The Time Sink

The holiday weekend has come and gone; I've completed a few projects and deferred others; we had some busy times and we had some down time; I've been up late and I've napped all day (or so it seemed); books were finished and new ones were started; homework was non-existent (or so we were told <g>)...

Sheesh. ...and just when I'm thinking about trying another distro: the Linux box seems to have had a rather nasty hard drive crash. I spent most of the evening after homework fscking the darned thing (no, that's not what you're thinking for the non-geeks; and yes, it worked okay for the geeks). At this point X is hosed completely, but it looks like I should be able to get in and do some CLI work. Right now all I care about is /home so I can pull the files; and I'm pretty sure my Kmail archives I pull once a week are on that partition. As to Evolution, the last time I looked you couldn't even export contacts or email so that may be a lost cause.

...and the rest of the night was/is spent downloading a distro or two to play with, including at least one "Live" version that should be able to give me a good view of the errant drive. ...and if memory serves, there should be a second spindle I can move things to for safekeeping. Hmmm... This BitTorrent thing appears to be kinda' cool too; I was going to play with it on the Linux box, but I have two different clients running on two Win2k boxes and it seems to be working okay. I mean, like, well, one's downloading a DVD ISO with both a Live and a standard distro of Ubuntu while the other is just working it's way through a standard ISO image for Linspire. Both are looking to be done in the morning.

This evening was devoted to kids and their stuff: we hauled Brad over to volleyball tryouts for a competive league to see what would happen there and then came home late and did homework with both boys.

...and on the weather front, it is so nice to be able to walk outside and feel the pronounced coolness in the afternoons! It's only after you've been out for a bit or look at a thermometer that you realize it's still in the nineties. ...but the change from the 100+ we've had for so long is just amazing.

Here's some background on the hurricane aid/relief links I have up on the blog:

This one is to the Mercy Corps donations page; Alwin pointed me their way a disaster or two ago and I've been satisfied with their service and accounting practices. ...and as a side note, an acquaintance of our family ran across some of their people in Thailand and had good things to say about them. This is one of the few 'national' organizations I'm donating to or giving coverage to...

This one is the brainchild of Miz Jett. ...and yes, it is a local response; but as has been pointed out many places, this event is showing the need to put the 'civilian' back in "Civil Defense". If you'd like more of an explanation of that concept drop by Gordon's place and see how they are handling it. Think globally, act locally...

This one is best explained by the lady: "i am not a qualified medical or military professional, just an ordinary person, an artist. this is the only way i know how to help. " A donation to her place gets passed on to Habitat for Humanity (yep, the same 'tGaL' theme). ...but the bonus here is that you get a nice piece of New Orleans-focused art. (Yes, you've seen some of her stuff hanging in my office).

Someone has to try to deal with the animals; these people have a decent track record. They've also supplied teams to the area to assist with the search and rescue efforts.

It's been a week, albeit a short one (but sometimes those are soooo not your friend), and it's time to wind it down a notch or two. Thing is, Brad and I are planning on entering some photos in the local Fair and I'm behind on my selection process...

Okay! Well, I won't say today evolved as much a 'catch-up day', but we did get a few things done, the main one being Brad and me getting our admission forms into the Fair office. ...and we have which shots we'd like to use more or less chosen (admission only required a title). Now to print them, mount them and get them ready to deliver next week.

...and the weather has taken a rather quick and long overdue change; we didn't hit the nineties today for the for the first time since Spring. Yep, 101 to the mid-nineties and now the high eighties in about ten days. We'll take it!

Click image for larger version

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is
indistinguishable from magic."
Arthur C. Clarke, "Technology and the Future"

    Thanks for visiting!  
All content Copyright 1999->2005 Daniel C. Bowman. Most rights reserved.