Done recently (20130910 Tu - 0915 Su)

[mdlbear]

Tried to log in on my file server last week and found out that the hard drive was dead. Finally went to Fry's yesterday, and bought a couple of Western Digital red (NAS) 2TB drives. Designed for continuous duty, which would be a good thing. Disassembled the lock on the docking bay I had the backup drive in (and promptly found the key, lurking in what had been my nightstand).

Confirmed that the backup works and the old main drive doesn't, and installed the latest Debian. Which only took about an hour. It boots fast as a bat, and ships with a driver for the Realtek ethernet controller on my motherboard. So I can free up the PCI slot for something more useful, like maybe an ESATA/USB-3 card, if I can find one.

Now begins the tedious process of restoring (done, as of this evening) and reconfiguring. Which will take time because I want to make some long-overdue changes in the config.

It looks like the last time a backup was made was June 25th. I don't *think* I did much, if anything, since then except maybe add a couple of passwords to the keychain. And of course I've lost a lot of email. If you sent anything to steve at thestarport.org in the last couple of months, I haven't seen it. (It is now forwarded to my gmail account, along with steve at savitzky.net which I've been doing pretty well at keeping up with.)

It's possible that some of the transient stuff can be rescued from the old drive -- it seems to run ok for a few minutes before suddenly going offline. Not entirely clear that it's worth bothering with.

Apart from that... Colleen has been getting physical therapy three times/week, and is now able to stand up and transfer into her power chair. Progress. Her caregiver is an excellent cook -- Thai, Chinese, and Japanese, with an emphasis on lean and low sodium. Yum!

Links in the notes, as usual. One, found by a coworker after I'd mentioned something to that effect, is one of my favorite stats: iPad 2 as fast as Cray 2 supercomputer. I also dropped a donation on YsabetWordsmith's poem, "Part of Who I Am". Some great links there, too.

0910 Tu
  * up 6:30; W=204.8, p=1; d, n, t; shower
  @ "Faerie's Aire and Death Waltz" presented by CSMTA - YouTube (ysabetwordsmith)
  & Recovered my Comcast account password.  It seems my usual username is taken.  Quite
    possibly by me.  The rep on chat was mostly using canned phrases; sounded like a bot.
    : Their website is incredibly slow and clumsy to use.  Bletch.  It also doesn't work
      worth a damn in Chrome

0911 We
  * up 6:33; W=204.8, p=2; d, n
  * Told Medicare about my work insurance.  Apparently this has been a problem for some
    time; just found out about it while being reminded about my urology appointment
    tomorrow.  Weird.  Also required two phone calls.  No way to do it online :P
  * Updated my mailing address with ssa.gov.
  @ iPad 2 as fast as Cray 2 supercomputer, fraction of the size | Electronista 
    (found by a coworker after I mentioned something of the sort)

0912 Th
  * up 5:50; W=204.4, p=3; d, n; shower
    p=1.5-2 after shower
  * 7:30ish leave for urology appointment -> got me up there at 8:12
  * 8:15am urology -> biopsy scheduled to check out a hard spot.
  * 3-6 team barbecue
  @ Kelly McGonigal: How to make stress your friend | Video on TED.com 
    It turns out that it isn't stress that's bad for you, it's _thinking that stress is
    bad for you_ that's bad for you.  It also turns out that oxytocin is a stress hormone.
    Caring for people and reaching out for help 
  @ dropped some money on The Wordsmith's Forge - Poem: "Part of Who I Am"

0913 Fr
  * up 6:30; W=205.2, p=1.5; d, n
  : Colleen managed transfers in and out of her power chair today!
  @ Half a year of ’hood clickin’ | Code for America

0914 Sa
  * up 7ish; W=205.0; d, n
  @ You Are What You Touch: How Tool Use Changes the Brain's Representations of the Body:
    Scientific American (The Wordsmith's Forge - Poem: "Part of Who I Am")
  : Have been unable to find a charger that works with Colleen's netbook, except for the
    genuine Dell one that has a flaky cable.  :(
    -> the Kensington charger worked once I found the right tip.
  * Found Colleen's tablet!  It was in the Rainbow Room on the table between the chairs.
  * Pulled the backup drive; disassembled the latch.  Probably won't use the dock for a
    while, though.
  * The backup drive works!  I win.
  * Nova's sda looks pretty good, too, so far.  I may only have lost sda1, though I'm not
    going to trust it.  -> Um... no.  It has now stopped working - short reads, even on
    partitions that worked before.  Might be possible to rescue some of it, but not
    worthwhile if the backup is decent.  Fry's run tomorrow.
  * 15min:  (more like 2h) re-arranged narrow bay of LR bookcases to hold art books, etc.

0915 Su
  * up 9:05; W=205; d, n; shower
  * found the dock keys - in my old nightstand, of all places.
  @ FINALLY – a clothing store uses a diverse range of models and the results are amazing
    ‹ Beauty Exists f(Elizabeth Barrett)
  * Fry's:  2 WD 2TB "network" drives.  Compared to the "mainstream" drives they have a
    longer expected lifetime, and are designed for 24/7 operation.  Decided to stick with
    2TB because I was nowhere near filling the 1.5 that used to be the main drive.
  * making chili for dinner.  Chip joined us.
  * attempted to sort out power cables prior to installing on Nova.  Non-trivial.
  * 9ish installing Debian on Nova using a USB drive.  It griped about not having a
    driver, but seemed to be ok anyway.  Saw both the on-board ethernet and the card,
    which is a first.  Threw everything onto /vv; may decide to make /home later.
    (/home on nova was a 64GB partition.  Making it 100 for good measure.)
  : The old main drive is well and truly hosed -- failed while trying to copy /etc.
  : oops.  Apparently I haven't been backing up /etc.  This isn't fatal -- I can get users
    and groups from algol.  Taking advantage of the opportunity to do some drastic
    trimming.  Hmm.  I remember now... it was backed up in home/starport/Archive.  Whew!

Comments

[thnidu.livejournal.com]

That's good to hear about Colleen's progress :-)

[mdlbear]

Thanks

[carol-kitty.livejournal.com]

Glad colleen is home. Glad to know her caregiver is good. Hugs.

[museinred.livejournal.com]

Glad to hear Lady Colleen is doing well. Hugs to you both.

[quadrivium.livejournal.com]

Glad to hear Colleen is doing well! I just noticed your home location is Rainbow's End. I read that book last year on Brooke's recommendation. The only other book I've read by Vernor Vinge is Fire Upon the Deep which I also enjoyed. I need to raid our library for more of his work.