/var/log/vadept.log

So I spent most of the evening trying to find out how to stem the hoards of spam comments i’ve been getting in gallery2. The captcha system sucks and it doesn’t seem to stop anonymous commenting.

Heres a temp solution before version 2.3 comes out that has a ton of anti-spam features built in. This solution assumes that you are using the short-url module which writes an .htaccess file with a bunch of mod_rewrite crap in it.
Put the following code at the very end of all the pregenerated stuff (but within the IfModule and /IfModule statements)

RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} .*AddComment.*$
RewriteRule ^.*$ - [F]

Basically all that does is returns a 403 Forbidden error with any URL that contains AddComment.  Yeah, its stupid.  At least this will tide you over since there really isn’t a good way to globally turn off all comments.  This isn’t tested very much so buyer-beware.

So I sent in my background/application for the online tabletop game over at http://www.onlinetabletop.com. I’ve never played an RPG via message board, but I know the guy who is running it (and if you’re smart you’ll realize that im hosting it on this server) so I figured I’d give it a shot.

Be it since its online it wont take up a chunk of my time, and I wont have to dedicate hours upon hours preparing for it. I’m curious how its going to be ran, but thats half the fun.

I’ve Uploaded the PDF of my background so you all can take a look at it (and so I wont lose it). Feel free to join, but don’t get discouraged if they reject your background.

Today I had the wonderful idea of replacing the water-sensor and flapper valve that powers the ancient toilet in my house.  It wasn’t filling properly, and I figured that if I could pass pharmacy school, a toilet couldn’t be too hard to fix.  Nothing annoys me more than sitting down waiting for the damn toilet to fill when there is 1 shit-covered piece of toilet paper floating around in there.  The old fill-valve took about 5 min’s to fill the tank, which is way too long in my book.

So I managed to find the toilet-rebuilding section of Home Depot and gather my parts.  It wasn’t too hard or involved since toilets are pretty much standardized (thank god) so I grabbed a few other things I needed and proceeded to the auto-checkout line.

There was a woman there berating the machine at the top of her lungs as to how stupid it was, and how they were so hard to use, blah blah blah, rant rant rant.  I looked around at the 4 empty checkout lines who’s clerks were just sitting there looking at her.  Personally I like the auto-checkout because its fast, and I like scanning stuff.  Her and I finished about the same time as she decided to involve me into her psychotic tirade about the checkout machines.  She started saying “dont you find those hard to use?”.  I sorta quietly said “Well, not really, I like them”.  Boy, wrong answer.  Have two-scoops of insanity-driven money-shot all over your face Frank.  I just sorta ignored her as I walked to my car continuing to hear her rant about the damn auto-checkouts.

Now I was confused, did she intentionally go to the auto-checkout so she’ll have something to bitch about or out of convince.  There was really nobody in the store at the time, so she could of gone to a manual checkout and gotten serviced by a real person.  I think she was just lonely and needed something to bitch about, much like I’m doing now in a more public but less conspicuous way.

So I’m walking around in my local gunstore looking at revolvers, and while I’m browsing the tons of overpriced Taurus’ I overhear a conversation between a store employee and a potential gun buyer.

This guy was either a cop or some sort of security guard.  He was obviously looking for something to carry concealed (since I doubt you’d strap a 3″ subnose revolver or Kimber 1911 to your hip).  He had not one clue about guns.  He was asking the most rudamentry and stupid questions (what caliber should I get, why does the 1911 have to be cocked and locked, SA vs DA triggers, etc).  Here is a guy who knows nothing about handguns who (unlike myself) has a license to carry a concealed weapon. 

Now am I the only one who find something wrong with that?  You have me who has been shooting handguns/rifles for a good part of 20+ years, handloads his own ammo, has more guns that you can shake a stick at, can recite the ballistics and reloading data of all of the major rifle/handgun calibers, and the wonderful city of Stockton denies my CCW permit even though I’ve been held up at gunpoint twice while at work.  Lets just ignore the fact that I have a doctorate, am educated, and have access to more narcotics than a Grateful Dead concert.

The some dipshit rent-a-cop gets a CCW who knows nothing about handguns, can barely tell the difference between a 1911 and a sig, and has the gall to completely blow me off when I tell him from a non-salesman standpoint that he is going to need a nice Galco leather IWB holster to make that subcompact Kimber comfortable to carry 9+ hours a day.  Hell, If I were looking for a new gun, and someone said “You know, I have that, and to get the most out of it you’ll need *real world advice here*” I would be fucking grateful and ask HIM questions, not the salesman.

I mean hell, what do I know, I’m obviously not some Rent-A-Cop who is looking for an automatic in 38 special (*sigh*).  I almost left when he asked how many bullets the clip held (A ‘clip’ refers to a M1-Garand en-bloc clip or a moonclip.  He wanted to know how many rounds the magazine held.  Bullets are the part that shoot out of the gun, a round is the unfired bullet + casing + powder).

I left at the part where he is arguing with the guy who works there about not needing moon-clips for a revolver chambered in 45-ACP (for those at home, 45ACP is rimless, and revolvers need a rim for proper headspacing, so a moonclip puts an artificial ‘rim’ on a rimless auto cartridge).  I could tell the salesman was starting to get annoyed, and an off-duty cop in there decided to set him straight and just told him what he needs for a backup gun.

I mean really, If you are going to have a CCW don’t be a dick to those who know more than you do.

So since my Fiance is out of town for the week (and I’m bored off of my ass), I decided to watch some of the American Idol episodes she has recorded.

If I hear “OMG I DID NOT MAKE IT, NOW WHAT WILL I DO WITH MY LIFE” I will vomit blood on an innocent puppy.  Who in the hell puts their future on competing on a stupid TV show?  Seriously, that ranks up there with having a retirement plan of “Winning the Lottery”.

People on TV are full of win.

Caliber: .40 S&W
Press: Dillon 550B
Bullet: 170gr LaserCast
Powder: 6.5gr Unique
Overall Length: 1.138″

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2005/11/home_made_hot_p.php

That is how I plan to make the hot pepper oil.  I am going to try to make this as concentrated as possible so I can just dilute it afterwards.

I’ve decided that I’m going to churn back up the pepper factory.

A few years ago, I got seeds from a patient of ours for some ‘peter
peppers’ (I think he has since died, and the seeds on the internet are
insanely expensive).  Google them to find out more, I guarantee you’ll
want to grow some yourself.  With a few of his peppers I managed to get
about 12 plants roaring which gave me about 50 peppers a piece.  I
collected the seeds from a selection of them as the rest of them just
grew mold and rotted in my pantry.  The seeds sat in an old glass
bottle until recently when I stumbled upon them.

So I have the
seeds planted in those little peat-starter thingys you buy at
home-depot.  I actually looked up as to the proper way to dry/can them,
so I wont have hundreds of peppers just sitting around rotting.  I also
am going to order some Naga Jolokia seeds so I can make my own atomic pepper oil.

Why do major computer problems always hit when you really don’t have the time or need to deal with it?  For example, there was a major local root exploit published on slashdot on 2/10/08.  A real doozey.  Run this program as a normal user and you magically get root access.  Shit like this makes the assholes of sysadmins chew on the leather of their big chairs.  Shit like this makes me glad that I went into pharmacy and not a full time sysadmin.

Since all the major vendors (and even the kernel developers) are blindsided by this (2/10/08 is a Sunday) someone puts out a hotfix.  So I apply said hotfix to my workstation, my internal file server, and a server in an undisclosed location that is NOT at my house.

Everything is fine, until the MOMENT I get into my car to go and do something that will take 4 hours.  Off goes the cellphone to let me know that all 3 machines have shit the bed.  Wonderful, just fucking wonderful.  Cue the terrible anxiety for the WHOLE damn 4 hour appointment.  I get home, just get to fixing the servers that have shit the bed when the pent up anxiety makes my dinner explode out of my ass in 10 min increments.

I read then to see that the hotfix is really hit and miss as to if it panics the kernel or not.  To make things even fucking better, I find a /proc option that will automatically reboot your server if it locks up due to kernel panic.  Go fucking me.

I guess I should start this thing off by posting some sort of introduction so you all know what this site is about.

This site is going to be a braindump of random things that I’m interested in.  It can range from tabletop rpg, guns, computer stuff, pharmacy stuff, etc.

As for me, I’m a 29 year old living in California.  I’m a full-time pharmacist who also has a past-life as a sysadmin for an ISP.  I still play tabletop RPG games (and no, I do get laid and I do not live in my parents basement) as well as video games and do other things that your typical geek does (like drink gin).  I’m slated to get married to my wonderful fiance’ in 2008, and I wear size 12 shoes.

If you decide you like this site, then subscribe to the RSS feed.  If you don’t like this site, then go screw yourself and the horse you rode in on.