Posts 896 to 903:

Internet Connection Problems

Sometime near the beginning of this week, our internet connection got really slow.  Web pages either wouldn’t load at all, or they’d take 2 or 3 minutes to load.  Sending email took forever.  Uploading data happened at 1-8 KB/s instead of the normal 50 KB/s.

I called the cable company and they said they could detect signal problems getting to our modem.  They said they would be able to send someone out in 2 weeks (!!) but it was likely a problem with a splitter on the coaxial cable: the splitters sometimes go bad and then the signal gets severely degraded.  The idea of a splitter dying sounded ridiculous to me, given that it’s an entirely passive device with no electrical or moving parts, but I figured I’d take the splitter out (thus temporarily disabling the TV’s signal) and connect the cable directly to the cable modem.

Unbelievably, the internet was back to its good old speedy self.  Still in denial, I put the splitter back, but now the internet still worked fine.  So apparently, either the splitter or one of the cables involved has a bad connection or a break somewhere, and moving stuff around must have bumped it back into good contact.  For now I’ll just have to keep an eye on it and maybe go jostle the whole mess around once in a while to see how the signal is affected.

Posted by Anthony on reply

Dusk Moon

Here’s a photo that I took from the back deck last night.  The orange only lasted for a couple minutes, as usual.  When I looked again 15 or 20 minutes later, the moon had gone down in the sky, so maybe over the next few days I’ll be able to get some nice red moon shots.

Click the image to get the high-resolution version.

posted image

Posted by Anthony on 1 reply

Geek Humor

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If you’re not familiar with sudo, then this probably won’t make any sense to you.  That’s OK.  Trust me, it’s hilarious.

(Source)

Posted by Anthony on 2 replies

Loss

About a month ago, on August 8th, my family was shocked by the sudden loss of Kim’s father.  In addition to being extremely busy with moving and helping Kim’s mom take care of the many, many things that Warner always took care of for us, I wasn’t sure if I even wanted to post about this.  It’s very hard and very personal, but I think that not saying anything about it here would be worse.

Lots of great things have been said about Warner and his very full life.  It is true that he lived a happy and full life -- probably more full than anyone else I know -- and we know that because he was born again, he is now with the Lord.  We also know that God’s timing is correct.  Still, right now it’s hard to focus on anything but the fact that he’s not here with us, and it’s hard not to think that his life was cut short.  I always unconsciously assumed that there would be many more long hikes and fun trips with my father-in-law.

I only knew Warner for about 2 years, and I am hurting a lot now, so I can only imagine what Kim, her mom, and Travis are going through.  You didn’t have to spend much time with Warner to see that he was a great dad and a great husband.  But if you did spend any considerable amount of time with him, you realized that he was just a great person period.  He was unquestionably one of the greatest men I have ever known, and quite possibly the single greatest.  He was a role model, an inspiration, and a friend to me, and I miss him.

Posted by Anthony on 4 replies

Groove Salad, Business, and The Secret to Charcoal Grilling

Wow, quiet times around here, no?  I know it’s time to make a new post when I get one of those "are you still alive??" emails from my mom.

I’ve been extremely busy with work, which I’m extremely thankful for.  July was my most profitable month to date, and business -- both sales and custom work -- seems to be steadily picking up.  Don’t get me wrong: my income is still no match for my student loan bills, but I’m making way more money doing web programming than I was making as a PC technician.

A couple weeks ago, Dan imparted unto me the secret to grilling with charcoal.  My problem has been that the coals are always too cool to put a nice charred exterior on meats, yet ironically I still can’t avoid making things more dry and well-done than I’d like.  Dan’s tip was to spread the coals out unevenly (after they turn gray, of course), so that they are just a single layer deep on one side of the grill, but stacked up on the other side.  That way one side of the grill is extremely hot and puts those nice grill-lines on your steaks, but you can move them off to the other cooler side after that.

To wrap things up, I’d like to say that Groove Salad on SomaFM is a great internet radio station.  They call it: "A nicely chilled plate of ambient beats and grooves."  It’s largely instrumental, and on the occasional vocal track, I usually enjoy the vocals too.  I listen to it pretty much all day every day.

Posted by Anthony on 2 replies

Thanks Uncle Anthony and Aunt Kim!

"I love you so much Uncle Anthony and Aunt Kim.  Thanks for taking us on the train ride it was a long day with you and we want to do it again!  I love you so much and miss you.  Thanks for playing in the creek with us.  I love Pizza Hut too.  Maybe next time we can see puppies."  Love, Cailin.
Erin said thanks too!  :)

Posted by Heidi on 3 replies

JeanniesPhotos Redesign

I have just completed a redesign of JeanniesPhotos.com:

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Click the image to see the screenshot full-size, or just visit jeanniesphotos.com.

I may still need to tweak the text to improve the readability, like the photo-set names when they are on top of the grass at the bottom of the image.

Posted by Anthony on 5 replies

Funny Things

Oh man these had me cracking up, and I immediately thought of Anthony when I read them-
Funny Instructions
Stuff that Annoys Me(excuse the language on this page)

Posted by Maria on 2 replies

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