nuxx.net
Making, baking, and (un-)breaking things in Southeast Michigan.

Category around the house

Buds!

June 2, 2007

One of the first buds on the Victoria Blue Salvia Farinacea.

The salvia in front of my house was fairly small when planted, and since then it has grown to a rather decent size without flowering. I’ve never grown a larger variety before, but I guess it buds rather late. At this point normal salvia would already have a good load of flowers on it.

The habernero chilis I planted have already begun to bud as well. I’m curious / nervous about these, as I’m slightly afraid I won’t be able to use the whole crop.

Also, when out to get Thai food I stopped by Lowe’s, returned a light bulb (wrong kind for my needs), and purchased an upside down feeder and some seed blend. This sort of feeder / seeds is designed for goldfinches. While I don’t desire to feed just one kind of bird, I’m hoping that the combination of hulled sunflower seeds, thistle, and the small opening on the feeder will help cut down on waste and keep various non-grass plants from growing in the grass below the feeder.

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Cable Management Is Fun!

June 1, 2007

Rack, cabled, ready to go.
(Click for full size image…)

Last night, in preparation for the coming (on the 6th, I hope) Mac Pro I decided to re-cable my office. Back in 2003 just before I first acquired my Power Mac G5 (photo gallery retired) (when the Power Mac G4 Cube (photo gallery retired) was my only Mac) I set up my office in what is generally its current configuration, with the large O’Sullivan Diplomat L-shaped desk, black wire rack, torch lamp, vertical bookshelf, etc.

Since then I’ve changed things slightly, but most of what I’ve done is just add on additional cruft (cabling) to the things without pulling out much of the unused stuff. Well, last night I pulled out a large pile of various cables from both behind my desk and behind the rack and cleaned everything up. I also pulled the VCR out of the stack, moved the DV bridge to beneath the computer, eliminated the USB 1.1 and FireWire hubs, etc.

With all this cabling done in the rack I was able to directly plug everything in smoothly, and the Mac Pro should fit in just as well. Beyond the MP, the rack also holds a JetDirect, HP LaserJet 5L, Formac StudioTVR (TV Tuner / DV Bridge), APC SmartUPS 1400, USB 2.0 hub, and two external hard disks. This is connected to the desk via a cable trunk which maintains a 1″ separation or right-angle crossing between data cables and power lines. On the desk there is a USB 2.0 hub, iPod cable, USB 2.0 CF/SD reader, speakers, LCD, keyboard, and mouse. It is all connected without any cables hanging on the floor or even visible beneath the desk, just how I like it. (I’ll post photos of the wholly done office once it’s… done.)

Hopefully tonight I’ll be able to finish moving everything to compact fluorescent lighting too. Right now I’ve got a 30W Sunwave full spectrum bulb in a lamp on the desk, but I need to redo the diffuser for it. A coworker gave me some 14W bulbs I’ll use in the ceiling fan in place of the extra-hot halogens, and I’ll move the torch lamp to some manner of CF spotlight. I’m putting X10 controls back on all lighting (except the ceiling fan), and I’ll probably put an X10 switchplate next to the normal one.

Then it’ll just be a matter of dusting a bit more, straightening up things in the closet, and waiting for the Mac Pro to arrive and I’ll be done with my office. Yay!

around the housecomputersmoved from livejournal

Injured Dragonfly

June 1, 2007

Beheaded Dragonfly, Still Living
(Click for larger image…)

While driving home from work today yesterday (LJ has been giving me posting fits) I noticed an injured dragonfly on the seat next to me. I took it home, occasionally carrying it on my finger, and took some pictures of it. As you can see above, it seems pretty injured. It would only move around using some of its legs, always staying in that head-tilted-forward / almost-handstand position.

After taking some pictures and letting it set next to me for a while, I took it outside and set it next to the rosemary bush to die.

The other alternative was to kill it quickly with ether, but I didn’t really want to do that.

Anyway, all of the photos can be seen here (photo gallery retired).

Around midnight I went outside to look at it, and it was just barely moving. It still seemed alive, though. :(

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Airport Extreme makes for working internets.

May 25, 2007

My new-ish network setup.

While the Airport Express + Cable Modem beneath the couch setup I put together back in January was working well for a while, within the last two weeks or so it’s started to become especially problematic. Last night I put a call into Comcast because the connection seemed to be dying fairly regularly. And by regularly, I mean many times per day. Eventually yesterday came around and I couldn’t really get it to come back at all.

After I had a case submitted and an appointment scheduled for next Saturday I did a bit more digging and found the actual problem: neither of my Apple Airport Expresses would link any more. I had this problem with one of them a while back, but I’d sort of forgotten about it. Now the other one was refusing to link.

Thinking that it was an autonegotiation problem I flipped it to 100/Full and that fixed the problem for about six hours. After that the PC light on the cable modem once again went out (indicating no link), would no longer light after many reboots / resets of each device. I then brought out my laptop and found that there were no problems linking to there. I tried a few other devices and the cable modem could link with them as well. Then I knew the problem was the Airport Expresses.

Since I don’t currently own a device which has AppleCare they are both out of warranty. With the Somerset Apple Store being closed I had to either pay full price (I normally get Student Discount), wait a week for shipping, or drive out to the Apple Store in 12 Oaks Mall. Fortunately today found me leaving work early to run down to the RenCen to pick some things up, and with me downtown at 2:15pm, I figured it wouldn’t be too far out of the way to swing by Novi on the way home.

While I hit a few slow bits of traffic (I-94 between I-75 and I-96), most of it moved surprisingly well. I-696 was horribly backed up going westbound, but not where I was going.

Anyway, long story short, things are working much better now. The shared hard disk thing is interesting (mounts HFS+ and FAT32, at the very least, but partitions can’t be edited), the built-in switch has allowed me to use my JetDirect, wired network on the G5 (hopefully Mac Pro soon), and provide a link for the workbench. I’ve had no dropped connections at all, and the Airport Expresses are all set up as clients of the main base station (no WPA) to save on bandwidth, and music can stream out as desired.

around the housecomputersmoved from livejournal

My Office

May 16, 2007

(Cross posted from YakYak…)


Here’s my desk / office at home taken with an 8mm fisheye lens. You can just barely see the door and G5, which are in opposite corners of a 12′ x 12′ room.

That’s exactly how it is now, except I’ve opened the just-received-before-photo box from Advanced Circuits. (They are the prototype PCBs for a project I’m working on.)

Click on the image to make it full size…

(And please ignore all the wacky flare. It is a fisheye with a 47W diffused daylight CF near the edge.)

around the houseelectronicsmoved from livejournal

Dr. Bronner’s Peppermint Pure Castile Liquid Soap

May 10, 2007

(Click for full size image…)

Oh, I also (finally) replaced the Dial-branded pump soap dispensers which I’ve had in the bathrooms since I bought this place with something nicer. The old dispensers weren’t dirty or worn out, but I was fairly tired of the smell and anti-bacterial-ness of Dial soap. The cheap, prone-to-toppling dispensers were a bit of a bother too.

Stopping at Trader Joes on the way home I picked up a bottle of Dr. Bronner’s Liqiud Soap, in Peppermint. At US$8.99 for one quart it’s not very cheap, but it is very nice soap.

Also, don’t forget to read about E. H. Bronner‘s colorful, driven personality.

acquired thingsaround the housemoved from livejournal

2007 Flowers (Plants)

May 10, 2007

Rosemary
(Click for more photos of the 2007 Flowers around my house (photo gallery retired)…)

Arriving home a bit early from training at the Microsoft facility in Southfield I decided to head over to Deneweth’s Greenhouses, which is just down 22 Mile Road from my house, and grab some flowers.

Well, instead of following the trend from previous years and planting just flowers I decided to pick up some pretty herbs and chilis as well. The four things planted are Rosemary (Rosmarinus officinalis – as seen above), Caribbean Red Habernaro, Obsession with Blue Eye Verbena, and Victoria Blue Salvia Farinacea. I’m quite happy with how they all look spaced out around my front porch and such. With the salvia growing to 12″ – 20″ it should be nicely, imposingly friendly. Hopefully the chilis will be good, and the rosemary gets as bushy as I’d like. Ideally I could regularly bake bread using the rosemary. Mmm!

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Basement Cleaning

April 4, 2007

Clean, more-empty basement.

Looking towards my workbench in the clean, more-empty basement.
(Click for more photos…)

Well, after dragging my feet on it for a while, I finally finished up cleaning my basement this evening. I still have a pile of things to take to Salvation Army (hopefully tomorrow) and a whole bunch of bottles to get rid of. Anyone who wants to return them to Red Wagon — where they will all be accepted — is welcome to have them all, and any deposit obtained from returning them. I just don’t feel like it. There is probably $20 worth, too.

While I know it won’t sound as good as it could, I also hung the rear speakers from the ceiling in the basement, getting them off of stands, wires out of the way, and generally making things look nicer.

As can be seen here I also did away with the very large green ping pong-like table thing, and turned what was the rack of computers into a shelf for things. This shelf wasn’t needed as I spent a good bit of time earlier in the year condensing many of my computing things on to my desktop, saving power, cutting down on maintenance, etc.

So, all in all this is a good thing. Hopefully I’ll get to cleaning the bathroom(s), kitchen, and doing a general dusting and vacuuming sometime this holiday weekend.

around the housemoved from livejournal

Screen Door

March 26, 2007

Front door screen retainer.

There are a few times each year which sticks in my mind. The first time the furnace has to be turned on (and the accompanying burnt dust smell). The first snowfall which makes it too difficult to go somewhere. The first day so hot that one must retreat to the cold of the basement.

Growing up I remember this day as the time when my dad (and eventually I) would open my bedroom window, slide the glass panes out of the way, and slide the screen into place. That was also the amazing day where there would be nothing in the window and I could lean out, looking straight down at the ground. This was also the day when my dad would get the screens for the front and side storm doors out of the rafters of the garage, replace the screen material (if needed), remove the glass from the doors, and replace them with screens.

After this point all the doors and windows could be opened and the finally-warm Michigan wind would blow through, airing out the house from months of being closed up against the cold.

Today is that day.

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