Weekly Wrap 278: Reducing the pain, increasing the pace

Waratah in bloom at Bunjaree Cottages: click to embiggenMy week of Monday 28 September to Sunday 4 October 2015 was another pain-ridden ocean of chaos, but nevertheless there were a few solid achievements.

I launched Send Stilgherrian to Ruxcon 2015, a Pozible crowdfunding campaign with an obvious aim. As I write this, it’s already reached 29% of its initial target, which is promising.

On the health front, the broken tooth was repaired again. As for my shoulder, the X-rays and ultrasound imagery taken last week showed no permanent damage or signs of specific problems. It’s “just” strained muscles and tendons, and all that’s needed is rest. It does seem to be getting better, albeit very slowly.

Articles

Podcasts

I got most of an episode of The 9pm Edict recorded, but was too tired to complete it on Sunday night. Stand by.

Media Appearances

  • On Wednesday, I spoke about Facebook hoaxes on ABC 105.7 Darwin, but I didn’t record it.
  • Also on Wednesday, I spoke about Bitcoin and tractor square dancing on ABC 774 Melbourne and stations around Victoria, but I didn’t record that either.
  • On Thursday, I spoke about my crowdfunding efforts on ABC Radio National’s Media Report.

5at5

There were no editions of 5at5 at all, and that’s terrible. Why not subscribe so you’ll get all the future ones?

Geekery

Having migrated the final batch of a long-standing client’s websites to new virtualised infrastructure, I finally shut down my remaining hard-iron Linux server, a leased machine somewhere in a rack in San Francisco. Typing halt for the last time also ended my business relationship with ServePath, which later became GoGrid, and which was recently acquired by and absorbed into Datapipe. I’ll miss the excellent support their engineers have provided over the years.

Meanwhile, I’ve picked up a quick little job: building what is in essence a paywall for the website of the literary magazine Meanjin, so they can start selling digital subscriptions.

Corporate Largesse

None.

The Week Ahead

Once more, most of this week is over. It’s already the end of Thursday! But there’s still plenty of things to do…

On Friday, it’s the long train commute to Sydney for a lunchtime briefing on smart cities and the Internet of Things with Alcatel-Lucent’s expert on such things, Marc Jadoul. I’ll knock off some errands while I’m down there, and certain SEKRIT planning on the train.

On the weekend — note that I’m not predicting a specific day for each item — I’ll finish that episode of The 9pm Edict, finish the video of my UTS lecture, do some audio equipment tests, and do the preparatory work for Meanjin.

Further Ahead

The week beginning Monday 12 October will be a hectic one. Monday is the calm before the storm, when I’ll collect my thoughts and prepare myself.

On Tuesday, I fly to Melbourne, sneaking in a quick work session at Meanjin in the afternoon, before a reception kicks off the Australian Information Security Association (AISA) National Conference. I’m covering that for ZDNet, as well as recording material for my own Corrupted Nerds podcast. My thanks got to security vendor Tanium for covering my costs.

On Friday, I’ll be writing for ZDNet before flying back to Sydney. Some time on the weekend, I’ll produce another episode of The 9pm Edict.

The week starting… no, I’ll tell you about that next time.

[Photo: Waratah in bloom at Bunjaree Cottages, photographed on 8 October 2015. This waratah flower is slightly past its peak, but the intensity of its colour still manages to dominate the camera’s sensors.]

Weekly Wrap 277: Pain, pain reduction, fire, and teeth

Sydney Central station on fireMy week of Monday 21 to Sunday 27 September continued to be painful. Literally. In pain. Again. Which rather detracted from the joy of being in Sydney. And then Central station caught fire, and my front tooth broke again.

I did get some productive work done, as listed below, but if you’ll allow me to have a personal whinge for a moment…

The shoulder pain I mentioned last week hasn’t been fading, so I saw a doctor. His referral for imagery, both ultrasound and X-ray, has a clinical note written on it: “??rotator cuff tear ??bursistis”. This does not sound wonderful. I’ll know more next week.

And the broken front-tooth filling that was repaired a few weeks back? Yes, it broke again today. I’m rather stressed by this right now, because I know it will now need a more expensive repair option, and this sort of unexpected expense at the end of the month is, well, difficult to deal with.

Articles

Both of the ZDNet columns that I wrote this week were reflections on the Malcolm Turnbull-led Australian government. Yes, the regime change was yet another significant force that shaped my week.

Podcasts

None, but a new episode of The 9pm Edict is expected to appear very, very soon. I’m also thinking of ways to resurrect Corrupted Nerds.

Media Appearances

None. Well, that’s not quite true. On Wednesday, I was interviewed by ABC Radio National’s Media Report about my crowdfunding efforts, and that will be heard this coming Thursday 1 October at 1730, Friday 2 October at 0530, and on the program website.

I also stumbled across Matthew da Silva’s profile of me from earlier this month. People you should know … Stilgherrian. Why anyone would start a new series of blog posts with me is anyone’s guess.

5at5

The were four editions of 5at5, on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Why not subscribe so you’ll get all the future ones?

Geekery

I usually don’t mention the geekery that I do for the clients of my legacy business Prussia.Net and elsewhere. However, this week I’ve been migrating a client’s internet presence to new infrastructure, some 13 domains in all, and I’ve also been planning out some future work.

Corporate Largesse

  • On Thursday evening, Sapphire Communications introduced us to some of their clients over drinks at Gowings Bar and Grill.

The Week Ahead

I’ll be in Sydney for another week, it seems. It’ll be a busy one, at least to begin with. And it’ll also continue to be painful, at least to begin with. Sigh. This entire section was rewritten on Monday evening to reflect a rapidly-changing reality, and again on Thursday morning.

On Monday, I was approved to start on a SEKRIT project. I also went to the dentist in the early afternoon to re-do the tooth fix. The rest of the day was a write-off, because the codeine for my shoulder pain played very well with the Ativan for reducing the anxiety of having things in my mouth. I found writing to be a bit difficult after that.

On Tuesday, I’ll be writing a column for ZDNet, discussing another SEKRIT project, and tackling finishing an episode of The 9pm Edict podcast, projects. Tuesday was overrun by pain, some in the form of email, some in the form of neural signals.

On Wednesday morning, I’m shutting down that Prussia.Net client’s old server and tidying things up. In the afternoon, I’m getting the medical imagery done. At 1650 AEST, I’m doing a spot on ABC 105.7 Darwin. Then at 1930 AEST, I’ll be talking about various tech things on ABC 774 Melbourne and local stations around Victoria.

Thursday is 1 October. A new quarter, bringing with it a certain amount of adminstrivia. I’ll also visit the new VMware Briefing Centre in Sydney. I should write something for ZDNet in there too. In the morning, I’ll be working on plans for two trips to Melbourne later in the month. Then at 1500 I’ll re-visit the doctor to look at the medical imagery and decide what happens next.

Friday is bound to be about tying up the week’s loose ends before the long weekend, with the Labour Day public holiday on Monday 5 October. Nothing specific has been planned for that yet. Needless to say, I am stressed by the chaos levels.

Update 1 October: Edited to reflect the much-changed plan for the week.

[Photo: Sydney Central station on fire, photographed on 26 September 2015. This photo was also used by Radio New Zealand in their story Fire at Sydney’s Central Station extinguished.]

Weekly Wrap 273: Security, dentistry, and technology

Don't be a cog in the machine: click to embiggenMy week of Monday 24 to Sunday 30 August 2015 was disrupted by dentistry. A filling broke, quite a large one, and I lost half a day of covering the Gartner Security & Risk Management Summit. There were also budgetary impacts. Why do we have teeth?

There was some good news, however. My new MacBook Pro arrived, courtesy of The 9pm Urgent Hardware Refresh. Migrating everything to the new machine was seamless, and took just over two hours. I’ll report further on its performance in due course.

Articles

None, but I’ve done most of the work on a ZDNet column that will be posted on Monday.

Podcasts

None, but a new episode of The 9pm Edict will appear on Tuesday. I’ve already done a lot of the pre-production.

Media Appearances

  • On Wednesday morning, I spoke about telecommunications metadata on ABC 105.7 Darwin.
  • On Wednesday evening, I spoke about this very same subject at length on ABC 774 Melbourne, but I didn’t make a recording.

5at5

There were three editions of 5at5, on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Why not subscribe so you’ll get all the future ones?

Corporate Largesse

  • On Monday and Tuesday, I covered the Gartner Security & Risk Management Summit at the Hilton Hotel Sydney, and there was plenty of food and drink. While I was there, Blue Coat gave me a 16GB thumb drive.

The Week Ahead

It’s the second of two weeks in Sydney, and it starts off hectic. On Monday, I have to finish a ZDNet column, scope out a server upgrade for a client, and complete The 9pm Edict podcast.

On Tuesday, I’ll organise the final technology purchases for The 9pm Urgent Hardware Refresh, and write my bit for the ACCAN National Conference debate on Wednesday. Then at 2030 AEST that night, I’m talking about some recent tech stories on ABC 702 Sydney and Local Radio around NSW.

On Wednesday, I’ll actually be at the ACCAN National Conference, or at least in the afternoon for the panel discussion. The morning is likely to be spent catching up on various background tasks.

On Thursday, I’m writing a column for ZDNet, and turning my UTS lecture from April into a video.

On Friday, I’ll design and test my new podcast recording set-up. I’ll post a description once that’s done.

The weekend will see me not working at all, ideally. No, really.

Further Ahead

On Friday 11 September, I’ll be presenting my regular guest lecture at UTS. And then on Saturday 12 September, it’s the recording session for The 9pm Edict Public House Forum, with post-production to be done on the Sunday.

[Photo: Don’t be a cog in the machine, being graffiti photographed somewhere in Sydney on 29 July 2007.]

Talking malware and stuff on Balls Radio, FM 99.3

Here’s last night’s regular spot on Phil Dobbie’s Balls Radio from FM 99.3 Northside Radio in Sydney.

I waffled on disjointedly about stuff that was on my mind after this week’s Patch Monday podcast — that is, how midway through 2012 it looks like all this talk of cyberwar is rubbish — and something about dental floss.

Here’s the audio of my segment. If you’d like more, Mr Dobbie has posted the full episode.

I’m fairly sure that copyright remains with Mr Dobbie rather than being transferred to Northside Radio, but I’ll figure that out later.