Orb Designs

  • Whoops…

    Frankly, I don’t know what happened on Sunday. It wasn’t a particularly stressful day, I got some stuff done, but not much. Not much at all since I managed also to forget to post, and continue forgetting until Marcia reminded me just now. What’s been going on? Today:

    Yeah, more snow
    Yeah, more snow

    You wouldn’t guess it was Spring already, eh? In other news, I’ve been a much better boy when it comes to sticking to the exercise routine this year. I picked up in earnest in early February and have been improving as I went along. Today, along with sit-ups and a few push-ups, I managed this on the elliptical:

    Today's elliptical workout - 845 calories & 5000 "strides"
    Today’s elliptical workout

    So I’ve got that going for me.

    *      *      *

    Good news, no new casualties reported by DoD (none announced since March 3). Ciao!

  • Dreaming of a White St. Paddy’s Day

    Echoes of Bing Crosby chasing around my head as I look outside:

    House in gray and white
    House in gray and white
    Very pretty, though
    Very pretty, though

    A downside is that there’s a couple more inches of the stuff headed our way, so I’ll be waiting to clear the driveway and sidewalks until mid-afternoon. And I’ll just have to assume that the snow peas are happy as clams in a snow-covered planting bed.

    *      *      *

    Here’s the laptop pedestal I built and finished over the weekend. It’s designed to sit on top of a regular desk, to be a stylish standing desktop for laptop and mouse. It can also move down to floor level, and be a foot-rest or stool. But mostly it’s a standing desk. Someone I know needs this (not me!)…

    Standing desk
    Standing desk

     

  • Mo’ Snow

    It has started snowing again, and is supposed to throughout St. Patrick’s Day. Weird, eh? Lexi is gonna be cranky when all of her spots are covered up with snow, again!

    No real other news, I’ve had a busy weekend and gotten lots accomplished, from shopping and haircut to coffee roasting and building a small woodshop project for a coworker. Oh, yeah, and patched some Solaris boxen, and … well, you get the idea. Sleep is for the weak.

    *      *      *

    No casualties were announced by DoD in the last week.

     

  • Sun Dog

    Lexi says that “I’m a  sundog, and you’d better not make any shade.”

    Sun Dog
    Sun Dog

  • Time Bandits

    They’ve been, and gone, and an hour of my life has been stolen from me. Worse yet, I had patching duties this morning early, and the vague worry about over-sleeping meant I actually slept very little. Sigh.

    However, it was seasonably warm here this weekend: mid-50’s yesterday, high 40’s today, so I wore shorts all weekend, yay! Walking the dog past shrinking piles of snow while wearing shorts made me unreasonably happy. I also made an early start in the garden: I turned over one bed, and planted snow peas. Just in time for possibly more snow, Wednesday night into Thursday. Sigh.

    Speaking of that, the Tuesday morning following last Monday’s Snow Day it got down to a brisk 0°F by the time I was driving into work, at about 0630. Wowser! New low records set all over the place in MD. Saves shaving though, I just wander around outside for a bit, then break the whiskers off flush with the skin. Sigh.

    *      *      *

    Our condolences to the families, friends, and units of these fallen warriors:

    • Lance Cpl. Caleb L. Erickson, 20, of Waseca, Minnesota, died Feb. 28, while conducting combat operations in Helmand province, Afghanistan.
    • Master Sgt. David L. Poirier, 52, of North Smithfield, Rhode Island, died Feb. 28, from a non-combat related incident.

  • Pictures or It Didn’t Happen

    Some of you may not have heard Amanda Palmer and the Grand Theft Orchestra singing Pictures (or It Didn’t Happen), off of the most excellent and awesome album, Theatre is Evil. I will say that, although I love this song, it isn’t my favorite song off the album. But the song is appropriate for this post…

    Bowie Snow Day, 3 March 2014
    Bowie Snow Day, 3 March 2014

    So I got the first coat of spar urethane onto the birdhouse this morning:

    Birdhouse in progress
    Birdhouse in progress

    And Lexi continues to relax in one of her accustomed spots. I think that she’s waiting for sun that isn’t going to appear today:

    Lexi relaxing
    Lexi relaxing

    The snow continues to fall, we’re up to about two inches so far, atop a layer of sleet and ice. So, overall I think a good call to make it a snow day. It’s supposed to drop to the single digits tonight, yay?

  • OMG Moar Wintar!!

    There’s a bit of rain on the ground … about a tenth of an inch since noon. The temperatures are in the mid-to-high 30’s (F). So of course OPM has already called it for tomorrow: CLOSED. Now, depending on how reliable you regard our weather forecasting establishment to be, that might be a good move. Others believe, too: BJs was crowded early this morning, when I was there for the weekly shopping. Evidently, for some folks, a winter storm is actually Ragnarok.

    I did a lot of small projects this weekend, and I’ve spent some time diving into Ansible as an alternative to Puppet for systems configuration management. It looks interesting, and a lot less programmatic in implementation. I don’t know quite enough about either to make an informed choice, yet. But soon, soon.

    I also built a birdhouse for the backyard, out of shop scraps. I’ve applied some walnut stain to most of the outer surfaces. I’m going to get a bit of white paint on the roof, then apply spar urethane over the whole project. I’ll put it out in a couple of weeks (and a picture of it up, at that time).

    Oh, hey. One of the people I follow on Twitter noted that they weren’t watching the Academy Awards. Those are on? Um, okay. Break a leg, film people.

    *      *      *

    DoD announced no new casualties in this last week, yay! Ciao!

  • Yardwork … errrr, Spring almost upon us.

    I withstood the temptation to wash cars this weekend, which was difficult, because the weather was glorious. About 60° F both days. We did open up the house both days and get some fresh air in, which was very nice indeed. But the highs are dropping back down into the 30’s, with chances of snow a couple of days this upcoming week. So I’ll just wait. Soon it’ll be time for washing of cars and yardwork … but not just yet.

    Today, I was going to cut my hair and bathe the dog this afternoon (shopping and work this morning), but instead ran Marcia over to G Street Fabrics in Rockville, to get us a little time out of the house. Pretty day for a drive.

    *      *      *

    Instead, I am dealing with my second SSD failure in a year. An old Crucial M4 gave up the ghost last year, and yesterday my Windows box failed to boot to the Samsung 840 I had installed there. No data lost, I have good backups, but it’s still a pain in the ass. To replace it, I’ve ordered on of the Seagate “hybrid” hard drives. I’ve not tried one of those, and I’d like to see how good they are. I’ll still probably end up with another SSD in this system, but not just yet.

    *      *      *

    Our condolences to the family and friends of Master Sgt. Aaron C. Torian, 36, of Paducah, Kentucky, who died Feb. 15 while conducting combat operations in Helmand Province, Afghanistan.

  • Sigh.

    TIME sends a notice "for senior citizens only"
    suck it, TIME

  • Happy Birthday, Baby

    Not puttin’ you in a corner, never fear. Yeah, my lovely had a nice birthday yesterday. She enjoyed a Downton Abby marathon, and we went out to supper with two other couples, each with a birthday celebration going in this week(end?). Good meal at Four Seasons Grille in Gambrills, just up the slightly frozen road from us a double handful of miles.

    Not much else to report. I should do taxes tomorrow, which is bound to be a cheerless and disappointing task. Why tomorrow? So that I can shell out some more dead Presidents to fund the current President’s predilection for non-legislative action. Sigh.

    *      *      *

    Our condolences to the families, friends, and units of these fallen warriors:

    • Pfc. Joshua A. Gray, 21, of Van Lear, Kentucky, died Feb. 10, in Bagram Airfield, Afghanistan, from a non-combat related incident.
    • Spc. Christopher A. Landis, 27, of Independence, Kentucky, died Feb. 10, on Bagram Airfield, Afghanistan, from wounds received when the enemy attacked his dismounted patrol with a rocket propelled grenade in Kapisa Province, Afghanistan.
    • Spc. John A. Pelham, 22, of Portland, Oregon, died Feb. 12, in Kapisa Province, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when he was struck by enemy small arms fire.
    • Sgt. First Class Roberto C. Skelt, 41, of York, Florida, died Feb. 12, in Kapisa Province, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when he was struck by enemy small arms fire.