TomS Words of Wisdom

"Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge."

— Jimmy Wales, Founder of Wikipedia

I recently bought a pair of high speed [7200 RPM] 1TB hard drives form TigerDirect. But when I went to install them, I found that I was short a pair of HD mounting rails, that allow 3.5" drives to fit the 5.25" bays in my big steel server case. So after asking the guy at the local PC Recycle center, I went googeling around looking for HD rails at a good price. They're not easy to find and only a few places seem to have them in stock. I did find an outfit, here in the Seattle area, that did have them.

While their site (and e-mail address) is hosted at Comcast, I decided to take a chance on them since I could pay using PayPal, and could fall back on their despute resolution process if needed. When I went to place the order however, i needed to use my "verified" address (a PO Box) for shipping but their site was only setup for UPS shipping. After a couple of quick e-mails I confirmed that they could ship USPS Priority, and placed my order. Their price was good enough that I ordered 5 pairs, enough to fill up all the bays in my server case.

The package arrived in a couple of days. The parts in the package were just as I had ordered, and even included the mounting screws!

So if you need HD rails I highly recommend Pyramid Distributing, and particularly Bill and the staff at their Seattle wherehouse.

Labels: "Hard Disk Rails"

Director Luce --

    I'm writing to let you know that I am very disappointed in you're department's inconsistency in address change policies and procedures.  While our state's Vehicle License services makes good use of 24 hour online interaction and decent use of outsourcing, our state's Drivers License service is way behind modern expectations for an efficient and responsive public agency. 

    Licensing services are by their very nature are a retail operation in the way that your agency interacts with our state's citizens. I have repeatedly found it appalling that your agency managers and administrators have stubbornly refused to admit that the business practices of 1950s era banks are suitable in the 21st century.  The banking industry a decade ago acknowledged the realities of the modern world by expanding business hours into the evenings, providing comprehensive online services and for decades has offered kiosk based services [ATMs] that are available 24/7.  Even the US Postal services has opened up it's PO Box lobbies 24/7 and installed kiosk based services [Automated Postal Centers®] in most post offices and offers comprehensive services online.  The FCC even allows 24/7 updates to it's licensing databases. 

    Because your agency's Drivers License service doesn't offer convenient evening hours or online address changes, I am forced to take time off from work to sit in a Drivers Licensing Office to change my address as required by our state's laws. 

    Your agency's administrators and managers, particularly in the Drivers License services, need to take into account the costs of lost time of our state's citizens and lost productivity of the businesses we work for, in their decision making processes. This is particularly important in these hard economic times when many people are moving, changing jobs and even working two jobs.  I'd also like to see your agency track its impacts on citizens lost time not only in its own offices but also in those of your contracted agents.  Ideally your agency needs to staff it's retail offices more like grocery store checkout lines then like school classrooms. 

    I would strongly like to suggest that you demand that your agency's administrators and managers meet, across divisions and at all levels, to discuss and drive to implementation how they can work together to share data, expertise and public resources, to improve customer service, convenience and privacy while preventing fraud and abuse.  I truly believe that an integrated approach to all licensing services that is aligned with modern customer service best practices would allow your agency to do far more to meet it's goals with the same or fewer tax and fee dollars.  It's time to change for the better.

    Finally one additional thought, as your agency prepares for the requirements of the REAL ID Act, please remind your staff and colleges at DHS that facial photos, like those found on drivers licenses and passports, are a very well studied and understood form of biometric identification with False Acceptance Rates similar to or better then fingerprints and retinal scans. Furthermore facial photos would integrate well into automated services supported by escalations to a consolidated call center form of customer service. 

Thanks
    Tom Sayles
    Fall City, Wa.

BTW -- This e-mail is also being posted to my blog.

The first major step of my annual turkey ritual is complete.

Tom's Turkey Brine

Gently boil the following for about 3 minutes:

• 1qt chicken broth
• 1 1/2 cup kosher salt
• 1/2 cup lemon juice
• 1 cup Snoqualmie 2006 Winemaker's Select Reisling
  
• 1 large fist full of herbs, fresh from the garden
  (mostly rosemary and thyme with some sage and oregano
  on the stems with little or no preparation. Clip and cook.)
• ~12 allspice berries (dried)
• ~8 whole cloves
• ~4 cm piece of a cinnamon stick
• ~1/4 tsp fresh ground black pepper

As the brine concentrate, above cools, clean and prep the turkey.
Line a suitable large container with clean tall kitchen garbage bag.
Place turkey breast down in the lined container. Add the following to the container:

• 2 qts chicken broth
• brine concentrate (including the blanched herbs)
  
• cold water and ice to cover
  (if you have to add more then ~2 gal.
  be sure to also add salt to maintain sufficient salinity)
  

Remove as much air as possible from the bag and tie tightly closed to prevent leaks. Remember to slosh the bird back and forth a few times to let any air trapped inside escape. If needed pack paper towels around the bag / inside the container to make sure that the bird is submerged.
Cover the container and place in the refrigerator or in another area that will be between 33 and 40 degrees F for the 12 to 16 hours of soaking time (typically overnight).

Tomorrow ... Basting the Bird!

......Kermit the Frog

www.flickr.com TSayles' Snoqualmie Flood at Night photoset

Yes Dad, those are typical La Nina year phenomenon.  However if you dig a little into the subject, one of the sources quoted in your e-mail, the International Arctic Research Center, is actually featuring a link on their home page to NOAA's Arctic Report Card which is reporting: "5° C temperature increases were recorded in autumn", "Near-record minimum summer sea ice extent ", "Fisheries and marine mammals impacted by loss of sea ice", "Observed increase in temperature of surface and deep ocean layers", "Greenland, Records set in both the duration and extent of summer surface melt", "Permafrost temperatures tend to increase, while snow extent tends to decrease".  [Gotta love the power of Google's page rank.]

The commentary you often redistribute about climatology (and a few other subjects) tends to cherry pick facts to support a particular political point of view.  You really need to spend more time understanding the original sources and science rather then relying on ratings driven conservative talk show and newsletter punditry.  This is tragic misuse of science for political propaganda and personal gain.

I have a particular god given gift for taking many diverse facts in a wide range of subjects and forming a very consistent and coherent overall understanding of the "big picture".  The real scientific debate, that did last a decade or more, is over and the conclusions are clear. So I can assure you that anthropogenic CO2 emissions are in fact effecting the global climate and ecosystems.  Any claims to the contrary, without compelling and overwhelming new evidence, are simply false.

Whether these changes will surpass pre-historic levels (they have already passed historic levels) will depend upon three factors: Do enough 'boomers die off soon enough that the western domesticities  can actually reverse their anthropogenic CO2 emissions in time; Does the vast majority of the developing world [China & India] base their economies on burning fossil fuels; and Is there a major dust producing event (large meteoroid impact or supervolcano eruption)?  These are the only relevant unknowns, two of which are really political questions, the other is a cosmic / geologic lottery.  None of them are scientific debate.





Note that the time axis on these two graphs face opposite directions and they are both linked to from the Wikimedia Commons.

This post is copyright by Tom Sayles and is released licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 License.
  Some rights reserved.

Charles Sayles wrote:

Cold Reality

By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY | Friday, October 17, 2008 4:20 PM PT

... <Editorial not quoted here to respect copyrights nor influance page rank.>