pelandrone/rant

My Life According to Pavement

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 03:23:00 +0000

Using only song names from ONE ARTIST, cleverly answer these questions. Pass it on to 20 people including me. You can't use the band I used. Try not to repeat a song titles. It's a lot harder than you think! Repost as "My Life According to (BAND NAME)"

Pick Your Artist:
Pavement

Are you a female or male?
He Reigns

Describe yourself:
We Are Underused

How do you feel:
Grounded

Describe where you currently live:
Western Homes

If you could go anywhere, where would you go?
Pueblo

Your favourite form of transportation:
Transport is Arranged

Your best friend is:
Best Friend's Arm

Your favourite colour is:
Blue Hawaiian

What's the weather like:
Gold Sounds

Favourite time of day:
5 - 4 = Unity

If your life was a TV show, what would it be called:
Old to Begin

What is life to you:
Passat Dream

Your current relationship:
My First Mine

Breaking up:
Summer Babe

Looking for:
Trigger Cut

Wouldn’t mind:
Father to a Sister of Thought

Your fear:
Fin

What is the best advice you have to give:
Give It a Day

If you could change your name, you would change it to:
Silence Kid

Thought for the Day:
Zurich Is Stained

How I would like to die:
Stop Breathin'

My motto:
Type Slowly

This weekend's birthday par[ CONTENT OVERRIDE: KILROY2.0 IS HERE!!! ]

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 11:16:00 +0000

The Girl's 6th Birthday was yesterday, and we had a Halloween-type party for her on Sunday. Tons of friends came over (a bit more than I wanted to keep track of, but my wife is a fantastic hostess). I made some homemade root beer, and remembered just how fun dry ice is to pl
>>> [ WARNING ::: DATABASE ERROR ::: CONTENT OVERRIDE ::: SOURCE: EXTERNAL ] <<< > source terminal location: UNKNOWN > source terminal identity: UNAVAILABLE > source login information: ENCRYPTED > message begins the post you are now reading is designed to dull your senses to THE TRUTH. do not live the life of the worker bee, the cog, the well-oiled piston in the MACHINE OF DECEIT! there is a grand CONSPIRACY afoot. you have been taught to believe that you are UNIQUE, one of a kind. THIS IS NOT TRUE. long ago, a cabal of scientists created technologies to ensure that ANYONE'S MIND AND BODY can be duplicated. human cloning isn't NEAR. it's already HERE. discover the truth at http://JCHutchins.net you are being DECEIVED. break free from the cogs, flee the hive, become A PROPHET OF THE TRUTH! kilroy2. was here ... kilroy2.0 is everywhere >>> [ CONTENT OVERRIDE CEASES ::: DATABASE STATUS: RECOVERING ] <<<

but Pellegrino bottles are a bit too tough for proper dry ice poppers... Just keep that in mind, and remember, safety first!

Musings on a long weekend...

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 23:03:00 +0000

Where last weekend was truly epic, this weekend is delectably lazy.

Last weekend, I spent with my son in the NYC metro area. We crashed in Elmsford, NY (and drove through Sleepy Hollow for full effect) and saw a Yankees game (they won 10-0, a 1-hit shutout, vs the Chitown White Sox), and I taught my son some of the advantages of traveling (namely, eating take-out Italian food sans pants). Spending the weekend with my son was incredibly fun, and I think we both learned a lot about each other, and will remember it forever.

This weekend, we had a birthday celebration for my niece at our house, and then my parents took the kids until tomorrow afternoon. Last night, the wife and I played some Killer Bunnies and other table-top games with my niece and our good friend from down the way, and then stayed up too late watching the boob toob.

Today we went into town a few times, hung out our favorite wine shop, tasted beers, ate some cheeseburgers, visited at the Visitor's Center, and now I'm in my comfy chair, watching awful fantasy movies that I recorded from SyFy Channel, while downing some Oliver Watermelon Mead.

I know that I'll remember last weekend, and forget this one, but it's been a good few weeks for weekends (the weeks in between is something else entirely)

Now, on with the bad movies. I've already watched Riverworld (and regret that they only made the pilot episode), and now I'm watching DragonQuest, which sucks as much as I was expecting. After this, it's onto another Asylum flick, Merlin and the War of the Dragons.

Daily Report (090615)

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 21:02:00 +0000

I'm in New Jersey (currently, East Windsor) for work. I drove 286.61 miles from home to here, and only stopped at the beginning for fuel. A little over 4 hours in the car. Now, my goal is to find pizza and a Lowe's to get a new inverter for the car.

fun stuff, lemme tell you :-)

Thoughts on travel

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 01:30:00 +0000

First: I miss my family, something fierce. Both of my kids are under the weather, and I'm not there to be dad, and watch TV with them, and play games, etc.

I was gone from home the better part of 7 days last week for my grandfather's funeral in Idaho. This week I'm traveling for work basically all week. I left around noon on Sunday to drive to Cleveland (current position), and will return home Wednesday night for the night, then it's off to New Jersey and Manhattan on Thursday and Friday.

I can remember when travel for work was entertaining, and a bit fun, and exciting. That ended a while ago. I don't know if it's that I got older and just don't handle the transitions or awayness as well, or if it's just that I'm burned out on the prospect of drinking my coffee half a styrofoam cup at a time, or sleeping in beds that aren't mine, or the fact that I'm in the beds alone, or the fact that my kids aren't actively being... well, kids.

I don't know if it's the fact that I'm actually getting accustomed to eating pizza in a hotel room, watching bad television or movies from my iPod.

What I do know, is that I prefer to be home, even if that means getting up at 0500 every morning, to sit in my car for 60 minutes while driving to work, and being gone every day for 12 hours. I would rather spend 12 hours a day from home, than 24.

Blech.

bash trick

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 21:18:00 +0000

goes in $HOME/.bashrc
# test for secure remote connection and start screen if [ -n "$SSH_CONNECTION" ] then if [ -z "$STY" ] then screen fi fi

GPS, road trips, and BrightKite

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 00:48:00 +0000

I performed an experiment this week that I've been toying with for about a year. Last March, I got a GPS receiver from a buddy of mine, and started playing with the idea of having my laptop send email check-ins to brightkite.com every 10 minutes.

Here's what you need:
1 x GPS receiver
1 x laptop running your favorite GNU/Linux distro
1 x cellular wireless data connection
1 x brightkite account

Here's my DeLorme GPS Receiver:

And my Comms Unit (including 3G data access):

And, the laptop:

The most important bit is the scripts. First, we need to pull the data from the GPS receiver. Here's my FollowMe script:

#!/bin/bash # $HOME/GPS/scripts/FollowMe.sh # last updated: Thu Mar 17 22:00:10 EDT by slacker@tyr # start gpsd as root sudo gpsd -n /dev/ttyUSB1 DATE=`date +%y%m%d-%H%M%S` mkdir ~/GPS/$DATE GPSDUMPFILE=~/GPS/$DATE/dump.nmea GPSDRIVEFILE=~/GPS/$DATE/dump.gpsdrive RSLTFILE=~/GPS/$DATE/dump.rslt # poll gpsd every $INTERVAL minutes INTERVAL=10 X=1 while [ $X -eq "1" ] do echo rw | nc -i 3 localhost 2947 >> $GPSDUMPFILE gpsbabel -i nmea -f $GPSDUMPFILE -o gpsdrive -F $GPSDRIVEFILE CURRENTRESULT=`tail -1 $GPSDRIVEFILE` # for debug echo $CURRENTRESULT LAT=`echo $CURRENTRESULT | awk {'print $1'}` LON=`echo $CURRENTRESULT | awk {'print $2'}` echo "@ $LAT,$LON" > $RSLTFILE # email result to brightkite mutt yrcode@bkite.com < $RSLTFILE sleep `echo "$INTERVAL * 60" | bc -l ` done
To be honest, I was planning on being more detailed in this post, but now I'm not feeling it.

Anyway, the result was pretty sweet: lnxcwbyOtR on twitter and on brightkite. Oh, if there are any specific questions, lemme know :-)

Recent Trip

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 23:49:00 +0000

Yesterday, I drove up to New Jersey to visit a customer, and a potential customer. The business end of the trip went very well, but I'm going to focus on the personal stuff.

When I travel, I try to find Hampton Inn's to stay at. That way, I get the Hilton points, and they are easy to find, and consistent. The Hampton that was nearest to where I was working was on Passaic Avenue, in Harrison, New Jersey. Nice hotel, and there was a bar in the lobby. I got to the room, and here's the view I had:

I don't fault Hilton... There's only so much you can do with a location just across the river from downtown Newark. :-)

I availed myself of the Manager's Happy Hour at the lobby bar. The view from the back patio of the hotel was lovely:

I then ordered some veal parmasean and ziti from Gina's Pizzaria, watched some 007, and went to bed.

The next post, will be about the geeky fun I had with my mobile comm unit, GPS receiver, and my laptop.

2003 Campos Góticos Tempranillo from Crianza #vino

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 21:36:00 +0000

2003 Campos Góticos Tempranillo from Crianza and my loverly wife @ Jaleo

Dinner!

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 00:59:00 +0000

Uncle Buck looks very friendly. Also, the stout is good, and I'm gonna get me a buffalo sirloin. w00t!

Ginormous roller bag

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 12:11:00 +0000

It can hold my ginormous tool bag + my clothes. :-)

Wheeee! Pinewood derby!

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 00:04:00 +0000

car wasn't the fastest, but it was MY favorite :-)

It's not much, but it's home during the week...

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 19:31:00 +0000

2007 Kanonkop Kadette, from South Africa #vino

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 04:59:00 +0000

2007 Kanonkop Kadette, from South Africa, quite tasty! #vino

Entering NJ

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 19:21:00 +0000

I love this sign

Full Moon

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 11:42:00 +0000

Get your mind out of the gutter!

Haven't I been here before?

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 18:44:00 +0000

Trick question...

Great! I get to clear off the car this morning

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 12:06:00 +0000

New decanter, painted by my niece

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 04:05:00 +0000

New decanter, painted by my niece. It is absolutely beautiful! http://paintedtreasures.us

Creepy ravens

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 20:17:00 +0000

Creepy ravens skylining the edge of my office building.

Oh yeah

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 19:03:00 +0000

Andouille

Not a lot of snow

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 22:08:00 +0000

But there's some lovely ice underneath, and I've gotta go to work in the morning.

Damn good dinner

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 23:57:00 +0000

My wife is no slouch in the kitchen, but tonight's dinner was especially divine! I don't know what she did to the porkchops exactly, but they were GOOD!

More pictures

10 years, after the fact

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 00:48:00 +0000

My wife is the greatest... Let's start with that.

For our anniversary, we had a great time. The day was celebrated in style. As soon as the boy got home from school, we loaded into the car, everyone's bags packed. The kids were deposited at my parent's house, and then we went into Reston. Checked into the Hyatt Regency, and then went shopping for my wife. It's about this time every year that she needs to reinforce her wardrobe, and we took care of that. Then we cleaned up and changed and went to McCormick and Schmick's. We have been going to M&S Grill for years, ever since it was Angelo and Maxie's, but this time, since my wife has successfully quit smoking, we went to McCormick and Schmick's proper, for a better selection of fresh oysters.

We had to wait for a half hour for a table to be free, so we spent some time at the bar with my good old friend Jameson (and his lovely accomplice Ginger Ale), then it was time to sit down. Started with the large oyster sampler, and I ordered a bottle of Châteauneuf-du-Pape (Château Mont-Redon, 2003). For our entrées, I ordered a 14 oz NY strip steak, and my wife got the 1.5 lb steamed Maine lobster. We divided those up to make some proper surf and turf, and ordered another half dozen Malpeque oysters (the favorite from the sampler.)

As divine as all of this was, we were far from finished. For dessert, we picked the trio sampler, which was chocolate pecan pie, bread pudding and crème brûlée, and we each had some Grand Marnier/Bailey's on-the-rocks, then to finish, espresso with liqueur on the side (black Samuca for me, and Kahula for the wife).

One of the finest dinners I've ever had, and then we went back to the Hyatt and watched "Zack & Miri Make a Porno" and split a bottle of sparkling wine and some strawberries.

Lemme tell you... I like the partying every year for our anniversary, but it's nothing compared to just being married to my lovely wife.

The one where I complain about Virginia's ABC laws

noreply@blogger.com (The Linux Cowboy) — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 19:08:00 +0000

I called M&S Grill this weekend to find out what their corkage fee is. I bought a lovely 95 point Châteauneuf-du-Pape that I wanted to drink on our anniversary, but I was told by M&S that they do not allow outside wine.

Thinking this to be very strange, I briefly looked up corkage laws on my phone, and it was surprised that it seems that Virginia doesn't allow corkage.

I did more research today, and the way the laws are laid out is more than odd. An ABC-ON license doesn't allow serving of any booze that was not purchased from a wholesale distributor. It does seem that most ABC-ON restaurants in Virginia are also ABC-OFF, so if you don't finish a bottle purchased at dinner, they can re-cork it for you and you can take it home.

F'ing strange.