Openfire 3.6.4 & RFC Compliance With DNS Resolution

April 22nd, 2010

I’ve been searching for an answer to why server to server connections have stopped working with Google Talk, and this seems to be the reason:

http://www.igniterealtime.org/issues/browse/OF-44

The short story is that Openfire 3.6.4 isn’t RFC compliant on resolving DNS records. This causes problems with XMPP domains that provide multiple SRV records. Google is one of them.

S2S connections worked with Google Talk for the longest time (since I started hosting Jabber in 2005)! I wonder when Google made the change? Oh well. It looks like I get to wait for the next release of Openfire. Which according to http://www.igniterealtime.org/community/message/202626 should be soon.

Go Openfire developers! I’ll be impatiently waiting. :-)


How-To Install StartSSL XMPP Certificate In Openfire 3.6.4

April 18th, 2010

I recently discovered StartCom’s free Class 1 SSL certificates and decided to request some for my server. I figured, why not start with Jabber? The Openfire admin interface makes it seem simple enough. Well, it’s not as straight-forward as it sounds, but it’s relatively easy once you know what to do.

Your server must be running JRE 6 with the Java Cryptography Extension (JCE) Unlimited Strength Jurisdiction Policy Files 6 to be able to use a certificate generated by StartCom.

My experience is Debian based, so these instructions will be written as such. All terminal commands below are performed as root.

Step 0 – Delete Existing Certificates

Log in to your Openfire server at http://yourserver:9090

Under “Server Settings” select “Server Certificates”

Delete all listed certificates.

Step 1 – Install and configure JRE 6

To install Java 6 JRE, simply do:

apt-get install sun-java6-jre

Next, we want to make sure JRE 6 is the default for java on our server.

update-alternatives --config java

Be sure to select the option corresponding to /usr/lib/jvm/java-6-sun/jre/bin/java (option 3 on my server).

Step 2 – Install JCE Unlimited Strength Jurisdiction Policy Files 6

Download the files from http://java.sun.com/javase/downloads/index.jsp

Copy the files US_export_policy.jar and local_policy.jar to /usr/lib/jvm/java-6-sun/jre/lib/security overwriting what already exist. Be sure to retain the permissions the old files had.

Openfire will continue to use the old JRE until its environment variables are updated. I was too lazy to do this, so I rebooted my server. This worked for me!

Step 3 – Obtain Private Key & Certificate From StartCom

Go to https://www.startssl.com/ and go through the process of creating an account (if you haven’t already). Then request a Jabber/XMPP certificate through them for your server. Don’t use an Openfire generated CSR, let StartCom generate the private key for you.

Save the private key and its password!! If you lose this, your certificate will be invalid and you will NOT be able to re-request the certificate from StartCom! We will be using it in a later step.

Note: Since StartCom is generating the private key, you may have to wait a few hours for your request to be confirmed.

Step 4 – Install StartCom’s Class 1 Intermediate and Root Certificates

Note: You can perform this step while you’re waiting for your certificate to be generated.

Download StartCom’s class1 intermediate certificate here: https://www.startssl.com/certs/sub.class1.server.ca.pem and StartCom’s root certificate here: https://www.startssl.com/certs/ca.pem.

Copy the root and intermediate certificates to a logical location in your server. I worked in ~/ssl/ to keep things organized.

To install the certificates, use the following commands (each command is 1 line):

keytool -import -trustcacerts -alias startcom.ca -file ca.pem -keystore /usr/share/openfire/resources/security/truststore

keytool -import -trustcacerts -alias startcom.ca.sub -file sub.class1.server.ca.pem -keystore /usr/share/openfire/resources/security/truststore

You will be prompted for a password. The default password is “changeit”.

(It is recommended that you change the keystore and truststore passwords. For instructions on how to do this, see http://www.igniterealtime.org/builds/openfire/docs/latest/documentation/ssl-guide.html)

Step 5 – Additional Openfire Configuring

Browse to your Openfire server at http://yourserver:9090

Under “Server Manager”, select “System Properties”

Add/edit the following properties with the following values:

Property Name – Property Value
xmpp.socket.ssl.active – true
xmpp.socket.ssl.port – 5223
xmpp.socket.ssl.storeType – JKS
xmpp.socket.ssl.keystore – resources/security/keystore
xmpp.socket.ssl.keypass – changeit
xmpp.socket.ssl.truststore – resources/security/truststore
xmpp.socket.ssl.trustpass – changeit

(It’s recommended that you change the keystore and truststore passwords. See http://www.igniterealtime.org/builds/openfire/docs/latest/documentation/ssl-guide.htmlfor instructions on how to do this.)

Step 6 – Installing Private Key & Certificate

Now we’re ready to install the certificate! Log back into your Openfire server at http://yourserver:9090.

Under “Server Settings” select “Server Certificates”. You should be prompted with the message

“One or more certificates are missing. Click here to generate self-signed certificates or here to import a signed certificate and its private key.”

Click the second link corresponding to importing a signed certificate.

In the first field, type your private key’s password. Copy the private key generated by StartCom and paste it in the second field. Copy the XMPP certificate generated by StartCom and paste it in the 3rd field.

Click save. You should now be back at the “Server Certificates” page with your certificate listed below. You will still be prompted with the “One or more certificates are missing.” error, but simply ignore it. This is because Openfire is looking for an RSA and a DSA certificate. You don’t need both.

Restart Openfire and…success!


Busy busy busy…

November 24th, 2009

Been very busy. I should update this thing more often. Wait…that sounds familiar. lol


Checkup at the Dentist

April 13th, 2009

My teeth are healthy! No dental problems, here. I am proud to say that I am one of the few that can keep my wisdom teeth! There is just enough room. Yay! I want to put off the experience of having teeth pulled as long as I can :-D .


‘apt-get dist-upgrade’ Seems To Have Been A Success

March 15th, 2009

Did an ‘apt-get dist-upgrade’ yesterday and updated the ol’ server to Debian 5.0. For the most part, everything went fine. I did encounter one weird thing. The latest version of MySQL would not install, complaining about not having version information for libz.so.1 located in /opt/mono/lib/. It was very, very strange (I don’t ever remember installing Mono). I Googled around a bit, and found that other people simply deleted the file that the MySQL installer was referring to (as there was another copy somewhere else on the system and some path specification was messed up…something like that).

In any case, deleting it (and the entire /opt/mono directory…I don’t need it) seemed to fix the problem. MySQL is working (or else you wouldn’t be reading this). :shrug:


100k miles = I Paid Off My Car Today

March 8th, 2009

Woot!

Odometer displaying 100k miles

I had been stringing the loan along since I purchased the extended warranty back in ‘06. But, now that the warranty has expired, it’d extremely suck to have a car payment AND repair bills (although, this car has been pretty solid). It was sort-of on a whim (one of those “turn your head the other way and click” sort of things), but I had the money sitting in my savings account. Granted, it was being saved for when we buy a house…but that’s on hold for the moment. I’ll make a good chunk of it back by the time we’re ready to continue the home hunting trek via saving my car payment plus other extra cash. So, in my eyes, it’s a win win! Improves my credit report (less debt), and I’m throwing away less money (not paying interest).

So…meh.


Apache & SSL

February 12th, 2009

Not that it’s hard or anything, but I learned how to generate self-signed certificates and set up HTTPS sites in Apache. Go me! :D

So now, Apache forces (or should force) https upon anybody who tries to log in or view content under /wp-admin.

I should buy a certificate and server all of HHSn over HTTPS! …just kidding.

That is all!


A little inauguration excitement at Oak Knoll yesterday

January 21st, 2009

A news crew came to my school yesterday and did a little segment about Mr. Yob’s (one of our teachers) class learning about the inauguration and what this election means to our country. They showed blips of the ever so stressful (but pretty neat/fun) school-wide Skype conference I managed (and the principal hosted) with one of our teachers who happened to fly out to go to the inauguration in person.

Check it out!


Weekend in Los Angeles

December 8th, 2008

Brianna and I spent the weekend in L.A. We headed down at about 6 PM on Friday and headed back around 1 PM on Sunday. At first, I thought that the traveling-to-time-to-do-stuff would be too far in the “traveling” area, but it was actually a decent balance. Although, I wouldn’t travel much farther for a weekend’s worth of vacationing.

Friday night we arrived in Beverly Hills/Los Angeles area around 1 AM. We checked in to our hotel, which felt really creepy that late at night. There was no parking as a couple jackasses took up two spaces with their cars, so I was forced to park on a side street. I was nervous at first, but it was actually no big deal. Come light, the place and neighborhood was actually okay.

We stayed in the Beverly Inn, which is by no means a fancy hotel, but it wasn’t all that bad. We were across the street from the CBS studios, which was kinda cool. Saturday morning we took a walk and decided to eat at a place called Tart. Their portions were perfect, and their prices weren’t bad for the area as well. Afterwards, Brianna and I parted and did our own thing. What brought us to L.A. was an X-Files afiliated charity event Brianna wanted to attend. So, she did her thing and I did mine…

My first stop was my cousin Debbie’s house in Bellflower. I am very thankful for my TSX’s naviation system because with its aide I never made any major wrong moves. I felt like I dominated in L.A. traffic! Anywho…it was only supposed to take me a half hour to get from where I was in L.A. to Bellflower, but I had a little trouble at the gas station. It turns out that I pulled into a “full service” lane at the gas staiton! Without noticing, I start the process of getting gas and the attendant comes out and was like “hey, you’re in the full service lane!” I was like, “wha?!”. So, I apologized, canceled the transaction, and moved to a “self serve” pump. Here’s where the problem started. Apparently, Chevron (or at least this station) has a policy to where you must wait a certain period of time before a card with a canceled transaction can start another. After attempts at two pumps, I finally go see the attendant and he told me this. So, he rung me up for $20 worth of gas, I filled up, and I was on my way.

To get from where I was in L.A. to Bellflower, I had to take 101 to 710 to 105. It was a lot of fun. There were two things I had to get used to. 1) Carpool seems to be 24 hours, 2) Metering lights are more often on than not. Once I remembered those (and brought some patience), I was set. So Debbie and I hung out for a while, talked and whatnot. It was nice to see her. I’ll definitely do it again.

After my visit with Debbie, I went and saw my friend Sam down in Irvine. took me about a half hour to get down there which was expected. To get there, I had to take 91 to 605 to 405 to 73. Apparently, a portion of 73 is accompanied by toll, but luckily my exit was just before toll started. I got there with little problem as well. My only mistake was I turned into a UC parking lot rather than the shopping center where we were to meet. The shopping center and the UC lot I was in were maybe 500 feet apart, so it wasn’t a big deal.

I met Sam at Lee’s Sandwhiches in the university shopping center. Afterwards, he showed me around U.C. Irvine. The library has a pretty cool shelving system for material they deem less popular. The shelves are normal library shelves, but they’re on a track and slide around like an accordian. You can only access one side of a given shelf at a time. So, it saves a lot of space. The neatest part about it is that it’s computer controlled. There’s a simple control panel on the side of each shelving unit, and you can tell the system which side of which shelf you want to access, and it takes care of the rest! Sam also showed me the building he does most of his work in. He’s got a nice 30 inch Apple Cinema Display at his disposal, and a fancy lab coat with “Dr. Kaufman” embroidered on it. There were lots of neat projects spread around the building, something you just have to see for yourself. I thought it was all very neat.

After we finished with the U.C. Irvine “tour” we headed back to his apartment and “hung out”. This “hanging outage” eventually turned into something geeky. Sam decided to play One by U2 on his guitar and he wanted me to sing. Me, having zero singing voice, obviously didn’t want to sing. I jokingly suggested that the computer can sing for me, and it lead to this…

U2botic – One

It’s just a short 10 second clip that we whipped up in like 10-15 minutes. We didn’t have time to fine tune it as I was due back to Beverly Hills by the time the idea exploded. It was a lot of fun hanging out with Sam. Hopefully we’ll do it again!

Sunday, Brianna and I decided to check out the Santa Monica Pier. It wasn’t as exciting as we thought it would be, but it was neat nevertheless. If the weather was better (it was overcast when we were there) I’m sure the experience would’ve been better, too. We stopped at a local Denny’s to get a bite to eat and then we hit the road. Highways 10 to 405 to 5 to 152 to 101 to 85 to 17, all over the course of 340 miles.

All in all, it was fun!


Tires, Car Maintenance, Rooster T Feathers

November 16th, 2008

Tires
On Friday, I bought new tires for my car. I settled on getting a set of Yokohama YK520’s from America’s Tire as they seemed to be the best tire for the cost. So far, I like them and am happy with my purchase.

Car Maintenance
I spent most of my Saturday sitting at Los Gatos Acura waiting for my car to be serviced. All I needed was a routine oil change along with a 4 wheel alignment (since I bought new tires). What was supposed to be a simple $140 combined job turned into $450. The technician working on my car discovered that a suspension component related to my right rear wheel was bent which would prevent them from being able to give the car a proper alignment. So, I opted for them to replace the component. The part itself wasn’t expensive (only being $75) it was the labor and second alignment that brought up the cost of the repair. I’ve had a relatively good experience with Los Gatos Acura, so since I was there I figured why not.

Rooster T Feathers
Brianna’s parents bought tickets for the four of us to go to a comedy show Saturday night at Rooster T Feathers in Sunnyvale. It was a lot of fun! The night’s acts were Mike Gardner, Robert Mac, and Brent Weinbach. Our table was right up against the stage, so naturally we were the inspiration for some of the comedians’ jokes. Mike Gardner happened to notice Brianna’s dad was wearing a fanny pack and did a bit about that. It was pretty funny. At one point while he was doing his thing, he stopped, looked at Brianna’s dad, and said “Are you with me Fanny Pack?!” I don’t know why, but that hit the funny spot and had me laughing for a few minutes. It was fun.


Hmm…what to write about

November 14th, 2008

A lot, but at the same time, not much, has happened lately.

Home Hunt
Brianna and I started looking for a house a month or so ago, and things were going along quite well considering the economy. We put bits on three houses. With the first house, we were beat by a larger offer. With the second house, we were beat with a cash offer. With the third house, our offer was accepted! However, there was a catch. The house needed a lot of work. After a lot of “I think I can do this”, then “oh crap we can’t do this!”, then “wait, yes we can”, we decided to negotiate with the bank to see what they’d be willing to do for us considering the condition of the house. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to hear back from the bank because…

Unemployment
Brianna was laid off on November 3rd. It was very sudden and not expected in the slightest bit. The company she worked for lost $60k in monthly revenue. She was newly hired (started August 15th) and she was low on the totem poll, so she was the first to go. This was devistating, but manageable. It only meant one thing. We couldn’t buy a house. So, our house plans were put on hold. Oh well!

Re-employment
Brianna starts a new job on Monday! I think she’s close to a world record of going from laid off to hired in less than 2 weeks. I’m very happy for her (and me). She was paranoid that, considering the economy, she’d be without a job for months. I speculated that she’d be without a job for no longer than a month. Looks like I was right! :-P She wants to wait at least 3 months until we consider buying a house again. This way, she can adjust to her new job and be assured that her position isn’t going anywhere any time soon.

You know what this means?
I think I can, finally, bring the server home. I’m cheap and don’t want to pay for the electricity, but it would be much better if it was within reach rather than sitting 100+ miles away. If the server was in a space where I heard/saw it on a daily basis, it’d really encourage me to tinker…and that’s something I love to do. We’ll see!

I really aught to blog more. Even though nobody reads this, it’s kinda cool to go back and read about some of the things I’ve posted about in the past. Also, I feel it’s good exercise for my brain! Unlike some, I really try to write, spell, and use grammar properly (but in no way am I perfect).

Last thing…I think I need to re-asses “categories”.


We’re Famous!

August 19th, 2008

Sort of…

Over the summer, I and a co-worker moved e-mail over from a tired G5 Xserve running the default “Mail” package that OS X Server (Tiger) comes with to Zimbra (which was installed on a new beefy Dell server running Debian 4.0)! The move went excellent and nothing more than what was expected went wrong. It was truly much less problem free than anybody expected. We were so excited that we had a little “party” when we “flipped the switch” and officially switched over. The party lasted, oh, 15 minutes maybe. Carel made six cup cakes, one for every letter in the word Zimbra. He also doodled “Happy Zimbra Day” on the white board in the office. I decided to share this with the Zimbra team and, now, we’re famous!

http://www.zimbrablog.com/blog/archives/2008/08/happy-zimbra-day.html

Woot!


Jag, I’ll Miss You

June 23rd, 2008

A few weeks ago Jag, my black lab, had stopped eating or drinking. He was taken to the vet and they kept him for a few days to nourish him back to life. We were given prescription dog food, prescription treats, and very strict feeding guidelines. Everything was going well until last Wednesday. Mom had told me that he wasn’t eating like usual, but I brushed it off. I got a phone call Sunday morning from my dad. He said it’s time. So, I rushed to my parents house in the Central Valley (about a 2 hour drive from my place in San Jose) so I could see him before he was put down. I decided to spend the night and go with him to the vet in the morning. So, I spent 95% of my time sitting/laying next to him. As the day progressed, he got worse and worse. Dad and I had to carry him whenever he wanted to go somewhere. We limited him to the back yard and the living room. Eventually, he didn’t care where he was. Before everyone settled down for the night, Mom and I carried him into the house. I decided to sleep with him, which was the best decision I made. Of course, I couldn’t sleep because the sheer thought of losing Jag kept my mind turning. So, I layed down next to him and switched between watching him and watching the TV. Time passed and his breaths became farther apart. At about 1:13 AM (early Monday morning), he stopped breathing all together and passed.

Jag was my first dog and, besides fish, my first pet loss. I never imagined that it would be this hard. He was an extraordinary dog. He was happiest when he was with the family regardless of where we were (though he did prefer being on the boat or in a car). It’s like I’ve lost a brother. He was 11 years old…it was his time.

Jag, I’m going to miss you…very much.


Jag with rawhide.

Jag in pool.

Surprise Jag


HHSn Forums are Back!

February 24th, 2008

http://forums.hhsn.net

After a long internal debate, I decided to bring them back. Although none of the old/original posts exist, I hope that it’ll become a little something that’ll use some of the wasted CPU cycles of my server. :-)

Any comments/suggestions about the forums are welcomed and appreciated. :)

Pass the word around, please!


Windows Vista

February 19th, 2008

Last weekend I obtained a copy of Windows Vista Ultimate. I didn’t really expect much out of it as I’m not really a fan and haven’t heard any worthwhile testimony on why anybody should be using it. However, I still felt the urge to check it out anyway. So, I moved partitions around on my Dimension’s 160 GB hard drive and plopped Vista on it.

The first thing I expected was slowness. I know the system requirements for Vista are pretty high with a minimum 1 GHz CPU and 512 MB RAM. I’ve even heard that Vista runs best with 4 GB RAM! With that said, my Dimension only has a P4 2.8GHz CPU and 1.5 GB RAM. Surprisingly, it’s actually very responsive. With anti-virus software installed, it feels pretty close to how responsive XP is on this machine.

It was a little frustrating figuring out where Microsoft decided to stash things this time around. One thing that MS has actually handled quite well until now was that the transition between versions of Windows never killed anybody. Let me tell you, A LOT has changed in Vista. From somethings as simple as “My Documents” being changed to broken down folders inside your user’s home directory to “My Computer” being re-named just plain ‘ol “Computer”, to complete path changes (no more Documents and Settings folder, it’s now a Mac-ish /Users folder) and preference relocations (they’ve combined all network interfaces into a what wants to be an intuitive interface, but coming from XP it took me a minute to figure it out).

I had also expected to run into the incompatibility problems with installing older applications, but everything that I have installed this far has worked without a hitch. I haven’t tried any older games (I love Sim City 3000 :-D ), so we’ll see.

Aero is pretty neat. It’s not an amazing must-have, but does show that Windows has come a long way. Windows fade in and out, translucent titlebars and taskbar, along with other fancy touches here and there. However, you must have a fairly beefy video card to get the full Aero effect. Luckily, the GeForce 6800 XT I bought a few weeks ago supports it very nicely.

The alert dialog boxes that appear when certain tasks are performed isn’t as annoying as I thought it’d be. It’s just like when you perform a task that requires root privileges to run in Ubuntu and you are prompted for your password, except that you aren’t prompted for a password. I can see how this is pointless, as a user who isn’t sure what is going on could just as easily click “continue” and allow potentially bad tasks to run. Also, the alerts aren’t always descriptive. That can add to a user going “I don’t know *clicks continue*?”

Brianna decided to be a Vista guinea pig as well. She let me wipe her laptop and put Vista on it…from SCRATCH! I wish she’d let me do that with Linux. Oh well! :)

In summary, Vista is (in my opinion) a little more pretty than previous versions of Windows. I don’t have any major complaints, yet, nor do I have anything to rant and rave about. People have said that it’s the next Windows ME. I can agree, but so far without as many bugs. :)


Adventures With a Dimension 4600i

January 26th, 2008

Last weekend, I helped my mom’s cousin Debbie move some stuff for her boss up to San Rafael. She drove up from Los Angeles Friday night, and we headed up from my place to San Rafael Saturday morning. Since she was up, she brought me her old HP to try to “spruce up”, along with a Dell she was given. Debbie is really partial to Windows 98 (no idea why!), and since her HP was dead I couldn’t do much for her. So, I proposed a little trade. If she gave me the Dell, I’d give her the best system I could build that would run Windows 98. She agreed.

So, about this Dell. It’s a Dimension 4600i that has a 2.8GHz P4 /w hyperthreading, 512 MB of RAM (in dual channel mode, so 2×256), onboard video and sound, and no hard drive. For free, it’s a pretty decent machine. It has an AGP 8x slot, and supports Serial ATA hard drives. So, I decided to put a couple hundred bucks into it to bring it up to speed.

I bought a Serial ATA hard drive, a matched pair of 512MB DDR RAM sticks (for a total of 1.5 GB RAM), and a GeForce 6800XT video card (was open box, $60, I couldn’t pass it up). Since the hard drive didn’t come with a Serial ATA cable, and I was too lazy to run to Fry’s, I decided to install the RAM and video cards first (I previously installed a PATA hard drive).

All went perfect! So, being very excited, I ran to Fry’s and picked up a Serial ATA cable for the hard drive. I ghosted the contents of the old drive over to the new drive and booted the machine up. I’d get to the Windows XP login screen, log in, and as soon as the nVidia control panel application would load, the display would jumble and the computer would crash. So, I was like “what the fuck?!” It was working fine a half hour ago. I am pushing the limits of its power supply…it’s only rated to produce a peak wattage of 170 watts. So, yeah.

I wasn’t about to give up! I took all the hardware I had installed out. I switched back to the PATA hard drive. I booted the machine up, and it’d freeze at the login screen. Okay…so I’ll just wipe the drive and re-install the OS. It would freeze at the initial Windows setup screen! Perhaps I fucked up the power supply…

For the hell of it, I updated the BIOS. This didn’t seem to do any good. I was rather confused as to why the machine was running funky in it’s original configuration. So, for the hell of it, I took the CMOS battery out and let the system sit for a while.

I put the battery back in, booted the machine up with it’s original hardware configuration, and success! So, one by one, I added hardware. First, I added the RAM. The machine was still happy, so I added the hard drive. Nope, unhappy. I remembered that this drive had a jumper setting to force SATA 150, so I set that jumper and the computer became happy again. Last, I added the video card. Nope, the computer became crashy again!

It worked in the beginning, so why wouldn’t it work now? Power supply? I think so. However, I still didn’t give up! I rebooted the computer about a million times, and I finally got it to blue screen. It complained about “nv4_disp”. Aha! When the video card driver initializes, all goes crazy.

I removed the video card (because the system would freeze in SAFE MODE!), booted the machine up, and uninstalled the nVidia drivers. Re-installed the video card, re-installed the video drivers…

And the machine seems happy!

Whew. What an adventure. What a picky video card! The only thing I haven’t done is tried to play a game. We shall see how that goes!


Joe Cool

December 17th, 2007

I don’t think I’ve ever heard this song from anywhere other than the 25th anniversary Charlie Brown CD my dad bought in the late 80’s. It’s a great ‘blusey’ tune. Who doesn’t like B.B. King, anyway?! It’s one of my favorites of the moment, and I thought I’d share!

B.B. King – Joe Cool (128k MP3, 3.5MB)

Enjoy!


I’ve got curtains!

December 17th, 2007

After much deliberation and “I’m not going to decorate” debates with myself, I’ve decided to hang the curtains that I had in Oakland. The only difference is that the curtains that were in the Oakland bedroom went in my living room, and the curtains that were in the Oakland kitchen/dining room are going to go in my spare bedroom.

Pictures may follow, stay tuned. :-)

Update: Here are pictures!

The left picture is the curtains in the living room. The right picture is the curtains in the spare bedroom (notice they are crappier :-D ).


Severns-Pease Christmas Display 2007

December 9th, 2007

A friend of mine from elementary school (Cumberland, 5th grade), her dad, and their neighbor set up a really cool Christmas light display synced to music. I had known about it for a few years, but never got a chance to see it in person. Since I’ve moved back to the South Bay, I decided to check it out! Brianna, Ryan, and I drove to their house on Tangerine Avenue in Sunnyvale, tuned in, and watched it for about a half hour. It’s really cool! They use an FM transmitter to broadcast the music so people passing by can tune in, but the locals don’t get annoyed by all the music.

Along with being a holiday treat, the light display is also set up as an attraction for a food drive/donation drive for the Second Harvest food bank. If you like the display you’re encouraged to donate something (Brianna contributed $2, the only change we had), but it’s not required.

You can find out more at their website, http://severex.com.

If you’re in the area, check it out!


Not a smidge over 68 degrees…

December 4th, 2007

Got my first winter PG&E bill since I moved. It’s nowhere near as high as most, but it’s high for me. From Oakland, I’m used to $20-$25 PG&E bills in the summer and $40-$45 in the winter. This bill comes to $63.88.

I think I’m going to keep a strict ritual of setting the heater to 68 degrees when I am awake, and 62 degrees when I go to bed. I’ve been a bit lax so far. This month I’d set the heater to 63 before I go to bed, and at 68 after work when I’m home. My feet would get a little cold, so I’d bump the heater up to 70. Gotta have a toasty house when I get out of the shower, so the heater gets bumped up to 72 for that.

No more!

The heater will now be at a strict 62 degrees when asleep, turned off when I’m not home, and set to 68 when I am awake at home.