NetFuzz – It's the fuzz-izzle

To all of my old school SunLit Surf buddies out there. I don’t know if you remember cute little Neo, also known as Sunny the SunLit Surf mascot, the tiny little furball that would darn near fit in your hand when I first found him, that then turned into a beautiful and majestic cat. I am sad to report that he passed away Thursday. It was rather sudden and unexpected, a natural breakdown that could not be stopped according to the vet.

Whoever is reading this will think I am silly to post it, but I don’t really care. Neo was my buddy for a long time, and I have lots of fond memories of that little scruffy guy, and I miss him. He rode with me from my home in Pulaski to the SunLit office in Princeton on many a day, and I think the whole office enjoyed it. Well, except maybe for Mike, but he’s a hard one to read. I know I enjoyed his company on the trip, and he always seemed eager to get in the carrier in the morning, even if we were just heading to my local office in Draper just a few minutes away.

There are many days that I miss the good times of years gone by at SunLit Surf. We had an awesome bunch of people that did awesome things when most folk were betting against us. To that end, some of my favorite pictures I have are of Neo at the office, including ones of him and Keith simply playing with a ball of paper on a string. I remember that was about the time that we all gave him his last name, Gretzky (I think Tony originated that though), because he was so good at batting that ball of paper up and down the hall like a hockey puck.

So, to anyone that remembers the little guy and cares, raise you glass to a stray kitten that almost got overlooked, but in the end brought some smiles and sunshine to a whole bunch of people.

Click on an image to get a larger one, and click here to see all of Neo’s pics I have posted on the pics page.

I am going to share a little experience I had recently. I am thinking that most folk won’t quite understand, and especially will think I am crazy and chalk it up to coincidence. That’s OK, whatever works for you is fine with me. For me though, it was one in a long line of little things that reinforces my beliefs. This is really kind of trivial, but it’s not the first time it has happened, nor is it the first of it’s kind. I was mowing Sunday, and although I don’t live in a mansion or anything, I do have a good sized yard, maybe average for living on the side of a mountain. However, a good deal of it is a big hill, which I have to mow by hand and it takes a while. All in all it usually takes me about four hours to mow, sometimes more or less depending on how detailed I am getting that particular time.

This time I was getting pretty detailed since I hadn’t been the last couple times. So, I mow the front part of the yard on Saturday, and then the back and top on Sunday. Now I was fretting a little over the yard, which I don’t normally do, because it had been awhile since I last mowed it. I am not one of these people that has to have a manicured lawn, and mows twice a week and all that. However, between my work schedule and the weather, I hadn’t mowed for almost three weeks! Fortunately the grass had been growing slow, but nonetheless, it needed to be cut.

The point is, is that I was on the tractor in the back yard trying to get it done before the rain hit. Thunderstorms had been forecast for that day, and it was looking like it was going to be true to the prediction and roll in a good one. I am pushing hard to get the back yard finished (I hate to leave it half done and stop in the middle), when the sky that was already dark started letting some rain drops loose. I felt them, then saw them on the hood of the tractor, and I was stressing. I was maybe halfway done, and really wanted to get it finished. Without really any conscious thought about it, I looked up and said “Oh Lord, just give me one more hour, then you can rain all you want.”

As soon as I said it, the sun came out and the rain stopped. It was kind of eerie. The rain stayed away for a couple of hours, and I got the mowing done, plus some trimming and extra mowing I don’t always do. I figured I had better take advantage of the Divine reprieve. Then, after a bit, it did in fact rain and storm and all that fun stuff. Like I said earlier, most people will laugh me off and say it was coincidence, and maybe so. But, it’s not the first time I have seen something like this happen to me, and I like to believe my guardian angel put in a call to the Big Man and He saw fit to help me out. It doesn’t work like you think, you can’t sit here and wish/pray for a million dollars and have it appear, but He’ll help you when you need it. That’s whether you are trying to solve a problem, or even deal with a crisis in life. On this day though, it was a simple rain reprieve that helped me out and eased my stress level, all the while giving me a vehicle to share with you my experience.

For anyone reading this that is anywhere close to the New River Valley area, specifically Dublin, Va., the New River Valley Fair is in town, and I highly recommend it.  They have lots to offer, like the rides and games you’d expect, along with the carni type side shows, and etc.  They also have some other cool stuff, like a petting zoo, animal shows, and even more animal areas where you can go see all kinds of stuff.  We saw your normal stuff like goats, cows and such, but they also had a camel, a llama, monkeys, african foxes, african plains cat, birds and just all kinds of stuff.

If you aren’t into animals, they have performances by up and coming artists, crafts and exhibits and even events like the demolition derby and horse pull (like a tractor pull, but with horses).  Of course, those two I mentioned are already over, but they have lawnmower races coming up, I bet that would be a hoot!  You can see more of what’s going on there at their website, www.nrvfair.com.

Anyway,  my main point was to share that it was fun, and that you ought to go check it out.  We took my daughter last night, it was her first time at the fair (she closing in on 22 months old), and she loved it.  She loves animals, and I think that was her favorite part.  She liked looking at the lights and people too, but she loved those animals.  If you make it by there, I hope you have as much fun as I did!

Time for me to share something that happened to me today.  It’s something that is kind of funny, yet kind of sad too.  I am a firearms enthusiast, I love guns.  I don’t hunt because I don’t like to kill animals, but I love to go target shoot for fun, and I would drop the hammer on a home invader or similar threat in a heartbeat, don’t misunderstand me.  I am also a CHP (Concealed Handgun Permit) holder, so I can carry a pistol concealed legally, and I am a member of the VCDL (Virginia Citizens Defense League), and you should be too, whether you carry/shoot or not, but that is for another post.

Now, I have heard about and read about gun owners and carriers that get treated badly, or differently because of people that don’t understad someone carrying a gun  Or those same people that think that just because you have a gun you are some kind of maniac.  However, I haven’t really run into that myself very much.  Until today.

I took advantage of having a day off, to go to the local courthouse here in Pulaski, Virginia, to renew my CHP since it expires next month.  I go to the office of the clerk, and I request the appropriate paperwork to renew my permit.  For those of you that don’t know, you cannot carry in the courthouse, there are signs all over forbidding guns, mace, pepper spray, what have you.  The point being, that although I am a CHP holder, I was not in any way carrying today on this trip to the courthouse.

I get a clipboard with papers to fill out, I take a seat and begin the arduous task of filling out my forms.  There are several clerks on duty, and while I am doing my paperwork thing, one clerk comes back from a break and one goes to take a break.  Naturally, they are updating one another on what is going on, and I hear them talk about me.  I here one clerk say to the other:

“That guy there is filling out an application for a concealed carry permit so, you know, I am just saying … be careful.”

Now, I got a chuckle out of that, but also I was a bit offended.  I didn’t say anything, I didn’t want to make a fuss, but it struck me that I was judged and convicted simply by a request for paperwork.  By following the law, you know, being a lawful citizen and following the rules, I am branded as some type of dangerous killer.  That doesn’t make any sense at all.  If I were going to go in there and start shooting people, or if I was the type of person to fly off the handle and then start shooting people, do you think I would be the kind of person who would go through all the trouble to get a legal permit first??!!

After I got over being offended, which didn’t take long, I just found it funny more than anything.  Funny and kind of sad that these people are that shallow and/or misdirected, clueless even.  If they judged me that quick, over something like that, no telling who else they judge and by what.  Food for thought, let’s all be nice to each other, eh?

Well, I just went through and upgraded the software that runs this site, so please let me know if you see anything out of whack.  I think things are looking OK, but if you see an error, drop me a line.  Thanks!

Well, here is a tasty tidbit for you. I was reading about ways to improve your blog, and traffic, etc. So I thought I would try some of these tips, one of which was to submit your blog to various blog catalogs, like (no surprise) blogcatalog.com. So, I submit netfuzz last night, and get a declination letter this morning. Well now, let’s see what they say …

“Unfortunately upon reviewing your blog we are unable to grant it access to the directory.”

Here are the reasons:

• “You did not add a link back to Blog Catalog from your website.” – Nope, I put a link in linking back to them just as they asked (It’s gone now though for sure).
• “The URL you submitted is not a blog, is solely for commercial purposes, or is suspected to be spam.” – Well, this ain’t for commercial purposes, I think that’s obvious. I guess if they don’t like my posts they could call me spam, but come one. Have you seen some of the other blogs out there?
• “Your blog is brand new and doesn’t have enough content to make it truly valuable.” – This is debatable, but I put it in the personal blog category, what else do they want? I have plenty of content, I guess it’s not personal enough … ?
• ” Your blog contains pornographic material.” – Unless I forgot and uploaded a bunch of pR0n somewhere, this isn’t true.

All in all, I don’t really care. I was simply trying to learn. This site is my place to share information, sound off on my opinion, etc. It’s just the so called reasons they gave for not putting my site the their directory that got to me. I for sure won’t be dealing with them anymore. Just my 2c worth.

I doubt anyone noticed, but just in case I thought I would pop up a message here.  It seems that we had a catastrophic power failure with the PDU that feeds the row where our server is located in the datacenter where we host this server.  That means that from about 0830 to sometime around noon we were down while the electricians made repairs.  It happens, and the hosting company (ServerBeach) did a great job of informing us, keeping us updated and getting the problem fixed as quickly as they could.  They even posted pictures of the problems and after shots of the fix.  All in all, they have been a great company to host with.

I have to share something with everyone (yeah both of you that visit my site). I have a daughter, that much we all know. She is right at 19 months old now, which means she’s toddling all over the place. One of her favorite things is to go outside, and especially to pick dandelions. I guess it’s a good thing I have a couple acres to run around on. I think it’s pretty cool that, as much as she likes her Elmo and Sesame Street, even more she loves to be outside playing the dirt, watering the flowers, picking dandelions or any number of other things. I have come to enjoy and even look forward to our romps outside to find and grab up the unsuspecting dandelions. At least chasing her around the yard ought to be helping me get some exercise! Anyway, if you are having a rough day and need a break, I suggest going out in the yard and hunting some dandy dandelions.

Well, you knew it was bound to happen, it was just a matter of time. Hmm, that could be a song … anyway. I am moving the netfuzz site from the e107 portal to wordpress. I like the function and features of wordpress, and it fits more of what I am wanting nowadays. I’ll be working to get some of the content moved over to the new site, but the bad news is I can’t move the users. Well, I can move the users, but I can’t move the passwords since they encrypt differently between systems, so it wouldn’t do me any good. At any rate, anyone that wants to, will need to sign up as a user again.  If not that’s fine too, but I like having my friends around. Thanks for being patient, send flame mails any time

One of the things that I enjoy about this site, and previous incarnations before it, is displaying all of the pictures that I feel like making public. I have now moved my pictures to a separate sub-domain so I could use a better photo album package. If you click on the link to pictures, it will now take you to the new site. Let me know what you think, it should be easier to add new stuff now and then when I get it.