June 2009

There were 50 posts published in June 2009 (this is page 3 of 5).

UNC-TV has bumpy DTV transition

Before last Friday’s DTV transition, when all analog TV signals were switched off in favor of digital ones, We used to receive the digital signals from Chapel Hill’s WUNC-TV Channel 4.1 like a cannon, thanks to our attic’s mega-huge Yagi antenna being pointed right at the tower. All that changed during Friday’s transition, however. The stations changed their channels’ frequencies as part of the move and UNC-TV mysteriously disappeared from all of my TVs.

Bits and pieces of information filtered out of UNC-TV. This was posted on the unctv.org website on Sunday:
Continue reading →

Iran

I’m fascinated with what I’m seeing happening in Iran right now. It’s beautiful to see people standing up for democracy and doing it in a peaceful manner. I also find it notable that many of the people demonstrating in the streets were not alive during the Islamic Revolution of 1979. They do not remember the oppressive Shah or the Ayatollah Khomeini. More importantly, in spite of what their government tells them they’ve never had any real reason to hate America. Indeed, many just want their freedom and friendship like their neighbors in Europe.

Even so, I’m still wary because of what happened in China twenty years ago this month. Could it happen to Tehran?

And there’s the fact that Iran is a republic in name only, as a small, unelected, powerful few actually rule.

Great civic day!

It’s been an amazing civic day! I began my morning with a meeting at 8 with the police chief and his staff to discuss an increased police presence at a nearby intersection. I’m optimistic about the outcome and think it’s a big step forward.

After work I led another great East CAC meeting, moving items along so that it actually ended ahead of schedule. We heard from a committee I initiated to get help out with CAC matters and I’m extremely proud of the caliber of neighbors who have stepped up to serve. Things are actually getting organized and its making our business run much more smoothly.

After the “drudge work” was done, we held out first “summer social,” with chicken wings provided by our Vice chair’s restaurant. It was thrilling to look around at 30 neighbors happily chatting and getting to know each other as they enjoyed the snacks. It was incredibly fun, and I knew that the bonds and connections that get created will strengthen our community in ways I hardly imagine.

I came home and talked Kelly’s ear off about the whole event. I sat there for a while, staring at the ceiling with a stupid grin on my face, relishing how cool it feels to empower people and watching where it leads.

Being paid for your work is a perk?

Laura Leslie from WUNC’s Isaac Hunter’s Tavern brings up the same question I had about the N&O’s story about state employee comp time: when did it become a perk to be paid for your work?

Says Leslie:

… comp time is mostly given in lieu of overtime to employees who aren’t eligible for the latter. And one reason employees are earning so much of it is because staffing in many departments is thinner than it’s been for years. When there’s more work to do and fewer people to do it, employees end up working extra hours to complete what needs to be done. Last time I checked federal labor laws, a one-to-one trade for overtime worked is not a “perk.”

Seems like a big hole in the N&O’s argument and one that should’ve been considered before running the story.

Zydecopious

The family and I went to see Zydecopious play at Seaboard Music Friday evening. My parents and brother’s family joined us and a bunch of our neighbors for the free show at Seaboard Station next to Peace China. Hallie and her cousin Hadley got the dancing started and by the time the show wrapped up there were dozens of couples dancing to the zydeco music.

The kids had been looking forward to this show for a week because we’ve been talking it up. Travis has played his zydeco CDs non-stop for the whole week. We knew they would love it but I have to say I didn’t realize just how much they’d love it. I’ve never seen happier faces on Hallie or Travis then I did Friday night. Both got time on stage playing the rubboard and tambourine and both clearly relished being onstage.

Now we’ll have to see when we can see them play again. It was a fantastic way to spend a Friday!

Returning from another break

MT.Net was down for the last couple of days due to more strangeness seen on the server. I took it down and rebuilt everything.

Should you experience any quirkiness here (outside of the stuff I post already, ha ha), let me know!

Hasta la vista

Yesterday evening I noticed our leafy backyard looked noticeably less leafy. It seems our neighbors behind us decided to clear-cut their backyard, removing the lovely natural screen we enjoyed that made our backyard so cozy. It’s their right, of course, as most of the trees between us belong to them, but we sure miss ’em. And just last weekend we were proudly showing off our leafy backyard to my parents.

We’ve got a 20-foot buffer between our back fence and our property line, which we may now fortify with some good screening shrubbery or trees.

Update 17 June 2009: It turns out their cutting was far more modest. There’s still a good number of trees back there, so that’s good.

Did Air France 447’s tail separate from the plane?

The L.A. Times reports that the recovered tail of Air France Flight 447 indicates the plane broke up in midflight, eerily similar to the 2001 crash of an American Airlines Airbus leaving New York. In the earlier accident American Airlines Flight 587, an Airbus 300, had taken off into turbulence from a preceding 747 and the pilots apparently overcompensated with the rudder, causing the entire tail section to break off from the plane.

I’ve been thinking for a while now that these two crashes seem to be related. We’ll see for sure if/when the rest of the plane is found.

How to rewrite a hacked URL?

Hey Lazyweb,

When my WordPress site got compromised, The Google began indexing links that have a “?y%” in the middle of the URLs:

http://www.markturner.net/2007/04/page/4/?y%/you-are-what-you-grow/

This turns the second half of the URL into a query string, which complicates fixing it a bit. I’ve tried a few RewriteCond rules but haven’t figured out this voodoo well enough yet:

RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} y\%/(.*) [NC]
RewriteRule (.*) $1 [R=302,L]

Anyone have any pointers on how to turn the above URL into this?

http://www.markturner.net/2007/04/page/4/you-are-what-you-grow/

P.S. WordPress 2.8 is now out. Time to upgrade!