Digital Choke Daynotes |
What's a Daynote?"Daynotes" are daily (usually) journal entries of interesting happening and discussions. They are not 'blogs', which are often just a collection of links to other information (although we do include links occasionally). Daynotes are much more interesting (we hope). These "Digital Choke Daynotes" were inspired by the collection of daily journals of the "Daynotes Gang" (see sites at .com, .org, .net), a collection of daily technical and personal observations from the famous and others. That group started on September 29, 1999, and has grown to an interesting collection of individuals. Readers are invited and encouraged to visit those sites for other interesting daily journals. If you have comments, send us an email. A bit more about me is here. You might also enjoy our little story about the death of the 'net. |
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In case you hadn't noticed, Friday the 13th came on Monday this month. Which might explain John Dominik's post today. Another reason to be careful in the care and feeding of four-legged pets.
Had a nice visit yesterday with the grandkids. After dinner (lasagne, in case you cared), we bundled up and drove over to the local over-decorated Christmas neighborhood. This time, we got out and walked around the place. The kids really enjoyed all the Disney decoration, and all the lights. I did get a picture of the "20 foot tree through the porch roof". I just need to find the memory card reader, which has wandered off somewhere in a fit of cleaning, then I'll show it to you.
Tonight was Liam's 3rd birthday. We went over to his house, along with all his cousins on his Dad's side (Jared -- the dad -- comes from a large family). A good time was had by all.
First off, it's Microsoft Patch Day. A summary here at the Internet Storm Center; but since you all have automatic updates set to run automatically, then you're OK. (You do, don't you? Even you Linux users should update automatically.)
If not, you Windows users should start with my "Simple Steps" report. That will get you set up for some safe computing. I use Windows XP, IE 6, Outlook, and McAfee for anti-virus. For "scumware", Spybot Search and Destroy, and Ad-Aware. I don't open attachments, I don't do file sharing or instant messaging. And everything is working just fine. With proper precautions, you can do safe computing in Windows.
I got a bit more organized at work by cleaning up some piles of paper, and getting back on track on some projects. I need to do some more poking around the network looking for security problems. They are out there, I just need to find them.
After work, we went over to Pam's mother's house to set up her Christmas tree. Not too hard, but heavy. It's a fake one, but looks pretty good. About 8 feet tall, in three pieces, and includes lights. Went together quite easily, but one string of lights is not cooperating. I suspect a bad bulb somewhere. I replaced the fuses in the string; that didn't help. It will need some more troubleshooting later this week.
And while I was there, I replaced a few light bulbs and the furnace filters. And got dinner out of the whole deal, along with a blackberry pie. Not a bad deal.
The usual day at work, nothing exciting to report. There was an interesting report on the year's viruses and worms over at the F-Protect site. Some interesting trends: viruses and worms are becoming more commercially oriented, mostly linked to spammers. The virus writers install software on your computer that turns it into a 'bot', mostly for the purpose of using your computer as a spam source. Some identity theft possibilities with the same processes.
A quiet evening at home; a new "West Wing" to watch.
Over there are the pictures of the house with the tree that grew through the porch roof. Although the picture quality is not clear enough (I'm not too good with the photo editing program), you can see where the tree top pushed right through the shingles on the roof. I thought it was a very clever decoration. You can click on the image to see a larger image (they are a big big, so you'll want a high-speed connection).
I worked on a few general security audits today; one was a list of users that were logged on at 1:00am this morning. Since we are not a 24-hour operation, there shouldn't have been about 90 of those users logged in.
After work, Pam and I did a bit of holiday shopping. We got quite a few items crossed off of the lists. Pam is doing some wrapping now; she enjoys that, while I am not as good at the wrapping thing.
Watch out for Christmas greetings in emails. A great way to get a virus. Don't
open attachments, remember?
Tomorrow, Stacy comes home for the holidays. Looking forward to that.
... more later ...
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