Yesterday I woke up as usual and went into my office to check up on things with work before driving into the Reno office. I opened the lid to my MacBook Pro 17" and got nothing. Waited for awhile thinking that it was just sleep mode being really lazy.... nothing. So I did all the common things like pressing keys, clicking mouse, grumbling.

Thinking that my screensaver or sleep mode locked up again, I closed the MacBook so it would sleep again to re-try and wake it. This sometimes work. I waited for it to sleep, but it would not sleep. At this point I'm pretty sure it's locked up. So I power cycle it.

I hear the boot chimes, but no screen. I can hear the hard drive working away like it's booting normal, but no screen. I'm thinking that something bad just happened. I grab the cable to my 2nd screen and plug it in. No screen. Arg!

So I mess with it another half hour doing things like clearing NVRAM/PRAM and stuff. Popped the battery out and put it back in.... Nothing working.

Welp, off to the Apple store with it. DOH!

Got there and gave my Mac to the guy for repair. It's most likely the logic board, and they didn't have any more in stock (so they say). So they need to keep it for a few days. They said maybe Saturday or Monday.

As I'm walking away I'm thinking.... I should just buy a new Mac 13". I've been wanting a smaller Mac, and they have came down a lot in price. $1200 for the 13" MacBook Pro. I've been drooling over it for a while now. I talked to Jane about buying a new one for work so I don't have to miss out for the weekend. Dave is out on vacation so I'm the only one that can watch the servers.

I also justified it by doing some Craig's List and eBay searches to see what the 17" is selling for. I figured that I can sell my 17" for $1500 and that would make my new one free/cheap.

I went back in and talked to the Apple guy about getting the UNR discount via Jane. That was the deal maker. Getting a few hundred off.

Well, ended up getting the 13" MacBook Pro + one upgrade up to the better hard drive, RAM, and CPU. $1500, DOH! Just a bit more then I wanted to spend, but hey, I was caught up in the moment. Got the Apple Care, soft case, and plunked down my credit card.

So, I guess after selling my 17" I'll only be out a few hundred dollars.

PS, Jane has already sold my 17" to Randy, so I'm all set. Sweet!

The Rubicon was awesome. I love wheeling there. Had a ton of fun. Can't wait to go back again. Next month.

The WZ ran great all the way through and back again. I'm pretty stoked.

Forth of July weekend, I made it to the Fordyce Jeep Trail and didn't break down! WOW!

We didn't do a whole lot of wheeling, but we did make it to the first river crossing. I played around on Driveline Hill a bunch. Took all the lines up. the WZ worked great! Perfect!

I still have a few issues. My steering is acting up again. The defective ram just needs to be replaced. $300. I still have a small leak where my link smashed my oil filter. Most likely I'll need a new oil cooler or something. I wonder if I really need that oil cooler. I could just take it off.

Other then that, I'm ready for the next trip.

Flexing out on the rock next to Flex Rock

I installed a new theme for my blog. We are getting ready to do some Wordpress plugins and stuff at work, and my old theme didn't use all the Wordpress goodies. So here it is.

So for my birthday I got an iPhone. I just have to say, this is really a game changer. I just can't believe what I've been missing for the last few years. I don't think I've put it down since I purchased it.

It can pretty much do anything that a computer can do. I have 50 apps already installed for everything from my Wordpress blog to SSH.

AIM (with new push), Tweetie, Facebook, NetNewsWire, Skype, Weatherbug, Have2Eat, PhoneFlix, Linkedin, PayPal, Mint, Wordpress, Google Mobile, TED, Slicehost, Net Utility, FirePin, Speed Test, and TouchTerm SSH.

The GPS is awesome on the iPhone. It would be cool if I could see MPH with it, but I don't know if the iPhone is that detailed.

http://www.ubnt.com

Perfect! I love it. PPPoE, Router, DHCP, Shaping, Firewall, everything that I need on my roof for internet access. Wish they were around back in the day when I ran my WISP. These are the perfect radios.

I've got two things to tell ya tonight.

1st, we are buying a 2008 Mini Cooper. Should have it by Friday.
2nd, I found my oil leak in my buggy and I should have it running by the weekend.

Jane has been wanting to get a new car for like four years now. We have been trying to save up and get ahead before buying one. Well, last month the timing belt broke on the Jetta and bent the valves. I'm working on fixing it, but Jane is just tired of the Jetta. So she has been looking for a Mini Cooper for a few weeks now. We found a pretty good deal on one in CA. So we got the financing and we are going for it. This car is fully loaded with everything that there is. It's actually pretty sweet.

My buggy has been disappointing for like a year now. The engine just never ran right and had all kinds of issues. The last issue is the oil leaking out the back. I kept thinking it was the rear main seal, but really what it is, is the missing bolt from the flywheel. The bolt holes don't match up to and so one is left open. Well I found out on Saturday that it needs all the bolt holes filled to keep the oil in. The guy that built the engine I guess didn't know about that. Lame. So looks like I'll have it fixed up this week (If I can find the bolts). Can't wait to wheel the Rubicon/Fordyce and everything else in between. Woo hoo!

So I've been working in the car industry for just over 10 years. I've done hundreds of web sites for car dealers. I've always worked overtime to make sure their inventory and web sites are working correctly. I've spent extra time to make sure their needs are met.

Well, I've been looking for a good deal on a Mini Cooper. So far none of the dealers I've helped over the years have anything for me. They don't even seem interested in giving me a good deal.

I have single handedly saved car dealers millions of dollars over the time I've been working with dealers. You would think that I could get hooked up.

Well... I'll wait one more week then I'm going to pay full price for one. Time to start charging more and working less (to pay for a new car).

Yep, I've been out wheeling.

I've been so busy, but nothing new there.  Story of my life.

Jane had a great gallery show this week.  She almost sold out.  You can check it out on her Facebook page.  But from what I hear, everyone that seen it liked it.

I've been busy working on Ruby code.  Clustering servers, caching pages, and optimizing queries.  I think thinks are going really well.  Sounds like we have another batch of accounts coming on soon too.

My crawler is still in the works.  I can't believe it's been so long since I started.  I'm working out the kinks in the engine right now.  I hope to be putting it back in this weekend so I can do some wheeling!  Pretty much the only thing wrong is leaky leaky.  Oil, water, fuel!  Crazy.  I guess it just sat around for too long.

Anyway, it's bed time.