archive | belgo.org | Christopher Shepherd

Little Vietnam Bounty

Sun, 26 Nov 2006 17:31:15 -0500

I dropped off the Netflix and Gamefly at the post office and took a turn towards Tien Hung. Noodles, Pocky, panang curry, and soy milk. Don't front, I know you're jealous.

Black Friday at Millenia

Fri, 24 Nov 2006 15:51:10 -0500

When I found out the Apple Store was pushing the Wireless Mighty Mouse for $11 off (and no shipping when you come in and pick it up, natch), I couldn't resist. Especially given that my 2-year-old Wireless (non-Mighty) Mouse is showing its age. I'm glad I did it. I can right-click and scroll now. Getting into the mall wasn't half as tough as getting back out, but I managed.

Wii Night (Saturday, November 18)

Thu, 23 Nov 2006 20:41:10 -0500

I've almost made it. Not giddy though, just tired of waiting.

wii3

Thu, 23 Nov 2006 20:37:35 -0500

Later, I think it was around 10 or 10:30pm, they finally gave out tickets. These tickets gave us the right to wait awhile longer and attempt to purchase a Wii. They only gave out about 31 tickets. About 15-20 other brave souls waited at the back of the line without tickets, hoping one of our cards would decline. None did. Poor guys!

That's Dan proudly showing off his #29 and arousing tongue.

wii2

Thu, 23 Nov 2006 20:37:05 -0500

After I drank the champagne, I had to give some of it back to Wal-Mart. This wisdom was on the bathroom wall.

November

Sat, 04 Nov 2006 10:32:49 -0500

I'm sorta liking these wordy self-centered updates taking place monthly.

To begin with, my fitness program is still going great. It is a very simple formula: EFX for 30 minutes everyday (or in practice, most days), weight lifting every other day (just a few sets of 12 lifts). The diet is reasonable and not very indulgent (still a lot of salad, still no soda, but I still eat dessert), with an emphasis on protein on the days I don't lift. This is trimming fat and building muscle mass, but at a relatively slow pace that would be far exceeded by some of the more complex systems I've read about, but ain't gonna try. Frankly I'm happy with this pace. I have lines I never knew I had, and I bench 200, which is at least a good bit more than I weigh now, and I stay over 120 paces/minute on the EFX. So yeah, there's definitely results and people are starting to notice, but I'd say I'm only maybe halfway to my goal. The bottom line is that, between this regimen and quitting smoking, I believe my overall health, if somehow quantified, has at least doubled. The weight loss is purely secondary by comparison.

I've also managed to pay off the enormous debt incurred for dentistry, orthodontistry, and taxes, from 2005 and 2006. This crushing burden, over $30K worth at its worst, downgraded my credit scores and threatened my financial future. Now it is all over, because I worked hard, and paid it off. I can't put in words how terrible it is to wake up with such a thing over your head every day, or how joyful it is to be rid of it. The only remaining decision to make is, exactly how rude to be when drafting my letters to close the various lines of credit. I regret that I will be unable to be neutral on this matter, and FIA Card Services in particular, who lost faith in me and attempted to jack my interest rates up, will most likely be implicated in a serious family matter with their mothers.

And how bout them politics anyway? I think if you look back to 2004, you'll find me saying something along the lines of the Administration finally having enough rope to hang themselves. Since then, the Iraq situation has worsened tremendously, and the Administration has been abandoned, first by Evangelicals, then by Republicans, and finally by Neoconservatives, all of whom found a convenient scapegoat in the lame-duck president. Unfortunately for the GOP, the American public's memory isn't quite as short as they'd like to think, and not only is their legislative majority in question, but they're working overtime to draft legislation to protect themselves from prosecution for their nefarious and illegal deeds. Good luck guys, you're going to need it. I have given up publicly howling for the GOP's empire to end, in part because I realize they've screwed themselves, and so does the entire country. Unfortunately, we progressives and true conservatives have to try and do a better job at what Bush and his gang totally screwed up: The endgame. Once the GOP and their idiot-in-chief are removed from power, and carpetbagger Democrats show up to fill the vacuum, we can only hope to keep them on a tight enough leash to be fiscally responsible and keep their hands off of our firearms. At least that's easier than winning the current situation in Iraq.

So, I'm in great shape, don't owe anyone, and politics are going my way. But I'm not even remotely finished with everything I have to do. If anything, all I've done is lay the groundwork. What about Mumbai? Dubai? Berlin? Am I ever going to experience the life-changing thrill of world travel? What about my new home with countryside acreage? Should I invest in some of my friends' small companies? Maybe finish learning to fly small airplanes? Cut back on work and finally get a college degree like most smart people? At least some of these challenges are likely to be answered soon. After all, even those incestuous folks at FIA will tell you, Christopher always keeps a promise, regardless of your own faith. You can take it to the bank.

-Chris

Grace's RAZR V3m

Tue, 31 Oct 2006 15:00:33 -0500

Buzzzzz

Sun, 29 Oct 2006 16:30:20 -0500

#3 clippers everywhere. Stylist insisted on some additional trimming to keep me from looking like a total puff ball. I must remind the reader that I still work at home, and no work or bets put me up to this. So here it is, folks, cshepherd modeling The Disney Look. Remember, my Establishment Membership Card arrives in June.

October

Tue, 10 Oct 2006 09:56:04 -0400

The News:

This is October! Guavaween looms on the horizon, and although I've missed the past two, there are indications that I may be attending this one. Sadly I also missed the Diwali celebrations on this past weekend. The S2000 has been in the shop 4 weeks as of today and should be out any day between today and Friday (for the curious, it is getting a new 5/6 synchro sleeve in the manual transmission, as well as new convertible top latches and a driver's side window regulator, at a cost roughly on par with a new central air conditioning system, ug). The EFX 544 arrived last Tuesday. I've faithfully done 30 minutes of EFX, plus a few sets of almost-free-weights on Beel's Soloflex up in the loft, every single morning, as the physical-fitness routine ramps up and begins to yield small results. Consumer debt has been reduced to levels not seen since mid-2005 before my dental adventures began (speaking of which, I'm already more than halfway through orthodontic treatment). Dancin days aren't exactly here again, but we're close enough to hear the music, thanks to the toughest year I can recall. I harp on it a lot, but only because it is so true: This year tested everything I am, and I learned so much from it that I know things are going to be just fine from now on.

The Gadget:

I didn't want to write yet another self-congratulatory entry without something redeeming, so here it is: I paid a Craigslister $50 for an unlocked (originally from Broadvoice) UTStarcom F1000 Wi-Fi VOIP telephone. It it an amazing little device. It is the size of an average cell phone, and works flawlessly for making and receiving VOIP calls (me, I have an Asterisk machine in Virginia Equinix, that is provisioned via IAX2 from terravon.com, giving me a toll-free direct-dial number as well as 1.6 cents per minute to the US48, with per-second billing accuracy. What this all means is that it's dirt cheap and $20 will last you a couple months, even if you're relatively popular). Its OS is built on VxWorks, it has an HTTP administration interface, and you can telnet into it (although the much-publicized defaults from a few firmware revs ago, do not work).

Also a hint to people wishing to hack the F1000: It has an ARM processor, and the .bin.z firmware updates can be uncompressed with the standard zlib inflate() call, google for zpipe.c if you're too lazy to write an inflate() program yourself. The resulting file has all sorts of interesting things in it.

Oh yes, there will be more news soon.

-Chris

Wildflowers

Sat, 30 Sep 2006 14:45:57 -0400

September Update

Sat, 09 Sep 2006 11:49:27 -0400

I have to confess, the better my content gets, the less I like these personally-oriented updates. But it does bear noting that this remains, my damn blog, and these little things are going to keep happening, although hopefully sandwiched between increasing amounts of more-interesting stuff. Remember, these rants used to be the only thing I published (ugh, there's Livejournal for that! except I don't post enough goth lyrics to have a Livejournal) ...

Anyhow, the first thing I want to talk about is personal fitness. Some time ago (as of this writing it was many weeks ago, how time passes), I stopped drinking soda (again! some of you may know that I did not drink soda from about 2000 to 2003), began eating salad almost exclusively, and started daily workouts as well as herbal energy supplements (the dietary fallacy of which I am aware, but for now I think they're okay). The results, as one would expect with so sudden and radical a change, were immediate. I'm already 10 pounds lighter, and feeling a lot more energetic, and pulling off some of my life's greatest work during the week.

But it isn't like me to find a point and get comfortable with it ("Complacency is Failure!"), so I looked for ways to press forward. Luckily, there are some. The loft is busy being transformed into a home gym, complete with crowning glory, Precor EFX 544 elliptical cross-training machine being shipped all the way from a remanufacturer in Oklahoma. Also planned are punching bags and mats. Meanwhile yesterday, I took Grace to Target, and we grabbed two gloves and a ball, and played a spirited game of catch that the staff did not seem to take any notice of. We bought the gloves and ball, and since then, we've been absolutely unable to stop playing catch. Yesterday I even stopped working several times, to go out and play more catch. What is it about that simple damn game that's so much fun?

Anyway, my personal fitness regime is in full swing and will only intensify in the coming weeks. Its focus remains primarily cardio fitness, although I'm not going to rule out weight training just yet, but it's really too early to consider that. I have to be honest, I'm excited at the prospect of turning 30 in June of next year with straight teeth and a healthy body. Frankly it isn't going to take until June though. The most dramatic results will happen by Christmas. This is such a quick and easy thing if you just keep working at it.

I'm still doing other things you might expect from me, collecting Gamecube and DS games, learning to double-clutch and heel-toe-downshift the S2000, greatly broadening my musical horizons thanks to Usenet and Unison, seeing all the new movies on Netflix and In-Demand, and trying to figure out where I'm going to parasail next. This website, you may have noticed, benefitted greatly from a recent redesign and strategic re-assessment, the sort of re-assessment I'm struggling to apply to nearly everything these days.

I just don't know what to think of 2006. Is it the inbetween-year that I spent repaying debt from massive dentistry, the IRS, 3 cars, a new air conditioner, and other pitfalls? Not really, that part's almost finished. Is it the year my career made its greatest strides ever? I guess, it's easy to see it that way too. I want to see it as the year I tried harder, not out of greed or machismo, but simply out of curiosity.

-Chris

STS-115: Atlantis Takes Off

Sat, 09 Sep 2006 11:27:52 -0400

Transition

Fri, 01 Sep 2006 18:05:25 -0400

For years now, belgo.org and my other personal domains have been hosted on colocated computers, which I personally administered to provide DNS, mail, and HTTP service. That time is now at an end.

Free, fast, geographically-distributed DNS is available through the likes of pmsdns and everydns, and that's something I'm unwilling to match with personal resources, so I'm using that. Furthermore, the burden of being a system administrator in my spare time for the sake of mail and HTTP, is simply too much to bear when I work as much as I do. For a very small price, netwisp, operated by a longtime acquaintance of mine, offers hundreds of megabytes of storage (and large files can go on Amazon S3 if I need more space and bandwidth). My cost goes down from most of $1000 a year, to under $100 a year, and the service level actually increases, while I get to spend more time concentrating on next Best Thing. Everyone wins. In fact, you wouldn't even notice this change if I didn't blab about it.

Another result of this is that I'm finally decomissioning linux-florida.com. For three years now, I've encouraged people to email me at ieee.org. Soon, linux-florida.com email will be shut off, again, to reduce the layers of complexity that I have to deal with. My current contact address will always be published on the 'about chris' page.

-Chris

Key Largo 2006, Part Three: Parasailing Sky-Cam

Thu, 31 Aug 2006 22:43:09 -0400

Backup and Restore to Amazon S3, with PHP

Thu, 31 Aug 2006 11:59:53 -0400

Hello, and I hope this is the bombshell for you, that it is for me.

After learning about Amazon's S3 Service, which allows you to store data for 15 cents per gigabyte per month (compare this with the cost of a loaded 3TB ReadyNAS NV, which I was considering buying, and it certainly competes), or even transfer and/or serve it for about $63/gigabit/month, my mind was literally swimming with possibilities. I was ready to write the Next Killer App, to allow one of my clients to backup and restore their data with S3, when I noticed a real scarcity of PHP S3 support.

Geoff Gaudreault's PHP S3 class seems to be the most popular starting point for communicating with S3 using their REST API, so I started there, and created PHP classes to backup and restore data, that I'm going to share with you.

The Classes

S3_Backup will recursively backup an entire directory tree to an S3 bucket, while saving permissions, ownership, and modification times in the S3 metadata fields.

S3_Restore will restore a backup made with S3_Backup.

S3_Prune will recursively prune data stored in an S3 bucket.

Note that although S3_Backup supports them, S3_Restore does not support block/char special devices, FIFOs, or sockets, and that is because PHP4 lacks a mknod() as far as I can see, although there's no reason you can't shell_exec a commandline 'mknod' if you're really hankering for it. I just didn't immediately see a portable way to do it.

I've used these classes to backup and restore a 15GB dataset (with directories and symlinks) perfectly. However, I provide them as-is with no implied warranty. They are free to use, although I'd appreciate attribution.

-Chris

Key Largo 2006, Part Two: Parasailing Ground-Cam

Mon, 28 Aug 2006 23:58:58 -0400

And we're out! Here's our empty parking spot.

Key Largo 2006, Part One: Views

Mon, 28 Aug 2006 23:18:31 -0400

A New Use for Sandvox

Fri, 11 Aug 2006 10:33:38 -0400

Yesterday while looking over a rather spartan interface defined by BR's and tables, I saw an opportunity to fire up Sandvox and quickly make some (Smarty/Flexy) templates to replace what was there. For me, this is a new high point in interface design, because when you don't hire a graphics guy, you're going to get BR's and tables from me. But yeah, it doesn't even take you half an hour to reskin a templated site with a Sandvox design.

-Chris

DS Lite Stuff

Thu, 10 Aug 2006 21:14:46 -0400

It was a Nintendo DS Lite, she ended up getting for her birthday. She got New Super Mario Bros and a Nintendogs cartridge with it. Then some accessories arrived for it. Shown here is a Max Media Dock (and two NoPass devices, the Max Media Player and Max Media Launcher, which aren't exactly the same thing, but are amazingly similar), and an M3 Perfect CF with a 2GB CF card thrown into it.

These ended up being largely unnecessary, as you see the NoPass devices were totally unnecessary after flashing the firmware to FlashMe, and the Max Media Dock isn't the best thing to use if you've got an M3 around. So in the end, only the M3 ends up getting used.

The chair it's sitting in, recently arrived from Office Depot, where it is known as the Talega Leather Executive Chair. It is relatively cheap, stylish, and amazingly comforting for your rump.

Yeah, I'm playing with more features in Sandvox as it gets better. Hope it's catchy enough for you!

-Chris

Another July Update

Tue, 25 Jul 2006 22:37:10 -0400

Hello, I haven't blogged in awhile and this update will help test the supposedly-fixed Publish functionality of Sandvox (prior to this I'd been using rsync... I'd say that the one-click publishing should help me to blog more, but I don't want to make promises. Not here).

Re-conditioned the projector (Proxima DP6850), installed a new LAMP-017 bulb in it, put it back in place. Hopefully it will run for another 2 years, forestalling any decisions about what the next display technology should be for the bedroom. It looks really beautiful now, especially when playing XBox games on 78 inches of color.

The amateur radio station was rebuilt yet again, this time relocated to the same corner as the work Mini, where signals from Cuba, Switzerland, and Russia provide ample distraction for unwilling work days (yeah, last year's 40-meter wire dipole is still strung around the loft roof line, and the most excellent SGC antenna tuner snapped right into action after many months of disuse). And, okay, I missed listening to the ARES guys during the summer thunderstorms. I didn't spend a lot of time trying Mac OS X ham radio software, and I didn't even want to try MixW2 under Win XP via Parallels, so I threw my old Gateway laptop under the radio shelf, and used Synergy2 to make it share the Mini's keyboard and mouse. So far, it's solid.

Did a lot of hard work, but as was the case with 2005, some travel is rearing its head in this latter half of the year, including Hollywood (,Florida, again), Key Largo, and hopefully some other destinations. I sure wouldn't mind Niagara Falls again.

Tomorrow is Grace's birthday, and in just 90 minutes she will enjoy her first gift. I get the feeling she won't complain.

-Chris

PSP Days Are Here Again

Sun, 02 Jul 2006 04:07:12 -0400

Close as I am to executing another mod project with the Nintendo DS (I'm thinking DS Lite, Max Media Loader, etc), that's relatively old hat, compared to what just happened with the Sony PSP.

Our PSP here has been running the dreaded 2.5 Firmware ever since the day we got it, most of a year ago. Fortunately, we do own GTA Liberty City, and have been able to run some homebrew/emulators thanks to Fanjita's eLoader. Very recently, the opportunity has come about to downgrade 2.5 to the venerable 1.50, at some small risk of bricking the PSP. I figured this risk was worthwhile, considering the PSP hadn't been turned on in over a week, and in the event of a brick, I'd just get an Undiluted Platinum installed anyway.

Anyhow, the downgrader ran perfectly and our PSP is running Firmware 1.50 now! The world of emulators and homebrew is wide open, and I've been at it for about 4 hours so far tonight. Explored using MPH Game Loader to run Namco Museum Battle Collection and GTA Liberty City, which require higher firmware revs to run (but work just fine with MPH thank you very much). Explored the NO-KXPloit Patcher, a valuable hunk of stuff that lets 1.50 firmware run eboots out of just one directory without need for a second one. Again, it is a whole new world and I'm struggling to find time to explore it fully before returning to work on Monday.

One exciting prospect is the DAX ZISO loader, which apparently loads many (most?) PSP games over a USB cable connected to a Windows host, without the need for a fancy 2GB (or 4GB!) Memory Stick. I look forward to simpler configurations (ie using thumbdrives and iPods in target disk mode, I've got a 40-gigger 4th generation ipod here doing a whole lot of nothing).

The bottom line is, for a whole lot of people, PSP days are here again. Unless of course you're running 2.7 or 2.71, but you probably aren't. And now people are promising full-speed N64 emulation on PSP soon also.

Will keep you updated on this project, as well as the new DS Lite project, as they unfold. As usual, big big plans. Thanks for letting me stay up late, Grace.

-Chris

Let The Sun Shine

Mon, 19 Jun 2006 09:05:32 -0400

"What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy?"

- Mahatma Gandhi

(As quoted in www.archive.org/details/AnUnfairWar, a great movie made with Sims 2)

As the page turns on a new edition of belgo.org, and as a new work week unfolds, I beg everyone to look within themselves to find new ways of ending our wretched war.

The time is nigh when the lovers of peace shall retake at least one house of our Congress. Please help us make it two. When I write my quarterly checks to the United States Treasury under threat of imprisonment, I no longer want to consider how many children are dismembered, how many brides are widowed, how many sons are orphaned, for each check written.

It makes no difference to me, or the dying, or the dead, what your opinion of the present federal Administration may be. The wounded have no spare breath to condemn George Bush, and I'm running out myself. The only sentiment that either of us can bear to speak these days, is to bring peace at any cost.

We have a real opportunity, and if you're not registered to vote, please become so now. I am so grateful that the eyes of this nation are opening to see the treachery that began this terrible action, and your disapproval of those in charge is a step in the right direction. But please channel your ire towards making peace. Only then can the world (and even Iraq) see the real America.

Let the sun shine.

-Chris

Doing That Stuff

Fri, 16 Jun 2006 23:47:48 -0400

So you probably figured it out, if you've been listening to the same line I've been spewing for much of the past year: I've been working. I work hard from the time I get up Monday morning, until the sun goes down on Friday evening. Then I take a short break because I do not want to die just yet, then Monday I'm back at it.

It has its positives. I can tell you I'm pulling in several times what I made a year ago. And for a few minutes it was funny to fantasize about telling doctors and lawyers to get real jobs. But the fact is, it's hard work being a contractor, and you're constantly running afoul of some deadline or other, and the only way to manage it all is to deliver like a superstar, every single day. It takes so much out of you. I consider ending the madness and taking a nice cushy corporate job with benefits and direct deposit and the privilege of sleeping half the day, and maybe someday I will. But for now, I don't see it happening, because with the job comes the knowledge that you're working so extremely well and learning so much. I've gained an even broader exposure to Linux and FreeBSD based solutions than I had before, if only because I've no idea if a customer's computer is running FreeBSD, Fedora Core, Red Hat Enterprise, or even Windows, until I login to it, and by that time it's too late to turn back. You become an expert in everything, or the wolves eat you alive, and for now that's right.

I'm building a PostgreSQL cluster with pgcluster, a MySQL 5.0 multimastering cluster (if only I had time to tell you about that one! I got intimate with digging through binlogs today with mysqlbinlog, as part of a rollback strategy to fail back to the existing MySQL 4.0 server in case the new cluster doesn't do so well when cut live), a loadbalanced web cluster (IPVS crashes on FreeBSD when I try it, pen doesn't support https, leaves 'pound' and 'balance' for web and non web based LB/HA stuff), several credit card processors, and probably a few things I've forgotten. Again, the pressure would snap some young grasshoppers like twigs, but if you manage to grow from the experience, the reward extends well beyond the monetary, which itself is substantial.

That said, it appears I have found some small measure of time to fritter away on useless things!

First, I got a low-wattage soldering iron, some flux, and the Radio Shack "Helping Hands" magnifying glass and clips to hold wires in place, and practiced soldering 24-gauge wires onto old PCI cards. Once I was satisfied with that, I ordered a Qoob Pro chip for Grace's Gamecube.

The Qoob Pro is a very easy console mod job, consisting of six wires to solder, plus a case swap (if you want to use fullsized DVD-R's as your media, and I sure did). It went relatively quickly, although it took me several hours to really get to know the Gamecube world (quick rundown: Flash with the latest Qoob Pro BIOS. Use GCOM to backup discs. Use only TDK DVD-R's. In OSX, use Toast 7 to burn .iso's, select 2048 byte blocks, and go to town). If you also happen to find yourself loving Mac OS X and using a Qoob Pro-enhanced Gamecube, perhaps you may also enjoy Unison, the world's absolute best Usenet reader and binary downloader. I'm not gonna say why.

Not satisfied with that, I went out and got a slim PS2 and Guitar Hero and rocked out for awhile. Then I took the PS2 apart and read the install instructions for DMS4 Pro and realized I'd probably screw up the PS2 if I tried it. So I went instead for the cheap sensor covers and a set of Swap Magic discs, which work well with Sony brand DVD-R's, with the caveat that Swap Magic only works for single-layer DVD backups (which is still most of them).

Still not satisfied, I warmed up the soldering iron one last time, got a used XBox 1.0 (viva Mexico), dropped an Xecuter 3CE into it, and threw in a 300GB Seagate 7200rpm disk (X3 makes this so easy, it partitions and formats for you). This was another relatively easy install, albeit with a few more wires to solder than the Qoob. I flashed with the latest X3 BIOS, and ended up falling in love with XBox Media Center. XBMC is a true modern miracle for the XBox. Two tips: Use PxHDDLoader, and more importantly, holding the white button during bootup to break into X3 Config Live only works for me with an original XBox controller, not the third-party type S that I also have. If you're confounded by an inability to get back to X3 Config Live after setting the BIOS to boot right into the dashboard, maybe you should think about that.

And so went my great introduction into the current generation of video game consoles. I can tell you the PS2 is in last place in my book, despite Guitar Hero and Katamari Damacy. The XBox, with its couch-potato-supportive hard drive and XBox Media Center and emulators, should probably be #1. But the Gamecube, with its array of Mario and other first-party titles, and pretty happy clouds, still captures my heart enough to be a viable contender for that #1 spot.

We're running out of time here, but I want to devote a few more sentences to the new Apple Mac Mini, based on the Intel Core Duo processor. I was very lucky to come by one of these recently, and slid it right in place of the old G4 Mini (and its external DVD-DL burner! no need for that anymore, it's standard on the new Mini). If you're like I was, constantly pegging both the CPU and RAM on your G4 Mini, definately give the Intel a shot (but! buy it with 512M of Apple RAM, and get the 2GB of SODIMMs yourself on eBay for 180. You can buy a week's worth of groceries with what you'll save, especially if you can sell the two 256M SODIMMs that Apple supplies). And Parallels is an amazing product, I love cube-effect switching back and forth between Mac OS X and Windows XP (although I forget exactly why I needed XP again, drat). This thing really delivers on the CPU and RAM needs I had.

More updates soon, because there's a million small and large details I didn't cover here. Till then, I'm happy to be 29, and happy to have Grace for 10 months. Looking forward to selling my condo and buying a ranch. You stay classy, San Diego!

-Chris

Hello, Sandvox!

Fri, 16 Jun 2006 02:20:05 -0400

The astute observer may note a sudden shift from Movable Type to Sandvox, for the publication of belgo.org. This is because Sandvox's new fighting technique is unstoppable, and the publisher felt that we could more effectively capitalize on cross-strata synergies by leveraging... oh no, I've gone cross-eyed.

Stay tuned for my first real blog entries in months. Who knows where this could go? The latest entries will have everything.

The explosion will be of incredible magnitude.

It will be just one minute...

-Chris