06.23.07
Posted in Broadband, Rural Tech, Geek, Rural at 8:52 pm by Randy
“Let me explain… No, there is too much, let me sum up.” - Inigo Montoya in The Princess Bride
I try my best not to go all meta-blog around here, presenting my excuses for how I’m too busy or that I’m just too damn lazy to update this site. But I leave you with the following thought: A man’s gotta have his priorities. Moving on.
Much has transpired in the intervening months, albeit the goal is still tantalizingly out of reach. Dear reader, allow me to catch you up.
- We own a construction crawler, vintage 1985. Hey, it’s got a backhoe, what can I say?
- A trench was dug from the antenna site to the house.
- Part of that trench was dug along the straight section of the road to the vineyard, effectively destroying it.
- The Solar God smiled upon us and did grace us with a divine visitation to bury electrical cables and conduits along said road section.
- We still do not have the wires connected to the power panel in the garage, nor do we have the electrical boxes installed up at the antenna site.
- The fiber optic that will pump those lovely ones and zeros isn’t even ordered.
- We expect that we won’t be up and running until the end of July at the earliest.
Subchapter One: The Crawler Of DOOM
The crawler has an interesting story. Our next-door (meaning about a mile downhill from us) neighbor (a uniquely crusty old Brit, who made his fortune through logging in Northern California) moved to a Central American country last month. As part of his departure, Crusty was selling his old John Deere 450C loader crawler. A crawler, as opposed to a backhoe) uses tracks instead of tires, making it better suited for the ranch and its hilly terrain. Even though it was seriously old and long in the tooth, he wanted ten large. In an uncharacteristic turn, I haggled him down to eight. Of course, I’m still wondering who got the better deal.
Crusty spent a fair bit of time describing all that was wrong with the machine: hour meter broken, seats basically destroyed by the elements, lights not working, switches missing, hydraulic seals leaking like sieves, bushings completely gone on just about every pivot point, yada yada yada. So, as long as we used it in the daytime, didn’t lift hugely heavy items using the front loader, and we kept 20 gallons of hydraulic fluid on hand to keep the reservoir filled, the sucker would do work for us. Never mind that your ass would be sitting on bare metal and we literally have no idea how long that the crawler has actually been used over the years, those really are just subordinate issues. The crawler has a backhoe and it was shown to me that it could dig.
Of course, The Boss and I salivated mightily. We still recognized that we will need to have an agricultural tractor, so this crawler wouldn’t be able to do every little thing that we need around the ranch and vineyard. But the siren song of the backhoe could not be denied, even The Boss was taken in by it.
Subchapter Two: The Trench of DOOM (drink)
The trench presented several significant challenges. Originally, the Wunderkind was going to dig along the uphill side of the road to the vineyard, through all the twisty turns and across several culverts to go down, down to the house. But Mr. Handy (who, bless his heart, should be called Mr. Overtime, since he never knows when to frigging quit working) and I walked an alternate and slightly more direct route, which would avoid most (if not all) of the culverts, and stay off the road almost completely, so that we wouldn’t need to be concerned with vineyard traffic (which, at this time of year is basically about every ten days so they can spray sulphur on the vines). It also shaved about 100 feet off the distance that the Wunderkind originally estimated.
When the time came to dig the trench, Mr. Handy dropped everything and walked behind the big-ass trencher through hill and dale, suffering poison oak, bug bites, and sunburn to bring the trench down the hill, skipping across one of the seasonal gullies (because it was way too deep to dig under, and way too far to go around). We got to the final stretch before the meadow above the ranch house and realized that it was a rock garden. Correction, a boulder garden, and most of them were above ground, with no telling how much worse it would be underneath. No trencher known to man would cut through that, so we figured we would lay the conduit above ground and call it a day.
Of course, it wasn’t until the Solar God gazed upon our plan that He shone His holy wisdom down upon us: laying the pipes and conduit above ground would only work up until the first forest fire; the pipes and conduit would quickly melt and our glorious pipeline would be destroyed (and yes, I realize that if a forest fire blows through the ranch, we’ll be worried about more than whether our Internet connection is working, but stay with me on this). So, our hopes rested on the one thing we didn’t want to do: dig a trench down (part of) the road to the vineyard.
But there’s more, oh so much more. Stay tuned.
Permalink
02.10.07
Posted in Broadband, Money, Rant, Rural at 9:47 pm by Randy
After a fabulous January, where we enjoyed a long and luxurious streak of clear (or at least only partly cloudy skies), we have arrived at February, with the inevitable return of the winter rains that I so dreaded in December. The Boss flogged me ceaselessly to get the new greenhouse built (and at least partly covered with panels) before the heavens opened up. Naturally, I obliged, knowing my place in the grand order. The greenhouse itself came entirely in pieces, and was put together with great gnashing of teeth over the wretchedly written instructions (clearly written by someone who had never built on of these greenhouses, let alone taken a technical writing class). The entire story of the greenhouse will undoubtedly be told in a future post. For now, suffice it to say that it is standing and (mostly) keeping the weather out.
After about two months of using our interim broadband solution, we’ve come to realize that indeed, it is only a distant cousin to true broadband, and doesn’t quite fit our expectations for fast, reliable, “prosumer”-class Internet speeds (including glorous BitTorrent nights and unabashed iTunes video and podcast downloads). I find myself continuously trying to keep a mental tally on the amount of bits we’ve slurped over the airwaves, wondering how much closer to the dreaded 5GB limit that our service provider imposes. Hence a pattern emerges:
The Boss: “I’ve purchased a subscription to 24 on iTunes. I’ve missed four episodes because the TiVo is dead.”
(Aside: our venerable circa 1999 DirecTivo died and was replaced by a grand 160GB upgraded Series 2 model from Weaknees. Yes, it is muy macho. However, the Weaknees replacement was going to show up a day late for the start of the next season of 24.)
Me: “Hmm, that’s going to be a problem.”
Inside my head: Holy crap, we’ll hit the 5GB cap in no time.
The Boss: “It’s no big deal, only 250MB per episode.”
Me: “But it doesn’t take that many to add up to 5 gigs.”
The Boss: (deflated) “Hmm, good point.”
Don’t get me wrong. The Boss went ahead and downloaded them, because to deny her Jack Bauer and his ridiculous antics would be asking for my left eyeball to be plucked out and used as a cat toy. Anyhow, my paranoia has generally increased, and my discomfort at being subject to what I consider arbitrary restrictions on my usage of the Interweb is distracting me from doing what I’d like to be doing online. So, to ensure I can live online undistracted by such limits, I have once again taken up the quest to link our house to the antenna that sits forlornly up at the vineyard, powerlessly (literally) pointing to Sonoma Mountain and our future lifeline to the net.
I spent the next couple days enjoying my lunch break by browsing our favorite giant orange home improvement center. It seems that, based on their prices, we should be able to get the quantity of conduit and pipe necessary to go the distance for somewhere upwards of $400-500. Then we add the apparent price of fiber optic (on the order of $800), the rental of the trencher (for who knows how much) and finally, the solar equipment up at the vineyard to power the rig (somewhere in the $2500 range). Suddenly, this is looking like a job that will run us between 1/3 and 1/2 of the Wunderkind’s nasty $16k bid to do the job that I knew we could do ourselves.
Yup, Winter is a little bit past the halfway mark, and it’s time to get busy again.
Permalink
Posted in Broadband at 8:42 pm by Randy
I was in the midst of upgrading my blog software, when I kept running into a little snag: uploading on this “broadband” service is basically on par with dialup, and it sucks. It’s basically restarting the conversation in my head about when I’m going to get started with the final solution for our Internet needs here at the ranch.
However, I’m left with little choice but to wait out the weather and let the ground dry out just a bit more before we tear up the road to the vineyard with a trencher and 4500′ total of conduit and water pipes.
All questions of “where the Hell have you been for the last month” can be tabled for another time. There’s work to be done here.
Permalink
01.04.07
Posted in Wireless, Broadband, Geek, Money, Rant, Rural at 11:27 am by Randy
The Boss has been on me about updating the blog. The holiday doldrums, with its gray skies, wind and rain, has caught up to me. I have “cave-itis” pretty bad at the moment. It manifests in the overwhelming desire to sit in a dark room, staring intently into a LCD flat panel display.
Happily, we received our Kyocera KR-1 router
, and our online life has begun to approach something akin to normal. Now I know that last statement is a bit heavy with equivocation, but hear me out. We now enjoy lazing around in various rooms using the Internet on our respective laptops. I have managed to make my Vonage phone work over this connection, and I’m not leashed to the window in our living room in order to do whatever I want online. I even have been able to VPN into work and be productive. But here’s the thing: Verizon BroadbandAccess is not broadband, at least not how you would normally consider it. It is a wireless data service (and at $80/month, an expensive one) that Verizon wants you to use only for certain tasks. And after reading it, it’s pretty clear that the way I want to use it is not the way Verizon wants me to use it. To wit:
Unlimited Data Plans and Features (such as NationalAccess, BroadbandAccess, Push to Talk, and certain VZEmail services) may ONLY be used with wireless devices for the following purposes: (i) Internet browsing; (ii) email; and (iii) intranet access (including access to corporate intranets, email, and individual productivity applications like customer relationship management, sales force, and field service automation).
The emphasis is theirs. So, here’s the risk to our Internet stopgap: if we go over a pre-set bandwidth limit, they assumes we’re abusing the service and may kill our subscription without notice. Again, from Verizon:
Anyone using more than 5 GB per line in a given month is presumed to be using the service in a manner prohibited above, and we reserve the right to immediately terminate the service of any such person without notice. We also reserve the right to terminate service upon expiration of Customer Agreement term.
Fun.
So, while I am blogging about this and being quite open and honest, my desire is to just fly under the radar and hope that Verizon doesn’t pull the plug on my subscription before I’m able to install the “Trench of Dreams” and run the fiber link to the “Antenna of Doom”.
Speaking of the Trench of Dreams, I recently received a lovely pair of StarTech media converters
, these beauties will convert from the rather limited reach of Category 5e copper (say, about 100 meters) to multimode fiber optic strands (which can pump data up to 2 kilometers). Each one draws 9 watts, when added to the 7.2 watts that the radio at the vineyard is rated to draw, we have devised a relatively low-power rig for getting the real Internet to the house.
Also, a new character has come to play: Mr. Handy. We actually met Mr. Handy indirectly through our pan-dimensional super being, Solar God. He has turned out to be, well, quite handy in a number of projects around the ranch. He’s also a real easy guy to get along with.
Well, through no fault of his own, it looks as if he needs a place to stay, and the ranch having the extra cabin (small as it is), we have a place that is serviceable. Can you say “barter”? (I knew you could.) So, it might be that we will get the trench dug up to the vineyard for just the cost of renting the trencher.
After that, the major costs will be getting the materials (PVC conduit in varying sizes, fiber optic cable, copper wire) to get power, data and water to and from the vineyard. There’s still no strong estimate for solar versus copper for providing power. However, having run the numbers myself, I believe it would take about 5000 feet total of 1/0 AWG copper just to run a 20 amp circuit from our current panel up to the vineyard. Sounds just a bit prohibitive to me. Getting a basic solar installation seems much more likely to fit our budget.
So, as strange as it’s turning out, we’ll definitely come out ahead of the Wunderkind’s $16,000.00 Challenge. It’s now just a question of “how soon”?
Permalink
12.23.06
Posted in Broadband, Wireless, Money, Rant, Rural at 12:00 am by Randy
Nothing says “speed” like hauling ass to work during the week before Christmas. On Friday, I blazed to work, even after having stopped by McD’s for the #3 with coffee and a Sausage McMuffin “NO EGG”. The women who work the window there are relatively familiar with me, a distinction I don’t find all that comforting. We’re not on a first-name basis, mind you, but I’m sure that if I asked one of them for her name, she wouldn’t think I’m stalking. But socializing with the McDonald’s chicks will have to wait for another day.
It now seems that the pruning work is underway in Napa’s vineyards; more and more of the vines, now dormant after giving their all for the California wine industry this year, get themselves a little haircut. With the miles and miles of vineyards between home and work, I expect it will take a couple months to give all those vines a shave.
With a certain amount of trepidation, I resumed the research into how best to overcome the Wunderkind’s $16,000.00 barrier to our full re-admittance to the 21st century. The trench seems a fait accompli, with the acknowledgement of The Boss and TBB that the ranch will ultimately benefit from having it, and not just for data. And granted, the antenna is installed up at the vineyard, but without a suitable link between here and there, no bits will flow.
The bits must flow…
Thus, I bent my will to understanding what a fiber optic link would entail. Several terms swirl through the ether: multi-mode, single-mode, 50/125, 62.5/125, SC and ST connectors, zip cord, et cetera. After much gnashing of teeth and clicking of mouse, I struck up a chat with BIL (sister’s husband). As I may have mentioned, he does fiber optic as part of his work, and knows the ropes, as it were. After a half-hour, we concluded that we’ll buy multi-mode 62.5/125 fiber optic, 500 meters (around 1640 feet), BIL will pull the fiber through the conduit and terminate them (and I chose ST connectors), and we’ll use StarTech media converters. The fiber itself will cost upwards of 750 to 800 clams, whereas a pair of media converters comes to a mere $350.
Jeez, this crap starts to add up.
Tonight, The Boss and I talked about what’s next for our broadband lifestyle. Things are pretty decent with the new yagi installed, but I have some nagging gripes.
Me: “So, I’m tired of being the access point for the house.”
The Boss: “I can appreciate that.”
Me: “And I feel like I’m trapped, I can’t just dual-boot to Windows and play my games, since it doesn’t share the Internet as easily as Mac OS does. So now I’m looking at this WiFi router that you plug our data card into. It’d be just like the WiFi we used to have, and I can quit being tethered to the window because of the antenna cable.”
The Boss: “So, why haven’t you ordered it?”
[pause]
The Boss: “What?”
Me: “Well, it’s not cheap.”
The Boss: “Well, how much does it cost?”
Me: “Well… how much do you think it costs?”
[pause]
The Boss: “Four hundred?”
Me: [quickly] “No, it’s less than four hundred. But, it’s more than three hundred.”
The Boss starts to balk, the doubt is clearly there. We add up what we’ve spent on the data card, the yagi antenna, and realize we’re already over $300 into this “temporary” solution. If we keep pouring money into the Verizon broadband thing, we’re taking money away from Clueless Broadband (a good thing), but we’re not getting real broadband like Daddy wants (a bad thing). I go ahead and mention the possibility that maybe we stick with Verizon for the foreseeable future, and tell Clueless Broadband to go pound sand. The Boss observes that halting the trench/conduit/fiber project would free up money to start finishing off the porch (something that is a bit out of reach at the moment, due to all the spending we’ve done of late). A moment passes, then two.
Now, we both know that the amount of money we’re looking to spend on doing the trench, the fiber pull, and even the power (be it solar or a branch circuit from Hell up to the vineyard) is considerable, and we shouldn’t go blowing even more money on what we’ve agreed is our stopgap measure for Internet. The opportunity slips quietly away, and I tell her I’ll think on it for a couple days. We agree that there’s no hurry, and that since it’s Christmas weekend, nothing would get shipped until Tuesday at the earliest.
Back to my gripe: one of the things I’m missing because of the antenna cable leash is that I can’t pick up my MacBook Pro and move around the house with it. I’m stuck with what amounts to a low power-consumption desktop replacement that has to be plugged in and left at home so The Boss isn’t driven mad by lack of Internet (or more specifically, by returning to dial-up). When time comes for me to play MMO’s, I’m in the same boat: stuck the sofa by the window, no suitable ergonomic setup to be had.
I start to mull the problem, then inspiration strikes. I remember that I’ve planned to be away this next Saturday for a friend’s birthday. I deliver the coup de grace:
Me: “You know, when I go out for the birthday thing on Saturday, I will be taking this notebook with me.”
The Boss: [not missing a beat] “Just make sure that router gets here by Friday then.”
Yes, ma’am; it’ll ship Tuesday, FedEx Priority Overnight, thank you very much.
Permalink
12.22.06
Posted in Broadband, Wireless at 10:38 pm by Randy
Behold, the Wilson Cellular PCS Yagi antenna. This is 13dBi of sweet, sweet microwave gain. 
When connected to the Verizon (Novatel) V640 data card, something magical happens. Before, when connected to the 800MHz Yagi that we bought many moons ago, we were treated to speeds around 100kbps down, peaking occasionally but rarely at around 300kbps. Not thrilling, but it easily beat the 22kbps analog modem we’d be suffering through.
The 1.9GHz range boosted by this glorious strip of machined aluminum changes the rules of the game, my friends. Instead of connecting with 1xRTT, we now connect with 1xEV-DO, and instead of peak speeds at 300kbps, we now enjoy 1+Mbps peak speed. Even our nominal speed is downright reasonable, coming in well over 400kbps.
The difference in online experience couldn’t be more glaring. With 1xRTT, you can scrabble out a meager existence. With 1xEV-DO, you feel alive.
When I connected to my MMO’s last night, my ping was under 300ms. I whooped, I hollered (or at least did so in my head, because everyone else was asleep). The data rate was such that I could run Ventrilo for my game-playing VoIP needs, and still had headroom to not be sluggish while logged into my games.
I tell you, it’s almost like having broadband.
Permalink
12.20.06
Posted in Broadband, Rant, Rural at 12:19 pm by Randy
Twas the week before Christmas, and all through the house, not a creature was stirring, except for all of us gathered around the sweet, almost retro looking refrigerator we just received!
This GE Profile fridge is huge (22 cu. ft.) and basically uses less than a 1/3 of the electricity that the old propane/electric Dometic that we disconnected. Of course, as in all things, there was a story in its delivery…
Originally, we were expecting it to be delivered on Saturday by a freight company under contract by a Very Well-Known Home Improvement Warehouse. On Friday, The Boss got an automated computer recording letting us know that the fridge of our dreams would be delivered between 3:30PM and 7:30PM the following day.
Then we waited.
First 3:30 came and went. 4:30. 5:30. 6:00. Finally there’s a call from the driver of the truck. They were going to be there soon, but they informed The Boss that they were bringing a 26(!) foot truck up the road!
Now, speaking as someone who has driven a 16 foot truck up our road, I was extremely doubtful they would successfully navigate our one-lane road, especially where there are a couple nasty switchbacks. We’ve seen lesser trucks stranded going up it. But The Boss was hopeful, and not to be denied her prize.
6:45. The phone rings again, and I answer it.
Me: Hello?
Delivery Stooge: Hi, this is Delivery Stooge with Very Well-Known Home Improvement Warehouse. We can’t find your road. We saw Trinity Rd. and then Nuns Canyon Quarry…
Me: Ah, wrong road, keep going, you’ll see a sign for Atwood Ranch, we’re the street on the right after that.
Stooge: OK, thanks.
7:00. The phone rings again.
Me: Hello?
Stooge: Hi, this is the driver again. We’re not going to be able to deliver the refrigerator. It’s dark and we’re hitting branches with the truck.
Me: Ah. So what’s the next step?
Stooge: I’ll call our dispatch and have them call you back to reschedule.
Me: Right, OK then.
So, a few minutes later the dispatcher calls us, and The Boss proceeds to tear into the person on the other end of the phone. However, her tirade was for naught, the delivery company is closed on Sunday and Monday, so the next delivery opportunity would be Tuesday. The Boss makes damn sure they will bring a smaller truck next time.
Bitter remembrances of Clueless Broadband started to seep into my mind. Must every friggin’ company be so brain dead?
Speaking of broadband (that is the thread of this serial, is it not?): Solar God, hallowed be his name, has gazed upon the fruit of Mr. Flaky’s efforts, and despaired.
Solar God: You gotta put a picture of this on your blog, man! I mean, after all the stuff that has happened, and this is what you have to show for it.
Me: Yeah, it is pretty incredible, isn’t it.
I couldn’t disagree with him. He had descended from the heavens (also known as Healdsburg) on Sunday to minister to my spiritual (and high-bandwidth) needs. And as he beheld the result of several months of suffering, he saw that it was not good.
Of course, I still have to take the photo and post it.
We discussed the options, including how much solar to put up there and how best to dig the trench. My preference is to have power run from the house up to the antenna, obviating the need for a separate solar and battery installation, until we’re good and ready to do it right. Naturally, due to the holidays, work couldn’t possibly be started until sometime in January. So that poor antenna will just sit there until we have something rigged.
However, not everything is gloomy on the broadband front. The Verizon data card has been a blessing, and even though my poor MacBook Pro is pressed into service as a makeshift access point for The Boss’ web surfing and email needs, I am still pleased with how it performs. Considering it’s 5-10 times faster than what we were doing with dial-up, the Web is once again someplace I can tolerate visiting while at home. Heck, I’ve even managed to VPN to work through it, so I count that as a win!
So, as Winter Solstice is upon us, we hunker down, throw some logs into the stove, and celebrate that the days stop getting shorter. Broadband is gimped, but working at the ranch.
Here’s hoping 2007 brings better broadband juju for us up here in the boonies.
Permalink
12.18.06
Posted in Rural Tech, Rural at 10:11 am by Randy
This little gem is now mine! We were at Friedman’s in Sonoma on Sunday to pick up various and sundry items for the house. Sitting at the entrance was this Weber Genesis Silver C with a price tag of $499. Considering that this grill goes for $599 on Amazon (plus the inevitable massive shipping charge), I did a mental scha-wing!! and bought it outright. Of course, they claimed they had one in a box, but were unable to find it. However, the drive to own this was so great, we opted to take the floor model, already fully assembled (bonus: it saves assembly time!)
Trouble was, we had brought the SUV down, and had the kids with us. So, after all the errands were done, we headed back to the ranch, and I corralled the ranch pickup truck and drove it back down to fetch my glorious new grill.
And good thing too. As it turns out, this grill is LONG (nearly 5 feet long), and I would’ve been hard-pressed to fit this into the SUV without completely disassembling it. I broke down as much of the grill as I could without resorting to tools, and with some help from a passerby, lifted this into the bed of the pickup. A couple of straps later, and the grill was good to go.
After getting it home, our dear Solar God (hallowed be his name) had descended from the heavens for a visit regarding The Street of Broken Broadband Dreams (his divine visit I will expand upon in a future post), and with his preternatural help we levitated it from the pickup to it’s final home next to the house.
That Solar God, he’s a handy deity to keep around.
I quickly reassembled the grill in the diminishing daylight, and as the last glimmer of twilight waned I fired that bad boy up and grilled me some top sirloin. Yeeeehaw! Of course, I burnt the heck out of one side of the steaks, but the instant gratification of clicking a button to heat up a grill more than made up for the carcinogenic crust that had been scorched onto that one side.
Now, this doesn’t mean I’ve foresaken my old Weber kettle and it’s charcoal goodness. It’s just that this new propane grill has a rotisserie accessory (sold separately, but still!), and you just can’t deny utility like that when living this far from civilization.
God bless Weber grills.
Permalink
Posted in Solar at 9:37 am by Randy
Nanosolar.
Looking at the current prices of solar technology, I welcome them to come along and reduce the demand (and price) of silicon solar cells. Paying $5-7 per watt for solar modules is just freaking crazy.
Permalink
12.15.06
Posted in Broadband, Wireless, Money, Rant, Rural at 1:45 pm by Randy
Gloomy.
You know, I always used to snicker to myself when I lived in San Jose whenever I heard the weather report saying, “rain likely, in the North Bay.” After hearing that, I’d go on to have a nice winter day in San Jose; maybe it’d be overcast, but at least it’d be dry.
Well, those days are so very long gone. When the rains come to the Bay Area, especially this time of year, it comes straight for our area. In fact, earlier this week, it was so gloomy, the ranch (and indeed most of the Sonoma Valley) was completely enveloped in clouds for at least two whole days. I’d normally just say it was foggy, but this was middle-of-the-day kind of fog, and it was dark and, well, gloomy.
I’m sure someone in San Jose is laughing right at a weather report, and now I realize it’s at my expense.
Don’t get me wrong: today has offered somewhat of a reprieve. The sun has even shed some light on our solar panels (according to The Boss), and if we manage to get at least three hours of sun, we won’t need the generator tonight, which is a good thing in my book.
The Verizon data card has been working nicely, the external antenna that I shelled out for was somewhat of a bittersweet benefit. Whereas it made the signal a whole lot more stable, the antenna itself seems to only boost the 800-900MHz range instead of the 1.9GHz spectrum, meaning that it only supports Verizon’s 1xRTT service, which has a peak reported speed of 144kbps (Verizon calls this NationalAccess), instead of the 1xEvDO service, which claims 400-700kbps throughput (which Verizon dubs BroadbandAccess).
Bummer.
Anyhow, I discovered something else of note. The cellular antenna I bought way back when actually has a compatible connector to the pigtail that plugs into the data card. The downside is that it too only supports the 800-900MHz range. So now we have what I describe as a “rock solid” (if not blazingly fast) connection to Verizon’s broadband service. Heck, anything faster than 22kbps is gravy.
In fact, it’s fast enough that I actually was able to connect to WoW last night, only to discover that I’ve forgotten pretty much how to play it. The software for that game has been updated several times since I played, and the latest patch actually has broken lots of add-on “mods” that people have created. Since the game’s creator (Blizzard) kicked over the proverbial mod anthill, everyone has been scrambling to get their collective world back in order. The lag issue has gotten better; I find that if I let things settle down for a few minutes after connecting, my latency drops to a point where I’m actually able to play quite normally.
The downside to using the data card is that The Boss relies on it to keep her browsing experience tolerable too. Why is it a downside? Well, I don’t get to dual-boot into my Windows XP partition to play EVE, because I can’t seem to get Internet Connection Sharing to work (though I will admit I haven’t tried all that hard). The Boss says she’s willing to do the dial-up thing while I play online using Windows, but I think the mind control ray she uses has effectively prevented me from taking her up on that offer.
Everyone apparently wants to know what’s the plan with the “final solution.” Well, the plan is… there is no plan. We’re nearly out of spending money from the sale of the house (since we need to hold at least some of it in reserve to put down on an income property) and that is starting to limit our options. We still have projects in progress (read: fence) that need to be paid for, and then we will be discussing with Solar God (hallowed be his name) at some point about how to do the trench and conduit up the road. Throw finishing the porch into the mix, and suddenly we have don’t have enough money to pay for everything.
Hence, we now have to get picky (and if we’re smart, miserly).
Permalink
« Previous entries · Next entries »
