53 posts tagged “omgwtfbbq”
People wonder why, by mid-December, I have no Christmas spirit. It’s ’cause the season is too long and too invasive.
This is becoming an annual post for me....
The guys who left their locks in spots on the bike rack are pretty obnoxious. At the end of the day, however, they claimed but two spots. I saw something worse today.
The rack is designed for bikes to be locked to it perpendicular to the rack itself. Here is my commuting rig locked up there this morning.
I suppose I could have parked in the front of the rack where the spots were (tires would only peek out a bit next to his bike), but it is awkward. I thought about leaving him a note, but, as I was the only bike there, I didn't want to attract too much attention to myself (especially since my name was is on my bike).
I've decided that, at lunch, if there are more bikes there, to put a note there.
Some people are just rude.
Below is the bike rack under my building. Since the rack has been there, some people have simply left their locks attached to the rack. I thought it a bit presumptuous, but most folks kept them in the big spaces, so it wasn't a big deal.
However, these two have put their locks through the narrow slot, where you slide your bike's wheel. No one else can put their bike in this slot. In effect, they reserved some of the slots for themselves. If they aren't there today, the spots are totally unavailable.
I'd leave them a note, but, at best, I suspect it would be ignored or put on passiveaggressivenotes.com.
I was issued a new laptop at work today. It is a Lenovo ThinkPad, which has immediately been nicknamed the BlinkPad. Like the handlebar tape earlier this week, it will clearly need some getting used to.
The keyboard is different than the old WorkTop, but that's typical of laptops in general. You get used to one layout, and it's hard when there is something new. It sounds different...louder. As I typed this, coworkers asked if I was angry.
The ports are in an odd place. The cables aren't quite long enough. It fits on my desk funny.
Don't get me wrong. The old WorkTop needed something--at the very least, a fresh OS load. My theory is that for truly personal systems, such as laptops (especially those running Windows), a fresh load every year or two is a must. So much junk gets added and removed, things get shut down improperly, etc, that a clean start is required.
The catch is that as of a few months ago, I would wind up getting Windows Vista.
The BlinkPad has Vista.
It is every bit as bad as they say. Every time I do something, such as install something, create a folder, or join a network, it asks me if I'm sure. If it was a quick dialog on critical things (like on OS X), it'd be OK. However, it is quite frequent (creating a folder?!?), and invasive. Instead of a quick dialog, the whole screen flashes like it is changing resolution, then, it greys out everything except a dialog. I click "OK" (yes, I want to create this folder), and the process reverses. Annoying.
The look is too cute, and you can't turn it off. OS X is cute, but subtly so. This is like "see, we can be fun too."
In any case, I'm stuck with this beast for a few years or I find a new job. So, let's welcome the BlinkPad.
And I'm even Microsoft certified.
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They are predicting a significant snow storm in Cincinnati for the next 24-36 hours. However, the forecaster's record of late has been...spotty. one local TV station has made this post to twitter:
Debating between "snowmageddon", "snowpocalypse" and "snowzkrieg" for next headline.
I suppose it's good they can laugh at it. I suspect that the actual event will be anticlimactic.
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I'm not sure what Journalspace is. It sounds as though they had their servers on a RAID 1 (mirrored) set. Somehow (possibly sabotage), one drive was erased. The mirroring mechanism (hardware or software) dutifully copied the change, wiping out the data.
Best Practice would be for the SysAdmins to mutter curses under their breath, then initiate a restore from a tape backup. You would lose everything since then ("Recovery Point Objective", in the jargon), but you'd have something.
I am inferring from the fact that they are saying this is no more, that they don't have backups.
Oops.
RAID is not, in and of itself, backup. It is designed to protect data in the event of a hard drive failure. It doesn't protect you from millions of other scenarios.
Backups are one of the things that makes IT hosting fairly expensive. This is why. It could cost you your business.
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Over the last ten years, however, they've gotten a bit beat up. Normal wear and tear, but some are better than others--or at least better for the user. It is quite accepted, in fact, to take your chair when you move from desk to desk. The Aeron is very adjustable, so if you have it all dialed in, it made sense. I probably had my chair for six or seven years.
That is, until Labor Day this year. We were allowed to watch the Riverfest fireworks from our balcony. I dig that--we get great views, but don't have to deal with the crowds (a bonus when you have a small child). The other people there borrowed chairs while waiting for the show to start. Mine was one that they grabbed.
They didn't return my guest chair. Not a big deal--they are all identical and not adjusted. However, they also failed to return my chair. I got an Aeron, but not the one I had. I've been looking for it, but haven't found it.
This one is not dialed in. Worse, some of the setting things don't hold. So, it is hard to get set. Uhg! The search for my original chair continues...
