Acquired a set of Throttlemeisters via the vast wonderland that is eBay. I tried to get a VistaCruise to work, but alas, I am not skilled enough to reshape plastic to fit the grips on my R1150RT.

They went on really easy and once I moved the throttle grip close enough (thanks bmwsporttouring.com for that one!), they work like a champ.

Syd Barrett, co-founder of Pink Floyd, passed away a few days ago. My favorite quote from the reporting news agency: "However, Barrett suffered from mental instability, exacerbated by his use of LSD." (2007, Detroit Free Press).

Came in handy.

Consider "The Scarecrow." The song contains nascent existentialist themes, as singer Syd Barrett compares his own existence to that of the scarecrow, who, while "sadder" is also "resigned to his fate." Such thematic content would later become a mainstay of the band's lyrical imagery.

Shine on you crazy diamond.

I have an almost teenager at home. While a good kid, she does at times think that she's ready for the cold, cruel, adult world. Usually my wife and I agree that she is mature enough to handle what may come.

However, when it comes to the internet, we are in disagreement. My wife and I (we're both Technology professionals - and spend too much of our day working with computers) know better than to click on a result in a search engine just because its crafty metadata matches my search terms better than it matches the data it represents. We know because we've watched the internet mature into the wealth of information that it is today.
Continue reading "Can you say blacklist?"

I completed the upgrade to the new firewall. Finally I can turn off the POS that usually had me saying Whisky-Tango-Foxtrot.

I'll post more details about the distro I chose tomorrow. In the meantime, I need to go to bed.

I'm upgrading the firewall tonight. Hopefully everything goes well. I'm working on getting the port forwarding correct.

Let's see what breaks...

My friend Tim also noticed the cold today.

I got my wife's stamp of approval to get the matching pants for my riding jacket. So instead of going home, I went to Midwest Cycle.

I'm now armored head to toe.

It's still cold.

I am thoroughly enjoying the new motorcycle. I rode to work again today. Last year with my old '82 Honda CB900 Custom, I wouldn't have dreamed of riding it in the cold, windy, misty weather (44 degrees when I left home) that we have today. Mostly because the damn thing wouldn't have started. It hates cold weather especially since it needs a top end rebuild.
Continue reading "sometimes you have to get in the fire to get warm"

I rode my new bike to work today (BMW R1150RT). It's a fresh 55 degrees Farenheit. I clicked on the grip heater.

Mmmmm....

I may never drive the car again.

I picked up my new bick today. A 2002 BMW R1150RT. Silver. The ride home was the best ride on a motorcycle that I've ever had - except perhaps the first ride that had me hungering like a meth addict two days past due.

My old bike, a Honda CB900 C Custom, was 20 years older and 4 generations of technology behind. It was a good bike to learn on. I did drop it twice - without feeling too bad. However, it's now in need of serious tlc beyond my meager abilities.

All I can say now is YAHOO!

Last night we sat talking with some of our neighbors. As we talked about the neighborhood, eventually we landed on the topic of the kids. Especially how they've grown over the winter. Living in Minnesota, folks pretty much hibernate from Nov 1 until April 1. It's just too damn cold to socialize around the trampoline.

Continue reading "free association"

OpenFiler 2.0 was released last month. It now supports AD & LDAP as well as acting as an iSCSI target. Looks like I'll be busy in the near future.

Majordomo really works. It's very easy to over-communicate when using mail distribution lists.

However, I really don't need to know that some of the dist list members get paid vacations - that would be a meeting at a spa/resort with time built in the schedule to take advantage of the amenities. Perhaps some specificity in the dist lists that one chooses might be a good idea.

And no. I don't get the vacation.

Passive/aggresive. Nearly as futile as performing the same activity and expecting a different outcome with each repetition. Can a passive/aggressive person ever truly be satisfied? Is it possible to become so adept at reading into a conversation, that you can completely compensate for a passive/aggressive person?

I think my wife is a saint for putting up with my P/A tendencies. However, is there any room for it in the workplace?

So many questions. I'm almost thinking that today qualifies as a Monday.

hmmm.

Time is relative. Einstein knew it. Had a whole damn theory detailing it.

So why is it that I'd rather visit the dentist that continue on with the death by lab exercises?

I've never seen time go as slow.

Yikes.

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious
diatribes about how hard things were when they were growing up; what with
walking twenty-five miles to school every morning? uphill BOTH ways ..
yadda, yadda, yadda. And I remember promising myself that when I grew up,
there was no way in hell I was going to lay a bunch of crap like that on
kids about how hard I had it and how easy they've got it!

But now that... I'm over the ripe old age of thirty, I can't help but
look around and notice the youth of today. You've got it so easy! I
mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a damn Utopia! And I hate to
say it but you kids today you don't know how good you've got it!
Continue reading "over 30 & already crochety....."