Drinking after work again

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Some of us went out after work today. Miguel knows a friend that promotes parties, so we went to one. Keith, Sam, Alyssa, Jenn, Miguel, Vijay, and I went. It was ok. the drinks were strong, but the music wasn’t setup when we got there. I was tired and needed to get some work done tonight so I took off after 2 drinks with Sam. He gave me a ride to penn station. he is really funny.

A few of us are planning on friday night drinking this weekend. more information on that when I get it. My hands are tired, so more later.

must learn read hat flavored linux

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I am slowly picking stuff up. Not nearly as fast as I would like or need, but there is only so much time in the day not taken up by work that needs to get done before I learn.

Today I am going to try and pick up as much as I can about linux ftp. I need to look at the config files of an existing server to compare what I want to do.

I also need to do MRTG, but that is less important than the FTP project.

All the other standard work stuff also needs to get done today also. I have a 2pm meeting with our telecom provider about installation of our long distance T-1’s. I also need to call a telecom provider that wanted our business to let them know they didn’t get it. I am actually pissed at them for showing up to just talk to Gus because I didn’t return the guys phone call in a few hours. Sales guys take note, I am busy. So are other people. If I don’t want to call back in 5 minutes, I am not going to. Get over it. If I need or want you, I will call you. Some sales guys are cool about that, others are dumbass. If you are a dumbass I am not dealing with you.

My computers & Blogging stuff

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I realized yesterday that I wrote a bunch of blog entries. I decided to write an entry on on topic, or group of topics. So if I want to discuss a few things at once I will have multiple entries broken down for your reading enjoyment.

I am back into my routine of writing on the train. that is how we got the morning and afternoon posts yesterday. I just forget to post when I get to work and just have to post time-stamp things later on. I tried to use the thinkpad for blog entry’s. I found a bug in w.bloggar. Well I think it is a bug. The dam thing wont work on my laptop. I use it once after install and then it crashes every time I try to open it after that. I just gave up on Monday. My powerbook works great, and it is light. I can do without the thinkpad some days during the week.

Yes I do have two laptops. You are reading correctly. I have my own personal Apple Powerbook G4 12″. it is the little powerbook. It is awesome. I am new to the mac’s. I have only had a mac since last july. The other machine is my company issued Thinkpad T31. It has a bright screen and weight’s around the same as the Powerbook even though it is bigger in shape. It is also an awesome machine. The down side is that as much as I tried, I cannot get any windows laptops to go into and out of standby and hibernate modes properly. The mac usually works. Also the smaller mac is easier to open on the train.

Then we have desktops. I have 3 computers at home (not counting the laptops). I currently have an AMD Atholon XP 1500+ computer running Windows XP Pro. That machine is my main desktop computer. I don’t use it nearly enough anymore, but I bought it in December 2001 when my desktop was my main computer. This box is tricked out even though I don’t utilize it that much. It has a gig of ram, 180gig hard drive, etc.

My next two machines are used as servers. I have my old desktop, A Pentium III 800 with 780megs of ram. I use that to test different things on. It used to be my windows 2000 server. Then I have an old Dell Dimension desktop that I think has Pentium III 700 in it. That is now my main server running Red Hat 9.0.

While I am on the topic of my computer gear I can say that I am using a Linksys DSL Cable router with 802.11g wireless built in. That gives me fast wireless while I am on my Powerbook!

There you have it. I am trying to shrink down the size or amount of stuff I have so it doesn’t look so bad in my living room. I just put the AMD computer into a new smaller & cooler looking case. The other two are already in mid tower cases so I am not sure what I can do with those.

Dam wireless updated

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So it looks like my internal wireless card is fried. IBM is being asswholes about fixing it. They say it didn’t come with the Thinkpad and they cant find the card serial number on my warrentee. I am faxing them the dam info, but it will be days before I can get it fixed. I hate tech support, maybe that is why I am glad when the tech support guy in my company works for me:) Gus probibly feels the same way about me! But really hardware support people at manufacturers all suck. I have not found many good ones. Even Cisco has done dumbass things in my book. I am not yet ready to go back to pen and paper. I will let you know when I am.

Migrane alert

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I keep forgetting to update this thing with when I get a migrane. So I got the “beginings of a migrane” today. It was the first one in a about 2 weeks. I took 2 furiset and I feel all better. Actually they make me feel more than all better, but I am not complaining. I worry about these drugs, but it worked.

Responsibility is a double edged sword!

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It was weird. I was fine talking with dan for the first time in a while, and I got this pain right behind my left eye. It didn’t go away after like 5 minutes and I wasn’t taking chances that a migrane would develop. So I took the drugs.

I am finding I need to make decisions at work more and more without going through anyone. I knew that was what was needed, I am after all a manager now. it is funny, since I don’t consider myself one. But I have allot to oversee now. I don’t say that to think I am so super important. On the contrary, I say that because the reality of all this responsibility settles in and I worry. Worry that I know what is going on and can do the job. More importatnly is that I will do the right thing. Trusting instincts are good, but what if your instinct is wrong. That is bad! That being said, I have to do more independently. I like it, because it tells me people trust me to do the right thing on my own. I also like having that extra advice and help from people. I guess that is me not ever having to be in this situation before. I am taking the good with the bad. It is overwhelming sometimes, and fun other times. Today for example was super stressful, but actually fun. I spent time with Keith just troubleshooting multiple problems at once.

I just hope that when push comes to shove I get the job done. It is weird. I wanted to write about this (this blog is after all for me to speak my mind), but I know their is a 50/50 chance that Gus will read this. I don’t think I mind, but it is weird knowing he could have have. So, oh great and powerful boss of mine, if you do read this just don’t ever bring it up that you did. That way ignorance is bliss for me:)

Work is busy, I wouldn’t have it any other way!

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I have so much to do I don’t know where to begin sometimes. Then I get side tracked with people making requests. I feel bad because I am telling them I need requests for most non-system down problems. Just because I won’t get anything done otherwise. I like that people still feel they can ask me to do stuff, but most user requests are completed by Keith and justin now. I am spending my time trying to figure out how to do a highly available FTP system for a new client of ours. I am also looking into getting MRTG working on a red hat box. I have the windows version downloaded, but I am trying linux first. Going to windows will be admitting defeat for me. I came to the conclusion today that I need more ready to go testing machines. I currently need 2-3 linux machines to test stuff on. MRTG, FTP, & DHCP/DNS. I also need to setup a windows domain on another machine. Proxy server on yet another box. I have no room at my desk and my server room is getting cramped. Not full yet, but it is getting interesting.

On top of priority issues I have to do a scripted IIS web server install with one of the developers. We need this for a system refresh we are planning. I don’t know when it will happen, but it needs to be soon.

On a good note, I bought a NAS (network attached storage) device a few weeks ago. We wanted it to move files between offices. It is 4x faster or so than our USB hard drive solution we had. The NAS is only 4lbs so we just bring it to the colo or our office and just plug it in. It is awesome. Our hard to please DBA’s were very happy about it.

I got a ton of hardware approvals today. Lots of misc gear to keep things running in top shape. Gus grumbled about it, but signed off. I think he likes doing that. I still need to ask for some more hard drives for our dev and qa servers. our databases are growing so much we keep running out of space

More Stuff & Stress

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So I find out late Monday afternoon where all my stress and anguish originated from. Turns out Gus did something that inadvertintly caused our problems. Keith and I busted on him for a while (Keith more than me since I was out of the office by then) but I am going to cut him a break. He ussually is correct about alot of things. That is of course why we bust on him when he IS wrong. More details to this story, but I cant go into it. Needless to say my being vauge is nessisary, and the story quite funny in the end. If you want sick humor.

Things going on

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So I tried sleeping a different way last night. I think the way I lay my arms is causing them to hurt the next day. I think that may be causing my pain when typing and mouse clicking. Not sure. My hands hurt still, but I need to give it a few days and see.

Still have no idea what my plans are for the holiday weekend. Until yesterday I forgot that next monday was a holiday. John and I try again for poker this Saturday.

Our next softball game is tomorrow. It is supposed to rain, so I don’t know what is going to happen. We play my sisters company Standard & Poors. She wasn’t sure if she knew people on the softball team. I assume that they may have more then one since they have like 2000 people working for them.

Dam wireless

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I am having some issues with my Thinkpad. It is not doing wireless very well. I had issues yesterday in a meeting. I had no signal where I normally get good signal. Then last night the dam thing got low signal while I sat at my desk at home. I sit right over the dam wireless point so why did it have bad signal while my mac got great signall? Well, I have no idea. My netstumbler (a wireless signal and network meeter software program) also showed poor signal quaility. I need to check signal streangth with another laptop with netstumbler. if it is fine I have a bad wireless card. If it is bad, then something is wrong with both networks at work and home. That is unlikely.