Diary of a Network Geek

At least, if you're in Australia.

Actually, things are looking pretty good in Houston, too, though I can't vouch for the rest of the country. Things in Australia, though, seem to be especially good. I subscribe to a lot of news feeds via e-mail and I got one update from Australian IT that had two articles about how good things are for IT workers there right now.

First, there was Competition Gives Entrants Quick Ticket, about how there are so many IT jobs in Australia right now that they've got students getting out of school early to get really good jobs with less training than ever.
Then, there was an article titled Going Global In Search of Scarce Skills, about how there are so many open jobs in IT, and so few qualified workers, that they're bringing in foreign workers to fill those spots. So, if you're in IT and ever fancied working abroad, this might be your chance!

So, hey, there's never been a better time to be in IT!

You may have noticed a few very minor cosmetic changes.

That's because I upgraded the blog to the new version of WordPress Monday night.
I have to admit, I've been eager for the upgrade because I've been a little behind on that. With all the antispam plugins I was running, though, I never really had a security problem. I did have to fix a couple of plugins and replace one. You'll notice, for instance, that the titles are a bit different. That's due to a plugin not working with the new version and being replaced. Other changes are all behind the scenes, but involved editing other people's ancient, and no longer supported, plugins to work with the new version. The Time Of Day plugin, which shows you, roughly, what time of day I posted something, was one of those that I had to edit a bit.
Sadly, one very good plugin, Bad Behavior, just simply had to be turned off for now. I hope the author updates it soon for the new release of WordPress, because it's very, very good.

Now, I just have to update all my other blogs...

As if dreaming about my ex-wife weren't enough!

So, I'm glad that it's a new week, because last week was a little rough.
First, my car was in the shop, again, for mysterious electrical problems that the mechanic never could find. Sadly, even though he only charged me for the tow, I still paid almost five hundred dollars for a week's rental on a car.
Then, Tuesday, my cell phone falls in the toilet and shorts out. So, I go get a cell phone "upgrade" that I'm due and end up spending yet another hundred seventy-five dollars I don't have. Oh, and during that whole process, I discover that not only have I lost most of my saved data from the address book, but my old backup software won't work with the new phone, so I can't get the data back easily.
But, wait! There's more!
It turns out that my new phone is defective and ninety percent of the keys don't work, which means I have to go back and get my new phone replaced. But, before I can do that on Thursday, I discover that I've been fined one-hundred thirty dollars because my lawn trash was out a day early. Perfect!
I know, you're asking yourself what else could go wrong, right? Well, Friday morning, my car won't start. Again.

Well, I think the second mechanic has finally found the problem and sorted it out. And, just to keep things in perspective, at least I don't have cancer.

I dreamt of Nerf machine guns last night.

I had some truly strange and disturbing dreams this weekend. Last night, I was dreaming of the Nerf machine gun that I wrote about here. I think that was in part due to all the time I've spent recently looking at the DragonCon Flickr Pool. It's filled with pictures of really cool costumes.  You may have to dig in a little deep to find them, but there are tones of pictures of storm troopers and HALO soldiers.  Very, very cool.  But, it's really gotten my imagination going about costumes and creating them and making Nerf guns into something for costumes.  So, see, it's actually kind of logical.

What's harder to explain is the dream I had about my ex-wife.
I dreamt that my ex-wife had screwed up her fourth, and current, marriage and was moving back to Houston and, for some extremely strange reason, had called me on the phone.  I don't know why, or what we had been talking about, but I was making sympathetic noises, giving her a full share of pity for how she'd screwed up her life more and worse.  I don't recall offering to help, or even wanting her anywhere near me, but, somehow, I still felt sympathetic to her for being in a place of personal pain.  It didn't matter why, really, or who she'd been to me, but I felt a certain amount of sympathy for her position of having nothing and no one.  Just as one human being to another.
I found the whole thing profoundly disturbing.  I mean, I really can't think of anything worse than having her back in Houston, much less calling me on the phone.

After telling a friend about it, he offered that maybe it was just a sign that I'd moved to an emotional place where I could forgive her, in some way, for what happened and how she handled it.  I'd like to think so, but I suspect that it's something even simpler than that.  I'm just lonely for that "special someone" in my life and, in some sick, strange way, she represents marriage or married life to me.
Of course, that might also explain why I'm not even actively looking for anyone.  I mean, with a marriage like that, who needs cancer?

Eh, who knows.  Maybe it doesn't mean anything.  Maybe they were both just random firing of neurons.  Just dreams.

I love free.

One of the things people don't talk about when you're going through an extended medical illness is how to pay for what's not covered afterward. I'm working through that, and doing my best to work toward being debt free. And, in thinking about that, it brought to mind all the free things I can get on the web. The software I run this blog, and others, with is free, for instance. A little searching around can turn up all kinds of free things.

While doing a little search, I found three lists of free resources over at Lorelle on Wordpress.
Designing a Rainbow - free resources for color and design.
Blogging Tips - Hundreds of free resources for finding content for your blog.
and HTML, CSS, PHP, and More free cheatsheets

All three are lists of great resources for your website or blog. If you can't find something useful in at least one of them, you're not trying!

Not sure if this is "good" advice or not, but I've certainly found it to be true.

The other night I was flipping through channels and, as I buzzed past either Sundance or IFC, I saw one of the two oldest Marsalis brothers doling out some advice that was given to him by an older Jazz musician. I came in after the interview had started, so I don't know if it was Wynton or Branford, nor do I know who gave him the advice, but it was significant enough to make me think.

He said, basically, don't have anything to fall back on.
When someone starts on a path of professional creativity, whether it be musical or otherwise, we're told that we need to do something else, too, so that we "have something to fall back on". But, here's the thing. If you have something to fall back on, then you do, and never truly give everything to that creative endeavor. I know that's been true for me. I used to write all the time, but, then I got involved in my career and started spending more and more time on that. It's not a bad thing, as I do fairly well, but the IT stuff is what I do, not the writing. I never really succeeded at writing because, well, I never had to succeed at writing. I had something to fall back on.

So, whatever it is that you want to do, do that. It's the only way.

So, you want to build your own Linux server for home?

Okay, you've seen me write about it and many of you think it's too geeky to do on your own, but I swear to you, it's not. In fact, here is a list of easy howto sites:

Who needs Windows Home Server with Linux around?
Linux Home Server HowTo at LinuxQuestions.org
Build It: Linux Home Server
The Australian Linux HowTo

And maybe, just maybe, when I finally get around to doing this on my home network, I'll write up some documentation on how to do it. Or, at least, how I did it.

Wow, that's two in the space of a week.

They say that famous people die in threes.  Last week it was Gary Gygax.  Today, it was Arthur C. Clarke.   He was a great man who predicted the communications satellite, among other things, though he's probably best known for writing 2001:A Space Odyssey.  He wrote more books and stories than I can think of and continued to influence the science-fiction world right up until the end.

Locus Magazine has a more detailed biography.

Okay, so I had the appointment with my oncologist yesterday to get the results of my CT scan, instead of Thursday, like I originally thought I would.

The news is good.  I am still cancer free.  What's more surprising is that the scar tissue left behind in my lung after chemotherapy has shrunk even more!  In just a little over three months, it went from being a 2.8 x 4.0 cm mass, to being 1.8 x 3.7 cm. My blood work showed me as being mostly normal, a fact which may surprise many of you, though I'm still a little on the anemic side. And, the scan showed a small kidney stone, too, so the doctor reminded me to drink lots of water.

Other than that, though, everything is going well, medically at least. And I'll have another scan in about three months.
I'll keep you all posted!

Yummy noodles!

So, Thursday, after skipping lunch due to the indigestion that I always get from the barium, I thought I'd treat myself with something fast, easy, and that I didn't have to really think about. But, frankly, ramen noodles just weren't going to cut it, so, instead, I made Peanut Noodles from A Taste of Thai. These guys have been around for quite some time, but their "quick meals" are something new and they're damn good.

At least, the Peanut Noodles I had Thursday were fabulous. Under other circumstances, I'd probably add meat of some kind, and I suppose that vegans could add nice, firm tofu, but I was in a hurry, and my stomach wasn't quite up to anything too fancy. Besides, I'm not a giant fan of tofu.
The package is also the microwave-safe container to cook the noodles in, so there's no need to dirty a dish. And, in four minutes, plus a little time to stir and add a light dusting of peanuts, you can have what is, in my personal estimation, the peak of Southeast Asian cuisine, noodles with Thai peanut sauce.

Now, I found mine in the ethnic food aisle at my regular Kroger, but you can hit their website to find the store closest to you, if you want to try this almost instant culinary delight for yourself.

Oh, and my appointment to get the results got moved from Thursday to Monday, so I'll find out what all the radioactive isotopes and gastrointestinal distress have told the doctors about my lymphoma.  Or, hopefully, my lack of lymphoma.