Diary of a Network Geek

Again…

It seems like every year there’s another nut who thinks the end of the world is near. C’mon, people! The early Christians thought the end was “near” back before the Roman Empire fell. Every generation has been “sure” that the end is near. So far, we still seem to keep on going. Now, it is possible that I’ve missed the rapture, but that seems unlikely. Unless, of course, the only people who are going to be saved that way were the truly pious who have never sinned. In that case, both of them might have gone missing and no one would have noticed.

On the other hand, Warren Zevon has turned out to be a bit of a prophet. In his song The Envoy, from his 1982 album by the same name, he sang:
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp Nuclear arms in the Middle East
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp Israel is attacking the Iraqis
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp The Syrians are mad at the Lebanese
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp And Baghdad does whatever she please
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp Looks like another threat to world peace
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp For the envoy

Pretty heavy, considering that we’ve been to war with Iraqi once since then, and we’re about to be at war with them again. I guess you just have to pick which nuts to listen to.

It’s law and it’s about time!

I read yesterday that President Bush finally approved the National “Do-Not-Call” Registry. Horay! No more damn telemarketers!
According to the FTC’s Website, the registry should be ready to sign consumers up as early as July. It will be available to businesses as soon as September. And, most importantly, enforcement of the $10,000 fine for violation will begin as early as October of this year! Yeah! Finally, some consumer protection with teeth! You rock George!

I can’t remember what the first thing is!

For the past week or so, I’ve come up with several ideas for blog entries and forgotten them before I could get to a web interface and make the actual entry! Just now I sat down to write an entry that I’d thought of yesterday and drew a complete blank. How terrible! I’m sure that it would have been enlightening and horribly important, too. No doubt it would have made comment on current events and Linux and Microsoft vs. Novell. Or, maybe it would have mentioned certification and Cisco. Or, possibly even debated the merits of the CNE vs. the MCSE vs. the CCNA.
Or, it could have been total dribble about how pretty my ponds are.
Who knows? Damn early senility. See what working in the IT industry does to you?!?

As proud a parent, or step-parent, can be!

My wife reported to me today that our daughter is a bit of a writer, which I knew. What I did not know, however, is that at least one of her teachers thinks she’s good enough to get published. Or have her work submitted to a contest. I wish I could claim that it was biological superiority that made her such a literary genius, but, alas, she is my step-daughter and I can make no such claim. However, it does give weight to the nurture-vs-nature argument. She has, after all, seen me working at the Craft for more than five years now. Surely, some of that must have rubbed off on her. I hope that the fact I don’t make a living at it has registered for her, too. And, all the network administration I’ve taught her. I hope she’ll learn something other than Novell, though, because it’s really become too much of a niche market.
In any case, I have all the tools to help her find the appropriate publication or contest to submit her work to, if she wishes. I will not push her to do so, only suggest. At the moment, she writes for her own pleasure and I’d hate to take that away from her, but I would be tickled if I can help her get published. That’s something that I have yet to do.
In the mean time, I’ll just be as proud as I can be of my daughter, the Writer.

Hey, I’m a Geek of the Week!

So, earlier this week, I was going through my web site stats and noticed that a particular domain name had referred a lot of traffic to my site. So, out of idle curiosity, I finally went to see what it was. Well, it seems that I’ve been “awarded” the Geek of the Week site for the week of 2-23-2003. That’s pretty cool!
Though, I have to admit, it would have been nicer if the guy had let me know. After all, I might have gotten a sudden flood of traffic and had problems. Luckily, since I’ve gotten a new web host, traffic isn’t a big problem.
Anyway, I thought it was cool and thought I should share.
We now return you to your regular web surfing!

Why is it okay to interrupt my lunch?

For pity’s sake, I’m a contractor. I’m on a clock. My lunch hour is my own time. And, yet, people seem okay with completely trodding all over that and shoving work on me durning my time. Why is that?
Yesterday, it was someone who insisted on talking to me about nothing after obviously interrupting my lunchtime reading. Well, not quite nothing, but something that sure wasn’t as important as my personal time!
Today, someone wanted a file restored, but had to stand and watch me select the damn thing. He couldn’t have sent me an e-mail with the file path. Or, actually put in a ticket in the Helpdesk app. Oh, no! That would require effort on their part. And, a certain amount of consideration for their co-workers, so that just won’t do.

Ah, well, I guess I’ll just have to start leaving the building at lunch, now that the weather has gotten better.

I built a server yesterday.

Well, in a way I did. I really imaged a server, from a Ghost disk image. But, it was a Windows 2000 server, so at least I can use it on my resume. And, it beats working with nothing but the Novell servers that my company is phasing out. Of course, they’re phasing them out very, very slowly, but still, they are going to eventually go away.
Really, that’s my only complaint about this job. Everything moves slowly. Absolutely everything. So, I’m still waiting to go full-time and get benefits. And, since I have about two months left on COBRA, and even after they hire me I have to wait 90 days for benefits to start, I’ll have to get some kind of health insurance. Right now, I’m looking at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas, but I may find some other options, too. Man, I hate dealing with all that mundane garbage.

Anyway, at least I’m working. And, two jobs, too!

What do those two things have to do with each other?

Nothing, really. Except, of course, that’s what I’ve been doing for the past week or so.
My pond is looking good now. A week or two ago, I thought it was leaking so bad that I’d have to replace the entire liner. Not so. In fact, the waterfall isn’t even really leaking. It had gotten so clogged with roots and mud from the papyrus the original owners had planted there that the water was just flowing out and under the liner! I spent a couple hours this weekend cleaning it out to the point that the water was flowing again and it seems fine now. Honestly, after getting into it, it’s a wonder I didn’t have problems sooner. For pity’s sake, it was so clogged with dirt that there were earthworms living in the waterfall!

And, I’ve started a little consulting work on the side. It’s just a couple of hours a month, and I’ve only been doing it about a month, but it’s nice to make some extra money. Last month, I billed out four hours and last night, I’ve already racked up four hours! But, I think that was a bit unusual. In any case, I’ve got a great contact there that’s really flexible on hours and all, so I’m able to do it after I’m done at my main gig. So far, so good. I’m just going to see how it goes and not put too much pressure on myself. I’ll evaluate how things are going at 6 months and decide if it’s worth continuing from there.

Stay tuned!