03.26.01

Last week was spent almost entirely at work. I worked overnight each night as well as three or four hours during the day. Whole lotta fun. On the upside, the night work consisted of installing ten HPUX servers that are now tentatively under my control. I haven’t had any experience with HPUX until now. So far, it seems very similar to Solaris with some minor tweaks.

Spent a bit of time painting the babies’ room a light yellow. I still need to put up the “Winnie-the-Pooh” border, and the window-blinds that I put up aren’t wide enough (by about 1/2 inch) so I will need to replace them again. I can’t wait until it’s finished, I think the nursury will be quite nice.

03.19.01

Had to work both Friday and Saturday overnight to upgrade systems on both sides of the state. Not a lot of fun. Saturday morning I was awakened by a phone call from the Dodge dealership I mentioned below. The salesman said that they had received some mini-vans from Canada that would retail for the price we were looking for. (no I am NOT kidding, he actually said “from Canada”) I asked him if he remembered the last thing that I said to him, his boss and several other people standing around the showroom (”If you don’t have enough respect for me as a customer to not smoke in my vehicle, then I will not be doing business here.”) To which he responded with a mumbled apology that I just could not bring myself to accept, insincere as it was. At this point I just had to hang up. The nerve of this guy- I know he’s just trying to do his job and feed his family, but whatever happened to honesty and decency? Had they called to apologize the next day, or offered to do something (anything) about the cigarette smell in the car, I might have considered talking about other options.

Saturday night Faith, Logan and I went to one of Faith’s coworker’s house for a small St. Pat’s party. Nice people, good conversation. We all had a very nice time.

Sunday, the whole family got together at my Mom and Dad’s for the traditional corned beef and cabbage dinner. Good stuff!

03.16.01

YAFC! (yet another format change) What can I say, I like to keep things changing!

Last night was the first night of “Music Appreciation II” and guess what subject we started with? Yup, Beethoven! how cool is that? We focused on his fifth symphony. It looks as if this may be my hardest class this semester. There are a lot of definitions and ideas (form, texture, meter, tone, etc…) as well as some musical notation with which I am completely unfamiliar. The topics seem interesting, and I think I will enjoy this class as well.

03.12.01

Why does buying a car have to be such a hassle? No, let me rephrase that…Why do car salesmen have to be such weasels? I want to buy a car, I know how much it is worth, I know how much I can afford (read: I have done all the necessary research – Consumer Reports, contacted the insurance companies-very helpful, etc…) So I say “I can afford ‘X’, will you sell me that vehicle for ‘X’?” Notice that this is a yes or no question. Not a request for a diatribe on the virtues of free oil changes or how pretty the color ‘Garnet’ looks on the auto. It is not a request for an extended dialogue of the possible holes in my budget. It is not a devious plot on my part to ’snooker’ the car dealer into giving me an auto for free. It is a simple yes or no question. I’m a big boy, if you’re not willing to sell me the vehicle at the price I ask, just friggin’ say so. Quit wasting my time and yours. Now to add insult to injury, if the dealership desires to appraise my trade-in, at least have the common decency and respect for the customer not to smoke in the vehicle while you drive it around back! Had I just been frustrated about not being able to come to an amicable agreement, I probably wouldn’t be writing about any of this, after all, the “haggling” has become the status quo, no matter how frustrating it may be. No, I’m more much more upset that the dealership didn’t respect me enough as a customer to have the courtesy to not smoke in my automobile.

I updated to version 0.37.3 of Sawfish on my UltraSparcII. Very quick and easy. I have updated my Sawfish on Solaris page to reflect this newer version. No new screen shots as of yet.

More Buddha sitings… This past summer I commented on how many times I kept running into people or things related to Buddhism (including a group of monks at the Air Show!). Well, it seems to happening again! From happening across books by the Dalai Lama to getting into a discussion with a complete stranger regarding the location of Buddhist temples in St. Louis to catching an amazing interview with the Dalai Lama on tv Saturday night. Hmmm….

03.11.01

…Ahhh, the glorious Ninth!! ( or “a bit of the old Ludwig Van”)…

Yes! I have finally been able to replace my copy of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony! I have been unable to listen to my old copy for nearly a year. It had become scratched and worn from overuse to the point that no amount of polishing would allow it to play through. I have been on a quest ever since for a masterful recording that would live up to the high stanty different recordings (different conducters, differnt orchestras) in the past year, with no satisfaction. That is until yesterday. I purchased the Deutche Grammaphon recording of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Herbert Von Karajan. If you are a fan, this is the recording to have. Let me explain some of my criteria. First, from a technical standpoint, nothing will utterly condemn a performance like hearing someone cough, or hearing the conducter’s wand inadvertantly tap the music stand. I desire to hear the performance and the performance and the performance alone. In the case of the Ninth (or other chorales), the emotion of the lead voices must e impeccable as well as discernable and harmonious with the chorus. What do I mean by this? Take for instance another recording that I sampled previously where an extremely well known tenor (I will omit his name as well as that of the recording, since it exhibits both of the flaws I am currently discussing), while possessing a singular talent, seemed at odds with the other leads and the chorus. Each member seemed to be trying to overshadow each other and prove themselves better than this “very well known tenor”. They couldn’t, he was by far the better voice, and unfortunately, this lead to a rather cacophonous clattering of mis-matched voices. On the other hand, Peter Schreier lends a masterful tenor voice to the chorale which compliments and lifts the entire performance to the wonderful heights that I can imagine were Beethoven’s intentions. The last issue that requires mentioning is the conducter. Herbert Von Karajan breathes wonderful life and precision to the symphony that shows his prowess from the very first stanza. His emphasis and emotion are what brings this performance the cohesion and emotion that said to me “Yes, this is the one”. …ah yes, me droogies, peace at last…

When I made the above purchase, I also acquired a copy of Beethoven’s “Missa Solemnis”, which in his own words was his greatest work. It will have to be to surpass my preference for the Ninth. I have only given it a cursory glance at the moment, but so far, I must say that it is quite good. If it merits further discussion, I will post a review of it here in a day or two.

In other news, this weekend was again a tour-de-force with perhaps an hour or two actually spent at home. Friday night saw problems in Wichita that kept my attention for the better part of the evening. Saturday morning’s class was made more interesting when I managed to spill about half of nice, steaming hot coffee down the side of my leg as I was driving to class. Of course, there wasn’t enough time to turn around and change (the class begins with a test), so I sopped up what I could and went to class smelling of french vanilla. After class, the family went shopping for a new vehicle again. We have now driven nearly every mini-van made (with the exception of one or two models) The Dodge Grand-Caravan seems to be the roomiest with the best features. This means of course, that it is also the most expensive. The Honda Odyssey is the highest rated by Consumer Reports, but you have to wait two to three months (yes, MONTHS) for delivery. The Mazda MPV is the lowest price, but you sacrifice just about everything for that price including handling, noise levels, comfort, etc… The Nissan Quest is a very nice package, combining many nice features with an average price. I guess we will try to make a decision soon and then see what the banks say about all this. Next week, we will most likely begin looking at used mini-vans. Sunday, we once again visited the Cathedral Basilica so that I could get a few more pictures for my report. Most of the outside shots look great, very few of the inside ones even turned out. someday, I will learn just how to work my camera…

03.09.01

Last night marked the end of my first class at Maryville. “Principles of Management” is over, my grade, an “A”. I’m happy with that! Next week I begin “Music Appreciation II” I’m still deciding what classes to take over summer, but I still have a week or so before I will need to register.

I fear that the humor fairy has abandoned Charlie ::grin::

Mark has put up a nice little message board on his website.

03.07.01

Being unable to locate the precise fuse for my scanner (I managed to pop the fuse in my HP scanner some months ago), I decided that I would just stop by the Circuit City on the way home and see if I could find a cheapo replacement so that I could scan a picture or two for my report (due this weekend). All I found there were a couple of really overpriced units and one or two fifty dollar models that I wasn’t sure if I wanted to spend the money on. I decided to go over to the Best Buy a block away and check their selection. Not only was the selection better, on the end of one of the shelves was an open box unit (no docs, cables, software or anything) that just happened to be the exact same model as the scanner I have at home, and they only wanted twenty bucks for it! So, after verifying that this unit was still eligible for the return policy, I hurried home with my little treasure. I removed the old scanner from its resting place and hooked up the new one. “POP!” crud. Well, it appears that the transformer that I was using to power the scanner was what caused the fuse to blow the first time. And now the second time. So I sat there looking at two very nice, non-working scanners. Harumph. As I sat there I began to examine the transformer I was using and it slowly dawned on me that when I moved the furniture around I managed to grab the wrong transformer. Now that is frustrating! A 24V transformer plugged into a 12V appliance tends to produce smoke! In a bit of a fit, I disassembled both units, examined the differences in the circuit boards (they are radically different designs- even though they are from the same model) and found a workaround for each one. A bit of soldering and viola’: I now have two working scanners!

Charlie has reached a milestone! One year of journalling! Congrats!

03.06.01

Faith had a doctor’s appointment today: the babies are doing great! Good, strong heartbeats and they are active as can be! We went to lunch together and stopped by Target’s to look at the baby stuff. We ran into a young lady who was pushing twins in a tandem stroller w/car seats on top. After talking with her for a while, we decided that this is the way to go for a stroller. We found the exact stroller the lady was using and sort of took it for a spin around a few aisles to get the feel of it. It sure handles better than the stroller we used with Logan. (no matter how I tried, I just couldn’t figure how this one folds up!!!)

After spending several hours at the bookstores and scouring just about every resource we can think of, we are still at a loss for names. The doctor says we can probably expect these boys to arrive sometime in May (probably early in the month) so we have redoubled our efforts at selecting just the right names. (and yes, we are still soliciting suggestions here)

03.05.01

Worked overnight Friday retrofitting (upgrading) one of our switches. Everything went pretty smooth until we found out earlier today that the time was synced up Sunday morning. While this is all well and good, it means that my equipment was put out of sync (since no one informed me of this change, I didn’t sync my machine with theirs, therefore all the data I retrieve is now off by one hour!)

I didn’t get home until around 4:30am Saturday, so I spent most of the morning sleeping. Later we began our quest for a mini-van. Yes, with twins on the way and Logan in cub scouts, we went looking for a replacement vehicle for Faith. I think we may try for a Dodge Grand Caravan (it’s the mini-van with a bit of extra storage behind the back seat- for strollers and cribs and such!).

I have an assignment due next week in my “Cultures & Values” class that requires that I visit someplace “cultural” and write about it for three to five pages. I decided that I wanted to find someplace that I wouldn’t normally visit in the hopes of really surprising myself. Well, surprise myself I did! After searching for a couple of weeks for just the right place, I finally decided to take my teacher’s advice and visit The Cathedral Basilica of St. Louis. This is truly an awe-inspiring architectural landmark that is worth almost any journey! The cathedral boasts the world’s largest collection of mosaics, as well as being the final resting place of Cardinal Glennon (yes, that’s the guy they named the hospital after) If you have never seen this amazing romanesque cathedral, you really should take the tour!

03.01.01

ummm… hold on.. I’ll be right back….