Daily Grind

It seems like all the major events are now behind us. School has begun, Jonathan is off to college, vacations are over, life should settle down into a regular routine now. Should is the operative word. It seems something at work is always demanding immediate attention, throwing a wrench into the daily grind. Then again, maybe that is the daily grind at work - some seeming emergency demanding immediate attention and distracting me from the dozen other projects on which I'm supposed to be working.

This is funny... I have the TV on and tuned to the news on Fox 11 KTTV in LA. A commercial just came on with Barry White and the Love Unlimited Orchestra's Love's Theme as the background music. I love that song! It reminds me of driving, top down, in my 1969 Fiat 124 Spyder in 1977 to Las Vegas from Santa Barbara on a gorgeous spring day with a guy I was dating. We made a quickie trip (my first ever) to Vegas, getting into town at 11 pm, shooting craps (I had no idea how to play but he taught me) at downtown casinos until 5 AM - and winning enough to pay for the whole trip - taking a nap until 11 AM, then driving back, getting in at 6 PM. It was one of those spontaneous, whirlwind adventures you never forget. And the background music of the trip was the Barry White 8-track I had at the time with Love's Theme on it. That song is forever tied to that trip. Aside from that, I love Barry White. So, this commercial just came on with that music, so naturally, I looked up. It shows all these men buying milk in large quantities - dogs with packs on them to carry multiple half gallons of milk, grocery carts filled to overflowing with milk, men fighting for the last half gallon in the store... then the tag line comes up on the screen "studies have shown calcium intake decreases the symptoms of PMS" or something like that. Then it closes with a guy coming in the front door witih a grocery bag full of milk, looking around for his wife and saying "honey, are you home?" and "Got Milk" comes on the screen. It is a funny commercial with great music!

I just read Kaitlin's blog and it makes me wonder - should I do as she does and make a point to post every day, even if it's just some random thing? I look forward to going to her blog to see her latest musings on her life on a daily basis. I tend to only post when I feel I have something worthwhile to write about. Maybe I should be more "active" and post daily, or at least "week daily". Let me know, okay? I do this blog mostly for myself - writing is cathartic - but I do it for my readers as well. So, if you are one of my readers and would like more frequent posts, posts about my daily activities, thoughts, etc., let me know.

On that note, as I said, this is the beginning of a new school year for Jonathan. So far, so good. He called me yesterday to ask for phone numbers to call for various on-campus jobs I'd told him about. His computer was not yet setup so he didn't have access to that info and was anxious to find a job. Sadly, all the jobs in the IT department were already filled. He should have gone job hunting on Monday! He doesn't want an office job, and really doesn't want to work in the dining hall, but I think he's going to find those are the only jobs left. I told him to just get any old job for now. He can always quit when an IT job becomes available. I hope he takes my advice. I logged onto his Blackboard account (where all his classes should be listed along with each syllabus, assignments, etc.) and the only class listed so far is his Calc III class. I was able to find out which textbook he needs, even clarifying with the prof the edition, and found a copy for sale on eBay for 1/3 the price of a new one. The prof sounds nice, very willing to help make this a good experience for Jonathan. The class is hard. There are assignments every single day, due the next day. It's going to take a lot of discipline for Jonathan to get through this class. I would appreciate everyone's prayers for him - that he maintain his focus, not procrastinate, and not let computer games get in the way of school this year. I would especially like prayers that God put someone in his life who will lead him to make a decision for Christ. He is so close. He believes the Bible is the Word of God. He believes Christ is the Son of God, but he has yet to make that all-important commitment to Christ that precedes developing a personal relationship with Him. That's my prayer this year - that the Lord bring Jonathan into fellowship with Him.

Right after Calc III he has Interpersonal Communications. I am pretty sure Kaitlin is in his class. Their prof is all of 25 years old. Should be an interesting class. He had his first Intro to Photoshop class last night. I am anxious to hear how it was. I would love to take a semester long Photoshop class and I know Jonathan loves Photoshop and the artistic stuff you can do with it, so he should enjoy it. Today he has Computer Science, which is a repeat of a class he took last semester and dropped. He has the really good prof for that class this year, so it should be a lot better than last year. Let's hope! The only other classes he has yet to have are Photography 1 (Monday nights) and Yearbook (Tuesday evenings). I'm looking forward to a report on both those classes, especially since I was on the yearbook throughout high school (editor-in-chief my senior year) and it was one of the best experiences of all.

I got my first new server in yesterday. The second one should arrive tomorrow. Now I just have to set them both up and decide which servers they will replace. I have 5 servers in place in the main branch, each serving one specific function. I am pondering which functions I can put on a server together to help consolidate the network, make it more efficient, and eliminate some hardware. Right now, two servers are not even servers - they are just PIII-550 workstations that have Win2K Server on them so they can fill a role we needed filled. One of those two is our data server. It's not very robust, and that needs to change. The new servers are dual Xeon processor servers with 2GB RAM, RAID 5 on a split backplane, and redundant power supplies. These babies ROCK. They also have Win2K3 Server on them. For you non-techies that's just a bunch of gobbledy-gook, I know, but any techs will appreciate the specs. What it means, in English, is that these machines are designed to run hard, run non-stop, process tons of transactions simultaneously, and really fill the role of server. Combining roles, though, can be tricky, so I have to really ponder which things I will put on which servers and how I will balance the network load. I have my work cut out for me.

It's 7:02 AM. I could stop typing right now and actually get a workout in. Okay... I'm going to do that... but first a photo... this one is of Tom and Jonathan sitting in the main square at Butchart Gardens trying to whistle using leaves from grass plants as their "instrument". This "project" was brought on by sitting next to a guy moments earlier who picked a leaf and immediately started making all sorts of bird sounds, whistles, etc. Both "boys" just had to try it themselves. Jonathan experienced success first with Tom a close second. They drove me nuts for the next hour making all sorts of noises, chirps, whistles, with these "reeds". The activity even spilled over into our walk in downtown Victoria as Jonathan would make these bird calls (he got really good at it) surreptitiously as we walked along the streets, causing people to turn and look for the source. He got a big chuckle out of that, though I was irritated to no end. So, here's a shot of the boys gleefully practicing their new trick.