I woke up this morning after about 11 hours of sleep. That’s two nights in a row with that volume of sleep, and my body hasn’t felt so rested in a long time. I know it’s needed when the only sinus headache I get is mild.

is sick, and she was catching it before she left for New York. So, it looks like I’m following her lead. Copious amounts of Vitamin C, as well as the aforementioned sleep, are helping my body to fight it off, thankfully.

First thing I did was address a situation that has been frustrating me for weeks now. The wireless bridge that we use for our internet connection hasn’t been able to find a network to attach to, for about 75% of the time. When it does find one, it attaches for just long enough for me to attempt to load a page, and then it drops again. This thing has problems seeing the wireless router that’s right next to it, much of the time.

So, I moved the bridge back out into the hallway (closer to the source), and it picked up signal. It was as slow as dialup, but it was solid. I jumped up and down for joy a little bit, and then started browsing teh intarwebs from bed, where my comforter was still invitingly cozy. After a short while, Buddy joined me, so I surfed and petted the dog. Good times. Eventually, I decided to get up, and set the W2K3 server to update itself while I took a shower. And it was a perfect, relaxing, just-long-enough hot shower. My back muscles and neck muscles relaxed (which is a miracle, lately). I was smiling as I got dressed.

Update was successful, and now with intertubes, there’s no reason that I shouldn’t go and get that USB wireless adapter for that ancient iMac that’s downstairs. It’s not AirPort compatible, but I had found an adapter by Belkin that has open-source drivers (well, the makers of the chipset put out open source drivers, so it’s the same, in the end). It also happened to be the least expensive of the bunch, so I hit the ATM, hopped a bus, and headed to CompUSA in Frandor.

I picked it up, amazed and content that my day of technology was going so well. I decided to ride the bus the long way back so that I could get some reading in. Yup, still working on Wishsong of Shannarra.

By the time I got home and let the dog out, I was a little light-headed and shaky. This confused me, until I looked at the clock. 3:12 PM. I hadn’t eaten yet. SMRT. So, I set some eggs and hash browns cooking, and pop the wireless adapter into the iMac.

This is where things stop being easy. The device registers in the hardware list in Ubuntu, but it’s acting as if there’s no driver installed. Don’t think I can use ndiswrapper with a PC driver on an iMac. Also, I need to download some packages to do that, and the point of getting this was so that I wouldn’t have to run a wire to the iMac from upstairs. And I really don’t want to haul this thing into work.

So, I grab my iBook and bring it downstairs. I start searching for some drivers, and set the W2K3 Server (Alpha-Trion) to download some more updates. At this point, the connection is slower than dial-up. Still there, but crawling. I grind my teeth a little, but I’m able to bring up the Ubuntu forums page, which is about the best font of Ubuntu knowledge ever. And it’s down for some database cleanup. No access.

On the good side of things, the eggs and hash browns were delicious, and hit the spot.

The update on the server dies, because the connection has. I go upstairs, grumbling in my old-man grumble, and move the bridge around until it gets a signal. Nothing stable to be had, unfortunately. So, I packed up my shit, snapped a pic of the Playstation that I’m putting up on eBay, and headed out. After a nice walk, I enter Theio’s to find that my usual spots are taken. No biggie, there’s a table near a plug, so I sit there.

Right in the direct sunlight. In my black shirt and slacks. I started to sweat. IN OCTOBER. There is something wrong with that. I could barely see my iBook’s screen, and I was totally overheating. Thankfully, one of the nearby shaded seats was vacated shortly afterward, and I sit there now. Just out of the sunlight, decently cool, and with an idea to get some online shit taken care of, and then maybe some writing.

I’ve got coffee (stay caffeinated, young padowan), water (but do not dehydrate thyself), notebooks, my iBook (OptimusPrime), and idea to say screw it and put Panther on that old blue-green iMac at home (Kup). It’s funny, but Panther has a lower memory requirement than Ubuntu does.