I snapped the attached photo of this humorous emergency sign right before heading into our data center last week (name hidden to protect the guilty).  Then when we (tech dude Tim and I) got in, we found out that the man-trap "portal" that lets you in was broken.  We spent the next couple of hours running cables and cleaning up the mess in our cage in the colo facility, then decided it was about time to head out.  Which is when we found that the person we were supposed to call to get out of the data center had gone home for the day.  As had most of the people in the office.  We unsuccessfully tried to flag down the people streaming out the door to get some help, but finally got someone's attention, who let us out.  Turns out that there is *someone* on duty till 11pm, we just didn't have their phone number.

Which I found weird.  The previous colo I had experience with was at 365 Main in SF, which was very very much a 24x7 operation - our sysadmin used to spend the  night down there on a regular basis.  Access via the portal is 24x7 in theory, but if it's broken at 3am when someone needs to get in and there are no ($colo_facility) guys on hand... someone's going to get eaten alive. 

I've added some new photos in the May 2008 gallery - these are from the ladies' tea at church last week.  I'm sure Stef will have more to add about the event :)

 Hello - Stef here. The tea was given by several ladies at our church. It was SO much fun! We had two guest speakers come from Golden Hills and give a fun skit on the Proverbs 31 woman (mindset) and then Pat Pederson (from our church) did a devotional, basically on our "I'm too busy for life" attitude. Because typically when we're saying that about life in general , we're also telling God that and limiting our time with Him... or not giving Him any of our time at all. 

Anyway, the tea was beautiful! My Mom and about 5 other ladies organized it and I think they did an amazing job. I can't wait for next year's. 

The other pictures are just random pictures of Rachel. She's 22 months old now and I wanted to take a recent picture of her. She was being goofy in her Christmas pj's (in May, I know) and so I snapped a few. 

 Oh, there's also picutres of our Marine World trip last Saturday. 

 

Rachel pitched in and helped me get the car cleaned up.  Poor Ethan is throwing up a bit this morning, I think he caught Jane's bug the other evening.

Evidence attached.  On a similar note, I'm enjoying being home with them.

For those of you who really want to know what I look like at 4:30 in the morning after a 19 hour day, you're in luck.  In simulated infrared, here I am.

Amazing what you can do with a lot of bottles and time on your hands, a remote control car, and an empty parking garage. :)
http://view.break.com/487616 - Watch more free videos

XKCD rules: Also, I love working from home! Normally I'd be in the car or on BART right now. Instead I'm coding in bed and talking to Stef.

As many of you know, I trudge into San Francisco every day to get to work. I like my job a lot, but truth be told the 4 hour roundtrip commute wears on me, so a few weeks ago I started looking for alternatives.

Yesterday I formally accepted an offer to be a senior software developer for the Postcarbon Institute in Sebastopol. I'll be working on their social networks and other capabilities, which are primarily built on top of the excellent Drupal framework.  Postcarbon seeks to educate people on the coming peak in oil supply, and prepare communities to live without dependence on fossil fuels. 

I will be working from home 4 days a week. This is going to make an incredible difference for us: I'll be at home 4 hours a day more than I am right now, I may get more sleep at night, we're going to save somewhere on the order of $500/month on my commute costs, it's a promotion, and a small raise for me!

So that I don't disturb Stef and the kids, and to separate work and home life a little bit, I'm going to rent a bit of cubicle space in a business park about 5 minutes from home.

One of the blessings of this situation is that we have very clearly seen God's hand in every step of the way; one unlikely thing after another has pointed us to this place, and we're very grateful for both the job, and for the peace that God has given us about this situation.

I'm wrapping up my time here at Ensenda, then I'll start fulltime at Postcarbon after next week. I was also blessed in that my current team and management understand my situation, and have been very gracious about this whole process. That said, I'm exhausted, and excited to get moving with the new job, so next week will be l-o-n-g.

I caught most of Idol Gives Back last night, but had to go into a conference call around 9 and missed the below at the close of the show. It's interesting to watch, I both like to see it, but am also weirded out by people who in general have no Christian profession singing praises to God as a performance. I guess even the rocks will cry out, huh?

I mentioned a while back that I installed Windows XP on my laptop using Boot Camp, but that I had exceeded the number of times that I could activate my copy of Windows.

The Internet activation told me that my license was no good any more,  the automated phone bot told me that my license was no good any more, the live phone person told me that my license was no good anymore.  Instead of caving, I told him exactly why that statement was ridiculous (valid XP license, using it on ONE machine, legally and all that).  And he shut up and handed me an activation code.

 Big step forward for me... I even got a little indignant (it's amazing how the prospect of paying another $150 for something you already have can do that). 

 Oh, and I continue to want Call of Duty 4 pretty badly. *drums fingers till Mac release in May/June*