October 30, 2010

Ok, what the hell...

Ok, what the hell...

Yeah, that's a common one around here. In fact if I go for too long without hearing a sentence that starts with "ok, what the hell..." I know I'm probably not thinking hard enough.

Here´s the latest WTH around the house. I needed a fan to cool down some electronics, your typical 24/7 device scenario. But, if there's one thing that drives me absolutely nuts, it's fan noise. Especially when you're trying to think, having something that sounds like the turbine on a A320 sitting next to you doesn't really help.

So I tried different positions, stepped down the voltage to around 7V, and the thing was still loud. After pondering for a while, I finally figured it out. This fan was making an annoying hum thanks to the device case: being plastic, it's naturally rigid and amplifies high-pitched vibrations. Kind of like the body on a violin. So the solution was to put something that wouldn't vibrate at high frequencies in between.

After searching the house over, I finally settled on something unorthodox. I cut out a couple of bubbles from bubble wrap leftovers and placed the fan on them. Problem solved. Neither air nor plastic wrap conduct enough vibration to make the plastic case hum, so the only noise left over is the whoosh of air as it enters the case... which is really not that bad.

Eventually I'll have to find something to replace the plastic bubbles, since they come loose and blow away after a while. Maybe I can get some soft rubber feet at the hardware store, or maybe get one of those silicone baking sheets and cut a couple strips from it. Thing is, you have to get the material consistency just right, or the high-pitched hum goes right through.

October 29, 2010

Insured... not....

Insured.... not...

There's some days when you just have to come to the conclusion that life is depressing.

I got sent to a seminar on insurance policy management, sounded interesting enough. Insurance has always been one of those seemingly mysterious topics, that everyone seems to get, until it comes time to fill out the paperwork and make a claim.

Long story short, after 2 days it became clear that in this country nobody is clear on anything. Our state-owned insurance company (the only insurer at the present) is hellbent on screwing anyone and everyone in any way they can. Which is not really that unusual for an insurance company. The problem is that there's no viable way to defend yourself from it.

Everyone's got their own way to cover their back, and in the end, 99% of them don't work. And the 1% that does changes randomly from year to year and city to city. You simply have to pick your favorite, and pray.

October 28, 2010

John 3:16

John 3:16

Saw this one on my way to work today. I had been wondering where all the John 3:16 nuts had run off to.

Kind of a relief, for a minute there I thought they had all been taken away and the rest of us had been left to be damned for all eternity xD

October 27, 2010

The pizza was good, while it lasted

Well, the pizza was good

There's this place I always see on my way to work, hadn't thought about it recently until today, I realized it had been abandoned for at least 3 years or so.

The place used to be a pizza restaurant, one of those that's been around forever. The only problem was that parking was impossible: the restaurant was built on a lot that was at least 3 meters lower than the street, and never really got any parking (just improvised it wherever there was space).

So getting in and out was a pain. In the end it became more of a hassle than anything else to go there, and they went broke.

The pizza was good though, while it lasted.

October 26, 2010

Finally out the door

Finally out the door

Finally, that's that. I dropped off my WD hard disk at the post office this afternoon. All that's left to do is wait for the replacement to come in, which will probably take around three weeks.

Take what it may, it's good to finally get this one off the top of my head =)

October 25, 2010

Sunset

Finally sunset

Second attempt at getting a sunset on my way home. This time I didn't forget the memory card in my camera =D

October 24, 2010

One missed call

One Missed Call

Don't you just hate it when you forget your cell phone in the car, and remember that you left it there like 5 hours later? The worst part is when you're about to take it out of the glove compartment, and you're wondering just what you'll find on the screen when you do.

Best scenario is either the screen having nothing on it, or the phone battery having gone dead. You'll never know what happened while you were gone. Then there's the other scenario... missed calls. The worst is when you take the phone out, there's like 8 missed calls on it, and you just know that none of your friends love you so much as to call 8 times in a row. No, 8 missed calls can only mean one thing: someone at work was desperately trying to reach you, and you missed them.

And then you get to experience those seconds of dread as you push the button, to see who would call you 8 times straight.

It's only happened to me once. And that time it was more of a colleague suffering from obsessive compulsive dialing disorder than anything else. But yes, I have heard many horror stories of offices running amok around dying servers and missing papers, while somewhere, a cell phone silently tallies missed calls for someone to find later.

October 23, 2010

Beating a dead horse

Beating a dead horse

There's stuff around the house that you never seem to get rid of. Like my old desktop PC, which has undergone all sorts of personality changes in the past year.

I've been using my laptop as my primary computer for a while now, so the desktop goes from one job to the next. First it was my backup computer, then it was my computer for downloading stuff off the internet, then it was a storage server until the drive gave out, and most recently it's been a DVD player, when I got my new flatscreen and found it came with a VGA port.

That's my way of beating a dead horse. I like to think of it as helping to not contribute to the global electronic garbage crisis (yeah, sure).

Every time it seems the desktop has finally given out, I find some way to bring it back to life. Like today: the CPU cooler snapped a hook and the processor came loose. I tried to hunt up a new one on our local Ebay, and found one but when I called, the seller didn't remember where he put it. It seemed the time had come to toss this PC in the trash.

Until it came to me. Who needs a CPU cooler when you have plastic cable ties. Problem solved.

October 22, 2010

Moo

Moo

So, we finally get to the point where it comes time to figure out how to paint our container office at the job site. After brainstorming for a while, I came to the conclusion that there was only one way to get a decision on this one: generate a couple of renderings of what the finished product would look like and see which one got approved.

I did the traditional renderings: horizontal bands, vertical bands, stripes on corners, top and bottom, solid colors... and then figured I might as well try a few fun ones, I had in mind a blue/gray camouflage pattern I thought would look cool.

And eventually, as you can probably imagine, I got kind of carried away with that "fun" part. No approval on this particular design... did get a few laughs from the other departments though =D

October 21, 2010

Almost there

Almost there

One of the most difficult things in this life is bringing home a roll of bubble wrap without popping half of it while in traffic =D

October 20, 2010

Umbrellas

Umbrellas

Speaking of the university, I decided to stop by and have a look today. The whole place is decorated with umbrellas, I have no idea why. Probably one of those strange arts projects someone decided to carry out.

October 19, 2010

I should NOT be eating this

I should NOT be eating this...

One of the best parts about those years at the university was when around 10 AM this guy would walk the campus selling these meat pies out of a wicker basket. No plastic food gloves, no heating elements, just a wicker basket with some towels and the pies in it. Though they did come in a paper bag with a printed label.

All of a sudden he didn't come by anymore, which was pretty depressing for all of us, especially around 10 AM every day. Seems he moved to selling them at stadiums during the soccer matches: more people and better profits.

So today I walk into the office and a colleague tells me he brought something from his most recent trip to the Atlantic coast... and he pulls out one of them meat pies =D

They weren't from my original supplier at the university, but they were just as good. He tells me there's this guy near the beach that makes them, every day he walks the beach at 11 AM, and all his supply is gone by noon... until the next day. People literally line up waiting for him to come by.

I probably shouldn't be eating this stuff at my age. The meat's spiced up, and from the napkin you can probably tell it's not exactly dietary material xD

But, sometimes you've just gotta make an exception =D

On a side note, we've decided to track down our original supplier. We found a note on him in the local paper, and are desperately working to find his phone number so we can convince him to make us a couple weekly batches!

October 18, 2010

Killing the lights

Killing the lights

Ever notice how those little LEDs that you never pay attention to, all of a sudden look like halogen floodlamps at 2 AM? You wake up and think to yourself "wait a minute, didn't I turn off the lights 4 hours ago?"

The light on my network hard drive is especially mean. That thing will light up a room like a Christmas tree. So today I thought to stick a couple of rubber bands on it and repurpose a strip from an old plastic flag I had laying around.

And now it's a whole lot nicer. And the best part is, I can still see what the indicator light is doing.

October 17, 2010

Lemons

Lemons

This weekend it came time to pick a few lemons.

It all started when my WD Mybook World Edition II, which I painfully shelled out $260 for, started flashing it's LED in a way that just tells you something did not go well inside. Two days and a few emails to tech support later, I found out the problem was one of the internal disks had failed. Tech support told me to send them the defective hard disk for a replacement, and that started a week long chain of events that finally ended yesterday.

In the end, my hard headedness paid off, since the internal drive diagnostics seem to have gone wrong, and I was about to send them the disk that was in perfect working condition, while keeping the defective one. Good thing I decided to spend a few days running my own diagnostics on the unit.

I also learned quite a bit about how this WD network drive works behind the scenes. It's basically a very small, buggy and limited PC, that only knows how to move hard drives. Which brings me to a very important point... if you have one of these WD network drives, never format both internal disks. You'll kill the operating system and brick your drive. I was fortunate enough to stumble on to that fact by accident, and just barely avoid bricking it =S

So, once again, I seem to have gotten a lemon from Western Digital. Four months in, one of the disks dies. Next week, it's RMA and disk mailing time.

On a side note, I also found a relatively new (about a year old) Maxtor drive which is also defective, and under warranty. I'm surprised at the amount of stuff I have stashed away that I can claim warranty on. It's gonna be like christmas in october =D

October 16, 2010

Just for the heck of it

Hello Kitty


It's amazing the things companies come up with these days in order to sell napkins.

What's even better, though, is the fact that you actually end up buying these things. Just for the novelty of it all.

You could have 10 packs of napkins in your kitchen waiting to be used... and still find yourself buying another pack of Hello Kitty Napkins.

Just for the heck of it.

October 15, 2010

In the rainforest

In the rainforest

The rainforest, despite being sold as all nice and full of colorful flowers and birds, is a pretty rough environment. When the rainforest decides to take something, it doesn't give it back that easy.

We started trying to tame the rainforest back in the 1980's. We wanted a half decent road to get us to the Atlantic coast in a reasonable amount of time. Here we are, 30 years later, and still we don't own the forest. Sure it lets us through, but every so often it'll decide no one's going to the Atlantic that day... a couple of rockslides later, road closed for 24 hours.

Even the roadside barriers belong to the rainforest. Just a little every day reminder that we're travelling on borrowed land.

October 14, 2010

Meet SD

Meet SD

This is called an SD memory card. It's used a lot in cameras, especially in those smaller ones you can carry with you everywhere.

On a side note, it's really useful not to forget it. Especially on those days when you just might find yourself driving around a corner and finding yourself in front of the perfect sunset, which will disappear 5 minutes later.

I hate it when I point at something spectacular, only to see a NO MEMORY CARD message on my screen xD

Maybe tomorrow I'll be able to catch the sunset. In the mean time, I'll go watch my Western Digital drive spin while I run diagnostics on it. Almost a week into my WD drive crisis. I'm hoping to finally figure out tonight whether or not I really have a problem of if it's just a software glitch. More to come...

October 13, 2010

Home in a can

Home in a can

My latest project is turning an old shipping container into a usable office space. It's been pretty interesting really. In my line of work I've seen a lot of container offices, and quite frankly most of them are dull and uncomfortable.

So it begs the question, is there a better way to do it? And that's what I'm trying to answer right now. A lot of research and design hours have gone into this office can, in order to bring it up to standards and avoid the pitfalls everybody else is having. Decent electrical systems, enough outlets and circuits, and a well thought out LAN infrastructure are among the things that I hope will make this container office easier to live and work in.

And the project had an interesting spinoff. If you can make a decent office in a can... how about a home in a can? The models I've seen available locally are, quite frankly, sad to look at. But with some R&D work, you could probably manage a very livable space from a couple of used 20 foot containers... without going into the insanity dominion that a lot of container-based designers in other countries have gone into. Hope to figure that one out next.

October 12, 2010

#fuerzamineros

#fuerzamineros

Some days are just too cool. 33 people, trapped 700 meters underground. And through the effort of some very dedicated people, today they're back on the surface safe and sound.

Not to mention that we all get to watch it unfold live, from the front row. And comment in real time with thousands of other people from all over the world.

Quite frankly, I don't know what's been the coolest this century. It's gotta be a close one between this mine rescue and seeing the first pictures coming from the surface of Mars. Tough call to make.

October 11, 2010

Sorry, we're closed

Sorry, we´re closed

So, let´s try to hold off the earthquakes, floods, fire alarms, nuclear attacks, alien landings and similar for a few days... or at least until I can easily run out of my room in the middle of the night.

I had forgotten about that very important fact about 10K's... it's not easy to walk the day after! xD

October 10, 2010

Done for the day

Done for the day

Managed to finish my 10K. The last 2 Km was hell, despite being on a straight and level street. By that time you're so tired that even straight and level feels like Mt. Everest.

In the end I finished #1152. But I finished... which in the end is what counts. I had promised myself I wouldn't bail out, and I didn't =D

October 09, 2010

The Empire´s Day Off

Empire´s day off

I always did wonder what the Empire did on the weekends...

October 08, 2010

23 minutes

23 minutes

That´s how long it takes me to get to work in the morning. Every day. And it's almost flawless: 23 minutes one day, 24 the next, ocasionally 25. Always near the mark.

It's amazing how some things are just so cyclical. It takes me around 24 minutes to get ready in the morning. 10 to have breakfast. 23 to get to work. Always.

So, how long would it take me to get to work if I dumped the bike and simply took my car? I've measured that too. 24 minutes.

October 07, 2010

Here I go again

Here I go again

It's been a couple of years since I ran a 10K. Last one I did I finished, not precisely in record time, but I got to the finish line and survived.

Last week I saw that this Sunday one of the local papers has it's annual 10K, and figured I should take a shot. I thought and thought and thought about it, and finally signed up today.

So here I go again... 10K this Sunday. Just hope it doesn't rain =D

October 06, 2010

E for "enough"?

E means "enough" right?

Sometimes it happens, you're rolling along and look down, to see that little yellow light has come on again. Darn. Last time you looked, the needle was going down, but it was still far away from that last little line.

In my car it's especially dramatic, as soon as the yellow light comes up, the needle drops all the way down and doesn't move anymore. You feel like any minute now the engine's gonna sputter and you're gonna have to walk the rest of the way to work.

It's never happened though. I always manage to get to the nearest gas station before that happens.

I don't suppose E stands for "enough"?

October 05, 2010

Yeah, let's try it the other way around

October 5, 2010

Yeah, let´s try it the other way around

Yeah, these are the kind of things that make you wonder sometimes. I'm sure the dog was having a wonderful time for the first couple of blocks, but after that being leashed to a bike probably got real old, real fast.

Sometimes people mean well, I'm sure. They just don't take the time to think things through.

Maybe tomorrow they should try it the other way around. Might give the owner a better perspective on their idea.

October 04, 2010

It's HOW old?

October 4, 2010

It's HOW old?

There´s this jacket that I always wear around the house. It became a habit I can't even remember when. That day it was just cold, I found it stashed away in the closet and decided to use it for the day, and it worked... so it stayed with me.

Never really thought about it, until today. I figured I couldn't remember where that jacket had come from. Although I did have an idea in the back of my mind. Sure enough, looking through a couple of photo albums I had also stashed in the closet, I figured it out.

I got the jacket when I was in high school, back when I used to wear huge nerdy Bill Gates 1980s glasses, and a ridiculous pair of white tennis shoes with purple detailing. Not to mention a pair of pants that were generally a few sizes too large for me, with this god awful braided brown leather belt that looked like something out of an arts and crafts class gone wrong.

Oh, yeah... and I had hair back then too. And a Chicago Bulls cap I simply refused to drop. Although it was an improvement over the previous cap I refused to drop: one of those $2 K-mart ball caps with the white styrofoam front, that one had a big corvette on it that said, of course, CORVETTE. Damn shame I din't have a pickup truck and a shotgun to go wit it too... woulda just made my day.

Back to the jacket. Way back when, I somehow managed to find myself in the middle of a foreign exchange program heading to France. Which eventually led me to get the jacket, use it for a month or so and then stash it in the closet forever.

That would make it... more or less 16 years old. Wow. That's gotta be the longest lasting item of clothing I've ever owned.

October 03, 2010

Lankester Garden

Jardin Lankester

Lankester is one of the local botanical gardens dedicated to the preservation and study of Orchids, and has cultivated over 15.000 different species. I was supposed to go do a shoot at the garden, but in the end it went belly up. In any case, I figured I'd have a look around... you never need a reason to look for good photos :)

You can see the full set here.

Note to self, bring mosquito spray next time...

October 02, 2010

The Mars Conspiracy

The Mars Conspiracy

Ladies and gentlemen, difficult as it may be, I regret to inform you all that the Opportunity and Spirit missions were no more than a hoax, dutifully carried out by NASA. There was no Mars landing, there are no Mars pictures.

Somehow, NASA managed to obtain photos of my morning toast and superimposed them on a cheap Photoshop rendered background, and then sold the images to millions via the networks.

One does not need an engineering degree to see that a hoax is being perpetrated. For starters, there are no stars visible from the martian surface. Then, if there really was a camera on the rovers, it should have melted due to the high levels of solar radiation. And of course, the parachutes used would have been completely incompatible with a vacuum

I hope to type up my Mars Conspiracy story some time soon, which I will then print up and bind in my garage, and sell on the Internet for $20 =D

October 01, 2010

No rain

No rain

Yay... no rain, at least not in the early morning hours. Finally pulled out my bike today again =D

Which was a pretty good thing. It seems everyone decided to take their car out today. So there were insane lines of cars waiting at stoplights again and again and again.

I of course, followed Pooh. "Bother", I said, and took to the sidewalk. xD