Go Time!

I admit it... for the last 4 hours Ive been watching my PCs clock...waiting for that magical 5:00 PM string, signaling the end of my week and the beginning of 10 days off for Christmas and New Years.

Now... its time for a 4.5 hour drive to Minneapolis and tax free clothing shopping (I need more wool socks) there before Christmas!

Of course... Im not the only anxious one. For the last hour or two, little groups would appear in different labs, casually chatting, trying to pass the time.

One co-worker came up with a unique method... he signed out for 5:00 at 4:50... so that when 5 comes around... he doesnt have to waste time signing out.

30 days until 70-340

Whenever I sign up for a cert test, I like to schedule it a couple of weeks (up to a month) in advance, forcing a time for it to be taken so that I do not dillydally with regards to studying or other preparations.

Yesterday I signed up for my next text, 70-340, "Implementing Security for Applications with Microsoft® Visual C#® .NET", which after passing (I hope), will put me just one test away from an MCSD which with any luck (and dedication), I could have done before March of 06 given my current history.

While this is the first test that I’ve had some uncertainty relating to before hand, I do hope I pass, as being able to mention my having passed 4 certification tests since the last effective review date of 02/05 would no doubt help me a bit come reviews in this February (provided they are not delayed for 6 months as they were this year).

Also, one of these weeks I should look into the new wave of certs for the 2.0 Framework and VS2005, they do look rather interesting, and different.

RIP Seti Classic

After being a member for just over six and a half years, the original version of Seti@Home has closed down in favor of the new BOINIC system.

Starting off ages ago on an old AMD K5-133, it took me just over 2 days to do a single work unit... which did not encourage me to run it often... so I took off a year until I had more hardware... and then went insane with it.

While at DSU I had access (for a time) to a 4 processor Sun machine on which I’d run multiple copies of Seti (until the admin would nuke the processes, suspecting that they were just run of the mill runaway processes). As I upgraded my main PC, older PC’s would be devoted to Seti processing. At one time in my house I had 5 separate PC’s at it, as well as up to 6 at work.

Heck, the joke around work was that anytime I had control of any hardware, one of the first things I would do would be to run Seti on it... and believe it or not, it actually benefited us... once. One prototype unit we were building was found to have inadequate cooling, which was only revealed by running Seti on it.

While I understand why they are upgrading to the new system, I am still rather sad to see the old one go, in large part because the statistics and bragging rights from the old system are less important. Being able to say that one processed 30046 packets, or that out of 5,436,301 users, I was in 6647th place, having completed more work units than 99.878% of the users (I had always hoped to reach 3 nines).

Oh well, I’ll miss you Seti classic. Now I just need to figure out how to get the new BOINIC client to work under Linux machines, or in an install-less windows configuration (so that it can be run over the network.

Current Student Load Debt

After having a few people ask about my current student loan debt and disliking looking it up so much... I decided to do something slightly different... an ASP.NET web app that keeps track of my current debt load, adding interest, removing payments, etc and generates a small little image noting it.

Unfortunately... neither of my web hosts currently support ASP.NET 2.0... so until I'm on a plan that does... I'll just have to remember to upload a new picture each day... or automate it a bit.

In either case... below I present, my current student loan debt ($52,115.46 as of 12/17/2005):

Not So Expensive Reimbursement?

After having ~$840 of income (but not actual cash) being added to each of my pay checks for the last few months and fearing filing my 2005 Federal income tax return as mentioned previously... I realized my mistake today.

All of the ‘income’ being added to my paycheck will show up on my W-2 (in addition to everything before the $5250 IRS limit for not reporting)... and completely deductible, at least according to the IRS.

So in addition to the $2500 in student loan interest... I’ll also be getting to deduct nearly $12000 in tuition and $350 in books.

Of course the worst part about this I think... is that I’m still getting hosed on Social Security... all on the theory that I might get some of it years from now. Ha!

I wonder if I should also deduct driving costs for class days as well my Microsoft cert tests.


On a related note, a co-worker who is going through the same program as I didn’t have the reimbursement amounts added to his paychecks over as long of a time as I, instead he’s having them applied in full to each pay check as necessary.

Apparently he just received an e-mail saying that his next paycheck will be about 17 dollars... ouch, but then, he wants it that way believe it or not.

Deferment Oddity

Since January 2005 I have been working on a masters degree at a local institution and one advantage of being considered a full time student again is that existing student loans go into deferment... meaning you don’t have to make payments on them during that time but still accrue interest (except for Federally subsidized loans).

My loans going into deferment didn’t really matter to me as I intended to keep paying right on through (however the few bucks in federally subsidized loans wasn’t too bad as I am able to knock down that pile a little faster).

Last week... I received a letter from one of my creditors... Great Lakes Educational Loan Services, Inc... saying that my loan with them has now entered deferment. Why is this odd? It happened 11 months since I became a full time student again. I wonder what took them so long to get the news.

Third Time's the Charm - Dead Mouse

This morning I checked my traps to a wonderful surprise... a dead mouse in the one lethal one that was setup... looks like his luck finally ran out... on my third attempt to get him.

Now for the few day long hope that he didn't have a wife and kids who might come to torment me in the days/weeks to come.

On the down side... it appears that his lucky was not as bad as I had thought... the bait had was gone from the trap that got him... as well as from within one of the non lethal traps, so we was lucky to get as much as he did... but not quite enough to get away.

Smart Mouse

Last week I found some mouse droppings on my stove... and after cleaning the surface, ignored it... until I found some more a few days later… which prompted putting a regular killing trap on the stove... baited with peanut butter.

The next morning, the bait was gone, and the trap was empty, still waiting to be triggered.

That evening, I reset the trap and put another one near by... a non lethal one, also bated with some peanut butter on a small piece of cardboard... This morning when I got up, what did I find but both traps empty of bait and bodies as well as still waiting to spring into action.

I think it’s safe to say... I’ve either got a smart mouse... or am completely inept at setting up a mouse trap.

Windows 2003 on nForce2

Only a few months ago... I upgraded to Windows XP from my trusty 2000 I began having some serious networking issues, issues that I have yet to be able to fix. With my free copy of Visual Studio 2005 and Windows Server 2003 coming at one point as a result of the Channel 9 Halloween Costume Contest, I’m beginning to look into driver support for my various parts... only to discover something very bad...

Neither nVidia, nor ASUS provide drivers for my nForce2 based A7N8X Deluxe motherboard for Windows 2003.

Granted, the motherboard in question was first released in early 2003, I guess I find it a shame that they do not have driver support for 2003 for such a widely used chipset.

South Dakota Winter & Ditches

I love the winter... all summer long while being miserably and sweaty, I look forward to the impending change of frigid cold and blowing winds... and this year has not disappointed me yet (despite not quite being officially winter).

Here in South Dakota on Monday we had some freezing rain that turned into a blizzard by mid-afternoon resulting in large portions of or two interstates being closed, and yesterday we had ~6 more inches of snow to add to the dusting we got on Monday.

It should be noted that South Dakota is a funny place when it comes to snow... we can have a blizzard, with whiteout conditions... and when it’s all over... many areas are likely to have only a small dusting of snow... why is this? The wind! There is little here to stop it so the snow just keeps going.

One of the most fun part of any blizzard (or the time after) is driving to/from work and seeing all of the cars in the ditch belonging to people who just forgot how to drive over the summer.

Today’s count? 8 passenger vehicles and two semi trucks.

It was kind of shocking to see, despite seeing it so often every year. One of the semi’s was just the cab and was upside down in the median of the interstate... and another car looks like it was rear-ended pretty hard before going off the road.