[ Previous entry: "As many as six impossible things" ] [Main Index] [ Next entry: "Another golden bullet" ]

07/22/2003 Entry: "Widget Shooting Up, the AC guy, and Red Hat prep" Widget got shot ... for his rabies! Yes, it was the annual "take the dogs to the torture chamber" known as our vet's office. Actually, it's an awesome vet's office, with a lot of friendly vets. We no longer live near them, but they were so good, we couldn't risk going anywhere else, so we pack up our animals and drive back to Rt 7, right next to Reston, at the Great Falls Animal Hospital. Widget got blood samples taken, plus his rabies and distemper shots. He also got a new license, and I now keep his old West Virginia one on my keychain as a reminder of him. The new tag goes "jangle jangle," which is funny, because the old one goes "jingle jingle." Right now, people who never had a dog have no idea what I am talking about. Widget was not happy. Widget is so unlike Ahfu in many ways. Widget is a nervous dog, who is not as sociable as Ahfu. Widget also gets car sick almost immediately, and so the whole trip to and from the vets, he shook, drooled, and finally barfed. Widget did not yelp when he got the needles stuck in him, but he was still very sick from the medicine this morning. I hope he feels better. In other news, our air conditioning is fixed. Turns out it was a blown capacitor, which the repair guy said was common with our model. He educated me about our system more than anyone else. He said that we had a low end, 4-pound compressor attached to a 3-pound system. Our heat exchange unit was placed badly in our house (main vent facing a wall) so it's no wonder it doesn't work so well, but he was at a loss as to what to do about it other than ripping out the system and moving it elsewhere in the house (which he said was not worth the trouble). He also said our low-end compressor would probably run for another few years without trouble, and said the only difference between my system and a very high-end system was that it needed less repair work, and that in his years of experience, the high end systems lasted as long as the low-end anyway, usually because the parts got replaced so much. I asked him about what the house inspectors said when we bought the house, about how we had a huge high-quality system, and he laughed and told me, "You know how to become a home inspector? Take a 3-week course, pass a test, and the county slaps 'house expert' on you. Hell, I train some of these yokels, and I wouldn't trust them to identify a tree, much less a good AC system." That sure explains a lot. He also told me some horror stories about Sears outsourced contracting. He was a great guy. The repair was $100 even, and now the AC is working great. Today starts my first teaching job as a crash course Red Hat instructor. My goal is to bring everyone in my class up to the RHCE prerequisites. Wish me luck. We start the RHCE courses next week, and if I do any diary entries, I warn you, they will be tech heavy. I have been cramming like mad before the actual courses, just to make sure I have a good head start. I heard the exam is grueling. Very hands-on. Every day, I hope to go to class, learn what I can, take good notes, and then at night repeat over and over again. I would have camped out in the guest room, but Rogue is staying there through mid-August, so I'll have to do my setup in the rec room. I am lucky to have several computers I can use for various stuff.