Weekend at the Beach

This past weekend, I got down to the beach for a couple days. I took some longer walks up and down the blocks to see what work had been done and what still needs to be down in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy. There are still, even a year and a half later, ample signs of the costly damage the storm caused, and how capricious and seemingly at random the "hits" from Mother Nature were.

Down on the bayside, I saw this Great Black-backed Gull is the largest gull in the world, with a powerful build and a domineering attitude. They harry other birds to steal their food and even hunt adult birds such as grebes and puffins. It likely was resting before heading further north.

During the off-season, dogs are permitted on the beach and my dad likes to take his German Shepard, Zoey, down there to let her run. She does love the beach! She tears back and forth like a maniac and attacks the incoming waves.

Saturday night, there was a magnificent sunset. The pink sky glowed for hours. Some of the light show might have been caused by smoke in the air from a number of wildfires burning in the central New Jersey pine barrens.

Whatever the source, I admired the show for nearly an hour.

It's been awhile since I...

...photographed my foot. Is this a "selfie"?

I was on my way to the Hundred Acre Woods to see what spring has brought back to life. Obviously, this old car has seen better days (I took a few photos of it a few years back here and here). I wonder if it ever took someone to the local drive-in, an expectant mother to the hospital or a nervious teenager to a high school prom?

The Virginia Bluebells are just coming out now. I'll have to go back soon and take their picture... maybe the flood waters will recede and I'll even have new shoes by then.

The Great Computer Shuffle

With the (sort of) demise of Windows XP, my brother and I decided it was time to "recycle" some of the computers at the office. Much to my surprise, I found one Windows 98 machine still in operation (as a totally obsolete FTP site), three Windows 2000 Workstations (one used daily as a "Fax Machine"), a Windows Server 2000, and five Windows XP computers (not to mention the two Windows XP computers used in home offices or the four computers running various forms of Unix!)

It was long past time for a good "house cleaning".

When we acquired our third rack-mounted Dell Server, I took a deep breath and stepped off the deep end of the high-technology pool and set up some "hyper-visor-based" virtual computers on the machine pictured below. That done, many of the "specialized" desktops (with customized software installed) were shut off and never used again.

On a normal day, this Windows 2012 Datacenter Server (having two processors with four cores each, 64 gigabytes of memory and six (yes, 6!) one (1) tetra-byte hard drives) plays host to 6 virtual machines. A virtual machine is a software-based emulation of a computer, be it a desktop, workstation, or server. Virtual machines operate based on the computer architecture and functions of a real or hypothetical computer. So in short, this one "box" takes the place of seven (7!) individual computers.

One of those seven computers is "my" computer running Windows 8.1 and you know something? IE11 still kind of sucks even when you have 2 CPU's and 10 Gigabytes of memory) so I loaded FireFox on it. I'm not too sold on Windows 8 either...

The "big" server "talks" to the other two Dell Servers (one Windows Server 2008 R2 with the corporate files and one Windows Server 2012 that is home to a number of large databases) via a dedicated gigabit network.

Being that my home-office computer was Windows XP (and more than satisfactory for what I used it for), it was replaced with one of the retired Windows 7 Professional workstations from the office. Such a sacrifice in the name of security! I was off-line for a couple days or so while I played musical computers (and files there on) but the new computer is much, much faster - I'll need to learn how to type much, much faster! And I cna alreedy ytpe 300 wrods pre mniuet!!!

Now to take about a dozen old, dusty computers to the electronics recycle center.

I might just keep the Windows 98 computer though, in case the local historical society wants it.

Wordless Wednesday (A Day Late)

The long delayed arrival of Spring

Early "wire rope" bridge - Reigelsville, PA - Friends of the Delaware Canal Luncheon

When the American Shad come up the river from the Ocean to spawn, you know it's Spring. These fish are credited with "saving" Washington's starving soldiers at Valley Forge. Alosa Sapidissima are the guests of honor (so to speak) at the local Shad Festival.

The farmhouse for the farm that was made into a housing development that my parents live in.

A tree downed by the ice storm blocks the Delaware Canal towpath near Washington Crossing, PA.

My neighbor finally put his Christmas tree out at the curb for pickup the last day of March. Another sure sign of Spring.

The eatery at the side of the Perkiomen Trail is once more open for business. A nice sign of Spring - I'm kind of attached to this one.

Hard to see in the photo - but the surest sign of Spring to me, are the "return of the turtles" that climb onto logs to sun themselves!

In the past week, the Daffodils have exploded into bloom. I was overjoyed to see these guys!

A Forsythia bush at the Morris Arboretum.

Pots filled with Tulips greet the sun at the Arboretum.

And, yes, the migrating Orange Cones are back...

A bright moment during a dreary winter

It has been a long, cold, snowy, and hard winter. Today, it is raining. My mom says, "Be thankful, you don't need to shovel rain." And I am thankful. The grass is beginning to turn green again, and the spring flowers are on their way, sprouting upwards to greet the newly arrived red-breasted Robins.

The winter started before Thanksgiving - the hard times started a few weeks before that when my dad got sick once more. He spent last Thanksgiving in the hospital. At Christmas time, he was back in the hospital for a few weeks. He ended up getting a pacemaker implanted. But his health didn't improve much. By mid-February, he was back in the hospital with pulmonary edema (fluid in the lungs) threatening to drown him. He was miserable and cranky.

Each week during that period, it seemed we got more snow - and I shoveled and shoveled - mine, the office, and my parents. Especially my parents so that emergency workers could get in to my dad if need be. We got 10 times our average amount of snow this winter (so far). It wore us out.

It was extremely cold too - single digits for days and days - and those days, the wind seemed to always be howling. A winter ice storm knocked out my power for several days - no power meant no heat. My folks have a heat pump, but single digit temperatures meant back up heat from an oil burner. They ran out of oil a couple times - and it was cold waiting for the oil delivery truck to come the next day.

Throughout this hard winter, the folks at my parent's Church have been a rock of support for them and for me. They called every week just to check up on how my dad, my mom and myself were doing. And they prayed. They prayed for my dad to regain his health.

This past Sunday, my parents went to their Church. They were stunned when they were given a beautiful, hand made prayer quilt.

The lady that made it, started it back in February, when far from home, I took my dad to a strange hospital and needed someone (anyone) to just talk to my mom and help her remain calm. I found a phone number on my mom's cellphone "Prayer Chain" and dialed it. One of the members of their church answered, and I told them what was happening.

The next day, my dad was much improved. They drained the fluid in his lungs (nearly 2 gallons were to be removed by the end of his crisis) - and he slept comfortably for the first time in many weeks. His regular doctors had misdiagnosed him, saying his breathing trouble was due to a "common cold". Fortunately, the strange doctor so far from home, figured it out. My dad has been much improved, and as my mom puts it, "like his old self once more!"

My mom brought the prayer quilt to me at work. We admired it, and more so, we admired the thoughtfulness of the person that made it.

Do to others as you would have them do to you. There is so much power in it.