Saturday, April 02, 2005

What to do when the Internet is down....

Get the oil changed in the car! Well that's what I did this morning. Today was the first time since I moved the business and home phones to Vonnage that my internet connection died. Actually there was a cable outage (due to an accident I believe)... So, no internet and no phones... theoretically.

Interestingly enough, my failover plan actually worked! The business phone forwarded to my cell phone and the home line forwarded to my wife's cell phone... all automatic and no problems... maybe technology isn't all bad :) There was no way to automatically roll the old BellSouth lines to another number in the event of a failure. Nice to see this work, and on a Saturday NOT a business day!

Well UNC Chappel Hill is in the big dance! What a great game against Michigan, the first half was real close, no big leads and 6 or 8 lead changes... the second half though was all Chappel Hill! They played their game (run and gun) worked the paint, got posted up under the hoop and shot close to 70% from the floor... just a great game to watch against a solid Michigan team!

Spent most of today getting ready to tear back in to the restoration of my wife's '78 pickup, making a parts list, spec'ing out some new 'goodies' and getting an overall plan in place. With any luck I'll have the rest of the running gear out during the week and can get down to cleaning and painting the front half of the under-carriage and frame next weekend. Then I expect to start in on all the body modifications late in the weekend, or evenings next week.

This kind of stuff always makes me think about the old days... back when I had the shop in Oneida, NY... the crew that used to hang out, Al DiMauro, Quentin Charleston, Lauren Segal, Joe Best, Tim Spaulding... and all the others... man we had fun... built some cool stuff... and then later, after I'd closed that shop and started working out of my place and a local shop owned by Floyd (Whit) Whitney.. there were some nice rides getting done then too... and damn if Mitch Fox and I didn't paint a boat load of cars and trucks in his shop!! We had fun, made a little money.. but living then seemed so much simpler than it does now... we didn't have a lot, but we always made eats and got by... all in all it was pretty good living!

I get nostalgic for those days... my life was certainly slower paced... less stress... more fun... but ya know, I was also a lot younger then, with a ton more stamina.. I could work 8 hours a day, go to school full time and still find another 30 or more hours a week to work on our side projects... I don't seem to have that energy, or drive these 20 some years later... I wonder sometimes if that's just life's way of telling us to slow down a little, find new things to enjoy, new places to explore and adventures to have.

I suppose if I'm lucky, I'll be looking back at *these* days in another 20 years and be thinking similar things!

I need to write some soon about the old 'Micro Application' and 'CSMA' days... those were fun times too.. and we were building computer systems, not cars, bikes and trucks... but all of the systems were custom, like the rides had been... different, but equally fun, and rewarding!

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