Category Archives: Administrative

Administrative

Haven’t Checked Out Yet

9 Comments

In case anyone was wondering, that last post wasn’t a permanent blogging break, but I’ve been taking an unannounced temporary one. I’ll be back in CA tomorrow, and back to the usual hijinks.

[Wednesday-morning update]

The above was posted from my phone, before I got on the plane in DC on the way back to LAX. I didn’t warn about the blogging break because I didn’t plan it; it just sort of happened. I had my laptop with me the whole trip, and was on it quite a bit, but just didn’t bother to post anything (BTW, for future reference, if this happens again, and you want to see if I’m still metabolizing and on line, check my Twitter account, which remained relatively active throughout, at least in RTs).

I flew out Saturday morning to Dulles, and spent a relaxing half weekend with friends in rural Virginia, then took the train into DC Monday morning to attend the Satellite 2017 conference at the Convention Center, which I normally don’t attend, and in fact never have attended, because I’m not really a satellite sort of guy. But I’d been asked to speak at a panel on Monday afternoon, and I had other business in DC. It turned out that there were a lot of friends and useful contacts at the event, and while I was checking mail and Twitter, I just never got around to posting anything, not even a brief link, because it would have been a distraction. I in fact didn’t realize that the post had been the last one that I’d made until I saw comments there, so decided to at least put something up to assuage concerns, or disappoint those who were hoping for my demise (though I doubt that to the degree they exist at all, they spend much time here).

But in thinking about it, I may be suffering from blogging burnout to a degree, after over a decade and a half of it (last October was my 15th bloggiversary). There’s a lot going on in my life right now, both professionally and personally (good things, I hasten to add), and while in the past that might have been blog fodder, I don’t really feel motivated to discuss it long form, and the things that I do make the effort to discuss long form I try to place other places than the blog these days. I do still tweet a lot (probably too much), and maybe for now the best thing to do is to get my Twitter display working on the blog again, so it will at least be a microblog, and people who stop by will know I’m still here, even if I don’t overcome the additional energy barrier to put up an actual post.

Administrative

Back In The US of A

3 Comments

We just landed in New York from London, and have been up for 18 hours. The bad news: We still have a six-hour flight to LA, which gets in at 2 AM. The good news? We got upgraded.

[Update a few minutes later]

OK, the other bad news. The plane is late.

[Saturday-morning update]

OK, the good news is that the plane was just a few minutes late, and we got into LA pretty much on time. The better news is that with our business-class upgrade, which allowed me to fully recline, I actually slept on a plane for the first time in my life. I’m up at 8 AM in CA (it’s 4 PM in London), making coffee and getting my body on Pacific time, ASAP. Hopefully by Monday with a good night’s sleep tonight.

American seems to have

Administrative, Culinary

Travel Update

12 Comments

We celebrated New Years Eve in Paris, in a sixth-floor apartment we rented with a view of the Eiffel Tower. It’s just a couple blocks from the Sorbonne and the Pantheon.

Unfortunately, it’s socked in, but we could see the lights through the mist. They started sparkling an hour before midnight, and then again as the hour hit. Not a lot of fireworks here, but we saw a few out that window, and others out the loft window toward Notre Dame. But the Parisians were cheering in the streets.

The trip has been pretty much stab/explosion/truck-attack free so far. Apparently they weren’t so fortunate in Istanbul; the Jayvee team struck again last night.

But it’s cold. Below freezing last night, and probably tonight as well. But we’re cozy, and we’ll be going out this afternoon to check out the Cathedral. But right now we’re heating croissants in the oven and making scrambled eggs with Welsh cheddar, and gravlox from Norway, with leftover oven-fried potatoes from dinner last night.

[Update a few minutes later]

Oh, and bonne annee to my readers.

[Monday-morning update]

Yes, speaking from current experience, international travel is so much better than it used to be.

We’re off to the Louvre. We could walk, but it’s rainy and chilly. We’ll probably take Uber.

Administrative, War Commentary

Merry Christmas, And Happy New Year

14 Comments

And Happy Chanuka, to all my readers.

Posting will be light/non-existent for the next couple weeks. Patricia and I are flying to London tomorrow evening, for our first real vacation in a long time, and we’re scrambling around, while making a Christmas Eve dinner, to prepare for the trip. We’ll be there, and on the Continent (largely Benelux and France), and back on January 7th.

2016 has been a rough year (even ignoring the politics), with the death of Patricia’s eldest brother and mother, and all the time I spent in Florida getting the house ready to sell. But we sold it, and she has a new job, and we’re going to celebrate New Year’s Eve in Paris, where neither of us have ever been. We’ll try not to get blown up or stabbed or run over.

[Christmas-morning update]

I’ve always thought that the Wexford Carol was one of the most beautiful. Hard to imagine it being done better than this.

And on a lighter note, “I Saw Daddy Pat Down Santa Claus.”

[Update a few minutes later]

OK, this is heartwarming.

[Update a while later]

It’s that crucial time of year to give your cat an annual performance review.

Administrative, Mathematics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Science And Society, Technology and Society

Baby It’s Cold Outside

28 Comments

I know I shouldn’t complain in southern California, considering how brutally cold it is back east, but we woke up this morning to a 63-degree house, and listening to a struggling furnace on the morning after the coldest night of the season to date. The blower seems to be on the fritz.

On a Sunday.

I had other plans today, but I’m going to have to take it apart, and see if I can fix it. It’s twelve years old. Hoping it’s just a bad capacitor. I doubt I’d be able to find a replacement motor today.

[Update a few minutes later]

Not really complaining, and have no right to. If we were back east right now, this would be life threatening, and we’d either have to get an emergency HVAC guy in, or find somewhere else to stay, but for us, it’s just an inconvenience. Worst case is extra blankets tonight, and I’ll find a replacement motor (or limit switch, or whatever the problem is) tomorrow.

But it’s also a reminder of how thin the veneer of modern technology can be, and that nature is not our friend. Whatever the climate is doing (and anyone who claims they can confidently predict it out decades is either fooling themselves, or attempting to fool us), we have to maintain enough societal wealth to deal with it. The policies promulgated by those who insist we can control the climate would have the opposite effect.

[Monday-morning update]

When we woke up this morning, temp in the house was 61 F. A couple hours later, it’s down to 60. It will probably warm up when the sun gets higher, but high temp today is only predicted to be 67.

In troubleshooting, I’ve learned two things: 1) Modern gas furnaces are complicated as copulation and 2) the burner isn’t lighting, which is why the blower motor isn’t bothering to. The status light isn’t flashing any of the error codes in the manual, just steady on, the way it’s supposed to if everything is copacetic, so it’s not useful for diagnostics. I’m suspecting the gas valve (a problem with which the control board would be unaware), but not sure how to tell if it’s working. Could also be the igniter, except I’d think I’d at least momentarily smell gas if that were the problem. Anyway, I’ve got to go start poking at things with a VOM.

[Update a few minutes later]

OK, I am briefly smelling gas when it tries to start up, so the valve seems to be working. Now suspecting igniter:

1. Remove burner compartment door to gain access to the ignitor.
2. Disconnect the ignitor from the Ignition Control.
3. Using an ohmmeter measure the resistance of the ignitor.
4. Ignitor cool should read between 40 to 75 ohms.
5. Reconnect ignitor.
6. Place unit in heating cycle, measure current draw of ignitor during preheat cycle. Should read approximately 4 to 4.5 amps.
7. If ignitor is receiving 115 Volts and will not light, replace.
8. After check and/or replacement of hot surface ignitor, reinstall burner compartment door and verify proper unit operation.

Supposed to be 40-75 ohmns, showing infinite. That seems like the problem. Looks like they’re about $20. Now to go out and find one.

[Update a while later]

OK, a replacement (and improved version) was $42 bucks. The old one had clearly failed; you could see the burn through in the element that had opened it up. It probably got hit by a piece of dust or something when it was hot. House is now warming up.

[Update a while later]

Temp is up to 64 degrees and rising. In retrospect, I would have saved time if I’d relied on Occam: If something isn’t igniting, first check to see if there’s ignition.

Further thoughts: Pilotless ignition saves fuel, and is probably more reliable, but if a pilot blows out, it doesn’t cost $40+ to relight it.

Anyway, I understand my furnace much better now. It was the first time since we had it installed a dozen years ago that I’d opened it up to see how it works.

Administrative, Mathematics, Technology and Society

Evolution

2 Comments

No, not the theory, the software. Is there some good reason why it won’t synchronize with an IMAP server? I have this crazy idea that if email gets marked as junk locally, it should be removed from the inbox on the server, but it doesn’t happen. I don’t see it in the local inbox, but if I look at the server with roundcube, it’s all still there, and I have to manually remove it. The only thing I can find in a search to deal with it is to use offlineimap to synch, and point Evolution at the local files. But that seems like a PITA to set up. Why does this have to be so hard?

Administrative, Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

Off The Air

64 Comments

For those wondering, I flew from LA to Dallas on Thursday, and drove down to Austin, to attend the New Worlds Conference. Patricia flew in to Austin on Saturday, and we’re spending a couple days in Texas Hill Country. I’m sitting in a little house we rented in Comfort, overlooking a creek and deer in a natural meadow across it. A couple of them came up to the window last night and looked in. Between funerals and family visits, and house renovation, it’s the first real vacation we’ve had in a while.

I should be back in the saddle (so to speak) on Wednesday, surveying the aftermath of the electoral disaster to come (regardless of the outcome).