This weekend I bought a grill. It’s a Weber charcoal grill. It will be more than adequate for Colleen’s and my needs. To celebrate the purchase of the grill, we had a cook-out of sorts. For those of you that were hear on Saturday, you probably remember how crappy of a day it was. That didn’t stop us though, oh no! We had a few friends over (invited more than actually came over), had some good brats and hotdogs, then went out to Boltini’s. I’ve never been there before, and I was very impressed. The prices weren’t that bad, and I didn’t feel like I was surrounded by little kids, as is the case whenever I go to campus bars anymore.
Category: life
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EOH & Vacuuming
So, today was a productive day. I went and worked out from 10-noon, then came home and showered. I then headed Engineering Open House (EOH). Now, both my junior and senior year I was involved in EOH (I wasn’t in the engineering school for my freshman and sophomore years). At the time, I thought EOH was pretty dumb, but a great reason to get out of classes. However, now that I’m not (required) to have a project on display at the MatSE building. It’s great the projects that the students do, eventhough they don’t necissarily think they’re that great. I have fond memories of coming up with something the night before. However, the looks on the kids, hell and even the parents, is great. It is probably one of the best teach someone. All these displays on things that most, normal, people have never even heard of is fascinating. And talk about a great day to have it too, eh? I mean, perfectly clear, barely any wind, and somewhere near 60 degrees.
So, after that I went out to Meijer to get a few personal hygeine products: toothpaste and deoderant. While I was up that way, I swung into Best Buy and bought the new-ish Bonnaroo CD. I definitely like it a lot better than the 2002 CD. I enjoy the bands that they had in 2003 more I do believe. I walked out of Best Buy with it for $10, since I had a gift certificate from when I purchased TurboTax there. Then, I went and got my car washed because it needed it incredibly badly.
Came home, had a snack, ripped the CD to MP3, got it streaming to the xbox, then started cleaning the house. Now, I’m sure you’ve all seen the dyson vacuum commercials by now. You know, the one with the black background, with just the guy talking about how he hates all vacuums because they loose suction. So, I started vacuuming, and I remember how much my vacuum sucks (no pun intended). Tempted to just run back out to Best Buy and check out one of his vacuums, instead I (being an engineer) rip apart mine. Now, if you’ve ever ripped apart a vacuum, no matter how little “ripping” may be to you, it creates a mess. Well, I didn’t actually take the whole thing apart, this time (don’t ask). Instead, I did exactly what Dyson does in the commercial; I open up my bagless vacuum, and check out the filter. “Holy shit,” I think to myself. The filter is caked in dust/dirt. I start thinking about it, and I can’t remember ever cleaning the filter. So, I take it out and start banging it on the outside of my apt. Well, it seems to be working half way decent, only large chunks are falling off the filter, and much of it remained on the filter. And of course, there’s a bunch of small little groves in the filter that are hoplessly clogged. Drastic measure call for drastic actions. I go grab the knife and begin scraping it off. I swear I scrapped off at least 3-5 lbs of dust. I had a huge pile of the finest, non-man made silt I think I’ve ever seen (think of brownie mix, and then reduce the particle size by five times). So, I put everything back together (and being the good engineer that I am, everything went back together with no missing or spare peices), and start vacuuming the room over again. I was disgusting the amount of dirt I collected after I had already vacuumed it once. So, I had to clean off the ottoman that the cat likes to sleep on, so I whip out the attachment, and I almost lose a finger because of how powerful the vacuum is. Never, ever, has it been able to suck my hand against the tube. Now, it hurts if I put my hand over it and it grabs hold.
So, now that I sit here after vacuuming the apt, the best it’s ever been, I want to thank Mr. Dyson for reminding me to clean my filter, and not go out and buy one of his vacuums. So, for those of you that haven’t cleaned your vacuum filter lately, do it. Even if your vacuum preforms to your expectations, clean it, and be amazed!
On another note, those of you that have a website with me, you should be receiving an email from me in the near future about a new feature.
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MS Certification
So, today was my first MS Cert test. I went in feeling pretty comfortable about it. I mean, it was test 70-290 (Managing and Maintaining a Windows 2003 Server Environment). I do this both at work and at home. I even read the MS Press book cover to cover, and took notes on it. I did fine with all the questions that were in the book, and the questions that I found online (forgot that the books I got had a CD with extra tests on it). Needless to say, I figured I wouldn’t have too much of a problem. Well, if you haven’t figured it out by now, I failed the test. To pass, you’re required to get a 700, I got a 689.
Now, after taking the test, I realize how retarded these tests really are. Now, all the tests I’ve ever taken usually make sure you know the general stuff. Well, wouldn’t that make sense, to actually test you on the stuff you’re supposed to know? Well, not according to MS. Apparantly you’re supposed to know the stuff that isn’t included in any of their material, and the most obscure crap. No wonder they’ve had such a hard time with websites such as BrainDumps. Well, the say I see it, is memorizing the answers (ala braindumps) is worse than wasting the $125 by failing it. This whole experience has definitely been a turn off to getting an MCSE. I still want to read all the material, and know the material. I just don’t think I’m a good enough guesser for passing MS tests, because that’s what it boils down to.
After takin the test, it really makes me worried about the types of places that always say that MCSA/E is required. Very worried…
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More Taxes
Of course, I didn’t get all of Colleen’s forms when I did her taxes. Her’s is so much more of a pain than mine because of all her student loans. Needless to say, I forgot to include the 1098-T Form which can be used for educational credits. It turns out that she only needed to pay $29 in federal taxes last year, so she’s pretty much getting it all back. The “want it now” side of me is saying how that is grossly unfair, but then the “what the hell are you thinking” part of me knows better. I’d much rather have it my way, where I don’t have any debt, than having it her way, paying student loans but getting a big check from the gov’t this year. I doubt she’ll be able to get the up to $2000 tax credit next year because Cunningham should be paying for her tuition. That is a nice tax break though, and it can be used for any higher education learning whenever (unlike the Hope credit which is can only be used 2 years).
Well, it was 50 degrees here 2 days ago and yesterday morning. It’s unfortunate that it had to go back to normal. At least 99% of the ice and snow melted. I was getting sick of driving everywhere and hitting the ice from the tiny bit of snow that had melted during the day. I can’t wait till it gets warmer out. I can’t wait till I can go outside and actually do something without having to bundle up first.
For those of you that don’t know, Colleen is moving to days on the 29th. Both of us are very excited about that. She’ll be working 12pm-10pm on the weekdays, and 10am-10pm on the weekends. They will also be getting a new schedule so they actually get paid the full amount of time for the 2 weeks of pay. Unlike the way it is now, half of the paychecks they get paid for 36hrs, while the other half get paid 48hrs. I think they work 3 days, have 2 off, then two days, then two days off then 3 days, or something like that. I’m not exactly sure. She should also be getting a payraise. However, she has yet to get anything formal in writing about it. Hell, they just scheduled her for days without even really giving her the promotion or having her agree to it in writing. She doesn’t seem worried, but it doesn’t seem like the best practice.
Weee, talk about a bunch of garbled thoughts. Deal with it, I’m going to go shower.
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Taxes
Well, I finally got around to buying TurboTax and doing my taxes. I’m glad I did, since I’m getting back something like $750. I can’t complain about that. I also did Colleen’s and she’ll be more than happy with as much as she’s getting back. A whopping $840. Both of us are getting back $60 from the state too. I’m definitely taking my money and sticking it into either my Life Insurance plan, or into my savings account. I’m gonna need money for a down payment on a house, and this will help. I just can’t believe how much Cunningham had her overpaying. Maybe it’s because she wasn’t working there for the full year, but who knows. I mean, she’s getting back 6% of what she made last year. I just can’t believe how easy it is to do a return through the software solutions now. It’s just crazy. I did mine in like 20 minutes, and her’s didn’t take much more than that (I did it 2x because it seemed like she was getting an awful lot back). I suppose it also helps that we have like no deductions. Next years tax time will be a little different though. Especially since I’m planning on getting a house, and we have a lot of clothes to give to goodwill (well, it should’ve been included this time, but I totally forgot we had stuff), etc. Good times. I can never complain about getting my hard earned monies back.
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While at Work
Well, I’m at work, and I just finished testing the new Microsoft patches that were released today with out machines. Thankfully, once again, there doesn’t seem to be any problems with the patches affecting our machines (knock on wood). However, while I’ve tested the new patches on 3 different machines in VMWare (and installed all the software required for testing via GPO), I’ve been installing windows XP on a Virtual PC 2004 session. Needless to say, I’m working on 3.5 hours, and the basic install of XP still hasn’t completed. I can’t imagine how long it would take to do basic tasks inside of Virtual PC. This is just rediculous. Maybe it’s just the installation that takes forever. However, wasting 3+ hours on a simple install is crazy. Good thing I decided to use VMWare after I started install xp on the Virtual PC session, otherwise, I’d be here forever.
In other news, I really want to get a saltwater fishtank now. Hopefully Colleen will run by the bookstore today and grab a couple of books I want. Then I’ll think about starting the tank. I really want a reef tank, but I’ll start with fish, and after I get (more than) comfortable with that, I’ll move on to reef life.
*** Currently Listening To: Cake – Prolonging the Magic It’s just another classic Cake album. It’s fun to listen to, but even if you just set it as background music, it’s not loud or obnoxious or anything. Good stuff.
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Did Everything Die Today?
BLEH. Somedays I really hate being a “computer guy.” Well, actually, it wasn’t just a day, it’s been the last 4 days. As you can see, rebelpeon.com is finally back up (entirely). That’s about the first time since, what, Saturday? Let’s just say, it was going smooth until I started moving stuff back to my main server. DNS can be one of the nastiest things around. Then again, so can microsoft’s software. Between all the errors that had no solution and just crappiness all around, I stayed up way to late the last 3 nights pulling my hair out. Needless to say, it’s working now. By doing this, though, I’ve essentially started from scratch on my server without having to destroy my active directory domain. By not destroying it and starting over, I saved myself a lot more nightmares. I’ve also setup mysql and movabletype on the rebuilt server. This will allow a “real” comments section, and by having the blog database driven, I can have searching, a true archive, etc. I just need to muck around with the templates more to get everything the way I want it. Hopefully the new site will go live this weekend, but I make no promises 🙂
This weekend was our first actually snow fall of the year. I definitely wasn’t missing the lack of snow, that’s for sure. The people driving, the plows that don’t come out till its finished snowing, the car covered in salt, the people driving (oops, did I already say that?), etc. Plus, it’s decided to go from decently chilly out, to down right cold. I’m not a fan.
Today work was, well, interesting. Let’s start with last night, shall we? Well, last night I was talking to a guy that works for us (soon to be located at aaronbinford.com), and I noticed that our, the university’s, exchange server was down. No big deal, maybe they were doing patches etc. This was at 11. At around 1 when I stopped trying to fix my stupid servers, I noticed that it was still down. Oh well, didn’t really think anything of it…that is till this morning, when I arrived at the office to find that exchange was still down. Well, needless to say, we had about 4 phonecalls when I first got in. However, there’s absolutely nothing we can do, because we (at DIA) aren’t in charge of the exchange server. Well, the server stayed down the whole day (actually, it’s still down as I type this). Apparantly 3 harddrives failed last night, taking down most of the mailboxes with it. A 500GB restore from tape can take awhile. PLUS, we just implemented a new Point of Sale (POS) system at the Armory track and Atkins Tennis Center. Well, the software that was purchased had no way of differentiating between the stuff inputted in at the Armory as opposed to Atkins (or at least the users were trained on how to do that). So, the person in charge of the Armory, for whatever reason, started deleting records out of the database. Needless to say, he was on crack and started deleting everything, including the stuff from Atkins. Well, then later, after we told him what he had done, he apparantly did it again!!! Thankfully we had some of the stuff from tape backups (backups that had just started running last night). Let’s say that it didn’t surprise me what this particular user at the Armory did. *sigh*
Off to work on the new website templates…
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Script Kiddies
Well, I finally received enough scripting knowledge to automate the music list creation. It took me way to long to actually sit down and do, but now my music list is updated nightly. One less thing for me to think about is always a plus. I’ve really gone to town with scripts at work. It makes it WAY easier for us (mostly myself), as we don’t have to be constantly checking certain things daily, hourly, etc. The one I’m most proud of is the inventory script I wrote. Now I just need to learn how to dump the results into a SQL database and it’s all set. Currently it just writes it to a html file. It has come in handy so far, but I think the true potential will be seen when I can query fields in a database. Also, that way, I can keep a record of all the machines better, since now if the machine is off, it is just skipped. With the database, I should be able to simply overwrite fields with newer info, instead of just overwriting everytime I run the script. Also, the one that checks server harddrive space and then email’s us when it gets too low is a time saver too.
Tonight I went climbing at the local gym, Vertical Plains, and there was a guy there that looked absolutely amazing on the wall. The way he flowed up, down, and around the wall was stunning. I think I’m making my new goal to try look as fluent on the wall as he was within a year. I think it’s possible, but I doubt he’s only been climbing for 2 years (as I would be come Nov. ‘04). It’s amazing how much I’ve progressed within the last year though. You don’t really notice it until you start thinking about it, and realize how hard the basic basic basic stuff was when you started. And now, I’m getting routes before some of the way more experienced climbers are. This year will definitely be the year I climb outdoors a lot, and learn how to do it myself. That way Colleen and I can head out, and not have to go with anyone else to setup the routes. Just need some more equipment, and I should be set.
For those of you that have never gone climbing, do it. It’s so much fun. Yes, it’s difficult at first because you’re not used to it, but if you go a second time, you’ll be amazed at how much easier it is. It’s great exercise, and the best part is, it doesn’t feel like exercise because it’s fun (unlike going to a gym). You should try it at least once.
**Currently Listening To: Dave Matthews – Some Devil (Limited Edition). Ummm…it’s more of Dave Matthews stuff. Sound almost the same as when he’s with the band, only there’s no good fiddle playing, etc, that accompanies the band. How can people pay > $50 to see him in concert for this? I just fail to understand it.
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Frozen Pipes
So, after looking at the time stamp above, you may be asking yourself if I’m still on vacation? Well, no, I’m not. I’m just not at work right now because maintenance is at our apartment fixing our frozen pipes. Needless to say, last night it got pretty chilly, and our pipes didn’t seem to take the weather too well. Thankfully they didn’t burst, but apparantly, where the pipes run is in the little room that can only be accessed outside (not part of our apt). Well, to no one’s surprise (well, at least not my own), this area isn’t heated, and therefore will be the same temperature as it is outside (it just blocks the wind effectively). And who would’ve thunk the pipes would’ve froze?! Apparantly they have insulated the crap out of these pipes, but the maintenance guy is sure that they must have missed someplace, since when we called the emergency number we were informed that this happens about every year. Now, you’d think that since this happens (almost) yearly, they’d let us know. At least have us run the water at night or something. Dammit, there I go making sense again.
There was something else I was gonna post on here, but for the life of me, I can’t remember. Well, off to find something to do while the hot water heater refills itself so I can take a shower.
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Bored at Work
Well, I’m bored at work. I really shouldn’t be updating my website from here, but I’m about ready to fall asleep anyways. Thankfully work has been slowing down somewhat. I’d like to think that it has something to do with me being here :), but I think it has more to do with it not being the beginning of the school year.
Today I started spending some of my tech budget. Bought 4 MCSE books to start my MS certification, along with a general Windows 2003 book. The people here at DS are all about furthering my education. The way I see it, the faster I get my basic certs, the faster I can do more fun things. Also work related, we’re supposed to join a Tech Team for whatever reason. I’ve joined the exchange team. Unfortunately right now, nobody else is in the group, but hopefully it will start rolling with exchange 2003.
In other news, I purchased a pair of Klipsch KLF-30’s for the stereo. It’s nice actually having speakers that compliment the receiver. I’m currently looking for a KLF C7, preferrably in Medium Oak for my center channel. If anybody stumbles across one, I’d be much abliged if you’d pass it onto me.