Well, I have finally put up a for rent sign on the lawn of my 1st property. Despite the fact that there are a few small jobs that remain, I will still show the cozy bungaloo.
The entire project took entirely too long (~5months); however, it was my first and I was definitely short on disposable income. When I jump into the next project, I'm seriously considering taking off the project leader hat, and hiring a contractor to manage the rehab efforts from start to finish. I would then simply check out the progress on a weekly basis.
All I would have to do is simply supervise the contractor, he would manage the work of the subcontractors. What I have learned in this business, is that it is very difficult to gage the experience of these contractors. It really seems like a crap shoot. Some guys are very autonomous, others you have to constantly micro-manage. Anyway, I expect to have the property occupied by September. I have also updated the photo journal.
As usual, you can find them here.
Figured I would continue my wildly successful commentary of the Kill Bill series. Frankly, I wasn't overwhelmed by the Vol. 1, but I didn't pay to see that one, so I didn't complain.
I acquired the sequel via a bit of distributed computing. If you haven't already done so, check out BitTorrent.
It's far better than some of the other filesharing models (ie Kazaa, WinMX, etc).
Ok, on with the commentary. I found the Vol. 2 to be more believable, in terms of the martial arts content. It actually showed some remnants of Kung-Fu training. I just couldn't fathom a frail, anorexic looking women like Uma Thurman, performing these incredible techniques without tremendous amount of training. As a martial artist, I suppose I always look for a 'hint' of realism in martial arts films. Even, with Uma studying under the watchful eye of Gordon Lui, her prowess would be a stretch. For the sake of argument, let's disregard this for a moment.
Speaking, of Gordon Lui, he is of 'Kung-Fu' Theatre fame. If you're from NY, you'd remember him as the old man with a long Fu-Manchu beard. He starred in countless Hong Kong based films that aired on Channel 5. Lui and Carradine give the film instant street cred.
I did appreciate Carradine's performance in the film. He actually is a martial artist and is most known for his television series, "Kung-Fu".. For all of the trivia fans out there, Bruce Lee was actually, supposed to get the role as "Qui-Chang', but once it was discovered that he was Asian, he lost the role. So, Carradine got the part. Go figure.
Last word: The sequel doesn't have as many fight scenes as did its predecessor; however, the fight scenes are more, should I say 'believable'. Not too much sword play either.
Recommendation, don't spend any loot on this one. Get the Torrent.
One of the most annoying aspect of lawn care is weed control. Unfortunately, I had not done my due diligence and I paid dearly this past weekend. I am clear that I discovered a new species of these annoying plants.
I'll have to share a few pics of these mucous filled beast. I borrowed my neighbors reciprocating 2Hp saw and aggressively attacked them with a maniacal fervor. Heck, it made the Texas Chain Saw massacre look pretty tame.
I was in luck, because I also came across some neighborhood kids that were "actually" looking for lawns to cut. Very rare indeed. Most kids shirk this kind of stuff. They would prefer to go home and play with their Sony Playstations.
I simply broke them off with twenty spot, and had go to town on my lawn and even some weed pulling. Gotta love it.
I was recently invited to join LinkedIn a new business-focused networking service. I've not yet accepted, as I'm doing some independent research. Check out what others are saying..
mamamusings: linkedin: first impressions
I've been out of pocket for nearly two weeks. The webserver which host my site was down for about 36hrs. Apparently, it had been compromised and it subsequently launched an attack on another server on the internet. The data center staff decided to simply unplug the box to limit the damage and their liability. They later restored the OS and never bothered to figure out what caused the compromise.
Pretty unsettling, especially since there is no plan in place to prevent it from happening again. Anyway, I later discovered that my photo journal was broken. Luckily, all of the files are intact. I simply have to get the PHP stuff working again. I hope to have it fixed by the end of the weekend. I have new pics to share of my garden and my latest road trips. So stay tuned.
In an effort to recoup the many weeks of inactiivity, allow me share a few items with you.
I had the pleasure of doing another Linux talk.
This time I spoke to a group of Computer Science headz at the Detroit -Black Data Processors Association.
It marked the first time I actually spoke to non-Linux geeks like me. It was quite refreshing and somewhat challenging to extoll the virtues of Linux upon a large contingency of M$ users. Nonetheless, the talk was quite successful.
You can peep the presentation here.
I think some of the audience were surprised that I did not have a background in Computer Science. I was very upfront with them. I explained that I am self-taught, and a very firm believer that we learn by doing. You cannot connect with technology without immersing yourself in it. The audience was fairly docile, in that I didn't get the typical windoze questions. I did receive the following question, "Isn't Open Source insecure ?".
Basically, I flipped the question and provided the anti-thesis. I posed the following question. How secure is the closed source or proprietary model ?
How often is your business forced to rid itself of unwanted viruses and trojans destined for your Microsoft Information Internet Server or Outlook email client ?
To coin a phrase by Eric Raymond, "If the source code is closed only the bad guys see it, if it's open the good guys will see it too." No further questions were asked about this topic.
BDPA was kind enough to invite me back for a follow-up talk. I the next conversation, I will compare the Open Source and Closed Source models. If you're interested in understanding the Open Source model, take a moment to review the essays published by Eric Raymond.
Last word: I will add the event pics to my photo journal in the next few days.