Gardens, computers and stuff
Well, the roma tomatoes are pretty much done. A few more green ones hanging on the plant, but it's dying, so I may wind up harvesting them green and letting them ripen on bits of vine.
The Cherokee Purple finally started ripening (they are all yellow now and a few have gone red. Alas, they grew a bit too well, and most of them split some before they get ripe. I'm just cutting those sections out and chopping up the rest for use in various things. There are a couple dozen of so still on the plant. And *large*. Oy.
And the cherry tomato is not on;y still producing (though much slower than the peak) but the silly thing has actually put out more blossoms!
Next year I'll get that kind again, but I'll need to give it more space. It's covering a 3 foot square area. Darn near smothered the Romas!
On the tech side, I'd asked Doug to keep an eye out for an old box that'd run Win98 or so and have a serial port and a USB port. I'd planned on using something small and low powered to run the weather station stuff I've had for ages, and maybe a webcam looking outside.
He offered me an IBM ThinkCentre. Seems he'd bought half a dozen cheap a while back for various projects and had three left over. One had already been offered on eBay. But the specs on them were better than what I'm using as my *main* computer currently.
After some negotiation, I wound up with the last two for a price I can afford (and paying off a bit at a time doesn't hurt).
( much tech specs )
Timing was fortuitous, as my media server gizmo decided to die. Turns out that there actually *is* a fan in the case, but it wasn't running (I deduce this from the lack of dust). Of course, it's *way* out of warranty. And they don't sell them anymore. I may save up and get a replacement off eBay. But in the meantime, the S50 has more than enough "oomph" to play the videos that Fay and I watch. Good thing the TV has a VGA connector and a PC audio connector. :-)
The drive from inside the server is apparently ok, but had a fair number of file system error. Those are being fixed and I'm getting it synched back up with the drive I'd been backing it up to.
In other news, I seem to have come down with something. I'll probably spend extra time in bed today.
The Cherokee Purple finally started ripening (they are all yellow now and a few have gone red. Alas, they grew a bit too well, and most of them split some before they get ripe. I'm just cutting those sections out and chopping up the rest for use in various things. There are a couple dozen of so still on the plant. And *large*. Oy.
And the cherry tomato is not on;y still producing (though much slower than the peak) but the silly thing has actually put out more blossoms!
Next year I'll get that kind again, but I'll need to give it more space. It's covering a 3 foot square area. Darn near smothered the Romas!
On the tech side, I'd asked Doug to keep an eye out for an old box that'd run Win98 or so and have a serial port and a USB port. I'd planned on using something small and low powered to run the weather station stuff I've had for ages, and maybe a webcam looking outside.
He offered me an IBM ThinkCentre. Seems he'd bought half a dozen cheap a while back for various projects and had three left over. One had already been offered on eBay. But the specs on them were better than what I'm using as my *main* computer currently.
After some negotiation, I wound up with the last two for a price I can afford (and paying off a bit at a time doesn't hurt).
( much tech specs )
Timing was fortuitous, as my media server gizmo decided to die. Turns out that there actually *is* a fan in the case, but it wasn't running (I deduce this from the lack of dust). Of course, it's *way* out of warranty. And they don't sell them anymore. I may save up and get a replacement off eBay. But in the meantime, the S50 has more than enough "oomph" to play the videos that Fay and I watch. Good thing the TV has a VGA connector and a PC audio connector. :-)
The drive from inside the server is apparently ok, but had a fair number of file system error. Those are being fixed and I'm getting it synched back up with the drive I'd been backing it up to.
In other news, I seem to have come down with something. I'll probably spend extra time in bed today.