Unpredictable Fate

March 21 Went to Dr. Freeman (Neurologist). He didn’t know why I was sent to him. He retrieved my folder as I prepared, by removing my right shoe, for his examination. His focus seemed to be on the lack of hand and foot coordination. During his tests, I was unable to detect and notify him when he bent downward the big toe on my right foot. He showed me the CAT Scan film that illustrated an anomalous shadow in the left frontal lobe of my brain. His comment was that it is deep. He scheduled MRI and EEG to take place in the next week. I am growing more worried at each passing day.

That was a quote from my dad's journal on March 21, 2003. Five months later, he was dead. He had a brain tumor on the left side of his head. It started with a dizzy spell in January and by this entry in March, he could not tap his foot to a beat and the limbs on his right side where becoming less and less responsive. He died on August 23, 2003.

It's an interesting thing to note that his website is still up at http://members.tripod.com/~n8pyo/index.html and remains how he left it .. besides a small note from me placed there a few days after he passed away.

Before this tumor invaded his head, he was a very active and healthy person despite smoking an average pack a day of Winstons for the majority of his adult life. He was an avid hunter, fisherman, hard worker, and always had a few hobbies to keep him busy.

When he celebrated the New Year in 2003, he had no clue that he would be in the grave before September. He felt very healthy and life was good. Things where normal ... just as they are likely normal and good for you right now as you read this blog.

Anyone who knew my father would tell you that he was always full of wisdom and always had advise that put things into perspective. One of the most wise things that he said to me was only a few months before he died.

He said, "Son, you never know who you are going to touch and how you are going to do it; so, let everything that you do be something that you want to be remembered for when you're gone."

I don't know if they have Internet access in Heaven but just in case ... I miss you, Dad, and I'll see you when I get there.

Vista Initial Review

Ok, so I got my hands on a copy of the final Vista RTM and installed it in my Gateway MX7525 laptop as a dual boot with Windows XP SP2. I've tested just about every beta and RC release up to this point so I've seen my fair share of half baked features come and go in each one.

I have mixed feelings about the final product. I've found a few pretty major issues remaining but I've grown to really love the glassy interface and perkier reaction times.

The Problems

The biggest problem that I'm still running into is DHCP. It has never worked for me. It must be working for others because I've been having a hell of a time finding anything about it through Google. It just refuses to obtain a unique IP address through any Microsoft DHCP server that I put it in front of.

The problem is actually much worse than that. Not only does it not obtain an IP address, it cancels out all of the addresses in the scope of the DHCP server, causing the server to no longer be able to issue addresses to ANYONE! I have to log onto the DHCP server console and manually reset the list of available addresses to get rid of the ones that it thinks are already consumed on the network.

Basically, it looks like Vista is asking the DHCP server for an IP address, the server offers it one, then Vista decides somehow that it is already in use on the network so it tells the DHCP server so. The DHCP server, then, crosses it off the list of available addresses and then hands Vista another address in the scope. It does this redundantly until there are no more addresses left to give. At that point, Vista just uses it's auto-config addresses which is pointless and useless on any given LAN.

The only way that I've been able to get Vista to communicate on a network is by switching to a static IP address. This has been the case since the very first Beta and is still an issue in the final RTM. Maybe there's something that I need to do to get this to work but it shouldn't be even if there is. DHCP has always worked out of the box on all of the other operating systems. It should be no different for Vista.

For the record, I have tried this on three DHCP servers that work fine for all other operating systems. One is a Windows 2000 server, another is a Windows 2003 server, and the last one tried was built into a Linksys router. All three of them failed to give Vista a valid IP address.

The Good

I love the new interface. It's really not much different than XP other than the eye candy but I think that's a good thing. As much as I like new interfaces, it is good for Microsoft to keep things as similar as possible so that they don't make those of us that are not geeks relearn Windows with each new release. If they have to relearn the interface, that's one less thing keeping them from just switching to a MAC.

Things just seem to run faster under Vista. I installed Sim City 4 on both my Vista and XP partitions and played for about a half hour on each. It ran much faster and smoother on the Vista side. I'll post more on this as I try more applications. I do have to say that VNCScan looks real nice in the glass interface.

The Security Stuff

Ok, so it's a bit more secure than XP. I don't think that it's a good idea for Microsoft to spew out rhetoric that invites people to hack it but it is fair to say that it is THEIR most secure operating system since Windows for Workgroups 3.11. Before that, there was just DOS 6.22 and besides the occasional boot sector virus, you where about as safe as you could be.

I welcome the fact that they caught up to the Linux and Apple concept of running as a regular user and prompting for "root" to do administrative tasks. This has long been one of their biggest security flaws since the beginning of Windows. You have always been a root user by default and anything that you inadvertently ran was ran under the context of you ... meaning it could do anything on the system that you could do yourself. That is bad.

Now, it prompts you to tell you that an application needs this level of access and allows you to either stop it or let it happen. I've heard a couple home users tell me that this was going to get annoying but they'll get used to it. Now that Microsoft has embarrassed it, there's really nowhere to run to get the old lazy lack of security.

Conclusion

I'll continue pounding on it and posting smaller blog entries about specific findings. I'm still on the fence with Vista. I don't think that I'll make it my main OS yet but it shows promise. That's not a good thing for it being RTM.

Snowboarding Comming Up!

Tis the season ... FOR SNOWBOARDING! I'm getting excited. I was sweating it all summer because I lost my (very missed) snowboarding buddy that I've ridden with just about every year since I started snowboarding as a kid. I hate snowboarding alone.

I decided to take my son out with me this year and teach him everything that I know. He's excited about going to a "real hill". Yea, in Michigan, the best that we have to get excited about is a real HILL. In another year, I'll get my daughter out, too. Hopefully, they both get really into it and it will turn into a family thing. Kate even wants to give it a go next year.

I was chatting with one of my customers and found that he lived right by Bittersweet. That's a nice ski resort that I ride at every year quite a bit. I dropped a hint that I snowboard and he does, too! We exchanged email addresses and when I head up there, I'll hook up with him and his crew.

I really mourn that I will no longer be riding with my old friend. Memories enter my mind daily.

Anyways, away from the morbid stuff, I'm excited about snowboarding this year because I won't be alone and I'm hoping for lots of snow to make up for last year.

See ya on the slopes!

Baby update

Ok, it's been a while since I've posted and a lot has been happening. The most important upcoming event is the ultrasound next week where we get to find out the gender of our baby.

We've been holding off on the decorating of the baby room until we know the gender so next Monday will spark the beginning of a lot of painting and decorating.

I already have a son and a daughter so I'm not really pushing for one gender over the other. My wife, on the other hand, really wants a little girl. The kids are super excited, too. My son wants a "nicer" sister while my daughter wants another brother that she can boss around. ;) I guess that she doesn't like competition.

The baby has been kicking quite a bit. My wife says that it feels like the baby is throwing parties.