Imablog Perspectives of a Canadian in the Old/Deep/New/Geographic South: This is where I ramble on about nothing in particular and post a few nice pictures.

Fresh or frozen

Since I have no way of knowing how much thaw-age happened in the freezer and for how long, I decided to completely clear out the freezer of all the suspect food (there was lots of it). I had to cringe a little bit at having to toss a nice rib roast and a few containers of yummy roast turkey stock, but I prefer to err on the side of caution when it comes to food. Two garbage bags later, the freezer is pretty barren aside from a few ice packs and a surprising amount of dog hair.

Guess I'll have to clean the freezer compartment before I go about restocking it.

Whoa factor

Considering I was just in Minneapolis last week for the AAPM meeting, news of the bridge collapse has a certain 'whoa' and 'holy crap' factor to it (although I'm sure not nearly as much as for those living there). I didn't have to cross over the bridge that collapsed, but it wasn't too far from where I was staying and where the meeting was.

My thoughts go out to all of those affected.

Review: Babylon 5 - The Lost Tales

Got my copy of B5 - The Lost Tales earlier this week and finally got around to watching it yesterday. I'm not entirely sure how much I like it yet. I'll have to watch it one or two more times I think. At 72 minutes long, it's a little bit shorter than two regular episodes and is split up into two sub-plots. It's not entirely what I was expecting, but thinking back to what I initially heard about what Lost Tales as supposed to be, it fits pretty well.

If I recall correctly from the initial news of the Lost Tales project, it was supposed to be a series of character focused short stories. As such, I think it does a good job of further developing and refining the traits of the two main characters that make an appearance: Lochley and Sheridan. People expecting something resembling a full on B5 movie are likely to be disappointed. I liked the two stories that were told, and the endings definitely fit the characters involved. In fact, I thought the Sheridan story was predictable and had a reasonably good idea what his solution was going to be about halfway in.

The effects are pretty much all CGI with very few actual sets based on what I've seen in the special features on the DVD. The title 'The Lost Tales' gives the impression that there will be more than just the two stories, but I think the original intent was that if this one was successful, other DVDs would likely follow. It would be interesting to see the concept applied to other characters.

Lots of the usual extra stuff on the DVD (interviews, behind the scenes stuff), including a couple of nice tributes to Andreas Katsulas (G'Kar) and Richard Biggs (Dr. Franklin), both of whom are 'out exploring beyond the rim'.

4.5 stars out of 5 for the CGI and FX.
Overall, I think I'd give it 3.5 stars out of 5.

Puppy ouchies

It appears that at some point yesterday while running around, Simba managed to lose a sizable chunk of paw skin/padding on both his front paws. Not sure how he managed it, but he's definitely not into walking much at the moment. It's not bleeding but I know it probably doesn't feel that great for him. I'll have to make an appointment with the vet and get it checked out.

Switch over to MT4

I think I've managed to work out all the DB induced problems I was having, so after running the last few betas and RC versions without any problems on the test blog, I decided to switch my production blog over to MT4. The upgrade went off without a hitch and the templates rebuilt without any error messages. So far so good. I don't expect any more breakage, and the known issues list has gotten pretty short now.

Haven't made any changes to the templates yet, so the blog will look the same for now. Template work begins next. There are a lot of new MT tags that I'm interested in putting to work.

Everything should be functioning normally, but you discover anything broken, let me know.

Update: Excuse the breakage. I'm running into a few things with RC3 that I didn't encounter with the test version.

• Error accessing the archive templates: Can't call method "archive_label" on unblessed reference at lib/MT/App/CMS.pm line 5692. Fixed after cleaning out the plugins directory, something I forgot to do earlier.
• Individual entry archives are broken: Smarty error: [in mt:355 line 170]: syntax error: unrecognized tag 'mttinyturing' (Smarty_Compiler.class.php, line 580) Fixed after removing the MTTinyTuring tag from the template. Hopefully a new MT4 version of the plugin comes out soon.
• Category archive dropdown list is gone from the sidebar
• Category archives are busted. The pages appear, but they're either empty or there's only one entry that shows. I bet it's plugin related (catx.pl).

A funny

THE AIRPLANE RIDE

A stranger was seated next to a little girl on the airplane.

When the stranger turned to her and said, "Let's talk. I've heard that flights go quicker if you strike up a conversation with your fellow passenger." The little girl, who had just opened her book, closed it slowly and said to the stranger, "What would you like to talk about?"

"Oh, I don't know", said the stranger. "How about nuclear power?"

"OK". She said. "That could be an interesting topic. But let me ask you a question first. A horse, a cow, and a deer all eat grass. Yet a deer excretes little pellets, while a cow turns out a flat patty, and a horse produces clumps of dried grass. Why do you suppose that is?" The stranger thinks about it and says, "Hmmm, I have no idea."

To which the little girl replies, "Do you really feel qualified to discuss nuclear power when you don't know shit?"

Wii me

A friend of mine got himself a Nintendo Wii over the weekend, so yesterday I stopped by to check it out, and we spent a couple hours playing different Wii games.

The sports games that come with the Wii are surprisingly fun to play, and working with the controller is pretty cool. Takes a little bit to get a feel for it, but it's pretty cool.

I might consider getting myself one, but I hardly have time to play the games I have for the computer. The thought is very tempting though.

Maybe not so convenient

This interesting article over on ScienceDaily came to me over the GoogleReader feed.

'Convenience' Foods Save Little Time For Working Families At Dinner

In connection with a larger study, CELF researchers videotaped four days in the home lives of 32 working families in Los Angeles, including their dinner routines, between early 2002 and 2005.

The results about how people cook and what they use to make dinner are interesting. The difference in cook-to-plate time for meals prepared from scratch and those prepared using 'convenience items' wasn't significant, not a lot of cookbooks involved or recipes from magazines/newspapers, and little participation by the kids. Many parents in the study also made separate meals for the kids too, rather than cajole them into eating the same food the parents ate (like our parents did to us).

Of the 64 weeknight dinners Beck observed, 70 percent were completely home-cooked, meaning they were prepared at home, although not necessarily from scratch.

"People don't spend any less time overall on dinner when they use so-called convenience foods," Beck said. "Families seem to spend a certain amount of time cooking regardless. When commercial items are involved, they just ramp up how elaborate it gets."

"Some people don't fight the fight of getting the kids to eat what's being served for dinner," she said. "The kids frequently got entirely separate entrees or separate items from the adults, so that adds to the overall complexity of the meal."

So does this mean that the next generation's concept of fine dining will be determined by how many boxes or cans it was prepared from?

Hotness continues

It was really hot last month. This week it's been really, really hot. 8AM and it's already 30 freaking degrees °C outside. 38°C for a forecast high with a heat index well into the 40s.

If it wasn't for air conditioning, I'd have moved back home years ago.

I don't know why people around here say they hope for some rain to cool things down because rain never really does cool anything down here. You just get a warm rain (sometimes a warm downpour), and all it ever seems to do is jack up the humidity even higher.

Well, take the good with the bad I suppose.

Back to Typing Tutor

I've been thinking about getting one of these keyboards, a Microsoft Natural 4000. It's a pretty slick design with decent key feel, although a little chunky. Plus it's got lots of buttons, and it's hard for me to pass up a gadget with lots of buttons.

I've used ergo keyboards in the past and liked them a lot, but one of the things that's always bothered me about them is that the 6 and B keys are placed on the left side (for the left index finger to hit). My problem is that when I learned to touch type, I use my right index finger for those keys so my typing tends to come to a jarring halt when I go for those keys and hit nothing but air. Well, nothing a little bit of retraining won't take care of. Touch typing habits die hard though.

Having and Wanting

You may find that having is not so nearly pleasing a thing as wanting. It is not logical, but it is often true. - Spock in Amok Time

True pet ownership

I think one of the hallmarks of a true pet owner is probably the number of times they've cleaned up their pet's (or pets') diarrhea inside the house.

There's nothing like your 3AM-sleepy brain waking up because it detected a smelly what-crawled-up-your-butt-and-died stinky fart. Nothing wakes up that 3AM-sleepy brain like the realization that it's not dog gas you're smelling.

Not only did Simba have the runs in the bedroom this morning, but he walked it across half the bedroom. It's bad enough having to clean it up, but when you've got to get on your hands and knees to wipe up crap (literally) that's scattered across the bedroom, it's really bad. Now the bedroom smells of bleach cleaner with the faint odour of poo underneath.

I suppose it could be worse though. I could have stepped in it while I was blindly stumbling around to see what happened. Or he could have done it all over the carpet. Or it could have been projectile diarrhea. That definitely wouldn't have been fun to clean up.

Now I have to figure out why Simba's having diarrhea.

Oooh, I'll play

Spotted this post by Heather and figured I'd play along too. After this morning's poop incident, something food-related just seems apropos :).

1. What is your favorite flavor of chicken wings? How many do you generally order at a time? - I usually order the hottest ones available, normally a dozen at a time.
2. How often do you check out a restaurant's nutrition information before going there to have dinner? - Never. I'm usually not too concerned with specific nutritional information when I go out to eat.
3. If you have ever done so, what was your biggest surprise in reading the calorie or fat counts? - The calorie counts in a Chicago-style deep dish pizza from Pizzeria Uno.
4. Take the quiz: What does your pizza say about you? - The stereotype that best fits you is guy or girl next door. Hey, there's nothing wrong with being average.
5. What style of food do you think is generally served at what you'd consider the most romantic of restaurants? - I think anything that emphasizes fresh, good tasting ingredients. Food, like romance, is a shared experience.
6. What type of food would you be likely to sample first: food that is hot and spicy or food that is more mellow but has a richer taste? - I go for the hot and spicy stuff

Web designing

I'm terrible at web design. I make a pretty good webmaster though, but when it comes to design, I suck. As a result, most of what I come up with tends to be fairly simple, uncomplicated and non-flashy. It also fits with my tendency to prefer simple and low-bandwidth (a hold-over from my modem days I suppose).

Now that my role as webmaster for CSCLRC is official, my first duty was to clean up the horrid HTML generated by FrontPage. The site itself was fine, but the HTML behind it was characteristically messy FrontPage stuff. A little bit of new CSS and a lot of copy/pasting later, I pushed out a new much cleaned up variant of the site largely using the same graphics.

This week, after playing with Inkscape and Gimp, I rolled out a cleaner brighter looking (to me anyway) CSCLRC site. I'm quite pleased with what I've made, although there's still a little tweaking here and there that needs to be done.

Pizza me

Following up on Heather's food meme from yesterday...

• People may tell you that you have a small appetite... but you aren't under eating. You just aren't a pig.
• You consider pizza to be bread... very good bread. You fit in best in the Midwest part of the US.
• You like food that's traditional and well crafted. You aren't impressed with "gourmet" foods.
• You are dependable, loyal, and conservative with your choices.
• You are cultured and intellectual. You should consider traveling to Vienna.
• The stereotype that best fits you is guy or girl next door. Hey, there's nothing wrong with being average.

What Does Your Pizza Say About You?

Camera time

Time to get a new camera soon so that I'll have time to play with it and figure it out before the reunion.

I was looking at the Panasonic DMC-FZ28, but now I'm thinking about splurging a little more and going up to a Panasonic DMC-FZ50 instead. It's an extra $200 (although I found one place that's priced it $100 lower), but one big plus is that it has a hot shoe for a flash, which is something I've been missing with my previous digital cameras. The CCD on the FZ50 is a little smaller though, and it's almost double the weight of the FZ28. Having the hot shoe is pretty hard to pass up though, considering the built in flashes on most cameras are always so wimpy.

Oh, decisions, decisions.

What do you mean I can't have it anymore?

INTERNAL MEMO

From: Stomach
To: Management

Re: Ultra spicy foods

Apparently the previous memo following the hot wings from Necter was not received. Although the Braveheart wings from Wild Wing Cafe (tasty as they are) are not as spicy as the Necter wings, they are still causing minor problems with the food processing equipment. Due to the age of the facilities and normal wear and tear on the equipment, we are finding it more and more difficult to fully process extremely spicy foods. Since management is unable (or unwilling) to procure new equipment for our division, the stomach and other members of the Food Processing Division would like to ask management to refrain from ordering ultra-spicy foods from now on.

If management persists with ordering extremely spicy foods, we cannot guarantee our ability to properly process these items in the future with the equipment currently available.

We appreciate your cooperation in this matter.

Sincerely,

Food Processing Division

Is that you Dean?

Tropical Depression 4 is spinning up in the middle of the Atlantic and could become Tropical Storm Dean in a day or two. Probably won't be until the middle of next week or so before there's a reliable forecast of whether it will come by us or not. Something to keep an eye on.

Hopefully a storm doesn't decide to pop up while I'm away on my reunion trip.

Another TD?

Might be looking at Tropical Depression 5 soon too

From today's 0530 Tropical Weather Outlook:

SHOWERS AND THUNDERSTORMS ASSOCIATED WITH THE AREA OF LOW PRESSURE IN THE GULF OF MEXICO CENTERED JUST TO THE NORTH OF THE YUCATAN PENINSULA HAVE BECOME BETTER ORGANIZED OVER THE PAST FEW HOURS. UPPER-LEVEL WINDS ARE GRADUALLY BECOMING MORE FAVORABLE FOR DEVELOPMENT...AND A TROPICAL DEPRESSION COULD FORM LATER TODAY AS THE SYSTEM MOVES TO THE WEST-NORTHWEST AT 10 TO 15 MPH.

Update: The 11AM update upgraded TD4 to TS Dean.

TD 5/TS Erin

The system in the Gulf of Mexico was upgraded to TD 5 last night and may become a very short lived Tropical Storm Erin. Probably won't be much more than a windy rainy day for south Texas

From this morning's 5AM discussion:

UPPER-LEVEL WINDS ARE QUICKLY BECOMING FAVORABLE FOR STRENGTHENING AS AN UPPER-LEVEL ANTICYCLONE HAS FORMED OVER THE CENTRAL GULF OF MEXICO. THIS EVOLUTION IS RESULTING IN A REDUCTION IN VERTICAL SHEAR AND A MORE DIFFLUENT PATTERN ALOFT. STILL...THE CURRENT LACK OF ORGANIZATION ARGUES AGAINST SIGNIFICANT STRENGTHENING. EVEN IF THE DEPRESSION CAN BECOME BETTER ORGANIZED LATER TODAY...IT WOULD ONLY HAVE A DAY OR SO OVER WATER. THE OFFICIAL INTENSITY FORECAST THEREFORE CALLS FOR A LITTLE STRENGTHENING PRIOR TO LANDFALL. ONCE INLAND...THE DEPRESSION SHOULD QUICKLY WEAKEN WITH DISSIPATION BY DAY 3...IF NOT SOONER.

First <strike>post</strike>hurricane!

Tropical storm Dean was upgraded to the year's first hurricane with today's 5AM advisory.

From the 3 and 5 day tracks, it looks like Dean will be heading through the Carribean and towards the Gulf and shouldn't be a problem for the East coast.

DEAN IS ON THE SOUTH SIDE OF A DEEP-LAYER RIDGE...WHICH LARGE-SCALE MODELS FORECAST TO BUILD WESTWARD DURING THE FORECAST PERIOD. THIS BUILDING RIDGE IS FORECAST TO PUSH ASIDE A MID/UPPER-LEVEL LOW CURRENTLY EAST OF FLORIDA...AND SHOULD THIS HAPPEN THAT SYSTEM WOULD HAVE LITTLE INTERACTION WITH DEAN. THE PATTERN EVOLUTION SHOULD KEEP DEAN MOVING QUICKLY WESTWARD TO WEST-NORTHWESTWARD THROUGH THE FORECAST PERIOD. THE TRACK GUIDANCE IS IN GOOD AGREEMENT WITH THIS SCENARIO...AND THE MODELS ARE VERY TIGHTLY CLUSTERED AROUND A TRACK THROUGH THE CARIBBEAN SEA TO NEAR THE YUCATAN PENINSULA IN FIVE DAYS.

In local bloggage today

Heather is busy being a new mom (a big congrats to the new parents!) so I thought I'd fill in and do a little round-upping today.

Since I don't have the complete TBB in my feed reader, I'm going to use the slightly smaller subset over at Lowcountry Blogroll for the round-up. BTW, if you want your blog to be included in the Lowcountry Blogroll, fire off a message to Brian with a link to your blog and/or RSS feed.

Joan will be empty-nesting it soon. Try not to turn into a cat-lady Joan :). She also informs us that Gene Glave's one woman show, Mammologues is starting at the Village Playhouse on August 26th.

Pam sends another grant on its way and shares ferns and flowers with us.

Your thoughts on SC's new license plate? Our resident dental student isn't a big fan of the new design.

Probably more later when people wake up and start their daily blogging.

Imablog v4

Since MovableType 4.0 went gold yesterday, I decided to roll out a new look for the blog (it uses the Hills Dusk theme from Style Catcher). I've been working on it since beta 5 or so, figuring out the new templates and working out how to incorporate stuff from the old design into the new template scheme.

I managed to salvage most of the blocks I had on the old site and was able to use a few of them with the new layout. There is still some style related tweaking I want to do, but everything seems to be working (if you encounter something broken, let me know). Having a strange issue with getting the category dropdown list working, so in the meantime there's just a big long list of categories in the sidebar.

Known issues

• There's a lot of inter-blog linkage that's currently broken which is a side-effect of cloning the original blog. I'll probably fix these on a 'as I encounter them' basis.


• Hitting the archives is slow. This is an inherent problem with the new archive templates and the amount of processing required to build them on the fly. The 5 year old computer I'm using for a server probably isn't helping any either. A little bit of template reorganizing and optimizing should help out with the slowness.


• Category archives don't show all the entries, which I suspect is related to the Entry Listing Default setting in Blog Settings. I'll probably have to use a very large number for a lastn attribute to get all the entries in each category to show up.


• "Can't call method "ping_url_list" on an undefined value at lib/MT.pm line 1459." happens to me at seemingly random times when trying to publish a new entry.
  

Afternoon bloggage

It must be a quiet news day because there doesn't seem to be much going on in the Lowcountry blogland this afternoon. Either that or heatstroke has hit everyone.

Anyway, Margo shares some pictures of the newest Lowcountry blogger (in training).

Oops

An upgrade to one of the Apache server modules took the webserver down.

It's all better now.

Saturday 6: Karma

Another interesting meme from Patrick.

1. What is the most unlucky thing that has happened to you all week?

The exposure meter I was trying to use to do some CT dosimetry flaked out on me. That was supposed to be the easy part of the testing. The phantom part that was supposed to be hard was easy. The dose part that was supposed to be easy was hard.

That means another 2 hour road trip next week.

2. Do bad things happen more often to good people or bad people?

I think bad things happen to people equally. Bad people usually complain about it more.

3. How much do you believe that you can improve your outlook in life (from a "fate" perspective) by doing good deeds and correcting past wrongs?

Doing good things almost always results in a positive outlook, so I believe in it strongly. Atoning for past misdeeds is a way of coming to terms with yourself and the other person/group and past actions. Most of the time that leads to good things.

4. Take the quiz: What will happen to you in the future?

Im sorry. I have some pretty bad news for you today. It seems like you are going to have some trouble here. You will have an average job and make average money, but remember that money is not EVERYTHING in life. You will marry, but you will marry an average (wo)man. (S)he will not be smart and will be very stupid. The college he or she went to was not famous. If you said that your husband or wife went to that college, theyll be like whats that college? I never heard of that. And in their minds theyll think that YOU and your husband or wife were REALLY stupid because you went to unknown colleges. Here comes the lovely good news. NOT. This is just something that everybody should have. In the future, you will have a lot of friends. WOW! They are all so stupid just like you. Mmmmthis is just another thing that a lot of Americans (or whatever your race is) do/has. They go to unknown colleges (or so stupid that everybody knows it), and ALL of their friends go there. Nowyou seethat my thoughts about good colleges and your thoughts about good colleges may not be the same. Im sorry. You might not just get this straight now. Maybe the college you went to was good, but I think it is bad. Take for instants (something you havent heard of) Tomball College. Some people may think its good, and some people may think it is bad (REALLY stupid people would think it was good) (sorry for the insult if you went there). Nowenough of thisIll stop talking about useless stuff. You WILL bald (if you are a boy. Just ignore this if you are a girl) when you are older. You will die of natural causes when you are 74. Thank you will reading this useless crap.

Honestly, I have no idea what the poll creator is babbling on about here.

(The terrible grammar belongs to the poll creator, not me)

5. Do you believe in fate, coincidence, or both?

Coincidence.

6. Overall, when "bad things" happen, how often do you believe the victim generally "had it coming?"

If they are self-induced bad things (brought on by the victim's own stupidity, ignorance, etc) then I usually tend to think they had it coming. I like to think of it as a Darwin kind of thing.

Bad timing, wrong time/wrong place types of bad things I usually don't think feel that way.

Dog treats

Thanks to fellow Voxer and lab owner Amanda, Nala and Simba have some new turkey treats to enjoy.

I used 4 eggs in my batch and added in a small bunch of chopped fresh parsley. At some point during moving, the muffin tins seem to have disappeared, so I just rolled up a bunch of little meatballs and baked them up at 350°F for 30 minutes.

After letting them cool down, I gave one to each of the dogs. Once they figured out what the strange little round thing was and that it tasted good, the turkey meatballs disappeared pretty quickly. I think they liked their new treats.

Here's the version I made. It seems like a pretty flexible recipe to adjust, so be creative.

Turkey Treats

500 g (about 1 pound) lean ground turkey
1 small sweet potato, grated (about 1 cup)
4 eggs
4 cups rolled oats
1 cup chopped parsley
5 mL olive oil

Mix everything together and spoon into muffin tins (or roll into meatballs) and bake at 350°F for about 20-30 minutes depending on how large you made them.

Oh, poop

Not so good: Nala had grassy diarrhea today. I think she must have found a clump to snack on without me noticing the other day.

Worse: It was waiting for me all over her crate when I got home today. The house was very stinky.

Not so bad: Only a little bit splattered on the carpet and the wall.

Good: I was able to drag the crate (with Nala in it) over to the back door to let her out.

Not so good: She stepped in it getting out of the crate and left poopy paw prints on the back porch..

Good: The crate is easy to clean up.

Not so good: Nala ran back into the house to get a drink of water before I could hose her paws off. More poopy paw prints in the kitchen. Not as bad as on the back porch though.

Good: Cleaning up the carpet was easier than it could have been. Just a few spots here and there, and a little bit of scrubbing on the walls.

The house smells bleachy again. I knew I should have left work earlier.

I'm really going to have to do something about this grass eating thing.

Shutterbugging

The new camera came today! Splurged a little more than I originally planned to get it, but I think it'll be worth it. It's a beast of a camera, but has a lot of cool features I'm looking forward to exploring and playing with. Haven't taken too many pictures with it yet. Mostly spending time learning where all the buttons are and what they do. So far, image stabilization is very cool, the flash actually has a fairly decent range and it takes pretty good pictures of the dogs.

I'm all excited now :)

Dog: Good home wanted.

This came to me through a friend of mine. Anybody interested in a dog?

Hello! My name is "Lady of the Lake" because I swam out of the Lake into my Foster owner's yard to play with her 4 Standard Poodles. I was very playful and loving so she is trying to help me find a "forever" home. She can't keep me because she is allergic to dogs (that's why she has Poodles).

I have just been spayed. My shots are up to date and I have been tested for heartworm (I was clear) and updated my Rabies vaccines. I am Frontline and now Heartworm Preventative.

Here are my details:

• I am 18 inches high at the shoulder and 35 pounds, black with water resistant hair
• I swim and love to play fetch
• I am great with kids and other dogs
• I am VERY calm, loving, and love to lay and be pet
• I am smart and my foster owners are training me to "Here, Heel & Sit"
• I walk well on leash
• I am VERY quiet

There is NOTHING wrong with me other then I need a good home that will appreciate and love me.

If you would like to welcome me into your home for a small adoption fee, please contact:

Lady of the Lake
Claudia or Dana @ 704-483-6209

Computer geekery

A fine example of computer geekery.

What do you do with a gazillion CPUs that have been upgraded into obsolescence?

Tile a desk with them

First pics

This is one of the first pictures I took with the new camera. This was with a zoom factor of about 8 or 9 and shows how nicely the image stabilization works. It's much reduced from the original 32xx by 23xx (8 MP) pixel image. I'm really liking this camera so far.

Battlecry

You are but the buzzing of a fly to me, for I am VIGO!!!

A battlecry commonly used by Houseboat Hooligans (paraphrased from Ghostbusters 2) to challenge other houseboat dwellers (most of whom had no idea what it meant).

Dog FAQ

I've considered putting this on a shirt to wear while I'm walking my dogs.

• Yes, they're Labs.
• No, they're not part something
• No, he's not a miniature Lab.
• No, they're not related/married.
• No, I'm not breeding them.
• Yes, you can pet them.
• No, you can't feed them.

Statistically speaking

September is the peak of the storm season, and seeing as we're heading into September in a couple of days, there are plenty of things to keep an eye on according to tonight's TWO.

A TROPICAL WAVE LOCATED ABOUT 750 MILES EAST OF THE WINDWARD ISLANDS IS PRODUCING SHOWERS AND A FEW THUNDERSTORMS. THERE HAS BEEN LITTLE CHANGE IN ORGANIZATION THIS EVENING. HOWEVER...UPPER-LEVEL WINDS ARE EXPECTED TO BECOME MORE FAVORABLE FOR DEVELOPMENT OVER THE NEXT DAY OR TWO AS THE SYSTEM MOVES WESTWARD AROUND 15 MPH.

DISORGANIZED CLOUDINESS AND SHOWERS EXTEND SEVERAL HUNDRED MILES EAST AND NORTHEAST OF A NON-TROPICAL LOW CENTERED ABOUT 330 MILES EAST OF JACKSONVILLE FLORIDA. ALTHOUGH THERE ARE NO SIGNS OF DEVELOPMENT AT THIS TIME...UPPER-LEVEL WINDS COULD BECOME A LITTLE MORE FAVORABLE FOR TROPICAL CYCLONE FORMATION DURING THE NEXT DAY OR TWO.

CLOUDINESS AND A FEW SHOWERS ASSOCIATED WITH A WESTWARD-MOVING TROPICAL WAVE ARE BEGINNING TO SPREAD OVER THE THE BAY OF CAMPECHE. THIS SYSTEM HAS SOME POTENTIAL FOR DEVELOPMENT BEFORE IT MOVES OVER MAINLAND MEXICO IN A DAY OR SO.

Video card fun

A couple of new colour Barco monitors arrived yesterday for one of the diagnostic workstations over in Ultrasound. The monitors shipped with ATI FireGL video cards of an unknown model (read: I didn't look all that closely at the card before I popped it in), but since the workstation already has video cards in it, the ones that shipped with the monitors were extra. So I decided to grab one to put in my Fedora 7 workstation at work and see if I could get a dual-head setup running with the spiffy new 21" LCD monitor I scavenged from the above workstation (it was one of the monitors being replaced by the Barcos, really).

Normally this kind of thing should be easy.

• Download the drivers from ATI
• Build them into the kernel and create a suitable xorg.conf
• Reboot
• Configure for dual-head operation

Naturally, I know better. For some reason, the drivers I grabbed from the ATI site (8.35.5) for the FireGL cards wouldn't compile at all, so I have a feeling I might be missing something. One of the first errors that popped up was an attempt to link to libstdc++.so.5. libstdc++ is installed, but I have libstdc++.so.6 in /usr/lib, so I'm guessing I need to find an earlier version of the library or install the libstdc++ compatibility package. I didn't tinker around with it too much this afternoon, so I'll have to play around a little more tomorrow.

Boots up ok and shows the boot messages on both screens, which is promising. The driver issues are keeping the X server from starting though.

It'll be cool once I get this going. 3 megapixels of desktop goodness at my fingertips. Woot!

Ants!

A colony of fire ants took up residence next to the patio, so I thought I'd try the camera out on them and catch them in action.

Got bone?

The next storm?

From tonight's TWO, looks like the most likely candidate for the next storm is the system heading into the Carribean. Perhaps this wil become Felix?

SHOWER ACTIVITY ASSOCIATED WITH A TROPICAL WAVE LOCATED ABOUT 480 MILES EAST OF THE WINDWARD ISLANDS IS SLOWLY BECOMING BETTER ORGANIZED. IF CURRENT TRENDS CONTINUE...A TROPICAL DEPRESSION COULD FORM FROM THIS SYSTEM ON FRIDAY. INTERESTS IN THE WINDWARD ISLANDS SHOULD MONITOR THE PROGRESS OF THIS SYSTEM.

Dual-head...sort of

Finally got the ATI drivers (went with 8.40.4) to compile and now I've got my workstation running with two monitors, although not quite the way I was anticipating.

Instead of the desktop spanning both monitors, I've got separate desktops on each monitor. It's not the usual desktop layers either. More like having two separate simultaneous login sessions going. Not quite what I was expecting.

Going to have to do a little more research on the matter, but at least it's working (kinda).