I have been Busy. Busy-with-a-capital-B-Busy. Work. Home. Illness (= falling behind, = busier when I’m healthy).
How busy? It’s April 7, and this is my first post in April. Ouch.
How busy? Yesterday, while at work, I decided I needed some thinking music, so I grabbed my Powerbook from my bag, grabbed the mini-plug for my powered speakers that sits on my desk (I have a Wintel PC at work; why would I plug speakers into that?) and plugged in my ‘book. Two minutes into “What’s the Frequency, Kenneth?”, the music died. Battery. Oops. Power supply is at home. Did I say oops? I don’t think I ever used it all weekend. And this is my primary computer at home. Tonight I finally got around to plugging the thing into AC, only to find the battery had really, really died. Oops.
At least I’m getting things done. Released one major app last Thursday at work. Releasing the other this Thursday (crosses fingers). Nearly finished cleaning the garage.
Of course, when I get this busy, I usually end up looking for a stress-release, and the less practical the better. While cleaning the garage, my attention kept getting drawn to the pair of Sun SPARC/Station 1’s (complete with monitor) sitting on a shelf in my garage. I grabbed these years ago when my employer was discarding them. Of course, I’ve never been able to do anything useful with them. Or anything at all, for that matter. I’ve got an old copy of some version of a Sun OS for them, and even borrowed a SCSI CD-ROM drive at one point, but they were both net-booted workstations and have no hard drive. The only SCSI drive I’ve ever gotten my hands on (for free) I could never get to work.
In the years since I last played with these machines, I’ve gotten a little more Unix/Linix savvy, and have certainly acquired more hardware. As I’ve gazed at these old machines while I clean my garage, sorting through boxes of old memories and old junk, I’ve been pondering the potential. Linux. Net boot. Old hardware. What more could I need?
Well, a keyboard would be nice. At one time, at least, I had a Sun keyboard. I had hoped to find it in one of the remaining boxes. That hope was dashed tonight. I assumed it must be around the house somewhere. After calling it a night on the cleaning front, I decided to check my email for the first time in days (did I mention I’ve been Busy?). This proceeded into Googling for sparc 1 linux. I found scads of good stuff in the UltraLinux FAQ.
You can guess what happened next. With a little help, I got TFTP running on my Powerbook. I was just about to grab a compatible boot image, when I decided to grab some hardware. That’s when my lack of keyboard became more than a minor annoyance. I checked the basement, my office, and double-checked the garage… and I can’t find my Sun keyboard.
I briefly considered a serial port boot, but of course the SPARC 1 has a 25-pin serial port, and who knows where I might have put any 25-to-9-pin cables? Beside which, my powerbook has no serial port (I can’t believe I just complained about that!), and I don’t feel like getting the Win2000 machine involved tonight.
I’m no longer powerless; my new powerbrick for my Powerbook arrived today. Six more days of warranty support. And no, I didn’t buy Apple Care.
I’m a little behind on my reading and blogging; but I’ll try to get caught up over the next few days. Nice to be back on my Powerbook.
Today is my 32nd birthday. My buddy Sean got me a dual G5 Powermac… sort of.
It started yesterday, at the office. I had been waiting for a time-sensitive email on my personal account, so I had my Powerbook on. When the email arrived, I began sending a reply. The “reserve power” warning came on; ten minutes of power left. I kept typing. Suddenly realizing I had only 4 minutes left, I grabbed my copmuter bag and pulled out my power supply. Plugged it into the wall, stuck it in the Powerbook, and nothing happened.
Three minutes. Look at all the apps that are open… never get everything closed down in time. Why didn’t the light come on? Trying to bend reality to my will by ignoring it, I unplugged the cord from the Powerbook and plugged it back in. Nothing. Two minutes. Grasping the cord near the powerbook, I lifted the brick to see if the AC cord was plugged in snuggly. My foot was on the AC chord, however, and I ended up yanking the brick to a halt in midair, like a child on the playground with a friend grabbing each arm, tugging in opposite directions. Then the green light went on. And then off.
One minute. I jiggled the cord a little, brick still suspended in the air, and the light came on green. After a moment, it turned yellow… the battery was now charging. Slowly, gingerly, I lowered the brick to the floor. Power continued to flow. Immediate danger passed, big problem remaining.
This happened late in the day; when I packed up to go home, the PB was not fully charged. Later last night, I took it out and sat on the couch and read some email, caught up on some blogs. Eventually, the partial charge ran down, and it was time to plug in again. I grabbed the cord, earlier problems forgotten until I plugged it in, and nothing happened. Remembering the prior fix, I gave the cord a jiggle. On-off. Jiggle, shake. On-Off-on. Lower slowly. Off. Sharp wrist snap, On. Lower slowly. Still on. Resume computing irritated.
Of course, by morning I’d forgotten all this (where is my head, anyway?). I tossed the PB and cord in the bag and headed to work. I was again expecting an important email, and pulled out the PB around lunch time to check for it. It rolled in a little later, along with another email telling me something I ordered had shipped. Ooooh…. Fedex Tracking Numbers! I left the Powerbook on the desk the rest of the afternoon, occaisionally waking it to check my tracking numbers (obsessive? compulsive? don’t be silly) and my email. I never did bother to plug it in. Still had a little charge left when I headed home.
At home on the couch, eating dinner and surfing, I decided to run OS X Software update. As the update was winding up, I was running out of juice. Dinner finished, I decided to put the Powerbook in the office and let it charge for a while. Of course, when I plugged it in, no juice. I tried the jiggle trick, and the light flashed on and off a couple of times, and then nothing. I’ve fooled with it three or four times for 10 minutes a pop, and I can’t get it to charge. It’s powered off, but only 10 minutes of juice remain.
The good news is, my 1yr warranty is good for another week or two. The bad news is, I sure don’t want to wait for Apple to ship me a new cord… it this point I’ll be powerless all weekend. The closest place I know of to get a replacement is Compusa, which I’m boycotting for eternity. The next closest place is the Apple store, over an hour away; and I have about 0 chance of getting there this weekend with my parent coming to town for a visit.
So, for now, I’m unable to check email (I’ll be alot more desparate before I use webmail), I’m falling behind (further) on my blogs, and I probably won’t be posting much.
It’s been very cold here on the east coast for weeks. There’s several inches of snow still on the ground. I have had a nice coat of ice on my car’s windshield every morning for days. Having misplaced lost my window scraper, I am reduced to waiting for the car to warm up and melt the ice. This morning, the ice layer was thin. I decided to wait in the car while the ice melted. Five minutes later, I was very cold, but ready to leave.
This is when events began to conspire against me. While my driveway was clear of snow, the road at the end of my driveway still had some snow from the plows, which I hadn’t moved. My plan was to roll through at speed, which generally works. As my front wheels were passing the gutter, I realized I’d turned my car the wrong way… towards a neighbor’s car which is always parked on the road, strategically in my blind spot when I back out. Instinctively, I slowed the car for an extended crane-the-neck look for the other car- forgetting that this was a bad time to slow down. I stopped with my front wheels (of my front-wheel drive Eclipse) directly in the snow, in the gutter. Got my bearings, tried to back up… spun my wheels. Same going foward. Stuck. What a way to start the day!
The back of my car was blocking half the street, on a busy intersection. I was not pleased. I ran to get the snow shovel and rock salt, and asked Sherri to come help. I moved some snow, tossed some salt, and tried again. No change. Sherri tried to push. No change. I tried again… and slipped sideways. Slightly less road blocked, but I was still stuck. Watching the school bus thread its way between my car and the neighbor’s car (the one that caused all this) was especially invigorating.
I am ashamed to say I started getting mad. I was angry that this had happened to me. I was already imagining waiting for AAA to arrive, standing in the snow, waving people around my car. I was livid. I watched a big truck coming up the adjoining street, and was pleased when he didn’t turn. Then his brakes came on, and he started backing up. “Great! You would decide to turn after all, wouldn’t you?” I thought. I was hot.
And then something happened that immediately defused my tantrum. The truck stopped, and two guys hopped out. They walked over, moved a little more snow with the shovel, and pushed me out. I suddenly felt very small for being so worked up over nothing. I also realized it’s a shame that having someone stop to help you is a surprising thing these days.
To the anonymous gentlemen who helped me this morning, thank you and God bless you. You were the answer to a prayer I was too angry to pray. You not only saved me a lot of time and frustration, you improved my outlook for the entire day.
What a good way to start the day.