The dark day. No further comment.

Crunch time. Power shopping. Christmas is closing in fast, and I need to be looking for presents instead of writing this blog entry. Got a visit with Daniel a couple of weekends ago, Will and the rest of the family too. Work seems to be going better and the online gaming is been fun. I want to see Apocolypto and Eregon, so I guess I need to sneak away since the kiddos can't watch.

We also need to work on Christmas cards. That is a big To Do. I'm not sure what M has planned, but I'll bet it is another Christmas picture. Getting late, need sleep.

Returning. Well I haven't posted in a while. Other home server projects have been keeping me distracted. Not to mention Neverwinter Nights 2, which is the game of the day. I've got the truth about hillary/nancy blogs going, to start as a collection of material for the domains. Maybe I should just forward them to the blogs. Hmmmm. Well, it is about time for NWN. More to post later.

The news has almost stopped babbeling about the 'meaning' of the election. Like they know anything. I've started gathering crazy-lady "NANCY NEWS" for the web site. I'll have to get focused and finish the site set up. "thetruthaboutnancy.org" will be a fine compliment to the hillary site. I have a great internal debate whether to keep it serious, or humorous (onion-style).

Need time, focus, and sleep to do massive web-presence improvement weekend. Maybe over the Thansksgiving holiday, while I avoid black friday shopping.

Time to hide your head in the sand!

No really. If the political ads aren't enough, the news about the political ads is absolutely stifling. I am now in avoidance mode for all news: local, state, national, world. I don't know too many people who would really change their opinion because of some TV spot. And it really saddens me that TV has such a large influence on the vote, with 30 seconds worth of mud slinging.

The issues haven't changes too much from the last election really. But if you want a real change vote Libertarian or some other third party.

The on-line gaming went well. I've got a bunch of wrapup work to do now. Sent e-mail out to other Brescia buddies. I'm finding NPR particularly annoying this week for some reason. I think they need to fire their political editor and make a fresh start of it. There is no debate on any issues, just experts yapping and people whining. It is not the government's job to see to it that you have a good life. And diplomacy only works when both parties actually talk. Nut-cases like Venesuala, Iran, and North Korea just irritate me because talking for them is stalling, until they can make a real pest out of themselves. No one seems to mention that.

Sooo tired. Need sleep.

This is no good. I need to be more disciplined if this blogging thing is going to work. I've spent quite a bit of time migrating some of my domains to 1&1. Some of my DynDNS.org accounts expired in the process. Tonight I am busy wiring them back up. The new chat software is really slick. BLAB! rules.

I need to write more, but I have to clear off my desk and get to work. The Savage Tide is calling!

All of the web stuff has been moved to the new server. Big Wahoo! There is more stuff to do, i.e. e-mail, file space, and user accounts, but the momentum is there. Neverwinter Nights on Fridays has been pretty good, the module we have been playing has been very challenging. There are a few games at Target that have crossed the $20 threshold, but I may not want to distract myself from the seven books I need to read and the Wednesday night D&D on-line.

I really need to start working on the Savage Tide stuff for the on-line gig. Prep, prep, prep. A couple of good evenings and I'll be ready. I still need to finish organizing the computer room. I've got two more piles of stuff in the living room and I'll be done. (Yeah right.)

I have an issue with my CentOS 4.4 virtual machine. Apparently SELinux is preventing Apache from running on ports 81-89. This is preventing the migration from the old Red Hat 9 box from going smoothly. I guess I'll have to turn SELinux off until I can figure out how to edit or create a policy. I've fought this issue for a couple of days now, so I've neglected my posts.

The crazy Westboro church group intended to do their misguided protest at the funeral of the Amish kids that were shot at school the other day. This makes me so mad I can't see straight. I cannot believe they understand the important messages in the bible. They have thier priorities completely upside down, and are making a nusiance of themselves. The protest is cancelled now, and I'm glad the communities around the shooting area stood up to them.

This is a quick post to demonstrate to someone, what a blog interface is like.

Today was a fun and productive day. I had a summons for jury duty this afternoon. I was excused from this month's term, since I served 23 months ago, one month shy of the cut-off. I also made a trip to the court house for the car title transfer, Starbucks, the bank, the postoffice, the mall for a haircut. And I had a light lunch at the Famous Bistro.

I made a little progress getting nuke loaded up to the waldschmidt.org site. I am still hacking the config files out, but I probably make some progress tonight. S is still napping, L is up, and M in engaged in high-drama on one of her boards. I need to transfer one of my other domains to 1and1, or get my home server finished.

Note to self: need to get RPG destop software for online gaming.

It is a beautiful day today, there have been several in a row. The contractor is ready to pour the floor in our basement. As long as the weather holds, things will move along. I'll have to find something to go on a rant about soon...

Thunderstorms are rolling through. The thunder has been big enough, that I can feel the vibration in the floor. Rain, rain and more rain. The weather has conspired to keep the basement from being built. NWN wrapped up a little early this evening, so I get a change to post, while I watch the weather for M. I'll have to go to bed in a while and wake her up so she can storm-watch. Tomorrow I need to spend some real time in the computer room organizing and paying bills.

I've just about got M's Ubuntu virtual machine finished. Just a couple of app installs and it will be ready to transfer to her PC mini. There are two virtual machines active on the Linux server (Atlas) now. One CentOS and one Ubuntu. I'll have to figure out how to consolidate the user authentication on the Linux boxes without falling back to the Windows 2003 SBS Premium server. And I've got four web sites to work on, yet I'm hacking on the blog. Phbbbb.

No one has posted any responses to anything, so I still feel free to go blah, blah, blah. Speaking of which, the idiot Sean Penn made a movie. This is only good because I can now, deliberately, ignore his work. This guy is as useless as Martin Sheen, Susan Sarandon, and Danny Glover. There collective stoopidity has annoyed me enough to not be a consumer of any of their "products". Why these people are taken seriously for the politically punditry is beyond me. Making a living pretending to be other people is not enough to be a credible opinion on anything, except for pretending to be other people. Their only real hobby is keeping their name in the news.

There is the rant for today.

P.S. e-mail PBS and give them grief for firing Melanie Martinez. Stooooopid heads.

I writing this one from Safari on the Mac mini. The editing control doesn't have as many features on it. I'll have to try Firefox next, when I revise this post.

After a week and a half of feeling losey, today I feel almost normal. The cold seems to be passing finally. I spent some of yesterday evening cleaning up the master bedroom. It still needs work, but it looks a lot better now. Tonight I am working on the continuing organization of the computer room. Lucy just walked in, and I noticed that the dust-buster was emptied on the floor. Oh well. I still have to work on the waldschmidt.org web and e-mail setup. The e-mail I sent my dad, didn't make it too him, so I'll have to try again.

Today the turd-brained state attorney-general for the socialist state of California, opened his litigative-membrane against the major automotive companys for "global warming". Since this guy has nothing better to do than raise state revenue by engaging in frivolus lawsuits, now my tax dollars are being wasted while Bill Lockyer makes an ass of himself in federal court. And it will now waste my time by clogging the news with his stoopidness. Phhhbbbbb!!! Really, I would rather see him deport illegal immigrants to the southern tip of Chile. I swear if this guy runs for govenor or congress he should be deported too. (Cuba?) Really, the automakers should counter with the fact that the grand State of California is responsible for global warming, since they regulate emission controls on vehicles. Also, Hollywood his the biggest source of hot-gas in the world. Why not sue them too? How about smokers? And Farmers since cows emit methane and carbon dioxide. [note to self] I am really going to have to write this stooge a letter. Read about it in the BBC news. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/5365728.stm

I've got to get back to cleaning.

Yesterday was a loss. I wandered around like a zombie, when I wasn't sleeping. Today, I am moderately better. My sinuses still plauge me, but some of the soreness is gone. I got some more of my VMware virtual server work done. Things are running quite well on the new Linux box, I just wish I could stay conscious enough to make more progress. I need to be cleaning and organizing the computer room. Maybe a small distraction first...

I hurt... My illness Wednesday only weakened me for another cold. I feel worse now than I did then. Congestion, pain, sore throat... I want drugs!

I did a pretty good job last evening cleaning up the computer room. I was able to install both uninterruptable power supplies (UPS) and I organized the cabling on the server desk. I also upgraded the CentOS box to 4.4 and patch up the Mac Mini and the W2K3SBS box. The Linux upgrades went well. I am going to try to spend some time working on Joomla and getting my web domains moved over to 1&1.com for hosting.

I don't know how I will hold up for NWN tonight. I took Advil and some antihistamines about 10 minutes ago, so I should be able to host up for a couple of hours. I slept for a while earlier this evening. The chicken soup M made was very good. Hmmmm...

New website!!!! My request for domains went through. I've got both waldschmidt.org and thehubbub.org wired up to the 1and1.com account. Spiffy. Now figuring out the php/mysql/cms scenario will be the fun part. I haven't decided between a php-nuke, nuke-variant, or joomla. I've got Joomla partially set up on the home Linux(CentOS) virtual machine. I need to get all of my writing stuff in a Ubuntu or SUSE virtual machine (or my Mac) and keep it there.

I have been down the last couple of days. Some bug is keeping me under the weather, but I had a good rest this afternoon. I left work a little early, and Sophie and Lucy were asleep when I got home... Nap time for Papa! Someone when to Target to hit the back-to-school clearance items today, but I won't mention any names. ;-p

Well I'd go on about how the news media really stinks, but I'll save that for a future rant. I've got to get a few things done so I can go to bed.

I have decided to get a domain and website from a third party. Yes I feel that I have failed in my own ambitions by not hosting it myself. But I get to try out the shared hosting scenario and see how well it works out. I picked 1and1 for the service, mainly because they were so cheap, but also highly recommended. If this thing works out, I'll be really tweaked.

CentOS 4.4 came out recently. I guess I have to go upgrade the servers now... I really need more time in the computer room to play with Linux.

Why I hate "reality TV"... It's not real. Most of the tripe the networks are trying to entertain us with is artifically cooked drama with communal game show contestants. Since I am being exposed against my will, I find my attention deliberatly focused on other activities while my wife goes lemming into the masses. I can't even sit through the overplayed commercials from the show sponsors. I remember and miss the days when I didn't own a TV.

I can't really say I wanted my ravings here. I wanted to have the blog running at the home server, but it is taking me too long to get things migrated of the old reliable Red Hat box. I need a weeks vacation just to blow in the computer room, wrapping up stuff that I have already started.

I've been trying to back in touch with my old high school (Center Grove) buddies. My trip to GenCon in Indy has stirred up memories of the good-old-days. I've now sent e-mails to Terry, Dean, and Soupy.

I'll have to e-mail the Wabash crowd next and see how Eric (Pub), Mark (Gilligan), and Dan (Spooch) are doing.

I've got Ubuntu and IBM Developerworks DVD's waiting for my time too. And two new UPS's for the home network. And a mountain of papers that need to be filed. My domains are up for renewal in October, but I'm thinking about moving them to a hosting site too.

Maybe I will do a better job of keeping this blog going... HA!