dave's blog

It’s been many years since I’ve been seriously sick. In fact, I’ve been busy these past few months working to take better care of myself with calisthenics, walking, and eating better. I’d managed to drop over ten pounds and was feeling pretty good – until August 30.

I fly the digital audio system at church every other week. On Sunday, August 30, I jumped into the box with great anticipation; I really enjoy when my dance with the audio system results in a completely transparent experience for the attendees. All morning I felt like I was in a bit of a fog. There were no major errors (one late microphone start), but the presentation didn’t feel “right” to me. I blamed it on missing breakfast, which has become a part of my “better health” routine.

After church, Anne, Jessica, and myself visited our local Mexican restaurant for our traditional Sunday feast. It became evident that something more was wrong than just missing breakfast. Even though I consumed a reasonable meal (including a giant soda) I was continuing to crash. As the meal came to a close, I requested that we go straight home.

After relaxing on the bed for a few minutes, I decided to take a quick check with the thermometer; it showed a fever of over 102. Definitely not quite right. I was so loopy I couldn’t believe my eyes. I napped for a bit and tried again: 102.9. For the next four days I was eating extra strength Tylenol and trying to swallow any liquids I could get passed my swollen neck. The fever raged daily – at one point reaching 103.3.

Unfortunately, once the flu has taken hold, there really isn’t much that a doctor can do. They can monitor your vital signs, provide fluids, and prescribe fever reducing medications (only Tylenol for me); these were all things that Anne and I could do at home, so we did. Anne really did a fabulous job of dealing with a cranky, partially lucid patient.

Here we are, five days later, and the symptoms are easing slightly. Without medication today, the fever stayed below 101. I’m taking more Tylenol tonight so that I can get the best sleep possible.

I’m six pounds lighter, still have very swollen glands, and am very weak.

The first sidebar? Anne and Jessica have been fighting colds for weeks.

The second sidebar? Mike, the other sound guy, called in sick on Wednesday night… oh boy.
 

In the fine cinematic feature, “Monty Python and the Holy Grail,” there is drawn the great distinction between “bunnies” and “rabbits” when the troop encounters the Rabbit of Caerbannog. They are told that, “death awaits you all with nasty, big, pointy teeth,” in reference to the rabbit – which is obviously not warm and cuddly like a bunny. Therefore! I pronounce the critters I vanquished today to be dust rabbits!

A friend (who shall remain anonymous, to avoid being associated with the horror that follows) was having problems with his computer after installing new memory (RAM). The machine was decidedly unstable and quite disagreeable. I spent some time diagnosing the problem, finally discovering that one of the new “sticks” of RAM was indeed defective.

While digging through the computer I discovered the rabbits – they were everywhere! They had congregated beneath the cooling fan for the CPU – creating a lovely blanket of near-wool properties, ideal for summer computing!

There were rabbits in the video card fan, rabbits on the motherboard, and rabbits in the air intake vents. Those little beasties had multiplied over the years to take over the whole machine!

With vacuum cleaner hose in-hand, I conquered the evil monsters one-by-one. The machine should be more stable without the furry critters everywhere.

So, when was the last time you had a geek exterminate the beasties from your computer?
 

Anne has been working on a small vegetable garden this year. She planted several different crops, but it appears that the only one that will finish strong is the squash. Some of the plants fell to slugs, some fell to an overly helpful gardener (“Let me pull these weeds (carrots) for you!”), some didn’t get enough sun, and some just never appeared. Anne’s been watching and watering for weeks on end, so this little victory seems huge to us. I’ve stepped in to do watering from time to time, but Anne’s done the real work.

Given that the two of us are far better suited to computers than plants, getting any kind of “fruits” is amazing.
 

Seattle is known for its lush green surroundings, cold clear water, and temperate weather... except today. Today we set a new record for the hottest date in Seattle history: 102 degrees. Our normal high temperature for this date is 76. We'll be lucky if the low temperature is 76 tonight. The challenge for people (and pets) here is the inability to escape from the heat. The vast majority of homes have no air conditioning. Even many small businesses have no air conditioning. Those that have air conditioning are discovering that their systems can't keep up with this much heat, or are succumbing to power outages as demand races upward. My dentist's office called yesterday to warn me that they have to postpone my cleaning; the power was out.

Our house has pretty good insulation, so we close it up at about 10:00 a.m. (when the outside temp begins to exceed the ambient temperature in the house) and leave it closed up while the temperature races upward. We’ll keep it closed until the temps cool back down tonight – probably after 7 p.m. Currently, it's about 82 in the house (at 3:45 p.m.) and will probably climb to 84 before the afternoon is over.

Then we’ll throw open every window and turn on the whole-house ventilation system. Our furnace includes a whole-house mode that pulls in outside air to flush radon gas, which is common in the Pacific Northwest, out of the house. In the case of warm weather, it will also pull cooler air from outside and reduce the house temperature quickly.

It’s been a year of interesting weather – far more snow storms than usual, and a “real” summer. I wonder what’s next.

While I enjoy most Microsoft products, I found that the Windows Media Player isn’t my favorite. It performs well enough for most people, but I’m a little pickier. My newest machine is now four and a half years old, so any gains in performance are delightful to me. I’ve elected to switch back to Winamp as my default music player. The price is right too – you can get it for free.

The biggest drawback to Winamp are the hoops you must jump through when installing the application. First, the opportunity to choose the wrong edition (say, one that costs money) is quite easy. Second, during the installation the manufacturer (AOL) makes several attempts to hijack the user’s home page and other preferences, as well as install extra software. These assaults are easily avoided by geeks, but since they are the default options I’m sure normal mortals will fall prey to them.

Winamp plays my MP3 collection more cleanly that Windows Media player and supports “plug-ins” that allow the user to customize their experience. For me, there is a plug-in that I really adore: Stereo Tool. The simple name belays the coolness. The plug-in was developed by a fellow named Hans van Zutphen and is designed to moderate the differences in volume between different songs. Hans gives the plug-in away – pretty cool. Be warned: some of those previously save performance gains are lost with the use of the Stereo Tool. For me, the ROE (return on enjoyment) is well worth it. If there is one failing of Stereo Tool, it would be the incredible flexibility available in the plug-in - which is needed by radio broadcasters.

Here’s more detail about how Hans’ plug-in works for the geeks. Stereo Tool uses the same concepts used by commercial radio stations to get consistent loudness – multiband compression and limiting. The heart of the plug-in is a ten-band compressor/limiter (which has separate compressor and limiting functions) to provide a very good approximation of the radio station experience. If you’d like to learn more about the geeky details, feel free to drop me a line, or check out Han’s website.
 

Sometimes geeks get a little extra time on their hands - and do weird things. A friend-of-a-friend is learning a Microsoft technology called, "Silverlight." He decided to create a web page to hone his skills. His page is a little wierd, very simple, and adictive. Do you remember the "cow in a can" noise makers from childhood? You'd turn the can upside down, and when you righted the can, it would "moo." He built a web page that does the same thing - although you can get differet "moos" based on how far you turn the cow. Point at the cow ON THIS PAGE with your mouse, then move your mouse away... MOO! Be sure to try only turning the cow part way to get a different "moo."