Russell & Kimmy

So we lost two call centers earlier today. Wow that sounds grim (like the suddenly imploded or something) so let me rephrase that; we had two servers crash which took two call centers down. Being the end of the month and the end of the quarter there was the usual panic, pandemonium and the inevitable SRT call. I dread SRT calls; they are a slow form of agonizing embarrassment where people ask me questions about things I only have a rudimentary grasp of. It is quite similar to that dream where you show up to school naked and everyone laughs at you. I haven’t actually figured out what SRT stands for, it wouldn’t take me too long but knowing the full name would take too much effort and ruin the mystique and dread of the SRT call. So while this call swirls around me I did my usual routine, I put myself on mute and goofed off.
I figured I could blog but I am not sure what I want to talk about. I have all sorts of things that happened to me over the last two weeks but they are all personal, treasured, and throwing them out on the blog-o-sphere would cheapen and demean them. So I am left at work, bored, with nothing to write about. And then I remember I have a philosophy degree and that there has to be something inherently philosophical about this. Of course, then I remembered that I really didn’t pay that much attention when I was in class, so what ever philosophical nugget this holds probably just whizzed right by me. It was probably something about the inner me and the outer me and the struggle between the individual and society.
But that does bring up an interesting problem and one that I have run into repeatedly; how much information is too much information? As the world shrinks and the web brings people closer together I have that inherent need to share pseudo-anonymously my inner most thoughts and feelings. This wouldn’t be too big of a deal but most of my life revolves around Kimmy and others who don’t want their intimates aired out for all the world to see like naughty-sexy underwear on a clothesline; so I find myself remaining silent.
Even worse, some things I don’t even know how to explain to myself, and I find myself a little confused, nervous, and vaguely un-easy. Zounds! I am kind of like the American electorate/finance system except I am not currently expecting a bailout.
But the Moose in the room still looms, how much information is too much information?

You know what they say about the geek with a big desktop? No, never heard that one … oh well it means he has a BIG CPU fan!

So it has been a while since I last wrote; I have been a busy beaver. The first of September started off with me finally repairing my Desktop. Right before we moved, my old faithful Maxtor hard drive finally bought the farm. Well sort of, it bought the farm … it just hadn’t moved in yet. Realizing that eminent hard drive failure was approaching I finally upgraded from an 80 GB Maxtor IDE to a 500 GB Seagate SATA. Of course this required a new install of windows, some partitioning, some auditing, but most important … it required the damn computer to turn on. Actually no scratch that, it required a 3.5 floppy drive and then the need for the damn computer to turn on. Of course by the time I actually got off my fat ass and found a 3.5 floppy drive we had moved and then of course the CPU fan for what ever reason decided to die, actually again scratch that it didn’t die …. it just didn’t want to cool the CPU.

So I gave up and played on the laptop.

Eventually having to share a computer annoyed Kimmy enough that she demanded I repair the desktop. Of course I ignored her, suffered for it, and after healing my wounds Kimmy made the mistake of going to Fry’s with me. I of course realized I needed a new CPU fan, but was too proud to ask for any form of help. Instead I went to CNet.com and reviewed some reviews on CPU fans, then headed over to TigerDirect.com to review some more reviews on CPU fans. After several hours I realized that there are no standard metrics for measuring CPU fans and that most people who build their own systems are either morons or geniuses, at that point I gave up, decided to go with bigger is better (probably putting me in the moron category) and dragged Kimmy to Fry’s. In the spirit of having no clue what I was doing, I bought the biggest fan I could find, promised Kimmy that it would fit in the case, and promptly took it home. And as you can see, it is HUGE!

In fact it was big enough that I had to remove my piddly power supply and the graphics card just to have room for my fat fingers, but it fit. Did I mention that it was HUGE? And at some point I promise to post the specs, just as soon as I can escape from work, flee home, win Avlis, and possibly solve world hunger.

The stats:

147 (length) X 92 (width) X 143 (height) MM
Fan Speed 1300 ~ 2000 RPM
Max Air Flow 86.5 CFM
Noise 16 dBA ~ 24 dBA
And hopefully the damn thing will last the 50,000 hours ( 5.7 years) the box promises.

I deal with stats a lot at work. No let me re-phrase that; I deal with people who deal with stats a lot. Stats are magical, wonderful things that are amazingly adept at lying (and they can lie a lot I might add). Keeping in mind that stats can and do lie, I try to not give people raw data because (I was told in English class to never use because) it is eerily similar to giving a monkey a loaded gun (but not as fun and the only person who is going to get shot is me). Being so skeptical of stats I took it with a grain of salt (and a shot of tequila) that this humble blog has had 65,009 page hits so far this year; even more mind boggling is that this humble little blog has had 21,727 separate hosts served (w00t I am on my way to being the next McDonalds, except I don’t serve a crappy breakfast menu). At first I felt really special then I realized that I have checked my GMail account more than 65,009 times so far this year and that a vast majority of those 21,727 visitors were spammers who haven’t quite figured out that YES I do approve each and every comment. So when you take that into account the stats seem less impressive, although I am still amazed (and a little frightened) anybody actually takes the time to read my narcissistic ramblings.

All statistics and ramblings aside, it seems I have gotten a flood of what can only be called bad news. Most of it is way too personal to even mention on this blog and most of it angers/saddens/frustrates me because I am powerless to actually do anything about it, except lend moral support. It stews in the back of my mind and leaves me with a bad taste in the back of my throat till it seems that life just sucks; then I remember it is the small things that make life bearable. You think I would get use to the bad stuff (since tech support is a constant string of disasters) but somehow you never really do. Like I said, it is the small things that make life bearable, that and insurmountable hope that things will get better (believe it or not I am insurmountable optimist wrapped in a pessimists skin, and man is it tough skinning a pessimist).

One small victory I can claim today is I found a product key for a nice older lady who I occasionally do troubleshooting for. Some how (and I am still not sure how) she managed to get her OS re-installed which wiped out everything else; I think she some how did a system restore but I am still not sure how she did it. To make matters worse she had lost the product key for Office 2007, so it was looking like Microsoft Works (which is worse than a kick in the groin) or buying a new copy of Office 2007 (which is worse than two kicks in the groin). Luckily at work I remembered that we had a key finder, but in the spirit of disasters both big and small it had been deleted off the network. After poking around on CNET I was able to locate another one and it looks like it is going to work; so cross your fingers and spit.

Quick Link http://davehope.co.uk/projects/product-key-finder/ A key finder for all your installed Microsoft Applications

It didn’t work like I wanted it to (i.e. find the product key for Office 2007) so it is back to the old drawing board.

I have too much junk at my desk … it is amazing but I have actually lost the phone on my desk, I know it is there because I can here it ringing. I was going to post some photos, but I can’t find the camera … I think it is on the desk.

So its been a while since I have expounded upon the obtuseness of my co-workers, but every since one of the managers fired a few the, well of humor & pain has run a bit dry. Luckily yesterday it rained (something broke), and when it rains it pours (emails flowed like whiskey at an Irish … well any Irish event). To be fair it was part of the phone system that broke so the first logical group to contact is us (score 1 for logic), however it was the phone system in another office that was 1,653 miles away (take that logic) … so not a lot I could do. Luckily my superior brilliance instantly deduces the problem and in the first 5 minutes of all hell breaking loose I fire off a solution. Sadly it takes another 32 minutes and 37 emails before the problem is fixed. I am going to wager that in that 37 minutes I could have done something profound like world peace, or at least tamed the bear so I feel justified slapping my co-workers with a stinging -1 point.

Of course the nature of the problem is even funnier than me penalizing my co-workers. I was going to draw this out for my rapturous audience but since even my stick figures cause ocular bleeding I decided words were far safer; trust me folks … ocular bleeding isn’t fun. So I decided on a happy little narrative … so once upon a time there are three servers, let us call them Router, CAP, and Switch. Now Router, CAP, and Switch have an important job of preventing all hell from breaking loose and usually they cheerfully do this, BUT Router slept with Switch’s attractive 21 year old daughter so they currently aren’t speaking … and poor CAP is stuck in the middle trying to facilitate communication between the two in an effort to prevent all hell from breaking loose. Well after a while CAP decides this sucks and decides to flat out not talk to either Router or Switch. This is all fine and dandy but, they aren’t working and all hell breaks loose. Now the best solution would be to fire CAP, congratulate Router for scoring on Switch’s daughter, and replace Switch with some one less whiny and possibly more attractive. But! Don’t you hate butts … Switch has some photos from a office party and well getting rid of him would be costly so someone (i.e. a tech) has to walk up to CAP and slap him for being a whiny little snot, and tell him to get back to work. Then there is the process of stuffing hell back in a box, cleaning up, and trying to explain to people why the three servers decided to have drama on a Wednesday afternoon.

Fun times all around.