It’s a Monday. I was very tired this morning so I ended up sleeping later than I planned - I got up at 8:30 instead of 7:00, skipped the shower, packed a lunch and hauled my butt to work. I thought about calling in sick because my knee really hurts today, and I’m having a little trouble getting around. Traffic was light, thankfully. I got here a little before 10:00, but I somehow doubt anyone will even notice. ...

Why yes, my commute *does* suck, why do you ask? And no, “bad” is not quite accurate… “soul draining” is probably more correct. I really have to move.

This morning I weighed 283.0.

I gained back what I lost earlier this year. I’m now at

I took CalTrain into work today (actually light rail+cal train). It takes about two hours (driving takes about 1). Probably won’t do this every day, but maybe I could do 1 day a week? That sounds do-able. This particular method was: Light rail (Berryessa, Tasman, Mountain View); Caltrain (Mountain View, San Carlos); Shuttle (San Carlos, Island Dr). Leaving from the first light rail station at 6:09 makes this a 1h 33m trip, while leaving later than that would take more (1h 49 min, up to 1h 57m). (Add about 10 min to those for walking from the shuttle to work The cost is 5.75 each way. Other options were pretty much all over 2:20 and mabye 2:50, for similar or more cost. I looked into but ultimately rejected: Lt. Rail to Caltrain by way of downtown SJ, lt rail by way of Tamien (South San Jose), driving to Caltrain and parking, taking a regular bus to CalTrain, and even an express bus going to Palo Alto from my house, then walking (from El Camino at Page Mill) to California St. station. ...

I sent the following abuse complaint just now. (This is probably only interesting to folks who read certain comic feeds and like clicking on the comments link to see what other LJ users are saying about the comic.) I enjoy reading syndicated feeds and usually having comments on them is a good thing, because I can chat with other users who read the same feed. However, user “jassalol” has figured out a loophole in this system - it is basically a community with no maintainer and he feels he has the “right” to post whatever he wants in it. ...

We had another talk about sex, this time I think it went much better. She had gotten a book about sex (forgot the name, basic “sex advice” type of thing) and we started talking about what types of things might be OK vs. No Way. Probably OK list includes: regular p/v sex (might be touch and go due to not being aroused), touching firm enough to not tickle, massage, snuggling, kissing. ...

I was referred to the sleep disorders center for help with my sleep apnea (pause in breathing) and snoring/congestion. Last night was my sleep observation appointment. It looks like I will almost certainly get a CPAP machine to assist with keeping my airway open at night. Most of the tightening of the airway is due to my tongue (seems to be a bit wider than normal and has bite marks around the edges) and there’s an observable but not serious narrowing of the part just above the uvula/tonsil area leading to the nose. Continuous Positive Air Pressure should hopefully help both of those. ...

Friends- We have made reservations for Hawaii! We are going to the Big Island, from October 14 to October 20. That’s six nights, checking in Sunday and checking out Saturday. I know I have asked a few of you if you’d like to go with us, so now would be a good time to confirm your availability and request time off from work, etc. We have a short list (family mostly) that we want with us if possible, but not all of them will be available and so far there’s plenty of room. If you’re interested in joining us, let me know that you’re interested and I’ll get back to you to let you know if there’s still space available. I have reserved 4 bedrooms total (2 with king, 2 with double-queen) but there’s a chance to get more rooms if we act quickly. ...

More monitoring is not necessarily better monitoring What gets measured, gets fixed. Are we measuring the meaningful stuff, or incidentals Meaningful metrics: quality, quantity and cost Incidentals - swap, disk space, anything targetted at a specific “problem” condition There should be (at least) 3 levels of “severity” with appropriate corresponding actions Major site problem - VIP not working, broken images, error messages, can’t place orders, etc. Minor site problem - Slow response, error in rare cases, monitoring broken Not customer-facing - One server or a small number have a problem but VIP is OK Minor - Node is not down but some resources are out-of-bounds. (swap, disk, cpu etc) Forensic, correlating - Should not notify anyone, but can be used for additional information “Critical” is not necessarily important (e.g. NTP can be “critical” but not worth notifying anyone) Too many minor alarms can mask important problems and dull our response ...