Giants and Shoulders
This very moment, we have access to more information, instantly and concisely, than at any other point in human history. If there is anything I want to learn about, I can type a few words in to my phone or computer and bam! knowledge. It becomes obvious very quickly that taking time to comprehend this overwhelming access to information is the hard part. There are dozens of hundreds of thousands of giants for me to stand on, how can I choose just one? Even then, once I do choose one, I have to take my time to fully grasp all that I see from such a high vantage point. Then it all comes back to a simple question: how much time do I have? I’ve found that the answer can be expressed in just two words: not enough.
Time is the most finite resource. Everyone is given the same amount each day and it is up to us to invest it wisely. Unfortunately, time invested never results in an excess of time. Understanding, knowledge, power, happiness all of these yes, but not MORE time. The more humbling thought is that the people who have shaped the world we live in, even going back hundreds of years, each had only 24 hours in each day. They were able to maximize that time to truly impact the world around them and the future of that world. Think for a moment about the great minds that have made huge strides in science, math, technology, and any other myriad of subjects that have been revolutionized over and over again. Those men and women were not given more time than you or me. They did not have access to any more resource, they were just better with it.
Where am I going with this? Nowhere really, other than just trying to put words to screen that the minutes I have each day are all that I will get. Of course, I want to make the world a better place. I want to solve problems and I want to end the suffering of my fellow man. So with this, I am going to try and focus. Focus on the fact that the thought of “just five more minutes” is not only counterproductive but it is also toxic. I’m a firm believer that people, groups and systems are never static. They are either in a state of growth or a state of decay. Letting myself slip into a lackadaisical attitude towards my limited time to improve each day will ultimately result not in my own personal improvement but instead an atrophy of my mind and soul.
Work Sharp Knife Sharpener
My knives were dull. Not just kind of dull, but super dull. My everyday carry knife is a Ken Onion Leek in black and frankly, it was mega dull. At a gun show last year, some guy at a booth was offering $1 knife sharpening. He should have advertised $1 knife un-sharpening. It was lame. As a gift, my dad got me a Work Sharp Knife Sharpener (from Amazon) and I finally got a chance to set it up and use it.
My knives now? Dangerous. Literally. I already cut myself while trying to cut up a lime for a drink at a friends house. Right on my thumb, it just sliced right into the fat of my finger before I knew it I was bleeding.
Now the important part: Work Sharp Sharpener. What is really great about this system is that it uses what is basically a belt sander to sharpen the blade. Attach whatever angle you need, drop the knife in and pulse the motor while pulling the knife away. Repeat ten times for each side of the knife, change to a finer belt and do it all again. I ended up sharpening the cheapish kitchen knives we have and now they are “tomato sharp.” I actually made guacamole with them this week post sharpening and they were every bit as sharp as my Shun knives. I have yet to use my new Work Sharp system on the Shuns, but I’ll give it a shot sometime soon.
Here is a link to the Work Sharp Sharpener on Amazon:
SBF Flashing Droid X back to Froyo from OTA Gingerbread
Finally got around to doing a bit of tinkering that didn’t involve signing mortgage papers. Last month, Verizon and Motorola released the Gingerbread OTA (over the air) update to Droid X phones. At first I was excited then I realized a bunch of the changes that were made, specifically to favorites and contacts, just didn’t sit right with me. A lot of the functionality I enjoyed under Froyo was gone. Not to mention my phone was just running poorly in general after updating to Gingerbread.
I spent a good amount of time over the past week reading up on different ways to fix this problem. I didn’t know if I should root Gingerbread, roll back to Froyo, flash a different ROM, or what. After looking into all of it a bit more I realized that the best way thing to do was to roll back to Froyo version of Android on my Droid X. The reason for this is that getting back to Froyo is essential to both root and flash other ROMs onto the phone.
I basically followed this write up:
And it all went off without a hitch! This was the first time I had ever done anything like this so I thought I would write down some of the things that I found out while doing it that I haven’t seen written up other places.
- Download the Motorola drivers Here
- The phone will appear in the list below on RSD Lite. I had a hard time finding it at first
- When the phone reboots by the command from RSD lite, that is when it is “bootlooping” so unplug it, remove the battery, reinsert the battery and power up the phone while holding the HOME key. Then press the SEARCH key as listed in the walkthrough above.
- When running Z4root I found that I had to clear the cache in the recovery menu (Power+Home as above) to get it to root properly.
- Reactivating the phone: Dial *228 then press 1 (not #228 as I did at first woops)
Also, when I finished the rollback to Froyo and was able to run Z4Root and get a superuser app set up, I downloaded AntTek Application Manager (from the Android Market.) This app allows the owner of a rooted phone to ‘freeze’ apps so that they don’t function anymore. Once installed, I used AntTek to freeze the Upgrader and Updater apps, which from my research are two of the apps that request the phone be upgraded to Gingerbread. For good measure, I also froze a number of other apps that I never use nor will ever use.
All in all it went very well! I am still contemplating putting a custom ROM on the phone. I am thinking Cyanogenmod7 because I have read some seriously good reviews of it already for the Droid X. In the mean time though, I am happy to be back with Froyo on my Droid X and having back all the little things I enjoy so much about it.
Tinkering
I’ve recently been trying to tinker more. I have a few side projects going that I’ve been working on. I am toying with the idea of posting those somewhere more public so that people can see what I am up to. It is all pretty simple stuff. I am working on a watch winder for my Tissot watch, but I have been sort of slow in acquiring a motor to use. I’ve also been trying to learn more programming (C# and some Java) in order to just be more useful in general when it comes to making stuff. Learning the electronic component side as well as the programming that goes into different devices seems like skills I will never regret having.
I’m also going to order an ardruino to start learning some of that stuff. Basically, this post doesn’t have a lot of hard information in it other than the fact that I am just working on a few things.
Stop Alerts@Mobile.Live.Com Spam!
I just traded phones with another guy in my company and I started getting these spam messages for random, stupid stuff in my text messages. They were all from alerts@mobile.live.com. I beat my head against many solid surfaces before just contacting T-Mobile and doing a live chat with someone. They gave me the “short code” to send the word “stop” in order to stop the messages. That stop code is: 67622
Good luck to anyone else that has this problem!
Still with the malware!
I just updated to WordPress 3.0 so I hope that solves whatever issues are going on with my blog. I had another “malware warning” from Chrome today when I logged in to make a post. I ended up checking the last post I made and someone (a haxxor I’d imagine) inserted some malicious javascript line into the body. I deleted it and I think I am good to go now. Still frustrating.
Anyhow! Life has been moving and shaking lately. The little lady and I went and shot the Kimber on Saturday at a local gun range. It was really fun. Don’t worry, I used the .22LR conversion kit that I have for it so that A didn’t have to shoot a big, mean 45ACP as her first time shooting a pistol. She did really well! I am glad she is on my side. We also managed to make it to the gym both days this weekend though we failed to motivate last night. Hopefully tonight we get off our collective asses and make it over there.
This weekend, I have some big things planned. Gonna install a 12″ sub in my car! I have the wiring ready to go I am just waiting on the box and amp to show up. I will take lots of pics and stuff when that all comes together. Phew!
Ok, back to nonlinear electrokinetic theory. My brain needed the break! Ready to rock now, woohoo!
Some sort of Malware!
Apparently, WordPress blogs that are hosted on the RackSpace cloud are having some issues. That also appanerently includes MY blog. Alas, poor Okpok! But fear not, I have figured out what to do.
Chrome told me that my computer was at risk by going to Okpok. I must say, I am in love with Google Chrome. It has been an awesome upgrade over FireFox.
I did some Google-Fu and found the following link:
Attacks on WordPress Blogs on RackSpace
The hackers gained access to a bunch of blogs and made a spoof user named called “Amin”. Sure enough when I checked my blog, I had the fake user name. I deleted it. However, I still had some infection. I did some source code investigation and found that in one of my posts, a javascript line had been placed. I didn’t know where to delete it from my blog files so I just deleted the post itself. That seemed to do the trick. No more warnings from Chrome and my blog is happy again. Yay!
For those who would still like to follow me on Twitter, I can be found at twitter.com/brendanpjohnson. Thanks!