Maybe you noticed, maybe you didn't, but the site's down right now for repairs.
If you don't care about the painful details, skip the rest of this paragraph. I bought a new router, because Microcenter had wireless routers on sale for $60 after rebate, and then I could use the wireless card for my Forrester laptop at home to have a connection to the Internet anywhere in the apartment. But something about its port forwarding is different than my old router's, so for some reason, I couldn't get Apache configured to actually answer requests right. So I decided to just reformat the hard drive on this machine, and start from scratch. I set a lot of things up on that machine before I really knew what I was doing, so I had been meaning to do this for a while.
Anyway, it'll be back up by the time you read this, since you won't read this until it's back up.
I have time for these home IT projects since Terri's away in D.C. at a conference. She's staying with Kim, so they'll also be doing some wedding-oriented stuff like Kim's bachelorette party.
We flew to Pittsburgh last weekend for Nora's wedding. It was all a whirlwind, but it was nice. I got to meet many famous people from Terri's youth, like the other Gallers and Nora's friends Nico and Leslie. We also made an effort to drop in and see Greg and Dawn since Dawn is with child and we're excited for her. We stayed at the farm, and even though I swore to myself that I'd do no manual labor, I got some nice scratches on my face while helping Mom & Dad clear some thorn bushes near the back property line.
Terri and I went on a record-buying rampage through Cambridge's many fine used vinyl shops this evening. We picked up albums by Robyn Hitchcock, Jelly Roll Morton, Fats Waller, Scriabin, Rosemary Clooney and Bing Crosby, Jack Teagarden, and Lester Young.
While I eat some Cocoa Blasts and write this, Terri is now typing things on Matt Shaw's typewriter, which is still sitting on our dining room table from when we were working on the flipbook project for Sarah & Michael.
I'm looking forward to the long weekend. It's Columbus Day, which is still celebrated in Boston.
The site improvements are coming along. I found some really nifty software to make photo galleries, whilch should make it way less time consuming to make our little photo albums. The photo albums it makes are nicer and easier to navigate, too. One of these days, all two of you who come to this site will come back to find it utterly transformed.
I'm reading many things simultaneously; The Decameron, one of Terri's college textbooks about Buddhism, and some stuff I bought in Portland (starting with some essays by Octavio Paz).
I spent some time at the Apple store at the Cambridgeside Galleria last night. I would love a schnazzy new G4. But I'm trying to be realistic, and ask myself what I would do with that that I can't do with my current computer. There's really very little. iCal and iPhoto are the best parts of it. But it's not like I'm so busy that I really need iCal, and it's not like we even have a digital camera that we'd even need iPhoto. Anyway, I'm trying to stick to my guns. I care more about software than hardware; I care more about what people actually do with software than the software itself. Which is what led me to find the schnazzy photo gallery software and inspire me to actually do work on the website.
So now it's October and the weather is still stinking hot--I hate it. Where's the Fall I love?? My hopes for snow for the holidays are looking rather dim. Maine, Canada, Minnesota, and Alaska are all looking good right about now.
I hope to maybe do some work on the website... possibly tonight... and anyway, soon. I swear, new stuff is coming!
We spent last weekend in Portland, Oregon for Sarah Braun and Michael Hamilton's wedding. It was stinking hot out there one day, too, but pretty nice. I like the houses there, and the landscape is pretty. This weekend we are headed to State College. I have a haircut scheduled and I am SO ready for a new 'do.
Well, back to work. Need to do a few more things before I get to leave.
Think FALL HARDER.