That moment when you walk past a used book table and see a book you haven't seen since like the second grade!

Those who cannot remember the past...

Adminisk8or

03/19/2024

I'm starting to understand better that maybe sufferings and pain must precede the good stuff in life. Why do I say that, you ask? Oh, only because we finally did the thing we've been fighting tooth and claw to accomplish for like two or three years and bought a house.

That's right! The same day I last submitted this blog entry, we put in an offer for a house. I was a little worried, because two other offers had already been put in; but against all odds, they accepted ours, and for a week now, we've been going through all the fun rigmarole that buying a house (and a first house, no less) entails. I always thought the word "Escrow" sounded like a very old person word... and I guess I was right, because I am not so young now as I'd like to think I am. Yikes, when did getting older happen?

But yeah, that'll be a fun adventure for the next couple of weeks. And a fun financial adventure, too.... gotta love.... everything. Nevertheless, it's been long, busy days this last week- what between that, practicing for a performance I will soon be in, work, side hobbies and the usual.

Maybe the most interesting tech story this week comes from a side hobby I was doing. I was trying to restore some lights in a patio fountain I inherrited some years ago, now, and unfortunately, I've found myself fixing the lights in this thing many times, now... and I can't yet say I've found a solid solution, either. But I certainly thought I had the other day. I had acquired a small collection of the same very specific part: an LED status indicator light (for the server back cable arm) of a Dell PowerEdge rack server; and finding out how these lights was pretty cool; there are only two wires, and if you reverse the current running through them one way or the other, the light will either be amber or blue! I thought, well, that's cool, not only have I found some good solid lights, but I can even choose which color I want them to be!

I had even gone to the length of designing a two-channel toggle switch taken from some unknown computer power supply and configured it as a logical OR gate to flip the current one way or the other with just the flip of a small switch. I had done some quick, crude tests and determined the voltage those lights like to operate at was about 5 volts... it would've been wise if I had also considered current. So when I promptly burned out all four lights, I was a bit upset at myself. I had a couple of spare ones to re-test with, and it was then that I learned just how silly my assumptions were. I had hooked up a 5V 2A power supply. The amperage those lights needed? About 75 mA. So yeah, about 27 times less power than I was giving them.

I look at my presumption now and wonder, why didn't I try and test that? True, I didn't know beforehand that my multimeter could read current, but I certainly didn't think about trying that until after the unfortunate consequences followed. In a way, maybe I'm lucky- so long as I can learn to draw parallels from one experience to another well enough. History is full of examples that range from unfortunate to deadly and catastrophic of assumptions, careless acts, and shortcuts. Some were personal and only resulted in an individual face palming and saying, "man I should've thought that through, better." And then there were those that not only took the life of the person or people who made it, but sometimes thousands of other innocent lives, as well. I think I need say nothing of the many unfortunate disasters that has plagued the world in just the last hundred years, alone.

And I can't speak for those cases in general. I can't even speak for them individually, since not only was I not there, but the fact is that I am myself and not someone else. But if we are to heed the poignant and ever true words of George Santayana, perhaps we are best off starting with the little things in our life. When we make a mistake and feel that regret, we should naturally come to forgive ourselves for that silly notion we had which led to the foolish demise, however small. But to forgive does not mean to simply wash, rinse and repeat- indeed, I would argue it only implies the first two actions. While we can forget about guilt or misfortune, we have a mind designed to retain bad memories along with good ones- and it's with very good reason! Maybe my mind doesn't work as well as it should all the time, but if I could simply pause and think just a little more carefully before plugging in a cobbled string of lights, or before I flip a switch, or before I pull a plug, perhaps I could find out easier ways to learn than those who came before me and had to learn in some of the worst ways imaginable.

So, there's your thought of the week; remember George Santayana's words of wisdom: Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. I know I'm destined to make more blunders, some small and some big- of that I'm certain. But I hope by quoting these words this week, I've helped not only myself, but other, as well, who may be feeling anything between silly to downright depressed for a recent bad decision they made. Don't let it get to you- it may have been the stupidest thing you've ever done; but you can move on and still remember just enough not to do something that rash again. Until next time, see ya!