Finishing a cabinet; Ch-ch-ch-changes a’coming.

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Finishing the corner cabinet

Finishing the corner cabinet

 

I’m making progress, as you can see. This cabinet may be upstairs as early as Wednesday of the upcoming week. Depends if I can get enough coats of poly on the doors and shelves. Pictured above, I’m at the poly stage for the face and insides – the dark teal sides are already three coats and cured. After supper, I took those down, laid out the doors and shelves, and first-coated the backs. Tomorrow, a quick sanding and I’ll get the second coat on.

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While I am not going to have the liberty to host sites that aren’t mine, I’m migrating back to a personally administered system. $FIRM has graciously allowed me some bandwith, 1RU of rack space, and an old R410. I’ ve got Scientific Linux (the high-energy physics respin of RHEL) I’m doing this for reasons. REASONS, I tell you. Well, I’m not telling you, not now, anyway. There are likely to be format changes, too, though I’m going to maintain the blog format for convenience. But it may not be the front-line landing page anymore. What I do will be clear and documented, though.

This site is running from the new box, as are Daynotes.com and Daynotes.net. Speaking of the former, Daynotes.com is still “owned” by Tom Syroid. But since Tom appears to be staying offline, there’s no way to transfer ownership. If anyone wants to pick up the ball this year and give Network Solutions some money to renew Daynotes.com before the site expires in mid-September, that’d be awesome. You don’t need to have any formal access to renew (spend money) at NetSol, at least you didn’t last time I did it myself. I’ve renewed it several times personally, but it’d be nice if someone has found it useful steps up for a year or two. Let me know if you do, and you’ll get public thanks, here and elsewhere.

Depending on the gardening potential tomorrow, I’m going to try to get Marcia’s sites migrated to the new box before the new week gets rolling. Now to walk the mutt in between rain bursts and then do a bit of remote system administration for work. Ciao!

LOPSA-East #FTW

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I got back this morning at about 11:30 following a fantastic LOPSA-East conference. I entertained such subjects as Tom Limoncelli’s Evil Genius 101, Kyle Fulton’s Automation in the Cloud with Puppet, Shumon Huque’s Using and Migrating to IPv6, and Matt Simmons’s Intro to SSDs. The Friday night keynote was delivered by Marcus Ranum of varied and interesting fame – his talk was funny, accurate, and depressing as hell. Just sayin’.

The New Brunswick Hyatt is venue for the conference, and it was excellent. The food was superb (in general, not just in the context of a tech conference), and the training rooms were well equipped. The LOPSA organizers are all awesome. #HighFives, y’all.

The 325i was a fine place to spend a few hours in driving up on Thursday afternoon, and back this morning. Four hundred miles round trip, and I got over 37 MPG. Wow!

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

  • Staff Sgt. Michael H. Simpson, 30, of San Antonio, Texas, died May 1 in Landstuhl, Germany, of wounds sustained when insurgents attacked his unit on April 27, with an improvised explosive device in Arian, Afghanistan.
  • Spc. Trinidad Santiago Jr., 25, of San Diego, California, died May 2, in Camp Buehring, Kuwait, of injuries sustained in a vehicle accident.
  • Pfc. Charles P. McClure, 21, of Stratford, Oklahoma, died May 2, in Camp Buehring, Kuwait, of injuries sustained in a vehicle accident.
  • Capt. Mark T. Voss, 27, of Colorado Springs, Colorado, died May 3, near Chon-Aryk, Kyrgyzstan, in the crash of a KC-135 aircraft.
  • Capt. Victoria A. Pinckney, 27, of Palmdale, California, died May 3, near Chon-Aryk, Kyrgyzstan, in the crash of a KC-135 aircraft.
  • Tech Sgt. Herman Mackey III, 30, of Bakersfield, California, died May 3, near Chon-Aryk, Kyrgyzstan, in the crash of a KC-135 aircraft.

Paint It Black

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Well. not “black” as such, Rolling Stones songs notwithstanding. But I’ve managed to get finish (off-white, some walnut stain bodged onto the white for character, and dark teal) applied to all the bits of the cabinets. I’ve got a bit more “character” to apply to the face frames of the cabinets, then it’s time for polyurethane. Another few days at least…

It was a good five-day stint of woodworking and finishing, fun, really. I did take a break from that to shop, mow, and roast coffee (Nicaragua Finca Santa Helena Caturra, from Sweet Maria’s, of course) today, too.

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

Pfc. Barrett L. Austin, 20, of Easley, South Carolina, died April 21 in Landstuhl, Germany, of injuries sustained when his vehicle was attacked by an enemy improvised explosive device in Wardak Province, Afghanistan, April 17.

Capt. Aaron R. Blanchard, 32, of Selah, Washington, died April 23, in Pul-E-Alam, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered from enemy indirect fire.

1st Lt. Robert J. Hess, 26, of Fairfax, Virginia, died April 23, in Pul-E-Alam, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered from enemy indirect fire.

Capt. Brandon L. Cyr, 28, of Woodbridge, Virginia, died April 27, near Kandahar Airfield, Afghanistan, in the crash of an MC-12 aircraft.

Capt. Reid K. Nishizuka, 30, of Kailua, Hawaii, died April 27, near Kandahar Airfield, Afghanistan, in the crash of an MC-12 aircraft.

Staff Sgt. Richard A. Dickson, 24, of Rancho Cordova, California, died April 27, near Kandahar Airfield, Afghanistan, in the crash of an MC-12 aircraft.

Staff Sgt. Daniel N. Fannin, 30, of Morehead, Kentucky, died April 27, near Kandahar Airfield, Afghanistan, in the crash of an MC-12 aircraft.

Half-week Off

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I turned 10base52 (not 1, sigh) this week, on Wednesday. So I took that day, and the next two, off work so that I could spend some quality time in the woodshop. I finished building all of the cabinet doors and inter-shelving, installed the cabinet backs, and tested all the hardware:

Cabinet door fittings

Cabinet door fittings

Then I pulled, bagged, and labeled all the hardware, and started applying finish to the small pieces:

Finishing doors and shelves

Finishing doors and shelves

Today, those get a top-coat of polyurethane and a bit of distressing. And I’ll start applying finish to the cabinet carcasses. At least that’s the plan. But the yard needs some attention, too. Hmmm…

Spring games

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Friday night surrounded by wind and rain, we played Scrabble. Turns out that there is a body part you can use to not just win, but dominate in this game:

Winning at Scrabble takes balls.

Winning at Scrabble takes ______.

Fertilized and rained on, the lawns demand an aggressive mowing schedule. The good news is that following Friday’s storms, the temps were down significantly, making the yardwork a lot less sweaty. I also made progress on the cabinet building in the woodshop, fabricating the perforated screen door for the computer cabinet.

This metal screen cabinet door will aid in ventilation for the computers that will live in this cabinet.

Metal screen cabinet door

All of the components for the lower cabinet are now done. I need to build a couple of intermediate shelves for the upper, and three more doors. Then I can sand and finish that, taking another week or two. Next up, the cherry and maple desk.

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

Chief Warrant Officer Matthew P. Ruffner, 34, of Tafford, Pennsylvania, died April 9, in Pachir Wa Agam District, Nangarhar province, Afghanistan.

Chief Warrant Officer Jarett M. Yoder, 26, of Mohnton, Pennsylvania, died April 9, in Pachir Wa Agam District, Nangarhar province, Afghanistan.

Spring is exhausting…

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Last weekend, spring cleaning. This weekend, yardwork, all weekend long. The front is all pruned up, and first mowing of the year done. Looks pretty good (but the front fence needs a full redo). Today, I spent as much energy as I had (several hours worth) weeding out and tilling the garden beds in preparation for spring planting. In the evenings this week, I’ll get the rest of the back yard cleaned up, too. At least then I’ll have a starting point for the rest of the spring work.

Upcoming: This is going to be an expensive week, since a rock thrown a considerable distance by a truck cracked my windshield beyond the trivial repair stage. I’ve also got router bits to purchase for the cabinet work, and a bit more maple, too. Have to keep going on the office redo, or I’ll still be “working on it” months from now.

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

Staff Sgt. Christopher M. Ward, 24, of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, died April 6 in Kandahar, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked his unit in Zabul, Afghanistan with a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device.

Spc. Wilbel A. Robles-Santa, 25, of Juncos, Puerto Rico, died April 6 in Kandahar, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked his unit in Zabul, Afghanistan with a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device.

Spc. Delfin M. Santos Jr., 24, of San Jose, California, died April 6 in Kandahar, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked his unit in Zabul, Afghanistan with a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device.

Eeek! It’s Monday!

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The weekend was given over to spring cleaning, and moving bits of furniture about. I was in another world last night –  a world of pain. So sorry to have given the mostly-regular Sunday post a miss.

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Top Tech Tip – You should have on-premise Tier 1 timekeepers – NTP out in the world is a scary place (search on “ntp vulnerabilites” for more information). Used to be, you could either cobble something that worked out of an old bit of Garmin gear, or spent 2-3K$ on a “proper” rack-mounted GPS unit. It’s not good to have single points of failure, though, so either more cobbling, or more likely a second expensive bit of kit.

Now, though, there’s the Time Server, from Time Machines. When I say “now,” I’ve no idea how long these things have been on market. The Internet Archive first noticed this product in late 2011, so it’s been a year and a half, at least. The products are inexpensive, well built, and do precisely what is described. And at $600 for a pair of them, redundancy is a no brainer. Highly recommended.

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

  • Chief Warrant Officer Curtis S. Reagan, 43, of Summerville, South Carolina, died March 29 in Kandahar, Afghanistan, from a non-combat related illness.
  • Capt. James Michael Steel, 29, of Tampa, Florida, died April 3 in the crash of an F-16 near Bagram Airfield, Afghanistan.

Bunny Sunday

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Or, dare I say, hasenpfeffer? No, we didn’t have that for supper – the rabbits aren’t out and about yet as it’s been too bloody cold! I did nothing special in celebration of a mystical fiction. Instead, I continued to work on the RHCE material through the day.

This evening, we watched the new Doctor Who episode via DVR. The writing on that show remains so very sharp and smart.

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Our condolences to the family, friends, and unit of Sgt. Michael C. Cable, 26, of Philpot, Kentucky, who died on March 27 from injuries sustained when his unit was attacked by enemy forces in Shinwar District, Nangarhar Province, Afghanistan.

Change of Plans

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It’s a glorious Spring day out there. But I’m doing none of the things I should be doing on a day like this. I’m not out working in the yard, front or back. I’m not out playing, hiking, or whatevs. Instead, I’m doing quiet inside stuff.

I’ve been surrounded by people with varying degrees of razor throat (aka strep) for the last couple of weeks. Friday morning, I woke at 0300 with my throat starting to act up. I’ve also been battling a mild right ear infection for a couple of days. So, unusually for me, I bailed on work after a couple of hours yesterday morning, and went to the doctor’s office. They agreed that I needed a bit of help over this particular hump, and gave me a standard five day course of azithromycin. Also I got instructions to take it easy for a few days. Sigh. I’m staying out of the woodshop, and out of the yard.

So instead, I’m working on an RHCE course book and listening to prog rock. At the moment, the music is the 1991 Union Tour Live 1991 from Yes, and the RHCE topic is Kickstart files. The life of Reilly, this is mine. Heh, not!