Sorry for the unannounced, longer than expected hiatus. It wasn't really planned; it just kind of happened.
And, it really wasn't a vacation. Unless you count keeping up with education news as work, because I did take a vacation from that. It appears that I didn't miss much since this time of year tends to get a little slow, education-wise.
So what did I do?
A lot. Unfortunately most of it was mundane.
- I cleaned out my garage. This was a much-dreaded, but much-needed, undertaking. I don't have any before photos, but I'll post an after photo tomorrow. Or at least an almost-after photo since I'm not quite done.
- I finally finished labelling and terminating the almost 50 CAT-5e cables that run through my house. For you non-nerds, these cables are for Ethernet and phone service. I did this in preparation for ...
- I stuck it to the man, and switched to DSL. A bigger pain in the ass than it should have been, but I managed to cut my broadband bill in half and performance is about the same.
- I started beta-testing Windows Home Server. This required me to build a new computer, decommission a few old ones, cannibalize spare parts, juggle a dozen hard drives, and transfer a good 2 terabytes of data. Everything seems to be running smoothly now and I have a warm fuzzy feeling since all my household computers (five and counting!!) now get automatically backed-up every night and all my data files now have redundant storage. In addition, I can now access all my data from anywhere and can remotely control almost any computer in my house from anywhere I can get Internet access.
- I continued my never-ending project of logging and digitizing about 60 hours of home movies. I'm half-way done. Nothing like enduring hours of video shot by my wife of my kids when they were infants. It's for the greater good I suppose. In the end, I'm certain I can probably make an exciting 20 minute video out of all that footage.
- My cell phone finally gave up the ghost, so I bought a Treo and am learning how to use it.
Those were the big projects. I'll spare you the small ones. And, as you can see, most of the big projects aren't finished yet. They will be by the end of the summer. That's the goal. So, blogging may be a little lighter than usual until that time, but since I'm over the hump I think I'm now motivated to jump back in the blogging world.
I'll start off tomorrow by recounting my experience teaching my first grader (now a second grader) for the past 9 months.
8 comments:
My wife, whose business is growing by leaps and bounds, now lives by her Treo. She just added text messaging, and she may have to add Internet services, too.
I see your cleared out garage and raise you one cleared out house...
Good to see you back.
So why the server? I have an extra computer that I networked and shared the drive that I use as a makeshift server.
I use a t-mobile Dash smartphone that I love.
welcome back! Your presence was greatly missed :)
Ugh, the garage. I cleaned out about 1/20th of mine the other day, and it took an hour.
It's tempting some days to just close the door and tell everyone it's haunted.
Let me tell you what rocks:
A treo and a MS exchange email account. Syncs up your email, calendar, and contacts. And, pushes new email down to you. It's a good combo. You can get an exchange account for as little as $7 a month.
For the garage storage problem I went with a slatwall system (like this one). All it requires is a drill, a level, and some time.
Nice to see you back. Maybe I'll get back in the 'sphere eventually.
Whew! Welcome back! I look forward to your continued blogging. :)
My cell died, but it was the one I brought from Indiana, and was an 812 number, so other than calling people back there, it wasn't much use, since it's a long distance call from here. I haven't replaced it yet, and don't know if I will (I don't like telephones, period).
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