Geek Stuff
So I had a nice talk with my co-worker Chivarin on Friday about side-projects, and lo and behold today I asked to be added to our ARIN account, and here we go. So I am back once again working on something I am really psyched to do.
AS23514
WikiLeaks mirrors
Full wikileaks site mirrorSeeing as this information is critical to safeguard, I have mirrored it, and fired up several seeds. Please post your mirrors in the comments.
Why socialism is not the solution
1. You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity.
2. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving.
3. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.
4. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is the beginning of the end of any nation.
5. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it.
Adrian Rogers, 1931
Camping Trip
Spring is here in Texas, and it's a great time to be outside, so we're going on a camping trip! The location is some private property just outside of Austin, that a friend of mine has hooked us up with. The property is setup like a campground and several people live there, so we'll be guests on the property. Water and electricity are provided, and the rest is up to us. So to prepare we picked up a new tent, a very sturdy cover for dining, and tiki torches, and a few other odds and ends. I also bought a turkey fryer. Now it's useful for several things. First off it's the ideal stove for brewing beer, because you can do it outside and make a mess rather than brewing in the kitchen and having a lot of cleanup to do. Second the turkey fryer comes with a 30 quart pot, that's 7.5 gallons. If you have checked out any of my beer recipes, they are all for 5 gallon batches, that that is pretty standard, but up until now I have been using two 12 quart pots and combining them at the end. Now I can use a single pot without having to split and combine at all. Third since the cooker part of the kit uses propane it can also double as a camping stove. So we can have a fire to cook over, but also will have a nice propane burner. I also started a batch of pilsner which is now fermenting at a cool 55F, and I hope that it will come along camping with us.
Weight Loss
So about a week ago I went looking for a very good weight loss article that I read a couple of years ago, and I came upon
The Hacker's Diet Online. I have since setup accounts for both myself and Abisha, and we have started weighing in daily to track our progress. My goal is 180, and Abisha's is 140. I have a lot further to go than Abisha, but we're both progressing very well so far. I believe one of the factors that helps so much is the correct feedback that the statistics package on the sites generates. It uses a moving daily average to compute your current weight, and uses all data available to calculate this number. This results in a smoothed out chart showing your weight instead of an up and down chart as explained in the book. We have also started giving the daily work-outs a go, and decided to take the weekend off, but will start back on the routine today. The workout is 15 minutes a day, and gets harder as you improve, so you can start at a beginner's level, and work your way up in only 15 minutes a day, no equipment required (unless you want a mat on the floor), and the only space required is enough space to lay down.
New Update
So, it's been a while since I posted an update, but it's time now since I have quite a lot of big news to share. First off Friday was Abisha's last day as a full-time employee, and next Monday will be her first day as a full time student for the summer session. That's because Abisha is going back to school full time to work on her Human Resources Management degree. That's the first big thing. The second big thing is even better, if it can get better. We're buying a new place, and fixing up my current townhouse to sell it. We're going to have it listed up for sale by the end of the month to cash in on the excellent real-estate market right now. Since I started watching homes prices in the Houston area, I have seen foreclosure's rolling in day after day. I have seen homes drop in prices by more than 10%. The housing market is definitely a buyer's market. I'm hoping that my townhouse will sell despite the current market since it is an entry level property that is affordable for almost anyone making a decent salary. After all that we can move up to a nice 3 or 4 bedroom house. So this weekend the fun started, kicked off by replacing our toilet, and re-tiling the bathroom. Since Abisha is off today, and my parents came to help out, I expect I'll come home to a finished bathroom floor today, and we'll move on to the kitchen next. I'm also out to take on a number of other projects with the house before we put it up for sale. We'll be doing plenty of painting, which will mostly take place after my parents have gone. We found out that the cabinets have all but fallen apart in some places so we'll be replacing the cabinets. We'll be tiling all of the downstairs. We moved out a good amount of our stuff this weekend, including my home PC, and all of my gaming stuff. The front door only opens to about 30 degrees because the tile behind it was not laid flat. I'm thinking we'd be best off replacing that tile. We'll be getting the upstairs recarpeted. There are a couple of window and sliding screens that need to be replaced, and we'll be installing a new kitchen sink and counter-tops. There is also a wall that I'd like to take a piece out of to open up the kitchen. We have a new microwave hood to install over the oven. Many many things to do, so I'll be very busy working away at it all during the evenings and weekends, and then hopefully our place will sell quickly, and we'll get to go house shopping.
