The Daily Diversion Archive For May, 2003

Friday May 9, 2003

I'm going to take a few days off. Not like I've not taken the whole month off so far, but I'm going to put my heels up for a few more days.

I've been hugely busy at work and here at home as well. I hope to be back at full steam late next week.

Wednesday May 21, 2003

Happy Birthday to Katie!

So I did go on vacation. Sarah and I went north up to the North Shore to Lutzen. We rented a "condominium" thing and hung out for a couple of nights near the mouth of the Poplar River. It was pretty relaxing. We took in Grand Marais, where the Angry Trout earned it's good recommendation. We also found we were too early for the national monument at Grand Portage. We were also too early for a few other things as well.

We did go and hike the Temperance River. That was BIG fun. Split Rock Lighthouse was also fun, however this was one of the places we were too early for. The visitors' center and the lighthouse itself were closed for renovation and weren't to open for another couple of weeks.

We saw the Frank Lloyd Wright gas station in Cloquet and generally drove around and had fun for 3 long days.

When we came back, it was time for both Sarah and I to get another year older. We have birthdays on consecutive days and we celebrated in style. Well, perhaps not in "style," more like we laid around the house and tried not to do much of anything. For our birthdays, we both got iPods. Sarah got a Mac version one and I got a Windows version one. My brother-in-law got a very nice price on both of them and I couldn't pass them up. I must say that it is a VERY nice piece of equipment. I love it and I can't imagine life without it. Funny that something so frivolous can become so essential so quickly.

I got the laptop to work as the mp3 server for our stereo upstairs. It works using the remote desktop feature of Windows XP. My old laptop is more than up to the challenge of serving skipless mp3 files to the server. One of the best parts of this little geek-out is that there's a remote desktop client for Mac OSX. This means Sarah can utilize the remote control stereo just like I can. That's what it's all about.

I also have a new machine brewing down in the server room. The dual Pentium Pro server is gone--sold to a fellow FreeBSD user. Replacing it will be a different machine--one still based on the venerable PPro, but this time it may have more than just two processors. Stay tuned.

On a completely different and completely less enjoyable front, the Sable Wagon has ridden off into the sunset for us. I was on my way home last night and the transmission totally croaked. There's no use fixing it as if I did, I'd still have a 12 year old car with no air conditioning. That's all she wrote. I guess I'm not terribly upset about it. Sure, it sucks ass not having a decent car for a while, but I no longer have to treat it with kid gloves. If I drove that car like I usually drive, it wouldn't have lasted 5 months. As it was, it almost made it a year. I guess that is about right for a car that cost a grand, but what hurts is that we just dropped about six bills on repairs to keep it running. Had I known it was about to cack, I'd have just parked it.

The next car may well be a wagon, but it WILL have air conditioning. It will probably have an automatic tranny although I'm a bit gun-shy about THAT particular topic right now. I HATE slushboxes with a passion, but I must say that an clutch in stop and go traffic can really suck.

So anyway, I was on the way home and just as I was pulling away from a stop light, simultaneously the car when THUD, my cell phone rang and the asshole behind me started laying on the horn. It was my wife on the phone, calling in from out of town and she got to hear me cuss and swear at the car. I waved Mr. Asshole around the car and fortunately for me the car rolled through the intersection.

I talked to Sarah for a bit and rang off. I was three blocks from the house. It was all up hill except for the last 100' or so. Not really steeply uphill, mind you, but up hill gradually the whole way. The car was still running fine, it just had a gearbox full of neutrals. I figured pushing the car home solo would suck ass, but I couldn't think of anyone around at the time to come bail me out. It was only 3 blocks. Why the hell not?

Well, it sucked just exactly as bad as I thought it would. Actually, it super-sucked my expectations. On the way up Johnson Parkway, a kind person in an old Isuzu Trooper stopped and offered to help out, but I had to send her on her way as her bumper's bottom was right about where the top of mine started. I don't know why I didn't want the ass-end of my car to get munged up, but I guess I didn't want her to feel bad about damaging my car if it did happen. She left and I kept pushing.

The rest of the way up the Parkway was really tough. I stopped to catch my breath twice before turning left. I had to wait a while for my wind to return, and once it did, I had to wait until traffic cleared to push it through the left turn. The turn happened without event and I stopped again to rest as the whole turn was uphill. The way down 4th was no party as well as it's kinda pitted and bumpy. There was also a ton of cars and it has an even steeper pitch in places than Johnson. I had to stop 3 times on 4th. Just before I hit the stop sign and the crest of the hill, a nice fella pulled up and gave me a hand pushing it the rest of the way. Many thanks to you, Sir. By the time I got the Sable in front of the house, I was totally winded. I felt like I was going to puke and it was hard to lift my legs to walk. I staggered inside to a very worried dog. It took a full half-hour, a can of sugary pop and nearly a liter of water to make me feel remotely human. I won't say that I was out of shape, I'll just say this. Be my guest and push a ton and a half car 3 blocks uphill and see how you feel.

To add insult to injury, I get home today and the city has plastered the street with no parking signs. I said shit. I said fuck. I called my buddy Joe and he brought over some rope and we towed the stricken Sable around the block to the alley and to our back gate and driveway beyond. So there it sits. And sit it will until I figure out what to do with it.

Thursday May 29, 2003

I bought a car on Tuesday night. It's a '98 Nissan Maxima SE. It's a very nice car about which I'll proably bore you all to death in the coming months. You've been warned.

The Windows Terminal Services Client app really rocks. I like it.

The Sable is still waiting on its great reward. I'm hoping I can get it taken care of before the end of next week. I really need the space.

I need the space because they're tearing up our street this summer. Yes, we're being assessed out the butt for a bunch of stuff, but we're also taking this opportunity to get copper water pipes installed and that's not a bad thing at all, is it?

The Twins are on a mad tear and have gone 3+ up on the Royals in the AL Central. Look for them to extend their lead and be nearly out of reach to any other team in the Central by the All-Star break. You heard it here first.