What first world problem did you have today?

[John Connor]

Get payed Friday so I have to wait till then to add an Amcrest camera to the house. And I would like it up by the Fourth because the park they shot the fireworks off is down the street and there are TONS of people that walk down the street out & about and drunk, etc.

 

[CZroe]

At 9:20AM I was showing my friend the Atari 800 and Atari 5200. I started talking about how the 5200 was just a consolized version of the 800 except for the advanced controllers when I was suddenly interrupted by this...



I was about a mile away and yet it felt like my furnace exploded. Only knew it was elsewhere when I saw all the neighbors looking around too.

It's an aluminum plant. They say that rainwater got into the aluminum castings [with molten aluminum].

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Daaaaamn.

 

[IronWing]

Had totally useless all day training scheduled today. My manager sent a cancellation notice early this morning. I was elated, joyful, content in a small way. Then he sent an email apologizing for the inadvertent cancellation and that the training will be held as scheduled. I don't abuse drugs but the prospect of sitting through hours of nonsense has me reconsidering my lifestyle choices.

 

[Red Squirrel]

There was way too much aggregate in the concrete mix I used and it was hard to make my cement pad for my new A/C unit smooth and nice. Turned out kind of ugly.



Bought some bonding agent and non-aggregrate concrete so I'll put a parging coat on it later. This month's work schedule kinda sucks and I don't have much time off so this has been a long project trying to get a bit done at a time.

 

[Imp]

^You sure you didn't just let it cure improperly?

Concrete gets messed up on the surface when there's too much/little water on the surface, it gets too hot/cold.

Bla bla bla, not a professional.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Nay while it was wet it was just really hard to get it flat because of all the rocks. I probably used the wrong type of mix, I think this mix is more meant for posts and stuff. But could be I did something wrong. Not an expert either.

I put a parge coat on just now but ran out, and of course the bucket I got was the last one at HD.

I hate doing projects like this when I'm working, it's just too rushed. But I don't really have much days off this schedule so did not have a choice.

I think at the end it will be half decent though, just not as nice as I was hoping to do it. When you see a new sidewalk or concrete steps and it's all smooth, that's what I was trying to go for. I almost regret this and should have just went with the basic patio stone they normally put down, and call it a day.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Also, fuck mosquitoes up the ass.

I hope dead mosquitoes don't compromise the curing of concrete because it's like the hoover dam in there.

 

[Imp]

I hate doing projects like this when I'm working, it's just too rushed. But I don't really have much days off this schedule so did not have a choice.

Money can be exchange for goods and services().

Services like putting concrete down.

Honestly, I'd have gone with a patio stone too.

 

[Red Squirrel]

I tend to like to DIY so I can get the sense of accomplishment, but this project, not so much.

There are certain things I leave to pros though. Like I want to put interlocking stone in that general area, and that I will hire out for sure. It's not as easy as it looks. You need to dig down at least 4 feet, then pack down various layers of gravel and stuff, then the whole time make sure it's level. Easier to let a guy with an excavator do it.

 

[lxskllr]

That pad is awfully close to ground level. Perhaps you could float some grout on top, and use pavers for a more finished appearance.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Yeah, problem is time, pavers would be a bit more involved and I don't have enough time off this schedule. Kinda my fault for not planing this ahead of time, the A/C was kind a spur of the moment thing. So the parging will have to do. I mostly wanted it level with the grass, it's a bit higher (looks lower in the pic than what it actually is). One thing I did get right is the slope, it slopes away from the house, so snow melt is not going to cause water to pool.

I just hope it does not shift around too much, the whole idea was that it's more heavy. The patio stones tend to shift around a lot as they just get laid on top of the lawn. You see people's AC units all crooked and stuff, just looks botchy.

 

[Red Squirrel]

As the parging layer is curing it's not looking that bad now. If I can manage to find the time I may just get more mix and do another layer and think I'll be good to go.

 

[Imp]

^So, are you replacing an A/C unit or did you never have one?

And I'm hearing shit about a postage strike this weekend? My Amazon package just shipped tonight. It better come because I can't plug in my new speakers without the RCA to 3.5mm cable I ordered.

 

[Kaido]

1. Pitch an A/V migration for a client yesterday from their existing system to Symantec Endpoint for tens of thousands of dollars in licensing costs. Successful demo, training, yada yada yada.

2. https://www.engadget.com/2016/06/29/google-symantec-antivirus-flaws-are-as-bad-as-it-gets/

 

[Anubis]

1. Pitch an A/V migration for a client yesterday from their existing system to Symantec Endpoint for tens of thousands of dollars in licensing costs. Successful demo, training, yada yada yada.

2. https://www.engadget.com/2016/06/29/google-symantec-antivirus-flaws-are-as-bad-as-it-gets/

we use endpoint

i suspect 30 forced restarts tomorrow because of this

 

[Red Squirrel]

^So, are you replacing an A/C unit or did you never have one?

And I'm hearing shit about a postage strike this weekend? My Amazon package just shipped tonight. It better come because I can't plug in my new speakers without the RCA to 3.5mm cable I ordered.

Getting a new one, never had central before. Have a portable now. Hence the slab for it to go on.

It's actually turning out to be not bad now, I think another coat of parging and I should be good to go. It really seems to have bonded well too. I basically put the adhesive on, let it dry a bit, then made a slurry with more adhesive and parged it on. I hope HD gets more stock of that concrete I used as I want to use the same stuff if I put another coat. I could almost get away without it. At this point it just looks like any old cement slab, not fancy, but not super ugly either.

 

[Red Squirrel]

we use endpoint

i suspect 30 forced restarts tomorrow because of this

Ugh I hate forced restarts at work. We have like 40 programs open and it's a pain getting into all of them.

Our work's desktop support basically got taken over by a larger IT group (company is part of a bigger company) and they do whatever the hell they want and nobody has a say, not even high tier managers. Even the senior server guy has no say in it, and it pisses him off too.

I've been experimenting with disabling various services to see if it stops it. Once you get the dialog it's game over, and it's hard to tell when it will actually come as it's super random. You can go a week without it, or get it 3 times in the same night. It seems disabling windows update stops it, but I don't even know if this process is part of WU. It's not the standard WU dialog you'd get at home. It's this one:



Oh, and bringing the clock back 1 day and stopping the windows time service works too, temporarily. You can survive a night shift like that, but if you try to go any further back and leave it too long, all hell breaks loose when you get back the next day due to domain membership/time sync issues. But it can at least get you through 1 shift.

Was in the middle of swacting radios once with a tech, and get that dreaded dialog. Before doing the time trick, you only have 20 minutes. This could have potentially put Quebec's north in isolation for a good 30 minutes if I had not known about the clock trick. People could literally die, if they can't get 911 service, for example.

 

[Anubis]

yea thats more serious then when i do huge data pulls from the Pi server that take hours

 

[Kaido]

I've been experimenting with disabling various services to see if it stops it.

One of the blessing/curse features in Norton v12 Manager is that it has an awesome forced-shutdown mode. It bypasses everrrrrrrrything. I don't know what kind of magic voodoo they use to do it, but I can remote-restart everything no matter what, which is really nice. At most places, I have the local IT people create a schedule & regular reminder emails to log off over the weekends to allow updates, reboots, and scans to happen to the local machines. Nobody ever listens tho

 

[Kaido]

Getting a new one, never had central before. Have a portable now. Hence the slab for it to go on.

It's actually turning out to be not bad now, I think another coat of parging and I should be good to go. It really seems to have bonded well too. I basically put the adhesive on, let it dry a bit, then made a slurry with more adhesive and parged it on. I hope HD gets more stock of that concrete I used as I want to use the same stuff if I put another coat. I could almost get away without it. At this point it just looks like any old cement slab, not fancy, but not super ugly either.

I just replaced my central air (RIP mad money ). The quotes I got were CRAZY, as high as $2k in variation for the hardware & installation labor.

#firstworldproblem is that I replaced the A/C & had the guy peek into the furnace...turns out something had been leaking on the coils & was rotting it away, gotta replace that now too Upshot is my unit is 50% efficient & the new ones come in 80 to 90% efficiency (gotta run a new tube out for the 90% unit tho). Oh, and the humidifier for the furnace was 110% shot. There's another five hundred bucks on top of the furnace. Ouch. And all of the installers I've talked to either want cash up front or half now, half after - no payment plans available. My buddy at work did their HVAC system in payments along with their gas bill, so it just added a hundred bucks or so every month for the next few years. Jealous!

 

[Red Squirrel]

One of the blessing/curse features in Norton v12 Manager is that it has an awesome forced-shutdown mode. It bypasses everrrrrrrrything. I don't know what kind of magic voodoo they use to do it, but I can remote-restart everything no matter what, which is really nice. At most places, I have the local IT people create a schedule & regular reminder emails to log off over the weekends to allow updates, reboots, and scans to happen to the local machines. Nobody ever listens tho

Yeah this thing is similar. Like it does not use the shutdown command or anything, it seems to be it's own thing, it's weird because you'd think there would be some kind of process you can terminate, but I have yet to figure out what to do once the dialog does show up.

 

[Red Squirrel]

I just replaced my central air (RIP mad money ). The quotes I got were CRAZY, as high as $2k in variation for the hardware & installation labor.

#firstworldproblem is that I replaced the A/C & had the guy peek into the furnace...turns out something had been leaking on the coils & was rotting it away, gotta replace that now too Upshot is my unit is 50% efficient & the new ones come in 80 to 90% efficiency (gotta run a new tube out for the 90% unit tho). Oh, and the humidifier for the furnace was 110% shot. There's another five hundred bucks on top of the furnace. Ouch. And all of the installers I've talked to either want cash up front or half now, half after - no payment plans available. My buddy at work did their HVAC system in payments along with their gas bill, so it just added a hundred bucks or so every month for the next few years. Jealous!

My quote was like 4k. Well 3.5 but add HST and it is about 4k.

Thankfully I got a bit of extra money coming in soon so it will help, and do have some savings.

No shed this year though. I was planing on building one but that's going to go to next year.

 

[Svnla]

I did not win the Mega Millions so now I have to go to the stores to get a few tickets. I am too sexy for that kind of task <typical ATOTer mode is on>.

 

[IronWing]

Had totally useless all day training scheduled today. My manager sent a cancellation notice early this morning. I was elated, joyful, content in a small way. Then he sent an email apologizing for the inadvertent cancellation and that the training will be held as scheduled. I don't abuse drugs but the prospect of sitting through hours of nonsense has me reconsidering my lifestyle choices.

The useless training included the requisite bullshit personality test. I chose not to complete the test. The instructor got pissy, demanding to know why. I told her I thought that the test had nothing to do with the job for which I was hired and was inappropriate for the workplace. My supervisor (who did not appreciate that employees were being pulled away from actual work to take the class) was sitting next to me and had no issues with my response.