Author: gfox (old content)

Upgraded Upgrades

Another upgrade this morning. I upgraded the gallery install on muddylaces to the latest version (1.5.3).

Easy peasy. Untar, overwrite files. Login again. Upgrade complete. That is how I like upgrades to work.

Not much new in this version, but there is a security upgrade, which is what prompted the upgrade.

I am also playing with gallery 2.1 install somewhere. Might be moving to it soon. 2.1 still seems slow to me, and that sucks. I have also figured out how to set it up so the urls match my current install (using the url_rewrite module). That was also a huuuuuge stumbling block. Unfortunately some of the URL’s still; aren’t to my liking.

Gallery 1.5.3 pictures url: http://www.domain.com/gallery/albumname/MG_8387
versus
Gallery 2.1 url:http://www.domain.com/gallery_2_1/albumname/MG_8387.jpg.html

I want to get rid of the .jpg.html but so far haven’t figured that one out.

LOTD – Heat or Cool your seat.

Good grief, and other link to gizmodo today. The seat cushion that can heat or cool. I think this is awesome. Why? I live in Victoria, what would this do in my car? Well, I wouldn’t put it there. This baby would live at work. I am a programmer, and sitting in my chair all day can lead to a sweaty back. Add in to the mix that the building I work in has terrible air conditioning, and lots of hear sources, you get one sweaty Greg in the summer months. How wicked would it be to sit in a cool seat all summer.

Flip the switch in the winter (when the office is freezing cold due to inadequate heating), and now you have a cozy seat for programming. Happy programmers make happy code.

via gizmodo

LOTD – Military Lasers

Ahh lasers. Is there anything they can’t do? Heal skin, fix eyesight, remove tattoos, heat things. The list can go on and on. The US military wants to add them to their arsenal. Recent advances have made that more likely. My questions for this technology revolve around what happens when they miss their target? If this is installed in a plane, and that warplane is trying to shoot another down, but misses, where does the beam go? If it hits the ground, what happens to people/buildings? I know bullets have the same problem, but consider this. What happens if the shot is aimed skyward and the shot misses? The laser enters space? What happens then? Will it ever stop? What if we accidentally shoot down the space station? What if the shot goes clear out into outer space and hits an alien craft? We could start a glactic war in which we would lose horribly. 🙂

Lol, these are the things that run through my mind.

via gizmodo

Mountain Fluids

Last night after work I went for a mountain bike ride with some co-workers. Great ride. I took the Bullit out to get some quality time in the saddle for the race. I haven’t been on the Bullit much lately, so I wanted to make sure I was comfortable on the bike before the race this weekend.

Mission accomplised. I felt really good. Maybe the riding to work is paying off little by little. My legs felt really strong, and my balance was good. I practiced short downhill sprinting sections, braking and leaning into corners, tight twisties at speed, and the occasional jump. I also rode with the saddle lower than normal to get used to that too.

I feel pretty good about the race, and it is still 2 days away. Tomorrow I will actually get out onto the course for a bit of practice there. There are a couple sections I don’t ride very often so I need to work the kinks out there. Also, the last DH race at the dump had a couple loops on Snakes and Ladders cut out. Not sure if they will be doing that again.

I do need to do a bit of work on the bullit today. Top up the fork fluids (bottomed out a few times yesterday), clean and lube everything up, and add a big ring. I will need that for the race. I may also need a fender. As of right now 80% chance of light rain for Sunday. I hate waiting at the top of the course in the rain. You get cold and wet. Shitty way to start a race where you go balls out, fast as you can down technical and challenging trails.

Hotlinking Thieves

my space thieves

I was spending some geek time looking through my stats since I hadn’t done that in a very long time. I had to update my .htaccess according to the Dreamhost Drupal Docs so I could get access to the stats directory.

After doing this, and looking at the monthly stats I noticed that there were a *lot* of myspace referrals. Checking a few of the links I could see that tons of people were hotlinking one of my pictures.

Quick google search and I found this page: Preventing image hotlinking: An improved tutorial. In the comments there was the exact example of what I was looking for. Copy paste, upload the new .htaccess. Nothing like the taste of sweet success.

I double checked by reloading one of the myspace thieving posts, and there was a missing image. Perfect. Sometime I want to create an image to send to the thieves instead of the blankness they see.

Downhill Jitters

Friday at work I began to wonder about the upcoming Island Cup downhill racing season. Every year I do 1 or 2 races. Last year was the exception due to conflicts with stag parties, weddings, and the like. 🙂

After the usual Google search, I ended up at the Arrowsmith Mountain Bike Club. Front page there is the advertsing poster. Much to my dismay/amazement I noticed that the first race is this weekend in Nanaimo. Damn. I was hoping to do that race this year.

Next weekend is Victoria. WTF? I am dumbfounded that I haven’t heard of this race yet. After seeing this race is next weekend I jumped over to the SIMBS page has no mention of the race. This is an organization that must approve of races in the park. This is the same organization that is supposed to be promoting riding and racing in Victoria. No big mention of the Victoria race in the SIMBS forums either.

In any event I am looking forward to the race next weekend. I called Oak Bay Bikes today and learned that the race is on the same course as the last DH race at the dump. This is good news for me. I don’t have enough spare time next weekend to do a full training day on a new course before race day. Knowing those trails the way I do I feel pretty good about being able to put in a good race. I just wish I had put in some real training for the season. Maybe my commuting the last few weeks will pay off in the fitness arena.

I am anticipating the race. In some weird way I really enjoy the pre race jitters. I enjoy riding the course in my head a million times before my race run. I love the felling of my heartbeat racing off as the race official counts down my start. I love the adrenaline rush as I take off from the start line. I definitely push myself way more when I race rather than a normal ride, and I love that feeling too. The burning sensation in my budy as I cross the finish line is something I will never forget. The heavy breathing, the acidic almost blood like taste in my mouth. All of it is an experience that really makes me feel alive.

More next weekend on the race though.

Approximating Investment

Riding home from work last night I saw the price of gas had risen to 101.9. This got me to thinking about the money I spent on the bike. I keep wondering if I spent too much, and if we could really afford it.

Approximating the price of the bike at $400 ($350 + taxes)
Set the gas price at $1.109

$400 will buy me approx 360 Litres of gas.

My truck has a 70 L tank. 360/70 will yield approx 5 full tanks of gas. If I drove the truck to work every day, I would fill up every 2 weeks (approx). This means that in 10 weeks (2.5 months) of riding I will have worked off the price of the bike if gas prices remained constant. This doesn’t take into account, what I would have to pay for parking. The spot we used to rent was $90 a month.

Let’s take into account the parking spot price. Two months of driving would cost me $180 + $310 (4 tanks of gas), this totals $490. Less than 2 months of riding.

Not a bad investment.

What if I took the bus instead of driving? Bus passes are currently around $65 a month. It would take me around 6 months of riding to be cost effective.

Again, not bad. The bike is just as quick as the bus, and way more convenient. The math makes me feel a lot better about buying this bike.