life - That Fleming Gent

A response to Danny Nalliah

(Non-technical post: Fedora folks can skip this if they like, I just feel the need to rant as this offends me deeply) Context: My city of Brisbane, Australia is currently experiencing the worst floods in the region since 1974; Outlying areas and regional towns and cities are cut off and

bloodyidiots

Too Fscking Clever

* If you have six discrete crontabs for a relatively small set of tasks instead of two (or even just one) you may be Too Fscking Clever. * If your SQL statement has five or more JOINS in it, you may be Too Fscking Clever (or a web development framework ORM) * If

fedora

Some updates, and a little "open sermon"

* I’m in the unusual position of being inside, yet rugged up with a jacket and scarf with what feels like a cold. I can’t say I’m happy about it. * Upgraded WordPress here to 2.7.1 (Fedora 11 RPM rebuilt for F10) without too many hassles. It

fedora

Result may be fit, social with an open messaging standard on top.

Techie Happenings: I’ve been tinkering with more XMPP (Jabber to you oldies) messaging in general, as it happens. I’ve had a look at the python Yahoo transport and found it a little lacking – it’s config is a little too different to the python MSN / ICQ / AIM transports

ipv6

This is why I'm not a "webmaster"

In an effort to help my girlfriends website generate a bit of traffic – and some business for her ? – I’ve spent a bit of time (probably a little too much for a holidaying techie, but it’s a “love job”) trying to get my head around more indepth search engine

fedora

Murphy is my co-pilot.

After moving what seems to be several mountains at the workplace over the last few weeks, I’m finally on holiday. Additionally, my girlfriend is back from interstate, which makes me even happier. Alas, nature doesn’t like us and lo, as soon as she stepped off the plane it

informationtech

Where to from here?

I seem to have found myself at a crossroads. Not a personal one (well, not really) but hobby / professional. Make of that what you will. Firstly, I’ve been doing IT support and systems administration for a living for nigh on nine years now. I’d been a Linux tinkerer

blackberry

Crackberries, Earth Hour and Web 2.0 boredom

After having a good laugh at “crackberry” users and their addiction for what seemed like forever, I gave in and traded in my not-trusty-at-all Nokia Slide for a Blackberry Storm. After playing with it for a while, I must say it’s not bad. Getting used to typing with it

bloodyidiots

Smallish things.

Well, one thing is fairly important if you’re a long time user. “enlartenment.com” is gradually going away. I’ve had the domain for what seems like forever and no one seems to understand the etymology. In essence it’s a bit hackish – a mashup of “enlightenment” and “LART”

fedora

The one about yoga, marketing and DNS.

I’ve been fairly flat out this week. No blog entries, even my Twitter updates are sparse in comparison to the norm for me. Speaking of Twitter – dear Marketing people: I know you won’t listen because you don’t really care unless you can make a buck out of

hosting

Sort-of-Emergency Post

I’ll keep this short as it’s a little late and I should turn in. I’ve had a bit of a hosting hiccup – my now ex-host unceremoniously cut me off and disconnected my server on Valentine’s Day, citing an ESA copyright notice. Unfortunately for him and the

life

Thursday's Thoughts.

1. People need to chill the fuck out. I’ve had two people I love dearly lose the plot today; is there really a need? Really? Life is short and things are impermanent. If someone else has fucked you over, it’s their problem, not necessarily you – let them deal

health

I'm getting fitter!

As most folks who know me personally know, I’m not exactly a little guy. Not huge (175cm / 95kg or 5’9″ and 205lb in the old money) but not a lightweight either. I used to be even bigger in times past – 110kg at one stage a few years ago.

health

Oh, what to say

It seems quite odd – I’ve been twittering like mad lately, but don’t seem to have much to say here. Perhaps I’ve been too busy to put a coherent post together. Not that there’s anything wrong with Twittering, as long as the marketing wonks don’t push

bloodyidiots

Tourists...

Inquiring minds want to know how the following didn’t turn into a Darwin Awards nomination: Coming home from drinks with my good friend Steven, I was stopped and asked for directions by a middle aged couple in a reasonably priced car. This part is fine. However, they chose to

fedora

Something new and hopefully good.

A different kind of week this week. I do need to go on a diet, or at least go back to my old one as Christmas has done little for my waistline. The Significant Other is trying to convince me to go gluten-free and hit the gym, which are both

life

Things I've learnt this week

1. There are no tasteful Myspace layouts. It’s simply not possible 2. Most of the invites on above are spammers or struggling musos. No thanks.. 3. I like Perl’s way of writing to files better than Python’s 4. Olive oil makes a fast and effective makeup remover

life

What a strange state of being this is...

This has been one of those times where a moment of quiet reflection is not suggested, but mandatory. Firstly, my near and dear is most upset over the loss of a favourite horse. Being the animal lover she is, loss of any animal companion is going to hit hard. Secondly,

humour

Three little pre-Christmas requests.

Dear Lazyweb, I’ve set up icecast as an IPV6-only experiment (the result of a half-drunken challenge from Mr Steven Lisson Esq.) and am streaming some Ogg Vorbis tracks off it with EZstream. Winamp and Totem Player (Linux/Gnome) work fine. Banshee (Gnome/Mono) and WMP however do not – WMP

life

Busily employed.

I’m happy to (belatedly) announce that I’m now back in full-time employment, having started as systems administrator at Australian Publishing Network’s Milton office. My colleagues are pretty switched on, the atmosphere is fairly easygoing and being on Park Road there’s no shortage of places to get

fedora

Progress, Fleming style.

I have been privileged, spending the last couple of days in the most wonderful company of my very special “better half” – a great meal Tuesday (the Himalayan Cafe in Brunswick Street, Valley is recommended if you’re out that way) and a perfect followup yesterday of a lovely afternoon and

fedora

Unfortunate circumstances...

Thought I’d post a quick update seeing that’s it’s been a while. Firstly, I am again looking for work. I’m not going to go into detail other than to say I’m extremely disappointed and will be very careful who I work for in the future.

fedora

Updates..

Work: Is going well. Security and fixup work at the moment, a nice mailserver build (learning a bit about I/O kernel elevators) and miscellanea. Life: My love is back from interstate with all of her needed gear. Catching up with old friends from school via Facebook of all places.

fedora

Ups and downs.

Heh, a month between posts? I must be getting slack. Things have mostly improved. I am again gainfully employed in a systems architecture / infrastructure development type role with Dedicated Servers / Hosting Shop here in Brisbane. It means less systems admin work (and the downsides like insane hours and being tied

fedora

Much is happening (not much of it good...)

Well – what can I say? I’ve suddenly have some free time on my hands, however not the way I’d intended (some holidays). My employer decided – very suddenly I might add, over a coffee @4pm last Tuesday afternoon – to make me redundant as of the 13th of May. I