No more retail…. ala U-tote-M (best job ever at the Truck stop in Pflugerville!) or CircleK. Or HEB. Burned that bridge… 🙂 But it looks like I can leave the 401k where it is, no problem there.
Maybe a job as a bank teller. I’m good with handling cash. And banks don’t have you working from 6am to 2pm generally, because, hey, the Cash Controller has to do a bit of paperwork, with a 2pm to 10pm shift in the middle of the FUCKING week. Which give you maybe 6 hours sleep before the 4am alarm. Assuming you even get two days off in a row. I’m not 27 anymore. 30 years later, the shift bounces are rough.
No way in hell will I vote for Cruz The Slime. Bernie doesn’t stand a chance. I don’t like Hillary a bit. That leaves the demagogue. It’s kind of like voting for George Wallace because he’s the sane one.
I see no other option to vote for. Not happy about this at all.
OK, back to “what’s for supper” routine. And hurting my head trying to install an ad blocker onto my EdgeRouter. I’m not good at all with vi. 🙂 I’ll figure it out.
It’s not their fault, at least directly. Girls wear clothes with few pockets.
@Paul, you should be able to get any unused vacation, and personal days. You probably can’t get any “comp” days. In the US, you are not obligated to give notice. You are an “at will” employee, which they will be happy to tell you as they march you to the door. (This is different in Canada, and the company can force you to keep working, at least in theory.)
Since you say HEB, I’m guessing TX, which means minimum federal standards and laws regarding labor, as TX doesn’t have any of their own.
DON’T leave anything you’ve earned on the table, and don’t delay. I lost out on 10s of thousands because I waited too long to file my overtime complaint.
If it’s complicated, talk to TX Labor Commission or an attorney. It’s YOUR money.
nick
“It’s not their fault, at least directly. Girls wear clothes with few pockets.”
And no belts. There’s gotta be other ways of securing a dang cell phone on one’s female person without constantly losing them.
“…when the guy interviewing me is maybe 25 and I’m 37, old enough to be his father!”
I can’t wait for the one I have next week; probably several twenty-somethings asking me random chit on Winblows stuff when I’m old enuff now to be their friggin’ grandpa. I’ll treat it semi-seriously, but in my head I’ll be laughing my ass off, fuck it.
“Yeah, should have given notice, but sometimes ya gotta just walk out.”
Ditto; did that with my last state job down there in Montpelier, just down the street from where I’ll be interviewing again. LOL. If I hadn’t walked out that last time, I would have killed somebody, seriously. I’ll never work for a matriarchy again, period.
“I have almost 12 years of stuff to do on this 25 acres.”
Let’s see, I’ll be 74-75 in twelve years on this barely an acre. Assuming a LOT. And possibly a great-grandpa. Jesus wept. Imagine that chit. Tempus fugit.
“I see no other option to vote for. Not happy about this at all.”
Why bother? Don’t encourage the bastards; they’re only laughing at us.
“I’m not good at all with vi.”
Practice maketh perfect; there are online tutorials for it, after a while it goes to muscle memory on the keyboard, same with bash, or Powershell or my old fave, DCL (Digital Command Language, on the VAX/VMS machines, in plain English).
@Mr. Paul; what Mr. nick said; get that damn money.
Another $3 billion down the toilet. Why the fuck are we giving money away for others to fight “Climate Ejaculation?” Why not pay off student debt that all the libturds are screeching about instead. Do something that directly benefits this fucking country. Obola must go. And rot 6 feet under, too.
After the Paris climate deal was made, President Obama said he agreed to give the U.N. $3 billion of our money so they could help other countries fight global warming because if he didn’t Florida would be under water.
If you’re on a beach in Miami today and wondering why the water is a little lower, it’s because Obama has paid the first installment to the collective of Mr. Haneys & Chicken Littles who run the U.N. Green Climate Fund:
Then let them figure something out. Women as a group claim that they’re at least as intelligent and more practical than men.* It’s time for them to demonstrate it.
* Not all women go on the offensive about it, but it seems to me that all implicitly believe it. All American and Americanized women, anyway. Most get very offended at the observation that men in general seem to be better than women in general at most tasks involving getting a demonstrable, quantifiable result. And it’s not just my admittedly offensive personality which causes the offense; other men have reported the same.
“Why not pay off student debt that all the libturds are screeching about instead.”
That’ll take some doing; it’s a huge percentage of the national “debt.” Like a quarter of it or more, IIRC. Three billion here, three billion there….pretty soon we’re talkin’ about REAL MONEY, lol. No one cares. Except nasty old haters on this board.
And if Floriduh goes underwater…buy-bye! Who cares? Good riddance. Next up: the whole coastline of Megalopolis from Richmond, VA to Portland, Maine. Buy-bye!
“It’s time for them to demonstrate it.”
+1,000000000000 and a billion zeroes…
“And it’s not just my admittedly offensive personality which causes the offense…”
Yeah, it is, lol. It’s YOU, kemosabe. None of the rest of us have this problem, lol.
Calgary Ted fans:
http://www.popsugar.com/news/Ted-Cruz-Bad-Lip-Reading-40412795?campaign=sugar_social_button_m
@nick: (This is different in Canada, and the company can force you to keep working, at least in theory.)
In what province? Labour standards go by province, and I don’t know of any province where you cannot quit. If there is an employment contract, there may be conditions about notice but otherwise you are free to quit anytime you wish. The company must pay any outstanding vacation time accrued.
If you quit without cause you will be disqualified from collecting EI, but that is a federal program and is unrelated to provincial regulations.
Allow me to rephrase: It’s not simply a matter of my direct sentence structure and expressionless visage which causes the offense. Other men, who are much more inclined to smile while coming at the subject indirectly, report offense as well. The offensive aspect appears to be the subject matter itself, not the manner in which it is presented.
If, as you claim, other men do not encounter this problem, it is almost certainly because they either do not bring it up or they agree that women are better in all ways. At least when they are in the presence of women. Far be it for me to suggest cowardice…
I can’t wait for the one I have next week; probably several twenty-somethings asking me random chit on Winblows stuff when I’m old enuff now to be their friggin’ grandpa. I’ll treat it semi-seriously, but in my head I’ll be laughing my ass off, fuck it.
Go on the offensive! Smile sweetly as you ask your fresh-faced interlocutors how many bits there are in a byte, a question I’m positive most of my former IT cow-orkers couldn’t answer to save their lives.
What’ve you got to lose? 🙂
@rolf,
I was working in Kitchener/Waterloo and was told the reason we had [extremely surly and bad tempered employee x] still there was he didn’t give notice and was required to work until a replacement could be found. Several of my co-workers seconded this when I asked. this would have been 5-7 years ago.
It came up again in the context of firing people. The US offices could march you to the door, but the Canadian office couldn’t (which was a protection you got in exchange for possibly being compelled to stay).
In practice, no one wants an unwilling employee around a minute longer than necessary, so I can’t imagine that it was enforced very often.
nick
6 weeks of vacay
They have to pay you for your vacation days. That is the law. Sick and COMP are gone.
I can leave the 401k where it is
You can. But most financial advisors will tell you to move the money into a self managed fund and get it out of the company grasp.
In the US, you are not obligated to give notice. You are an “at will” employee
Varies by state and is not US wide.
talk to TX Labor Commission or an attorney. It’s YOUR money.
Especially on the vacation time, which is an accrued benefit.
Interesting scenario the last couple of days. My best friend of 27 years died over Christmas while diving in the Cayman Islands. Anyway, I am helping his wife clean up some of his computer stuff. It has been a nightmare.
You see, he had passwords on everything and figuring out the passwords has been a real challenge. He has four computers along with multiple web sites (financial), tax software and accounting software. Getting into these has been a lot of trial and error and educated guessing.
He also worked as a contractor for DOE working with nuclear stuff, all very hush hush. A lot of that is having to be cleaned out, some encrypted. For that I am just putting the stuff on a thumb drive and will turn it over to the prime contractor for his project. Getting into that stuff is their problem. None classified, just protected.
Anyway, I would suggest to everyone to store your passwords, user ID, Pin, etc. in a location that a spouse and/or a child is aware. Keep it up to date. If you use a password manager provide the master key to the password manager. It will make it much easier on people that have to find your stuff.
This has been a real pain and it is far from over. Still have some things that have to be cracked and access granted. A couple of sites were complete assholes and would provide nothing and required a certified, notarized letter with a copy of the certified death certificate, delivered by postal mail, before they will reset the password.
Ask them how many bytes in a word. That should confuse them.
Yep, systems will have to evolve to deal with our online lives.
There are a couple of places where I comment, that I’d like people to know I was gone, and maybe who I really was. I was thinking about it last week. No plans in place.
Wife has all the important passwords and accounts in a password keeper.
A few months ago I was at an estate sale, and looking thru a bookcase. There was a binder there, with every account and password the guy ever had. Since it was sitting on the shelf, the family clearly didn’t know it existed. I gave it to the estate sale company. Hopefully they passed it on. It only helps if people know it’s there.
nick
“It’s not their fault, at least directly. Girls wear clothes with few pockets.”
That’s what sewing machines are for.
MrAtoz wrote:
“Ask them how many bytes in a word. That should confuse them.”
10. Everybody knows that. (You were talking about CDC Cybers running in 170 state, weren’t you?)
“The offensive aspect appears to be the subject matter itself…”
There it is. Esp. if said subject matter is truth incarnate.
“Smile sweetly as you ask your fresh-faced interlocutors how many bits there are in a byte, a question I’m positive most of my former IT cow-orkers couldn’t answer to save their lives.”
Indeed. Another fun question I might have for them: “When you walked through the door here, did you know all about every square inch of the existing IT infrastructure? Because, if not, how would you expect someone else coming through that door for the first time to know it all?” And while they’re asking me random Winblows tech questions, I’ll have a few for them, too. Let’s have us some fun!
“The US offices could march you to the door…”
The corporate prolecube farm perp-walk. Had it done to me at that last crummy Winblows job, by the most senior HR harridan, BFD. They dumped the kid whom they’d hired to help me, behind my back out another door by way of the HR dollymop who liked to strut around in ultra-short shorts all the time and pretend she was drivin’ the old men crazy down on the shop floor. Mainly intended to terrorize the other prolecube farm denizens.
“Anyway, I would suggest to everyone to store your passwords, user ID, Pin, etc. in a location that a spouse and/or a child is aware. Keep it up to date. If you use a password manager provide the master key to the password manager. It will make it much easier on people that have to find your stuff.”
I keep meaning to do this, plus the directed will thing that the VA doc reminded me about again today when I met her, my new primary care MD, a short, slim Irish colleen with strawberry-blonde hair. Life is hard. Appearance-wise, a several orders of magnitude improvement over her predecessor, who was about 70, five feet tall, and at least 200 pounds.
“Ask them how many bytes in a word. That should confuse them.”
Good one. Yeah, I plan to have a few I can throw back at them. My take on these panel interrogations by other techies, instigated by their PHB mangler, is that they don’t want anyone smarter than them, but also not too much dumber than they are. And if the PHB mangler these days can bring in a Diversity candidate, guys like me don’t stand a chance.
“That’s what sewing machines are for.”
You try explaining that to them; or suggesting that they wear a belt. I’ve failed.
“10. Everybody knows that.”
Normally, anywhere from two to eight, depending on whether it’s 32- or 64-bit.
I got my last job at a county government agency at 57. I was older than all of the people that interviewed me. Got a position in the InfoSec dept, with my 23 years of prior experience in all sorts of IT stuff at a CA local government agency. Retired erly from there and moved to Utah.
Stayed at the UT position for three years; got a couple of performance bonuses (which is difficult in government agencies). Only left that jobbecause of wife’s sudden onset of pulmonary hypertension, which was exacerbated by the altitude in Utah. She had to be on oxygen 24/7. Doc said she had to move to a lower elevation or die sooner. So we are now just above sea level. No more need for oxygen.
So, old guys can get jobs in IT. In my experience.
“So, old guys can get jobs in IT. In my experience.”
We shall see. I’m giving it until Xmas. If nothing concrete by then, buh-bye. Seems a shame to waste years of experience across multiple hw and sw platforms but there it is. Eventually one has to cut one’s losses and give up a bad road and head for the treeline.
“Normally, anywhere from two to eight, depending on whether it’s 32- or 64-bit.”
Yeah, on Vaxen and IBM crap. 6 bit bytes and 60 bit words gives the correct answer.
The last car manufacturer in Australia closes next year. The state government is trying to get the feds to “do something”. Those guys are like the ones in Detroit: essentially unemployable.
(You were talking about CDC Cybers running in 170 state, weren’t you?)
Four nine-bit bytes (PDP-10, 36-bit words)
Six eight-bit bytes (Burroughs Large Systems; also eight six-bit “syllables”.) 🙂
Alternatively, OFD could ask the young whipper-snappers to name the members of the BUNCH.
“Yeah, on Vaxen and IBM crap.”
Well, they paid the bills for me for a while. Let’s see if any other hardware will cough it up this year.
Dave Cutler designed the code for the PDP and VAX machines in the beginning and then went over to M$ to build NT. He’s been working on Azure, which ironically is being tied in with Linux nowadays, and last I heard, he’s on some Xbox stuff lately. The guy I talked to today in that state gummint office was not put out by my recent Linux background, so one wonders what they may have in mind there. Also told me they have 500 virtualized servers, plus Sharepoint, Citrix and all that jazz. And some Linux servers, so maybe I can just work on those. Or not. The tax situation will probably kill this, or the fact that I walked off my state job fourteen years ago with about four hours notice. Before I butchered half the people in the building. I’m a lot calmer now. I think.
Big-endian or little endian??
n
And on what date did the current epoch start??
n
“Before I butchered half the people in the building. ”
MIGHT want to leave that part out. Just sayin’.
n
@Nick, in Ontario (where I live) they certainly can march you out the door with no notice. But the employer is required to provide pay in lieu of notice. Generally this is the statutory vacation pay period which is 2 weeks in Ontario if less than five years service, 3 weeks if more.
When I was laid off from my last job, I was allowed to pick up my personal effects and was quickly escorted from the building. I returned a few days later to pick up the rest of my stuff and for my exit interview. I was also given one months pay for each year but this was part of my employment agreement. Had I just quit, all they would have had to pay me was my accrued vacation pay. Ontario labour law has no requirement for an employee to give notice. In your case, there may have been other factors and considerations involved.
Federally regulated businesses (i.e. banking, transportation) can have some federally mandated regulations but these are mostly concerned with safety or discrimination. As far as I know, there is no law, federal or provincial that requires an employee to give notice in any civilian occupation. Needless to say, the military is something else.
Spos’ed to be gettin a big storm here tonight.
The thunder and lightning has started. I disconnected all the antennas….
Not much rain or wind yet.
Still got internet although the lights blinked. Love these modern boxes that can coast thru a little blink.
Glad that neither the dog nor the children is much much bothered by loud noises and storms. [or should it be “are”, the children being plural makes me want the “are” but I feel like that’s a trap. Can’t remember.]
Off to bed…
nick
added, checked the radar map. Mr Lynn looks like he might just catch the edge of the thunder, and most looks like it will miss me. Some folks are getting hammered though.
Six eight-bit bytes (Burroughs Large Systems; also eight six-bit “syllables”.)
Or in the case of the Burroughs Medium System there were no specific words. Data was just data and could be as long as you specified in the instruction with a maximum of 100 characters or digits (two digits per character). A “word” as it were, was 4 digits, two characters, and was only used in a few instructions for data movement. You could multiply a 100 digit number by another 100 digit number and get a 200 digit result accurate to the last digit.
All you guys talking about bits, bytes, and words get my head spinning. I used to know all that stuff, even though I was not a programmer. A mind is a terrible thing when it starts to fade. Some days I can remember damn near everything I ever knew and others I can hardly find my shoes.
Which brings me to reinforce the point about have passwords available for your wife and kids. I have all my passwords (kept up to date) on 3×5 cards in a small fire-proof Sentry box, along with my Living Will and Advanced Directive. The card file is replicated digitally and on an external drive (now an SSD). I have used RoboForm since their beginning and my Wife has to admit she finds that easiest.
It’s no fun each year as I go over doing taxes with the wife and kids, I’m not as patient as I use to be (which was not much).
Ever Vigilant (I’ll leave Latin up to OFD)
And I still support Trump.
I use 1Password and MrsAtoz finds that easy for her. I print out the contents now and then to have a paper copy.
And I still support Trump.
Me too. With Cruz as VP. Trump is mean enough to take out Hillary.
I suspect that Hillary is planning on exposing about 100 of Trump’s last girlfriends. Won’t phase me in the slightest.
SQL-Server on Linux – this would seem to be evidence that MS is losing server marketshare fast. In cloud offerings, it’s all Linux all the time. Offering SQL Server in this space is basically admitting defeat. After all, why would you want SQL Server? If you’re running a Linux-based infrastructure, you’ve already moved to something else.
MS has also lost much of the private market – plenty of people use phones and tablets instead of a PC. If someone has a laptop, it may well be a Mac. MS presence in this market is shrinking fast, except possibly for gaming, which may be the motivation behind merging the XBox and PC infrastructures. Yet they are closing various gaming studios they own. Note that Steam is now offering hundreds of games for Linux. Again, the smell of defeat is in the air.
All MS has left is Windows and Office on the corporate desktop.
“Ever Vigilant (I’ll leave Latin up to OFD)”
Easy: “semper vigilant” 50% same as English. We get a chit-ton of our language from Latin, even though it’s a West Germanic lingo.
“Me too. With Cruz as VP.”
I support Mr. Lynn for President and Mr. DadCooks as VP, with Mr. SteveF as SecDef. MrAtoz and me will provide security for all of the above and transportation. (given the vehicles and equipment and staff, natch).
“All MS has left is Windows and Office on the corporate desktop.”
Which is a LOT. Corporate PHBs generally just stupidly default to Winblows desktops and laptops for everyone. And I wouldn’t count the M$ behemoth out just yet; they’re pretty nimble when it comes to trying out new chit and the marketing thereof. I’m kinda curious how they’re working Azure with Linux.
MrAtoz and me will provide security for all of the above
I guess we should lay in a large supply of body bags ala Rambo. Or just go the Soylent Green route.
Pretty nasty storm last night. 1 and a half inches of rain. I lost a 5 port switch and an 8 port switch. Dead, no lights. Plus my month old EdgeRouter Lite (er3) was zapped. I have spares switches and re-installed the old and slow (which is why I replaced it) D-Link router.
The buried Ethernet from the EDC to the house, ~200 feet, seems be damaged as well. All I get is a blink every few seconds on either switch. For the hell of it, I re-made the connection on one end, checked the terminal on the other end and tried a couple of new patch cords. No joy. Perhaps I can use the other 2 pair in the cable? It’s worth looking at, anyway.
All of the computers are ok. So, dead switches can be a good thing. Perhaps the TrippLite Ethernet surge suppressors actually worked. The stereo seems ok, the Sqeezeboxes seem ok…. hard to tell when wi-fi is down, but they act normal. The DirecTV seemed dead this morning. I wish. But no, it’s the TV. My big old 55″ Vizio. The one that cost $2000 w/tax in November ’09. HDMI 1 was zapped. Crap.
I’m about 4 miles southeast of Burnet…. Texas, y’all. 🙂
Thanks for the heads up on vacation time. I assumed that by walking out it was gone. I’ll call HEB HR about that. As to the 401k, I saw something on the Frost Bank site the other day and I think they do 401ks. I think I’m ok with it being where it is, and hey, I’ll get the match for January’s contributions if I wait? I kicked the 401 up to the max 20% back in early December.
Ok, now to see if this posts. I’m tethered to my phone and OF COURSE I’m getting 1 bar of signal when I want to actually use the damned thing. Go figure.
I support Mr. Lynn for President and Mr. DadCooks as VP, with Mr. SteveF as SecDef. MrAtoz and me will provide security for all of the above and transportation. (given the vehicles and equipment and staff, natch).
Ooohhh, can I be the Secretary of Lighting.?
And I wouldn’t count the M$ behemoth out just yet; they’re pretty nimble when it comes to trying out new chit and the marketing thereof
Indeed. The Surface Pro and the Surface Book are some really nice machines that will give Apple some good competition.
“I guess we should lay in a large supply of body bags ala Rambo.”
Screw the bags; feed ’em into choppers and use for shark chum.
@Mr. paul; sorry to hear of the electronic fallout and damage down there. We get occasional t-storms here but I try to shut off most of our stuff if I’m here and I get enough warning. NOTHING like the t-storms and funnel clouds we got when I lived and worked down in Worcester, MA during the 1980s. Deafening cracks and trees splitting in the back yard, transformers blown into blue smoke, and tornado warnings. Very violent and enough to wake the dead.
Now back to flooring and suchlike fun in the soon-to-be attic workshop and ham shack. So fah, so good.
“Ooohhh, can I be the Secretary of Lighting.?”
Goes without saying; the position has been created for you already.
The DirecTV seemed dead this morning. I wish. But no, it’s the TV. My big old 55″ Vizio. The one that cost $2000 w/tax in November ’09. HDMI 1 was zapped. Crap.
I bought a 55 inch UHD (4K) LED tv at the Sugar Land Sam’s Club a month ago for $689 plus tax.
http://www.samsclub.com/sams/lg-4k-uhd-55-tv-55uf6450/prod18470040.ip?navAction=
That was some impressive lightning last night.
BTW, my old 2008 Sony 46 inch LCD does not work with my new DirecTV genie mini. The LCD is sitting on the Genie itself and works ok there. My surmise is that the newer equipment requires something in the HDMI that facilitates copy protection as the Sony LCD works for about 30 seconds and then goes straight to snow.
Those switches probably have wall-wart power supplies. Most likely those died not the switches themselves.
I support Mr. Lynn for President and Mr. DadCooks as VP, with Mr. SteveF as SecDef. MrAtoz and me will provide security for all of the above and transportation. (given the vehicles and equipment and staff, natch).
Can I move the Presidency to Wharton, Texas?
Why not? You would be the first Texan to do that.
@Paul
My wife and I bank with Frost and like them, but I’d look around for where to roll over your 401(k) money. Check with Fidelity, Schwab, etc. for a low cost rollover. If you don’t want to manage the money, or pay them to do it, there are a few low overhead ways to do it. First, they may have mutual funds that are targeted to a retirement year. They invest in a portfolio that gets more conservative as you get closer to the target year. So if you hit retirement age in 2030, you buy a 2030 fund. Second, you can buy a mix of index funds from a place like Vanguard – low fees, just need to adjust the mix of bonds and stocks as you age.
Move the Capital to San Antonio. Much more central as we take over Mexico and then the rest of the hemisphere. (that is the plan, right?) Then like LBJ did with 290 from Austin to Johnson City, have a super highway from Wharton to SA. 🙂
Gonna have to build I-39 or something to get around Austin on the east side. Or gut east Austin to make I-35 wide enough, like 10 lanes each way. Going on the west side of Austin gets pretty rocky…
The wall warts are fine. I didn’t even think to swap the warts! Brain fart there. And… with a new from the box wart, the switches are, like Franco, still dead.
Weren’t you just recently pointing out my offensiveness? I’ll be the Secretary of Offense.
“…the switches are, like Franco, still dead.”
How can we be sure? Franco got a bad rap. Sure, he sucked, but the opponents were FAR worse.
“I’ll be the Secretary of Offense.”
Sounds like a plan; the ancient title was SecWar but Offense is good now. I nominate myself for SecDef, and my main focus will be on Murkan borders, coastlines, sea lanes and air space, relying a lot on the sub force, part of the Navy, where Mr. DadCooks will be SecNavy.
No, the Secretary of Offense isn’t a rebranding of the Secretary of War, it’s a rebranding of the Secretary of State. I’d go around to all the countries and NGOs saying they need the American military and American support and especially that sweet, sweet American money, and tell them “Fuck you. No.” If they ask again, that’s when I become offensive.
Don’t forget that I’m running for Dictator for Life.
Don’t forget that I’m running for Dictator for Life.
So is Cankles. And Princess is ready to stand in if needful.
“Don’t forget that I’m running for Dictator for Life.”
1.) You have computer experience and can probably rig the voting machines accordingly.
2.) If that fails, you’re a wizard and can simply cast whatever spell/s and you’re in. As Brit schoolboys used to say “Wizard!”
“So is Cankles. And Princess is ready to stand in if needful.”
Almost done with Roger Stone’s book on the Klinton klan; Princess Chelsea is well on her way to being a carbon copy of her warthog dam; runs the Clinton Foundation and is infamous as a psycho bitch-on-wheels; place has constant turnover thanks to her. Has also had extensive plastic surgery so she doesn’t look as much like her real dad, Web Hubbell. And Larry’s real dad was a doctor in their hometown, and his half-brother Roger is really his actual brother; the mom was the town pump, evidently.
Turns out voting machines are too expensive. Much cheaper to buy one scanning machine and use paper ballots than to buy 20 individual voting machines. Many machines are getting old and need replacing so county clerks are looking to go back to paper to reduce the costs.
“… looking to go back to paper to reduce the costs.”
Well, that’s good, then; no way they can cheat with paper……oh wait…