Zoo

I finally got around to taking the family to the zoo today. We’ve only been talking about it for a couple of years. All that is required is to get up early on a Saturday instead of waiting around to nine am or so to finish getting up. We left the house just after eight o’clock in the morning, hoping to arrive at the zoo by nine, and we timed it almost perfect.



We didn’t see everything; the national zoo in Washington DC is very large, so seeing everything in one day with three kids isn’t easy. I suppose if I lived in the mid west some where and this was our only trip to Washington DC ever, then, maybe I would have made the kids stop and look at everything, but the zoo is only 41 miles away, so, we’ll go back, someday. We saw the pandas, of course, but they weren’t in the mood to be up close, and seemed to know right when we wanted to snap a picture and disappear.



The trip is well documented in photos on Amy’s site. We took 134 pictures, many of the kids, well, the backs of their heads, with a few poses. A camera with only digital zoom just doesn’t cut it with some of the exhibits, digital zoom sort of muddies the image, and makes it easy to blur with the slightest movement. Amy’s picture of the elephant is probably the best of the group. Amy's Zoo Pics.




One advantage of being a Smithsonian Institution contractor, I get a lot of discounts, for one, I don’t have to pay for parking, that saves sixteen dollars right there. We saved over ten dollars at lunch, with the thirty percent off discount, that also saved a couple of bucks on our popsicles, and ice cream. If that wasn’t good enough, another twenty percent off at the gift shop. I’m sure glad I brought my employee ID.

Basketball Hoops

Amy was visiting yard sales in a nearby neighborhood and I noticed something odd. I was sitting in the van, and I was able to count 9 basketball hoops setup on the street. I decided to go back there and count basketball hoops to houses. There were 28 houses on that street, and 11 basketball hoops setup. That is enough for 44 kids to play some 2 on 2. I don’t know about the kids in this neighborhood, but if there were 4 of us playing some 2 on 2, and there were 40 other kids around, I think a bigger game would be in order, maybe even some 5 on 5.

It peeves me a bit, because these are the same neighborhoods with home owners associations that will flip out for putting a modest ham radio antenna on your house, and a tower, forget it! They say, antennas are unsightly, while some antennas can get out of hand in their size and profile, in general, the modest antennas most ham radio operators have setup aren’t even that easy to see. Not that I dislike basketball, but all of these basketball hoops aren’t the most attractive sights when looking around the neighborhood from your front door.

Work - Datacenter Move

Got up at 1:00am today - went to work, the new office in Herndon Va. Things went pretty well, we are just waiting for some GroupWise things to work to complete our testing.

Co-worker Scott has a little poem for us:

Here we sit all broken hearted
Exchange is up
GroupWise is barely started

Antennas

It is been quite a week for me and antennas. On Saturday, yeah, I know Saturday was last week, but it is within the last six days, I helped a local ham radio operator assemble his 53 foot hygain hytower antenna, which is part tower and part antenna. We didn’t get it set up completely, mainly because we were missing one critical bolt that attaches the base. After work today, I helped two other Frederick Amateur Radio Club members set up a new antenna at our club station. Now we have two complete HF radio setups at the station. This weekend is the Mid Atlantic QSO party, a low key ham radio contest that our club is participating in, having two stations will be great, we should be able to work on two bands at a time when things get busy. Too bad I have to work Saturday, but Sunday should be fun.

Soda at Costco

It's a catastrophe! Costco was out of mountain dew this weekend. While Costco's inventory isn't exactly consistent, mountain dew has become something I could count on. I sure hope they continue to stock the 36 pack of 12 ounce cans, it was a great value, and mountain dew from an aluminum can is the best tasting mountain dew in my opinion.

A similar thing happened with Coke, Coca-Cola Classic. Costco stocked these four-packs of two liter bottles for less than 4 dollars. It was a great deal, and soda in a two liter bottle is ideal for keeping around the house, just in case you want a small glass. Costco stopped carrying the two liter four-packs though, and started selling the 32 pack of 12 ounce cans. They are portable, yes, but not the great value found in the two liter bottle. Amy is the Coke drinker in the house, and since she is pregnant, we haven't bought Coke in a while, but once the baby is born, we will have to stock up, thank God for Costco!

My Metro Ride Home Thursday

The Metro was packed yesterday, and, as usual, I was standing. When I first got on, a middle aged woman sitting down was arguing with a standing old guy with a cane, he had to be at least seventy-five, about a seat clearly marked for disabled people and seniors. She finally got up and stood like the rest of us.

Later in the trip, the doors wouldn't shut, the operator tried several times. If you've never been on the Washington DC Metro, when the doors close, there is a chime and voice command that says the doors are closing. The operator comes on the intercom and says, "the door chimes are not for your listening enjoyment, they mean the doors are closing, please step away from the doors to avoid personal injury and inconvenience to other passengers. If the doors can not close, the train will go out of service." This happens sometimes on a really crowded train.

A few stops later, I see this rather large woman standing, someone really should have offered her a seat because what I saw next was something I wish I hadn't. With her back to one of the poles people use to hold on to, she leaned against it, the pole slowly disappeared in her backside, literally, to the point where there was part of the pole that wan not visible because the lady's butt was wrapped all the way around it! I'll probably think twice about hanging on to one of those poles at waist level from now on.

E-Mail is Down

Here I sit, waiting for someone to fix the Storage Area Network so that I can turn e-mail back on for everyone where I work. Unfortunately, I have no involvement with the SAN, so, I depend on it, and those who manage it to work right so that e-mail works right.

While I wait, I guess I could do some work. I got a few comments on my immigration post, one saying something about the economy, I thought I addressed that, in step one, fill the need with legal immigrant workers, we will need more of them, of course.

My comment on illegal immigrants

I have no sympathy for those in the country illegally, in the real world, if you do something illegal, you should be punished, instead, many say "I love America" but then they proceed to violate the laws of the country they say they love. The system is broken, we all know that. I work with a guy from India here on H1B, working to get a green card, a painful, and expensive process. Why should 11 million people here illegally get citizenship while this guy waits for his green card, that he might not even get? The system is broken, but it isn’t that hard to fix, just hard for politicians to fix. Step one, secure the border, nobody gets in illegally. Step two, setup a legal process for people, a good million of them to start with, from all over the world, not just Mexico, to legally enter the country to work for several years. Step two must occur very soon after step one. Step three, crack down the businesses and those here illegally that they hire, after step one and step two are implemented, I’d have no problem with making these illegal actions a felony. Step four, the hardest of all, determine the path to eventual citizenship that is fair to all, but doesn’t make the United States the worlds dumping ground for the undesired citizens of other countries.

Socks

Saving Private Ryan is one of three Tom Hanks movies, along with Forrest Gump and Apollo 13, where socks play a role in the plot. The G.I.s use their socks to hold the components of sticky bombs that they improvise in the field.

Frederick Marathon

I took the kids, loaded them in the van for a quick trip to McDonalds this morning to get Amy some hash browns (and me a sausage McGriddles). What would normally be about a mile and a half trip took about four miles due to road closures related to the Frederick Marathon. Ordinarily, I would be helping with radio communications for that type of event, but the organizers of the Frederick Marathon and the local ham radio clubs had some sort of falling out. I think the story goes, that the head of the marathon was out of town on the day of the race, it snowed, things were all fouled up, and the radio operators sort of took charge and got everyone safe, making the race organizers not look so good. Oh well, it happens.

Fun with Dick and Jane

Fun with Dick and Jane was good - I especially liked the special thanks to Enron, Adelphia, WorldCom, and Tyco (there may have been more). After much reminding from my lovely wife, I recall the previews, but they didn’t really convinced me to watch the movie. When Amy opened a new Netflix account, the first movie she put on her list was one that she thought we would both enjoy, and she was right. I don’t know how she does it, but she knows what movies I would like better than I do. I guess that is ok, by some miracle, Tom Hanks, she watched Saving Private Ryan with me last night.

Amy’s Web Site

Amy has been busy updating her site. Not just with blog updates, but the entire layout. She switched from moveable type to word press and completely changed the look. Although she hasn’t decided on a final layout, it will definitely be different than the one that has been there for the last few years.

http://www.modernprincess.com

There is a great picture of Aidan in a toy dump truck posted on April 25!

Amy's Bread

Amy baked fresh bred for Easter dinner.

Missing Mountain Dews

I keep a couple of spare Mountain Dews in the refrigerator at work, just in case I need more than I bring with me every day, or I forget them all together. Yes, I drink a lot of Mountain Dew. It also allows me to get a cold one first thing in the morning.

This morning, when I go to transfer the Mountain Dews I brought with me from home to the refrigerator and grab a cold one to drink, the two that I had left there on Friday were missing.

Who would do such a thing?

Verizon wireless 411

It is about time that mobile phone companies give us a feature we can use. In the past, when calling 411 from the mobile, they would connect you and that was that. The problem is that you can't always write down those numbers, so, if you are disconnected or need to call back for some reason, you'd have to call 411 again.

Verizon Wireless now has a feature that allows you to get a text message with the number they connect you to. I'm sure they charged me extra, if not only the 10 cents for the text message, but it is worth it.

300

This is my 300th blog entry! :)

Metro Seats

Ok, so, this morning I’m riding the metro sitting down in my nice comfortable seat when an old lady with a cane gets on. I get up so she can sit down, I step back a little so that I can hold on to one of the poles so I don’t fall down. The very next stop, the old lady with the cane gets off and I take a step toward my seat. Instantly, another guy who was standing almost jumps into the seat. I guess it doesn’t pay to be nice to old lady’s with canes.

Superman

We got the original Superman DVD and watched it yesterday. I didn’t expect Andrew to be interested, but he really liked the opening credits. Alex on the other hand, I tried to keep interested in the movie, but he wouldn’t sit still. I can see how the first half of the movie would be a little boring to a four year old. I think I was five when I saw it for the first time, probably in 1983, and on laser disk. Once the action picked up a bit, Alex was sitting on the sofa at attention staring at the screen. Of course, Andrew was no where to be found, IE: in another room watching cartoons.

Cracker Barrel is Good

Yesterday I took Andrew, Alex, and Aidan out for breakfast to Cracker Barrel. As restaurants go, especially franchise types, Cracker Barrel is probably the best when it comes to breakfast, much better than the International House of Pancakes. Andrew and Alex both had a pancake, and Andrew had some bacon with his. I had a big stack of French toast, also with bacon. Aidan, he didn’t get anything because he is only four months old. One thing I forgot, I bought a coke for myself, and after eating the French toast covered in that yummy maple syrup, you can’t taste the sweetness in the coke and drinking coke that isn’t sweet isn’t cool. Before we left, we put in an order for pancakes, bacon, and hash browns for Amy, she stayed home to do some cleaning up, and deserved a good breakfast.

Dimes

I got eight dimes as change the other day. I don’t know why, but I decided to check the dates on each one. Out of eight dimes, two were minted before I was born. The dates are, 2005 Philadelphia, 2003 Philadelphia, 2000 Philadelphia, 1994 Denver, 1983 Philadelphia, 1983 Philadelphia, 1972 Denver, and 1968. I examined the 2005 and 1968 dimes closely, and they are definitely different. For starters, the 1968 dime doesn’t have the P or D to tell you where it was minted. The dime from 1968 has a slightly bigger portrait of Roosevelt and the date, the word “LIBERTY”, and “IN GOD WE TRUST” are closer to the rim of the dime. The reverse looks like it could be exactly the same, although I see some differences, those could be from general wear and tear.

Final Solution

You have to be careful how you use words these days. I sent an e-mail related to some technical work I am doing on a problem, and said "The final solution to this problem would be …" . Someone pointed out to me that "The Final Solution" was the term that Adolph Hitler used when describing the elimination of the Jews. I knew that, but when I'm in geek land, the history of the world isn’t exactly filtering my e-mails. I guess these days you can never be too politically correct. Maybe they should add a political correctness or sensitivity filter to Microsoft Word to go with the spell checker.

Mattresses

Went to Costco today, the plan was to pick up two mattresses for the bunk beds that we are getting for Alex. When I was there yesterday, I walked past the area where the mattresses are, and saw that there were plenty. What I found out today, was that the mattresses I saw were all sets, not the individual mattresses that I wanted for bunk beds like the price tag above described. Yet again, I make another trip out for nothing, well, I did get laundry detergent that I forgot yesterday, but it turns out that I didn’t need it, I had enough for today.

Public Service

Something I haven’t done a whole lot of recently, well, at all in the last few years is any sort of volunteer work. That changed this morning; I had the chance to help with communications for a five K run benefiting meals on wheels. It was a smooth event, I was responsible for monitoring two points on the course, one at the beginning, and one near the end. Although that might sound tricky, those two points were only about a block apart. It was a little cold, in the 20’s with 15 mph winds. I was fine except for my hands, I didn’t wear my thick gloves because it would be hard to use the radio with those gloves, so I wore my leather gloves but they didn’t keep my hands very warm for long. I’m a little over conservative when it comes to preserving my battery life, I tried to use the radio on 50 mw, which worked fine for my first station, but just a block away, I was having trouble being heard, so I moved up 1 watt, and I was loud and clear. I should probably get a second battery and charger for my radio, it is just a good idea to have more than one.

Closed Stores

I can’t seem to win. The other day, I got to the Sears auto shop and it was closed, they had recently changed their hours. Today, I get there 40 minutes before they close, and they say, they can’t take any new customers because they are closing soon. But wait, there’s more, we went out tonight to purchase Alex’s bunk beds, and guess what, that store was closed too, we were there at six forty-five, and they closed at six.

Interestingly enough, we went to Best Buy, since it was in the same shopping center as Furniture for Kids, and we left without buying anything. There were several DVDs that I wouldn’t mind watching if I had time, but DVDs at Best Buy are a bit over priced. After Best Buy, we walked over to the Educational Store, where Amy picked up some educational supplies for Alex.

Discover Cards

A couple of weeks ago, we lost one of our credit cards, so, we thought it would be best to get a new account. A couple of weeks go by, and no cards show up. I finally get around to calling them and it turns out that they didn’t ship them in the first place, but they did change the account. They sent them two us next day, which was actually two days because I called at night.

The cards arrived today and what a surprise, the look like crap! I liked my old silver discover card, it worked for me. Now I have this orange one. But it gets worse, Amy’s has this 1960’s hippy van/bus thing on it!

My Card


Amy's Card


I figure, I’ll keep this one for a few months, then order a replacement.

Alex & Me – Night Out

Amy and the kids haven’t been feeling well, and Amy isn’t getting much sleep because when Aidan goes to sleep, Alex decides it is time to play, and either keeps Amy up, or wakes up Aidan.

The idea was for me to take my car up to the Sears Auto Center / Jiffy Lube and have them change the oil, transmission fluid, and replace a tag light (I pulled over and issued a repair order for the tag light and to have my window tint checked). Since that place is attached to the mall, I’d take Alex in for some fun, dinner, and stop and pick up a new belt for myself.

Well, the shop changed their hours and closed at 6 before I got there, causing me to completely forget about walking through sears and getting a belt. Alex and I did have a lot of fun even though they removed the play area from the mall. We through pennies into the fountain, got on a couple of quarter rides, and had some candy. We also grabbed dinner at McDonalds, I had a double quarter pounder with cheese, and Alex had a cheese burger happy meal. That boy has been eating cheese burgers fairly well. It was funny, I was telling him that my burger was the same as his, but mine had two meats, and he said, “I don’t like meat, but I like cheese burgers.” LOL

Amy, on the other hand, didn’t get much sleep, Aidan decided to be awake the whole time we were gone.

Trip to West Virginia

This Saturday we went to visit my grandparents in Philippi West Virginia. The trip out was interesting, we ran into a pretty heavy snow storm in far Western Maryland and into West Virginia on I-68. It was worth it though, my grandparents hadn’t seen Aidan yet, and it got us out of the house for the weekend and my grandmother really likes babies!

We arrived Saturday afternoon and it was still snowing. My grandmother had a brand new flexible flier sled and told Alex that I would take him out sledding. Even though it was snowing a lot, there was a good wind and the snow was very light so it was all blowing off. Even so, Alex got to go out and play.




On Sunday morning, we made a trip to the nearest Wal-Mart which is about 25 miles away, the trip took more than thirty minutes. The point was to get Alex some gloves, some window washing fluid for the van, and some travel packets of formula for Aidan. Of course, they didn’t have the travel packets, but we left with everything else we wanted, plus a shirt for Alex, and cookies for all of us to enjoy.

Alex got to play in the snow again later Sunday, this time with gloves on his hands. I wore myself out pulling him on the sled (I even took two runs on the sled myself). Somehow I ended up with a headache later in the evening and ended up going to bed at about 7 o’clock Sunday evening.

The trip back was the best, we took the short cut through the back roads since the weather was good on Monday. Like the trip in, Amy was monitoring for wireless networks with her computer, which was pretty entertaining. Around lunch time we wanted to find a diner but ended up stopping in Frostburg at Pizza hut for lunch. We were back on the road in about an hour and stopped at the outlet mall in Hagerstown. I took Alex to the play ground while Amy shopped. Unfortunately (or fortunately) our replacement credit cards have yet to arrive, so she was limited to cash, but for $60 she bought 2 pairs of pants and 3 shirts for both Aidan and Alex. While I was at the play ground with Alex I got on the ham radio for a few minutes, that was fun too.

In all, good trip.

Now that is a long delay!

Surely a typo, but it was a shock seeing this on the blackberry this morning before I got on the train!


-----Original Message-----
From: bormp-request@lists-wmata.com
Sent: Thursday, February 16, 2006 6:37 AM
To: METRO Alerts
Subject: Metrorail eAlert on the Red Line

A 1000-minute delay is in effect between Fort Totten and Tenleytown-AU in the direction of Shady Grove.

Vice President Dick Cheney Shooting

It seems that, at least the media is making a big deal over why the White House or the Vice President’s office did not inform the public that Dick Cheney was involved in a hunting accident. Must they report on every aspect of the Mr. Cheney’s day to day activities that have nothing to do with his duties as Vice President?

Breaking news: this just in from the White House Press office “Dick Cheney was taking a leak yesterday and his aim was off, and some landed on his shoe.”

I think they did exactly what they should have done, accidentally shooting someone while hunting is embarrassing enough, nobody would go around advertising it if they didn’t have to, and the last time I read the constitution, I didn’t see the part about informing the media of the most embarrassing moments of our elected officials. The mainstream media is just ticked off about a small town Texas paper getting the story from a local before it was aired on CNN and the rest. The Vice President’s office and White House did exactly the correct thing, when the story broke; they confirmed it and that was that.

The late night talk show hosts sure had fun with this one. Jay Leno said, “That's the big story over the weekend. ... Dick Cheney accidentally shot a fellow hunter, a 78-year-old lawyer. In fact, when people found out he shot a lawyer, his popularity is now at 92 percent.”

Myspace

Why is myspace so slow?

oh yeah - I have a myspace - I don't know why

http://www.myspace.com/josephdurnal

Snow, What Snow?

Ok, so it snowed Saturday night and Sunday morning. By seven thirty in the morning it was reduced to flurries in my area. The governor was on TV telling everyone to stay off the roads and the media was making such a big deal out of dangerous roads. We had planned to go to my sister’s house in Dover for Aaron’s birthday party. After shouveling out and getting ready, the sun was out, so, we decided to go. I had thought about taking the long way, around Interstate 95 to Delaware route 1, but after seeing that the road conditions were much better than had been described on the news, I decided to go the normal route, across the bay bridge. That was a good choice because there were only a couple of isolated spots on the road where there was slush, even on the state routes on the eastern shore. The worst travel we experienced was a slushy Delaware route 8, I’m sure it didn’t snow that much more on that side of the state line, I guess it says something about Delaware’s snow removal capabilities. Anyway, I didn’t think the snow was all that bad in the Maryland area.

Alex’s Generosity

While I was out shopping, Alex had some M&M’s after eating his lunch. When I returned, I asked Alex if he saved any M&M’s to share with me and he said yes. So I asked him, “Where are the M&M’s you saved for me?” and he replied “In my mouth!” his term for what happens when you eat something.

Aidan the Smiling Boy

I was up early with Aidan today and he sure was in a good mood. I was on the ham radio for a little bit and I put Aidan in his bouncy chair. Took a break from what I was doing and Aidan was so happy and smiley. Again, I had enough time to grab the camera and take a some good pictures.

More PBEM CIV

I had a great night playing Civilization IV with Amy and Brandon in our play by e-mail game. I have a whopping three cities, and I’m still spending more than I make and don’t have much of a military. Amy is still killing all of us, I’ve never done so poorly in a game of CIV before.

Blog Template Update

Can you believe it? I changed my blog template. I’m sure that the changes are obvious, I added a family of pictures at the top. I’ve been very happy with the general template from blogger that I lightly modified once before, but it seemed to be missing something. I think it is fixed now.

Super Bowl Snacks

Back in the day, I didn’t think that Super Bowl snacks would ever amount to much more than chips and dip or something else from a bag in the chip isle. This weekend’s shopping list included several items indented to be consumed before and during the Super Bowl game, most notably, crab meat and meatballs. I think the crab meat dish is going to be something that I’ve never tasted before, but I’ll probably like it, and I already know I’ll love the meatballs, made with a secret sauce that includes grape jelly and chili sauce. MMM I’m really looking forward to overeating on Sunday!

Installed some lights

Last night when I was laving to go get Andrew I turned on the light that is just inside the front door and it seemingly burned out. While I was at Costco getting gas, Amy called and said that none of the lights worked on the main floor. I talked her through resetting the breaker and wondered why a light bulb burning out would blow a breaker.

It turns out that something failed inside of the light fixture causing it to arc and crack the plastic casing that holds the bulb. I was hoping to find that plastic casing, but realized that I might have to buy a new light fixture, which is what I had to do in the end. Below is a picture of the new light fixture installed.

While I was at it, we had needed a chandelier type light over the kitchen table since we moved in. In the summer, it isn’t so bad, there is plenty of natural light, but in the winter, even during the day, the sun just isn’t at the right angle to make that side of the kitchen very bright. I had to modify it with a power cord that would reach the wall socket and that had an on off switch, since there was no light socket above the table in the kitchen.

It is kind of hard to take pictures of lights.

More Civilization

I’ve been playing two games of Civilization 4 for a little while now. The first, a play by e-mail game with Amy and Brandon, hasn’t progressed very quickly, but it has a lot of potential. So far, Amy is kicking our butts, she’s lost more settlers to barbarians than I’ve been able to create so far. Of course, she did get lucky with the goodie huts. The only goodie hut I was able to get only gave me a map of the area (actually, I think I found another one with some gold).

My single player game, on a huge archipelago map is getting a little crazy. For one, it runs real slow and takes a long time to load. It is a lot of fun however. All of the map has now been occupied, which has caused my score to stall a little. I’ve fought a couple of wars earlier in the game, but I just started a war with the Romans who while not quite as advanced as me, have at least fighters and destroyers in their arsenal. I’ve already lost a couple of stealth bombers over their cities. My goal is to surround the Germans, my land is on one side, and the Romans are on the other. The Arabs had a defensive pact with the Romans, so, I’m at war with them too, but I have a couple of other computer players at war with them, so, I’m not too worried about it. I did send a fleet of battleships to their area to bombard cities and to intercept warships that might be trying to help the Romans. War, even in Civilization 4, has a lot to do with logistics, which I’ve been setting up over the last few days. In the archipelago map, it is all about shipping convoys, and making sure all of your cities have airports. I expect to have a lot of military capability left over from this war, but will probably need to spend a few turns making money. I really hope to finish this game with a conquest or domination victory, the only victory options I selected for the game. It has been quite fun.

Oatmeal

I skipped breakfast at home this morning so I bought some oatmeal from the cafeteria here at work. Basically, it is plain oatmeal with toppings. I chose brown sugar, honey, and granola. Interestingly enough, oatmeal and honey are hard to mix together. Maybe next time I’ll use chocolate chips.

Didn’t Blog for 10 Days

Can you use Blog as a verb? I guess I just did. Anyway, it isn’t that I haven’t had a lot of interesting things to Blog about; I’ve just been busy doing other things, like feeding Aidan, playing with Alex, sleeping, playing Civilization 4, getting on the radio, or whatever.

Also, I didn’t really want to push those pics of Aidan down from the top :).

Interesting Outlook Problem

A customer was complaining that she wasn’t getting any e-mail. Of course, I figured that it was a typical problem where the customer was working offline and didn’t think much of it. That turned out not to be the case so, I had to do some investigating. Eventually, the customer told me that sometimes she would see the some of the missing message in the Large Mail search folder. I started my search there and found that some of the messages were indicating they were in the folder “Top of Information Store”. This was odd, because mail never really goes there. I could not seem to figure out why this was happening, so, I was about to delete the customer’s mailbox and re-create it again. Before I did that, I wanted to see if there were any rules I need to make note of because they would be deleted along with the mailbox. That is when I saw it, the customer had a rule that said mailbox sent to the customer should be moved to “customer name – mailbox” or, the root folder, also known as, “Top of Information Store”. Mystery solved, rarely do I enjoy the helpdesk type work I get stuck with way too often, but this one was kind of fun.

Aidan in his Crib

I don’t know why but I put Aidan in his crib tonight while we were putting Alex to bed. Aidan sleeps in his cradle in our room and the crib is in Alex’s room. He smiled so big, I just had to grab the camera.

Today is my Birthday

I’m twenty-eight years old today. I guess that qualifies as pushing thirty.

General Class Ham Radio License

Back in October, I passed the Morse code exam, one of the required elements for the General Class License. Last week, I passed the written exam. The General license allows you to operate on almost all of the amateur radio frequencies, using CW (Morse code), voice, or data communication modes.

So far, I’ve made four contacts using my new license privileges, three yesterday, to Vermont, Indiana, and New Hampshire, and today’s contact was to the former Yugoslavia, now known as Serbia and Montenegro.

Unfortunately, those contacts were made using single side band voice. I have yet to actually get good enough at using Morse code to copy weak signals. I often call CQ and get no response; it could be that my sending is just that bad. The catch 22 is, to get good at it, you have to practice a lot, but to make a contact, you have to be able to send and copy the code on the air.

Aidan Eats Peas

No, I didn’t get a picture this time, but Aidan has just finished his first jar of peas. Of course, it took three meals for him to finish the jar, but he is only nine weeks old. He has done quite well with his rice cereal, he actually seems to enjoy it. The best news is, he will sleep from about ten o’clock at night until five o’clock the next morning. That’s my boy, he’s learning how to sleep in already, all he needs is just a little more practice, that’s all.

Haircut Day

Alex, Amy, and I all got hair cuts today.

Two K Six

What can I say, it's a new year!

Aidan Eats Rice Cereal

Yeah, he fussed, and a lot came right back out of his mouth, but he eventually got some down, and seemed really content with about three ounces of formula afterwards, compared to his normal six ounces. And of course, I took pictures!

Alex’s Car Track

Alex got a neat little car track from Amy’s friend Mary Beth. I got a couple of good pictures of him playing with it. I used to play with things like this when I was little, it was a blast to set up, and for me to play with too. Then the challenge came of snapping a good picture of the little flying thing that the car goes into in the end actually flying. Oh yeah, and Alex had to have his eyes open. Trust me, that is a lot harder than it sounds.

Slow on the Ham Radio

I haven’t had much success with the ham radio lately. I’ve been taking a little time to sit down and call CQ, but haven’t been answered for a while. I decided to try and improve my signal with a better antenna, but better is relative, its just a longer wire out the window. At least now it tunes up on 15 meters, and seems to do better on 80, but 40, once my best band, doesn’t tune so well anymore. I’m going to try and add a counterpoise wire, but not sure where I’ll be able to fit 34 feet of wire in this room, especially without it being near something that is RF noisy. If only I had the room to put up a real antenna, and no HOA to tell me to take it down.

Amy's Cookware

Amy used her Christmas present the other night to make one of my favorite meals, fried chicken, mashed potatoes with home made gravy, and baked beans. It seemed to go very well, especially the gravy making part. I don’t know all the details, but apparently, the heat needs to be evenly distributed in the pan for the gravy to work out right.

Most importantly, the chicken and gravy, potatoes and beans turned out great, although, I’m not sure I could tell the difference from when they were cooked in the old pan, but Amy could, and that is what counts.

The down side is that I forgot to bring the chicken that I had saved for my lunch yesterday.

Christmas Morning 2005

Amy really took care of Christmas this year. Nearly everything was bought online, with the exception of some white elephant gift exchange gifts that we got at Costco, and an emergency stop to Wal-Mart to get something that wasn’t supposed to arrive before one of the Christmas get togethers, the item arrived on time anyway.



Amy really wanted some new cookware, she was pretty specific about what she wanted, and for once I took the obvious hint and bought exactly what she wanted. The set replaces all of our old pots and pans, which had served their purpose, but didn’t really hold up to continuous use over the last two and a half years. Plus, it adds a chicken fryer, for those who don’t know what a chicken fryer is, like me, they are supposed to be really important for frying food, especially if it starts out being fried and then go into the oven.

Amy kept a good secret with my gift, an MP3 player. I think she really wanted to get me an ipod nano, but even with shopping early, they were sold out. Instead of risking it, she got me one from sandisk, after reading a lot of reviews. I put about 600 megebytes of music on it. It also has am/fm and a voice recorder. One thing I hope to get on it is some Morse code practice. I don’t get to use the radio enough to really practice the code, and with the MP3 player, I’ll be able to listen to it on the train.

Andrew got his first leather jacket; he really seemed to take to it. That boy is very hard to buy gifts for. He also got some books and CD sing along, some toy cars and air planes that Alex will probably get more play time out of than Andrew.



Alex got some flashcards and workbooks, he didn’t seem to interested in them, but I guess that is to be expected. His grandmother gave him a little flashlight; that seems to be his favorite gift of all, for now he seems to like that better than the Vsmile video game system that we bought for all the kids, even though Alex will probably use it the most, for now.



Aidan got a toy he can’t play with, a little activity table. It looks like a great toy for him once he starts standing or walking. He also got a little toy rattle / musical thing and my Aunt Joyce sent him the cutest little booties!



That concluded Christmas morning at our house. It was nice being able to give the children things that they are actually excited about getting. Alex has decided he really likes his video game, Andrew sure liked wearing his leather jacket, Aidan, well, he liked looking at the Christmas tree. And of course, Amy was ecstatic about that chicken fryer and other cookware. I’m going to get a lot of use out of the MP3 player I’m sure.

Breakfast

My breakfast today was 4 slices of bacon and a can of Mountain Dew.

Second CW QSO

I finally made another QSO using Morse code. I tried and tried during the 10 meter contest and found nothing. Thanks to Ron in Adena Ohio for the QSO, it took me a while to get his call sign, started with a KD, and I just wasn’t hearing the D, I think I was hearing KB, there are a lot of KB’s around here, but the D -.. and the B is -…, sort of close, but it is easy to tell them apart at slow speed. So far, 40 meters has been the band that is working for me, the first was on 7108 kHz and the second was on 7109 kHz. I hope to work CW a little more often so that I can boost up my code speed. It took an incredible amount of time to exchange names, home towns, and signal reports. QSL card with SASE is on the way!

Ohm’s Law and More

I was reading my general exam manual, chapter 5, electrical principles, and was being amazed by what I was learning for the second time. I got ahead of myself when reading about parallel circuits, specifically resistors. The first part focused on current, but I was confused, ohms law says that a resistor on 100 volts at 1 amp should be 100 ohms. The diagram I was looking at had two 400 ohm resistors and one 200 ohm resistor in parallel. How did this become 100 ohms? If I would have just read on a few pages, I would have figured it out, but I guess I’m just impatient. How does 400, 200, & 400 become 100? I filled up an 8.5 X 14 sheet of paper figuring it out. Basically, it is 1/(1/400 + 1/200 + 1/400) or 1/(4/400) or 1/0.01 = 100! I’m not a math in my head whiz, it’s a good thing my blackberry has a calculator, I was determined to figure it out. Of course, my theory was confirmed a few pages in the future. I also figured out the section about power (watts), but that was easy, I remembered the basic concept, the book just helped me remember how to associate figuring power with the help of ohm’s law. Fun!

Work Work Work Busy

Wow, it has been a busy few days at work. I was off on Monday, Tuesday I come in and there are all sorts of problems, most notably one of the higher ups accounts got messed up because someone used that account to make a template for her old job title in the old system. They used that template to create a new account Monday and there was some key information that caused the template account to overwrite the user’s account in the new Active Directory. The system DIRXML really sucks, I say that, but I don’t really have a good understanding of it. It was setup and not documented at all. From my end, it just doesn’t work very well. Its deleted accounts, not updated accounts that it should have, and made in general weird changes to accounts in my system. Of course, it may just be set up wrong, all I know, it doesn’t work right.

I have this problem with one of the units where I work that uses a lot of Macintosh computers with the Entourage 2004 mail client. Lets just say they have a lot of issues, not one has to do with the Exchange servers I manage, but for some reason, they choose a mail client that just doesn’t work, and then complain to me about their problems. I think the problem has to do with network communications if you ask me, but they just don’t want to hear it.

Today was interesting. I lost connection to my e-mail, as did everyone else in my office. I couldn’t reach my mail server on the network at all. Being a good systems engineer, I run up to the computer room (they call it a datacenter, but I’m sorry, any room that you can’t keep a reasonable constant temperature or humidity, where you blow breakers, and have boxes and storage, can’t be called a datacenter) to check it out. It turns out all my servers lost their network connections for about 3 minutes. I called the NOC, and they told me flat out that there was no problem and it must have been my PC, funny, when I called them I explained that I had several reports. I informed my supervisor, who wasn’t too happy about the situation, who called the NOC himself, they explained to him that a switch crashed. I have a funny suspicion that someone in the NOC did something to cause the switch to reboot. Of course, its not my problem, but it sure does make me look bad when nobody can connect to their e-mail.

To top it off, I get off the train in an ice storm, the van had 1/4 inch of ice on that I had to get off the windows before I could finish the drive home. The good news is, I worked on my general amateur radio license exam studying.

Andrew’s, no, Alex’s Boots

We did not buy Alex new boots for the winter, so, when it snowed, he needed some boots. I had kept around a pair of boots that Andrew used to wear. Amy put them on Alex and they were a pretty good fit. What will surprise you is that Andrew was wearing those boots when he was six years old, and Alex isn’t even four yet. Of course, Andrew was a little small for his age, and Alex is a little big for his age, but still, that is quite an age difference for the same sized shoes.

ARRL 10 Meter Amateur Radio Contest

This weekend the American Radio Relay League sponsored a contest, one of many that occur in any given year. The contest was specific to the 10 meter Amateur Radio band, or 28.0 to 29.7 MHz.

I had thirteen QSOs for the contest, with four different States and two other countries for a total of 156 points. Yes, that is a really low score, but it was my first real contest. I was very pleased to make two contacts in Washington State, one in Aruba, and one in Venezuela. The others were all local, MD, VA, WV. I probably could have made a higher score but I spent a lot of time Saturday and most of the time on Sunday operating CW mode. While I heard a lot of CW between 28.00 and 28.03 MHz, the license class I have right now is limited to 28.1 to 28.5 MHz. I was a bit frustrated, the problem was mostly that my antenna is just a wire out the window and wasn’t receiving other stations very well. I got an e-mail from Tucson Arizona who heard my signal but couldn’t contact me. I heard him answer me, but the signal was very weak and I didn’t get all of his call sign.

Even though I was frustrated that I didn’t make any CW contacts, I still had fun. I sent out all but one QSL card, the one for Venezuela. The others were all in the US, the station in Aruba also had a US address, maybe someone on vacation. For the Venezuela contact I needed an 80¢ stamp, plus I wanted to get some international reply coupons to cover postage for a return card.

Next year should be more fun, for one, my Morse code speed should be much improved, and I’ll have a general or higher license class to allow me to operate the entire band. And maybe, just maybe I’ll have a decent antenna in the air.

Alex Call’s CQ

Alex is such a cute boy. He is often with me when I’m using the ham radio and he has taken to imitating me. He will take a toy or something that he will pretend is a radio microphone, hold it up to his mouth and say CQ CQ NPQ! He’s been doing it for a while, although I only witnessed it recently. This weekend is the ARRL 10 meter ham radio contest, and at one point Alex was sitting in the chair next to me and we were saying CQ CQ CQ in unison.

Alex’s Booster

After driving Amy’s van for two days, I figured I really needed to put gas in the car last night, I was also going to swing by Radio Shack to buy a connector I needed, that they didn’t have so I had to improvise (a different story). Anyway, I said to Alex, “Do you want to come with me?” Not thinking that I was taking the car and his car seat is securely installed in the van. The damage was done, I couldn’t talk him out of wanting to come with me, so, he cried. I’ve wanted to get him a booster seat for my car for a while now, well, that did it. Amy ordered one while I was out, hopefully it will come soon. Now, whenever I am making a quick trip somewhere, Alex can come with me, like everyone else, he enjoys getting out of the house.

First CW QSO

I have everything setup and tonight I made my first CW QSO on 40 meters, 7.108 MHz, I made a lot of mistakes, and I had a little trouble copying, with all the resends mixed with the slow speed, it took about 20 minutes to exchange RST (signal report), Names, and QTH (location), but I guess that is to be expected for my first QSO. While Springfield Ohio isn’t very far away, it was definitely sky wave propagation.

I want to practice using CW as much as possible before this weekend; I hope to operate during the 10 meter contest. Stations will get twice as many points from me if working CW mode, since I’m not upgraded to the general license yet.

FT-847 CW Filter

During my little break from blogging, I purchased a new ham radio that I can use with my new license privileges I got when I passed the Morse code test. After a lot of research into different models and features, and a little stretching of the budget, I settled on the Yaesu FT-847. While not the top of the line, it is the best I could afford that did what I needed it to do.



Now, for the CW filter. Since I wanted to operate CW mode (using Morse Code), I knew I would need a filter that basically makes the receiver receive a narrower bandwidth, since CW doesn’t take up much bandwidth, the stock radio would pick up three or four different stations at a time if the band is crowded.

(the CW filter is the blue thing at the top)


What a difference it makes too, this weekend there is a ham radio CW only contest on the 160 meter band. Needless to say, the band is quite crowded. I knew to get the filter because more experienced operators have said so, but now, I really know why.

QSL from WP3IH

Well, almost. He replied to an e-mail I sent back in September and said that my QSL card was on the way. I had sent him a card with a self addressed stamped envelope. Why does this matter, because this was my first contact outside of the continental United States. Using my handheld radio no less, of course, it was through the satellite. I can’t wait to actually get the card in the mail!

Long time no post

It has been a while since I posted a blog entry. I was secretly holding out until Amy posted something new to her blog, but I guess, I’ll have to be the one making the first post since November 6, 2005.

A lot has been going on, Aidan is getting bigger, of course, and Christmas is coming. It has been busy at work for the most part, and at home I seem to be going non-stop from the time I get home to the time I go to bed.

I read a blog today about camera store’s bait and switch tactics, something that I had heard of before. Thomas Hawk's Digital Connection: PriceRitePhoto: Abusive Bait and Switch Camera Store. Posted a comment, and it got me thinking about how stale my blog was getting. Although, the picture of Alex holding Aidan was on top, my blog just isn’t the same when I’m not updating it regularly.

That’s all for now, I have a lot of updates, maybe they’ll be posted in the near future.

Alex Holds Aidan

It took Alex a while to be OK with holding Aidan. Finally, today, Alex said OK when I asked him if he wanted to hold Aidan.

Aidan is Home

Aidan is home from the Hospital at 3:30 pm on November 1, 2005. I also have pictures:

Aidan a few hours old (and Alex in the background)



Aidan dressed up



Aidan and his Mommy

It's a Boy

Baby boy Aidan Joseph, seven pounds and fifteen ounces. Born at 1:49PM on Sunday, October 30, 2005.

Here Comes Baby!

We are at the hospital again, and this time we are pretty sure baby will be born. I'm hoping today and not tomorrow!

Passed Element One

I passed my FCC Element One Morse Code Test yesterday. I can now operate on small portions of the HF amateur radio bands. Specifically 3675-3725 kHz, 7100-1750 kHz, 21,100-21,200 kHz in CW mode (Morse Code), 28,100-28,300 kHz in CW, RTTY, and data modes, and 28,300-28,500 kHz in CW and SSB voice modes. This is a big step for me; I wanted to do this back in 1993, when I got my no code Technician license that allowed me to operate on all amateur bands over 50 MHz. The difference is, without getting two technical, frequencies below 50 MHz are more suited to world wide communications.

Now, I need to get a radio that can use those frequencies. I’m not sure when this will happen, hopefully, before they discontinue the one I want to get. There is also studying for the element three exam for the General license, which will greatly expand my operating privileges on HF, and really make good use of that new radio I want to get. It shouldn’t be too hard, I took the element three on a whim without studying at all and missed passing by one question. I think I could refresh my memory by taking some practice tests online. It should be fun.

Been Busy Learning Morse Code

Not to many blog updates lately. I’ve spent a lot of spare time working on Morse code. I’m doing pretty well, I can copy most everything sent at ten words per minute. The speed is actually fifteen words per minute with the characters spaced at ten words per minute. It is supposed to make it easier to learn the code at higher speed. I should be able to take the FCC Amateur Radio Element One exam pretty soon. My first opportunity will be Tuesday evening at six o’clock. It all depends on when baby is born though. Right before the test, I will play some practice code at five words per minute; this should help me get used to the slower speed of the test. Hopefully, that will be the last time I ever have to use five words per minute.

The best part is, as soon as I pass the test, I can operate on some small portions of the amateur radio HF bands. Most of the bands that work well for long distance communications I’ll only be able to use CW mode which uses Morse Code. Too bad I don’t yet have a radio or antenna to operate on the HF bands yet. I’m hoping to be able to get the Yaesu FT-847 amateur transceiver. Although it isn’t the best performing HF radio around, but it also includes the six and two meter VHF bands and the seventy centimeter UHF band, areas where I also want to operate. The radio is the easy part, the tough part will be the antenna!

73

Ravens, not in HD?

Having recently obtained the HD service from Adelphia to go with our HDTV, I was excited to watch my first Baltimore Ravens football game in wide screen HD format. For some reason, the game wasn’t broadcast in HD, at least channel 9 wasn’t broadcasting it in HD. When the game was over and they switched to the New England at Denver game, suddenly, it was in HD. I don’t know what was wrong, but I was sure disappointed that I wasn’t able to see the Raven’s win in high definition.

Happy Birthday Amy

We have a few more hours for baby to be born today too!

Drove to the Wrong State

How many people can say they were heading for a particular State, but drove do a different State instead? That is what happened to me last night. I wanted to pick up a power ball ticket, and I forgot all about it while I was in Washington DC earlier in the day. So, after dinner, Amy, Alex, and I all hopped in van and headed for West Virginia. Now I thought taking US 340 west took you right into West Virginia once you crossed the Potomac River. So, once I crossed the bridge, I stopped at a gas station, went in to buy a power ball ticket, and they kindly informed me that I was in Virginia, not West Virginia. The good news was; West Virginia was only a couple of miles away.

National Air and Space Museum

We took Alex to the National Air and Space Museum on Saturday. He was really looking forward to seeing Air Planes, Rockets, Space Ships, and Helicopters. He sure seemed to enjoy the Museum, probably the one Museum that Alex can really appreciate at his age. Of course, his level of interest seemed to fade in and out, but for the most part, he enjoyed himself.

It seemed that one of his favorite galleries was the aircraft carrier exhibit. He got his picture taken in front of an A4.


While he wasn’t too interested in the planetary exploration gallery, he seemed to like the Mars Rover.


While Alex isn’t in the picture, I tried to explain to him the significance of Space Ship One. I think he thought it was an airplane. Of course, some of the airplanes look a little more like space ships, like the X-15, a supersonic stubby winged jet.


In all, it was a fun trip, we visited the gift shop and Alex got a little toy biplane and we shared some freeze dried “astronaut” ice cream.

HDTV

I watched my first HDTV program last night, Monday Night Football. While Amy couldn’t seem to tell the difference, I certainly could. The picture was very clear and crisp. You could see much more detail less grain and brighter colors. What I wasn’t expecting but really liked was the sounds. Football games are loud, the crowd noise blends in with the announcers, but with HD, you also get surround sound, and the play by play was sent to the center channel, making it easier to understand over the crowd noise. I’m looking forward to watching some shows in HD, although, the DVR hard drive is a little small, I won’t be able to record everything I want to watch in HD.

Still No Baby

Well, we are still waiting for things to move along so that baby can be born. We are just running some errands, keeping busy, right now we are at the post office and I'm posting this from my blackberry.

We also went to the bank to deposit some checks and ger Alex some savings bonds with his child support money. Not that it was a lot of money, just what they took from his biological father's tax return, but, the smart thing to do is to save it for Alex's future.

Hmm, Amy has been in the post office for a while, maybe baby decided he wanted to be born on federal property! Probably not, the parking lot is really crowded, so the line is probably long inside.

Baby is Coming

Well, it begins. We went to the hospital this morning and the doctor told Amy to go home and come back when the contractions get to a certain level. That means that baby should be born today or tomorrow. So, we could be heading back to the hospital in an hour or two, maybe later tonight, but I have a feeling, definitely sometime today.

Blackberry Post

Posting from my blackberry, just to see if it works.

Baby Names

I have this uncanny desire to name our new baby with a name that starts with the letter A. It seems that Amy and I had a good grasp on names for girls, and I had settled on names that did not begin with A, something about having a boy is pushing me toward the A names. Of course, we have Andrew, and we have Alexander, both given names starting with the letter A before Amy and I even met, there is just something that seems right with naming our baby boy with a name starting with the letter A. We can’t use Aaron, the boys have a first cousin named Aaron. The name we’ve been discussing the most is Aidan, which I’ve only seen spelled as Aden, but Amy assures me that Aidan is the correct spelling. Let’s hope the next two children are girls, the names will be much easier to figure out, as we pretty much know what we want to do, or at least what we are compromising on. Then again, they won’t ask me what the name is going to be, so, when the time comes, it’s all up to Amy

Our Tax Dollars at Work (Trash Removal)

I guess I should start out by saying that I work for the federal government as an IT contractor. It is 8:08 on Monday morning and a janitor just stopped by my cubical and emptied my trash bin. I don’t know what bothers me more, the fact that if I would have left an old sandwich in the trash can on Friday afternoon and it would have rotted through the weekend, or that someone was actually paid out of our tax dollars to empty the trash can with one empty soda can in it. While I’m complaining, why do they insist on vacuuming the office in the middle of the day? It never fails, I’m on the phone with a customer and in comes the vacuum cleaner, if you ask me, its disrespectful and down right rude.

Simulated Emergency Test

Simulated Emergency Test

Today I participated in a simulated emergency test exercise. Emergency communications is just one of the many aspects of amateur radio that I enjoy. There wasn’t much planning put into the SET here in Frederick County, but that didn’t stop several ham radio operators form participating. My reports were as follows:

This is N3PAQ reporting from the Ballenger Creek Area 3 miles south of Frederick

First Report – 1025 EDT
Blowing Trash Cans and light debris
Trees standing but bending quite a bit
Estimated Winds 40 MPH
Steady to Heavy Rain

Second Report - 1125 EDT
Winds subsided estimated 15 to 20 MPH with stronger gusts
Steady rain
Landline telephone service unavailable

Third Report – 1232 EDT
Winds light estimated 10 to 15 MPH
Light rain
Landline telephone service restored

I called my third report my final report, although the simulation will run until 2PM today. I'll keep listening to the frequency to hear what is going on. Some of the other operators have much better imaginations than I do.

2005 Jefferson Nickel

It is odd that the year 2005 is almost over and this is the first I’ve seen of this new coin. I really like the design of the portrait side of the new nickel. There are two different reverse designs, one being a buffalo, which I haven’t seen in real life yet, the other a Pacific North West image of pines on an ocean ridge.

I’m quite pleased with the changes we have seen in our currency over the past few years. The fifty state quarter program just makes quarters that much more interesting if you ask me. The redesigned bills from a few years ago looked great, and the second redesign of the twenty dollar and fifty dollar bill. I heard that there will be a new ten dollar bill in circulation sometime soon.

Another Trip to Frederick Memorial Hospital

Ahh, there is nothing like spending the night in the hospital, and I wasn’t even the one admitted. Amy had some more preterm labor contractions that needed to be taken care of. Although we both knew that it was still a little to early for baby to come, there was part of us that wanted him to be born today. I slept in a reclining chair for a couple of hours. Alex started out sleeping on the floor because I couldn’t get him to sleep in a chair. Sometime during the night a nurse put two arm chairs together that made a nice bed for him and he slept there for a while. It’s a good thing he brought his sleep doggy. So, it looks like the doctors might let baby be born sometime after October 5, of course, that is still a little early at 36 weeks, but I guess it is a trade off since all the drugs used to stop the preterm labor contractions probably aren’t the best for baby or Amy.

Blackberry Messenger

I replied to an e-mail that Brad (www.naponline.net) sent me on my blackberry the other day. Since our system adds “Sent from my Blackberry …” he figured out that I was using a blackberry and pointed me to the blackberry messenger at www.blackberry.com/messenger. I downloaded and installed it, and found it to be pretty cool. So far, my only conversation has been with Brad, I hope to get a little more use out of it. It’s just too bad that my blackberry doesn’t get coverage on the metro. Maybe, if I start taking the MARC train again, the blackberry can make my commute a little more interesting.

Down for Maintenance

I got the following message when I went to post a blog entry today:

Blogger is temporarily unavailable due to planned maintenance.
This downtime will last 1 hour from 4:30pm - 5:30pm (PST).

That’s interesting - I got this message at 9:40am (EST). Something must be broken.

Microsoft Support

I needed to get a hotfix for a specific issue I was having with the Active Directory Users and Computers admin tool. I knew exactly what I needed, but it was one of those hotfixes that you have to contact Microsoft to obtain. So, I called support and requested the hotfix. The support person on the other end asked me a bunch of irrelevant questions that I answered anyway just to get it over with. What came next shocked me, the technician on the phone indicated that the hotfix required Windows XP service pack 3. Of course, those of us that know anything about Windows XP know that the current service pack is only service pack 2. I tried to explain this, but the tech insisted that it required Windows XP service pack 3. Microsoft’s outsourced people in India really suck, its not the first time that I call and nobody seems to have any clue what I’m talking about. The place I’m working for really needs to get a good support contract with a technical account manager and domestic technicians that actually know what they are doing.

Car Died?

Maybe, I started it up this morning, and me, being in a rush just put it in drive and pushed the gas instead of giving it time to warm up. Anyway, it stalled and wouldn’t start again. The car has been giving me a little trouble in the stop and go traffic, occasionally stalling. I have no idea what is wrong with it. If I was forced to guess, I’d say that there is something wrong with the fuel pump or filter or something like that. I sure am glad we have the van now! The car’s imperfect operations sort of prompted me to accelerate plans to buy the van, but I’m sure glad we had it, especially after the baby shower and this weekend’s shopping trip, and of course, not to mention it got me to work this morning. Hopefully the car will start later today and I can run some fuel system cleaner through it. If not, its just another thing I’m going to have to get fixed.

The Great Frederick Fair (2005)

Wow, this is my second entry on the Great Frederick Fair. Once again, Alex had a blast riding rides. This time, I took more cash with me, and he actually got to play a game, a little fishing game where you hook a plastic fish with rings on it, and get a prize. Alex would have much preferred his prize to be that he could keep fishing!

Unfortunately, Amy couldn’t ride any rides, they all had the pregnancy warning. She did get to eat a funnel cake, something she was craving, although the powdered sugar had to be substituted with splenda. I tried it, it wasn’t so bad, but still, not as good as the real thing.

All in all, it was a good night, Alex had fun, and that was the point. Of note – I wore the exact same clothes I wore last year, as you can see in the pictures. Great Frederick Fair 2004

I Wanted to Take Off Today

I really wanted to take the day off of work today. I really need to get to the bank and close on a small home equity loan, but more importantly, Amy had a doctor’s appointment that I wanted to take her to. I’m not much for sitting and waiting at the doctor’s office, but I did say to Amy that I’d be taking off and could take her. I don’t remember it that way, but I’m sure that’s what I said. At first I was thinking about taking only half a day, but there was so much to do, I even thought about taking the whole day off. Work really gets in the way of life sometimes.

Here I am at work, it took several days for the backup guy to actually get around to installing the backup, then, and there were a few problems with it, because the wrong account was used to configure the backup software. Now if the people around here could actually do their jobs, this would have been done on Friday and all the testing would have been completed by Monday. But here I am, at work on Wednesday because the system needs to be tested and ready for production by the end of the day. What am I doing now, well, after a brief problem with another system this morning; I’m once again waiting for the back up guy to finish the required backup testing.

Word Verification

For a long time, Blogger didn’t suffer from SPAM comments. Well, that long time is over. I got one a while ago, and then another, and they have been getting worse. I don’t particularly like SPAM, so, I turned on a new Blogger feature called word verification. Basically, as you can see in the example below, it’s a graphic file with a slightly deformed word that you’ll have to type into a box when commenting. I like comments, so, please, don’t let this stop you from commenting on my blog posts.

Register your SmartTrip Card

I’m so glad I registered my Washington Metro SmartTrip card. I ended up loosing it last week, and it still had about $140 left on it. I gave myself a day to find it, but when it didn’t turn up, I called the WMATA and had them disable that card and add the value to a new card and send it to me. It cost $5 of my value, that is what it costs to buy the card outright. But I’ll take loosing $5 over $140 any day. If you have a SmartTrip card that you use regularly, go on over to www.wmata.com and register it!

SO-50 Ham Radio Satellite

I’m going to try and work the SO-50, also known as Saudi-OSCAR 50, ham radio satellite today. I just happened to notice that it is passing almost directly overhead, just a little to the east of Frederick at about 4:35 today. BTW, OSCAR stands for orbiting satellite carrying amateur radio, just in case you wanted to know. The big problem will be actually hearing it, since it only transmits at 250mW on 436.800 MHz. Since I don’t have a beam antenna, I might not have enough receiver gain to even pick up a signal. Still, it will be fun to try.

Exchange Cluster Build

What a couple of days it has been. I dug myself into a hole when I said I could have this Microsoft Exchange cluster built by today. First, I had a hard time even finding the servers that were already racked and connected. Even then, it was tough to figure out what monitor and keyboard they were connected to. Just that wasted half a days worth of work.

Then, two days where the production servers were having various problems that took most of both days fix, monitor, and manage. So, there goes another day and a half that I should have been working on the new cluster build.

I got right back to the build of the new cluster and started having more problems, it turned out that the servers were plugged into network ports that were not configured for the right VLAN. That would have been quick to figure out, except the cables weren’t labeled with the switch ports they connected to, so when I talked to the network guy, he didn’t know what ports I was talking about, and said, find the ports or MAC addresses and give me a call back. I found the ports, and for a backup, got the MAC addresses, and about fifteen minutes later, I called the network guy back but he had left for the day. We finally got it on the network first thing the following day, yesterday.

Enter, the SAN problems. I had been used to NetApp and HP SANs for the most part, but here, they use EMC. Shouldn’t be a problem, right? Wrong. I had all kinds of version conflicts with Windows 2003, the QLogic HBA drivers, and EMC’s PowerPath software. Eventually, I had to open up a support case with EMC that took two hours for them to respond to. After much back and forth e-mail with the EMC technician, I was able to get everything just right so it would work.

Since then, its been smooth sailing. Cluster server is installed, all the disks are configured, and Exchange is setup and running. Right now, I’m just waiting for the backup guy to do his thing and I’ll finish up. I might actually be done the build today, but I’ll still need another day or two for testing and review.

Fun.

Costco’s Gas Wasn’t Cheap

At least they had gas for a change, but I didn’t get gas at Costco yesterday. When I drove by Sheetz on my way to Costco, I noticed that it was $2.77, wow, I’m calling that cheap, compared to Costco’s gas at $2.85, I guess it could be called cheap. I was almost completely empty, something I don’t let happen too often. Traffic was so bad yesterday that I ended up using a lot more gas than I expected on my way to and from work. Still, I turned around and went back to Sheetz to get gas instead of Costco. I guess that’s ok, when Costco was out of gas all the time, Sheetz was my fill up spot.

Blank Trip

Last night we made what my Grandma Jackie would call “a blank trip”. Amy had talked to her mother on Saturday and she indicated that she would not be working on Sunday. Amy said that we would be coming up to visit after dropping of Andrew, not something out of the ordinary on Andrew weekends. We start by going to my mother’s house for a while, eating there, and then dropping off Andrew at five o’clock. After that, it is about a thirty to forty-five minute drive to Amy’s mother’s house. When we arrived, nobody was home. Fortunately for us, Amy has a key, so, we were able to get in. We figured Amy’s mother would be home any minute, so, we waited, and I watched some football. Alex still had a good time playing with blocks and action figures. After a while went by, we ordered pizza and waited a little long for it to arrive and after it arrived, it wasn’t very good. If I had more time I would have drove up to Dominos and demanded a refund. But, I sucked it up and ate the pizza anyway. After we ate, we cleaned up and drove to where Amy’s mother works, but she was not there and hadn’t been. Amy was worried, so, we called Brian, Amy’s brother. Once I was able to talk to him, he explained that his mother was with him, at the restaurant where he works. Mystery solved. She had left a message on our answering machine, but we had already left by then and didn’t check it. I still don’t know what it says. I suspect, since there were unopened baby shower gifts in the house, that she wanted to meet us somewhere instead of going to the house.

In all, it could have been worse, we could have been locked out and Alex could have had to go to the potty!

Worked Puerto Rico on the Ham Radio

Ok, now I never intended for my blog to be the ham radio blog, but tonight was really cool. I worked three stations on the AO-51 “Echo” ham radio satellite with my handheld radio. I just can’t get over it, I confirmed Puerto Rico and Ohio tonight, I think I may have talked to Michigan, but I’m not 100% certain on that one yet. Based on my experience trying to talk to the satellite with my old radio for transmitting and my scanner for receiving, I didn’t think I’d be able to make these contacts with such ease. The main thing is that the scanner can tune the center frequency of 435.300 MHz, but tunes in 12.5 KHz steps, while the ham radio tunes in 5 KHz steps. Since the satellite is moving so fast, the signal suffers from Doppler shift. When it is coming at me, I have to tune to 435.310 to start, then 435.305, that’s when its close enough for me to transmit. When it passes overhead you tune to 435.300 MHz, and as it moves away, drop to 435.295 MHz, and so on.

On the flip side, I’m out of the twenty-three cent stamps I use to send my QSL cards. Since the cards aren’t fancy, I just send them as post cards. I’ve been told that sending them in envelopes that also include a self addressed stamped envelope is better. I’ll see, I might do that for the Puerto Rico station.

Also on the ham radio today, I made my first contacts ever on the six meter (50 MHz) band and the one and a quarter meter (222 MHz) band. I also made my first simplex QSO on the seventy centimeter (445 MHz) band. Those contacts are because the VHF QSO party, a contest from the ARRL, which was going on this weekend, and because of my new radio that has those bands.

This is great!

New Minivan

Yes, it has happened, I’m officially old, Amy and I have bought a minivan. Yes, a minivan. I didn’t post right away because I wanted to snap a picture of it first, then, I just didn’t get around to it. But my recent post about Costco being out of gas I mentioned that I had two cars, and everyone I know knows that I only had one car before.


The van is a Toyota Sienna LE with option package number 5. Don’t get me wrong, it is really nice, for a minivan, even though we gave up a few things to go with a Toyota over a domestic model. Toyota seemed like the right choice for a van that would take us well beyond the five year mark, the trade off was that we couldn’t afford to get it with a DVD player, power seats, or two power doors. What we get is a van with a bunch of airbags and a host of other safety features, eight passenger seating, and one power door. If you really want to know the details, Toyota’s website has a listing of standard features for the LE and everything that package 5 comes with.

Amy has been driving it a lot, she is doing quite well. Although, I’m not the greatest driving teacher in the world, progress is being made. Tonight she drove us up to the Toyota dealer to pick up our license plates. Alex sure does love sitting up high where he can see things out the window. And we all love the one power sliding door!

Costco was Out of Gas

We drove to Costco today to get gas, and there was a big sign saying that they were temporarily out of gas. It is kind of annoying that I’ve been getting my gas at Costco ever since I moved to the area, but now, that the price of gas is so ridiculous, every other yahoo out there decides that they are going to do it too, leaving none for me, a loyal customer from the start. Oh well, its just gas, I still have enough between the two cars to get me where I need to go. If they don’t have gas tomorrow night though, I’ll have to go to a regular gas station, yuck.

First Satellite Contact AO-51

After a couple of tries where I know somebody heard me because they called back to me with my call sign, I finally made a complete contact using the AO-51 “Echo” amateur radio satellite. Although I heard the call sign wrong at first, I was one letter off, I had an “M” where there should have been an “N” and it was easy enough to figure out. I’m glad he said he was in North Carolina, that was a big help because he was a WB7 call sign, since 7 is normally west coast, I knew I had the right call sign when I looked it up.

Many may not find exchanging a few sentences with a random person a few states away very interesting, but to me, it was very exciting. I had heard the satellite a few times on the scanner, but could never talk to it. With the new radio, I was able to actually complete a contact through a satellite, made by volunteers, moving at 17,000 mph, using a handheld radio. I guess it is the geek in me, but now I can say, I talked to a guy in NC with my handheld radio!

New Ham Radio - Yaesu VX-7R

I left my handheld radio, the Realistic HTX-202 from Radio Shack, on the ledge for a while, well, Alex finally decided he wanted to play with it, or at least touch it, because it fell to the floor and broke. I got the HTX-202 back in 1993 when I first got my ham radio license, and it has been a good performer over the years, I’m a little sad to see it go.

I had some clear specifications that I was looking for in a radio, most importantly, being dual band, 146 and 440 MHz bands, with dual receive capabilities. There were three that made my short list. The Icom IC-W32A a good radio with a good price, but its big drawback was the fact that it drained batteries very quickly. Next on my list was the Kenwood TH-F6A, while more expensive than the W32A, it came stock with a much better battery, the 220 MHz band, and a wide band receiver with SSB capabilities. I finally decided on the Yaesu VX-7R, it seemed to me to be the most rugged, it also had a great battery, and I figured that the addition of the 50MHz band would be a better choice than the 220 MHz band (although the VX-7R does have 220, it is really low power, 300mW).

I made a few repeater contacts with my new Yaesu VX-7R the first night, once the battery was charged. The next day I took it up on the mountain and was able to hit some six meter repeaters, make a quick contact on 146.52. I tried a 220 MHz repeater, with no luck. I also had no luck on 70 centimeter or 6 meter simplex.



I also went after the satellite, but that is for another post!