Archive for June, 2006

I've always wanted to be able to send messages to my phone from the weather server but I didn't want to have to pay for the service.  Well, this week I've been researching phones as my current phone is starting to get weird.  Weird?  Yes, weird, as in Pat Robertson and I'm going to randomly yell at you weird.  Anyway, while I was on US Cellular's website I found out that contracts now have included email addresses.  This was helping to steer me into renewing my contract.  But first I decided to try sending email to the supposed email address I would get.  Guess what?  Yep, it works.

After that, it took about an hour of figuring out how to get around Mediacom's SMTP port blocking so I could send messages to myself.  Now it works!  And since I get unlimited incoming messages (or at least I think I do…next month's bill should answer that question), I don't have to worry about how many messages I get.  So, now, for the curious, if you'd like messages sent to your cell phone, and your provider has an email address that I can send it to, let me know.  I'd be happy to setup some alarms for you and alert you to whatever hazards for whatever counties you wish.  That's right… all that right here under Ryan's Parasol of Protection™.  Wink

Also, hopefully in the next week I'll be getting some memory delivered from NewEgg which should improve the weather server's response time.  With the computer running 24/7 with the server, message and map clients, and the webcam server, it occasionally gets bogged down and freaks out.  Hopefully the memory will work out of the box.

Sorry I haven’t been writing anything lately. Just nothing much is going on. Having a few computer problems in the home front, and I’ll probably end up reinstalling WinXP again this weekend. Otherwise, I’ve been going out at night for some lightning chasing. I really haven’t had much luck with that either. I did get a couple cool shots of sunrises against the storm clouds, but that’s about it. I think I’ve also discovered a couple of stuck pixels on my camera’s imaging chip. It’s not anything noticeable when taking daylight pictures, but they sure do stick out at night. For all I know, they may have always been there… I really haven’t taken night pictures until this year. Maybe it’s time to hand down my camera and start looking for a new one.

URGENT – CHILD AMBER ALERT
IOWA DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC SAFTEY
RELAYED BY NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE DES MOINES IA
1022 PM CDT SUN JUN 18 2006

THE AMBER ALERT HAS BEEN CANCELLED. SUSPECT AND BOTH JUVINILES
HAVE BEEN LOCATED IN SIOUX CITY.

Visit http://www.westendorf.us/special/emwin/amber.shtml for updates…

Overnight, I reset some alarms that were no longer working for the Weather Map client. Flood statements should once again be flowing (really, no pun intended) through the system and will begin mapping on the Weather Map client. No updates are needed on client machines. If there are other products that you aren't seeing mapped that you wish to see, please leave a comment to this post.

Yes indeed, the end is near.  Working twelve days in a row hasn’t been so bad.  But it definitely will be nice to just be completely lazy tomorrow.  Well, lazy after I clean the apartment, do my laundry, and take a tape to Mediacom.  Other than that… ahhh, a day off.  :)

This week has pretty much just been filled with business and working everynight.  On Friday, I went for a bike ride with Cory the audio guy from work.  It was fun, we started at a park at 2nd & Hickman in Des Moines and ended up somewhere just south of the Saylorville Dam.  I didn’t take very many photos, but what I did take will probably get put up on Flickr sometime Monday.

Decision 2006 (www.kare11.com)I got to work tonight for the primaries at the station. Honestly, breaking news, weather or anything different gets me excited. I just get bored with the same old crap everyday. Anyway, after the democratic Culver/Judge ticket had won, they made their victory speech. I’m hoping we’ll post it online tomorrow, but if you haven’t seen it, I do believe Patty Judge was drunk. Or high. Or maybe that’s how she is, I don’t know. I half expected her to go all Howard Dean on our assess. Either way, t’was a fun night, but I was stuck there too long. Just got home a bit ago and I have to be back in for my normal shift at 1:35pm. Thus, good night, my friends.

Image source: www.kare11.com

By tomorrow night my body will probably be about ready to kill me.  For some reason I agreed to come in and work a shift on Monday.  That means I have an 8 hour turn around after I get off work tonight.  Plus, I get to come in on Tuesday night for the primaries.  So much for my weekend.

I don’t know either.  Sometime on Wednesday, the GPS connection to my radio decided to quit.  I’m pretty sure I know what the problem is, but I am not at all comfortable opening up the radio and resoldering the joint.  It may be time to send the radio in to the Kenwood shop to let them have a look at it.  I’m almost afraid, though, to call and ask how long and how much it’s going to cost me.