m/work/

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Well, if nothing else over the past two days… I’ve at least gotten a chapter done with my book, and taken care of two issues on the website (y). I also managed to weasel through a little bit of code that might just go along way at making improvements hehe.

Spent a few hours relaxing in the proving grounds, didn’t want to interrupt the training in the other server. I dunno if it’s the time of day I usually /get/ to play or what, but PG#1 has been very laggy for me lately. Although I haven’t had any problems on TG#3 which also should be out in England lol.

For tonight my plans are working on a small analytical script for ringing alarm bells, this should be interesting lol.

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The more I’m here, the worse I feel
It’s like wasting away, on a full stomach.
Every thing points to the past, will it never die?
As I long für the future, to hold all I seek in my hands.
Little more then that dream keeps my bones from breaking.

Oh LORD, why am I tormented so…
I know almost no peace, my enemies no relent, till I am bound and gagged.
I keep my mouth shut, less it bring the rain.
While the wild beats graze around me, in search of flesh.

All I can see, is the emptiness here, so far am I from my goals.
Even the slightest thought of them, makes me crazy.
Just to concentrate a moment on that sensation…
Of all the things that could be, my life fulfilled.

Why can’t I have release? Even for a time of rest, just to be at peace.
They come at me, as if thieves by night to take my life.
Fore they take every thing and leave nothing behind,
Nothing save the corpse of my heart.

Where there was once joy, they bring pain.
Where there was once love, they bring sorrow.
Where there was once tranquility, they bring rage.

I find nothing of what I seek here, only a battlefield.
Layered with mines and entrenched with barbwire.
Some times I think, I would throw it all away…
Even my very dignity, my very sanity just for a few seconds.

But I know, that path seals fates but never frees them.
So I continue to stand, although I may crack and crumble.
My body refuses to break completely, surrender is not a word I know.
Yet sadly, nether is peace a word I’m familiar with either.

I am given sweet bread to eat, but nothing else in this place
Where I feel bitterness around me, as the chains that bind me
Are forged ever stronger about me. Whether ’tis by my destruction
Or by my freedom, be they even entwined:

I yearn to walk freely through the light again.

— 2008-04-26

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A very fine Italian expression comes to mind… couldn’t spell it correctly to save my life but it fits like a glove. In English, it roughly means:

Damn the misery !

Ninja Class, 2008-04-25T2000Z

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Conducted my basics level ‘Ninja’ Class today in our Raven Shield server. Originally planned for Thursday, 2000 Zulu but moved to Friday 2000 Zulu due to business reasons 8=), then moved from [SAS] Training Grounds #1 to [SAS] Proving Grounds #1 for technical reasons :-(.

I think things went fairly well, first time I’ve done a training session in a good while now… first time in a long time I’ve done one without a lesson plan either, you could say I winged it lol. Split things into three phases, because working with Recruit Shadows stealth training was the primary reason behind the session. I tried to keep things basic enough for recruits, less Capt’n Rouge have my head but still keeping the session interesting hehe.

Started off easy trying to get peoples minds into the right mind set. Mindful of ones surroundings, the possible cause and effect of ones actions, and thinking about how we can be more stealthy in what we do so often. And how to adopt from our usual “see tango, shoot tango” functioning, while that works under Green Light conditions it don’t the rest of times. And when you doing recon ops, leaving 10 or 20 dead bodies behind doesn’t help things. Belive it or not, there is a lot more to stealth then slapping on a suppressor and trying not to blow any thing sky high on the way in.

For the second part of training, I moved us onto the warehouse level so I could give them some practical practice time. Cleared the immediate area of threats and had everyone form an element while I set up a patrol route in between the two main buildings. They had to sneak past me — I made the patrol route simple, so it was not very hard but still took some effort to complete.

My favorite part was when I turned around on my patrol and saw Ambu standing in the open and shouted ‘tango spotted’ and fired a warning shot, only to turn left and go ‘tango spotted’ as I saw Ghost — good to see that if I had been a real tango, Ghost was ready to put’em down before Ambu could be harmed. Another fun time was when they snuck all ~5 or so of them right under my noise and then I turn around and their all standing behind me hahaha. I also got Ghost to try the patrol route I set up, and I gave it a go myself and snuck past to the designated objective on my first go.

A lot of times when I do training, I’ll try to challenge people to do better. Like back with Rct Boone and Rct Mando two years ago, they thought it was impossible to do this one room without blowing the heck out of it with tactical aids. So I doubled dared them into taking the room without any tactical aids, full dynamic assault, and without using suppressed weapons to approach the target room. I tagged along with a light machine gun shooting at them trying to distract them and they pulled off the entry, cleared the room without a hitch, and were like “Wow, we actually did it”. While I’m standing here with a smile on my face, thinking “I knew you lads could do it”.

I don’t like to ask any one to do some thing I’m not prepared to do myself, that’s why in my training sessions I’ll often try and arrange for me to have a turn at tricky things. I can’t do worse then fall flat on my face in front of the recruits, and at best I can show it’s actually possible (y).

I remember I once set up a ‘room clearing challenge’ that was modeled after my personal training sessions but I made it even harder and posted it. No body was able to complete the challenge, not even me for a long time… so i started doing more dynamic training myself and I eventually scored a respectable spot on the score board, only name there but that one really nagged at me. How could I ask the recruits do complete a task I couldn’t? So I set out to train until I could, and I did it..

For the last part of training, I wanted to give the guys a chance to relax yet still keep on learning. So I set up a mini live fire scenario where we had to do a double-hostage rescue, rules of engagement red (aka fire on command), and minimise loss of stealth and enemies neutralized to the max possible.

It took maybe 4 or 5 tries but we eventually did the mission, 4 man element, about 3 tangos killed, two hostages rescued, but one causality in the process 🙁

What I really liked about the live fire scenario is I got to see my teammates at work. Setting up angles of fire on the risky threats while we snuck past, so if any one got seen, the tango would have a nice double tap to the head before they could fire. And communicating the positions of the enemy patrols among each other and adopting our plan and formation to the situation.

We also found a few bugs in the map that really made sneaking in some spots harder and once we got ‘stepped on’ so to speak which resulted in the entire element being either gunned down or blown up lol. Eventually though we did it with flying colours (y) but we got plenty of good practice in the middle hehe.

It’s nice to do training again, I really love to have a chance to teach people. Of all the tasks that have eventually found there way to me in [SAS], the one I’ve always carried out the happiest is trying to pass on my experience and what was passed onto me, to a new generation.

In a lot of ways, I think I’m really starting to get to be an ‘old man’ of sorts among my teammates… Although most of them are older then me by a good margin or just a few years younger. I’ve been apart of this team for almost 2 and a half years now. I think in a way, I’m kind of like how people such as En4cer or Shield were to my generation of recruits. I’m not the best teacher but I do sincerely try to help us move into the right direction.

You’re only at your best, when you accept the limit of your current abilities as such rather then seeking a way to better yourself.

And in the [SAS], we always seek to improve ourselves for the future.

So Winucking funny, it’s pitiful !!!

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I honestly don’t know if I should laugh or cry, it’s really that bad but I’m laughing my ass off right now lol.

Like last week I set up Microsofts Services For UNIX 3.5 on my XP machine, configured user/group maps from my Windows XP user account to my account on the OpenBSD server with the NFS shares. I followed the documentation that came with the software to get it set up.

If I try to access \vectrasrvnfs through Windows Explorer I either get an error message or I get the files, or I get BOTH. And trying to even right click to highlight any thing in Windows Explorer causes lock ups for several seconds. If I use the IP address rather then the alias ‘vectra’ that I setup in %SystemRoot%System32Driversetchosts it works slightly faster if I try to use the dir command in the command prompt which is stupid.

When I try to map the share to a network drive in Windows Explorer it dies with an error at \vectrasrvnfs, but I can ‘browse’ for it and then use it some times. It also ignores the maps I set up in the graphical SFU admin program so I can’t access files — and still buggers up when I tell it the login datam.

So finally pissed off after a week of this lag & lock crap, I open a command prompt with SFU’s shell and check the mount commands documentation which tells me to use the Windows Uniform Naming Convention (UNC) syntax for the file paths.

mount \vectrasrvnfs N:

And I get an error message about \vectrasrvnfs being an invalid command line argument to mount. So I for the hell of it I try the unix style host:share syntax to see if that works.

mount vectra:/srv/nfs N:

and BOOM it friging works !!!

I open windows explorer and go to N: in the nav bar and it works QUICKLY just like the NFS Shares mounted on my PC-BSD system do. Now my NFS shares are working through Windows Explorer properly, not like a piece of garbage as it was when doing through the GUI on Windows.

THE IRONY OF IT ALL !?

Microsoft Windows is noted by some people for giving easy, graphical ways to do things that ‘unix’ systems are supposed to lack quality documentation.

I used the ‘easy’, ‘graphical’ interfaces in Windows to do what takes 2 seconds in Unix which is ‘supposed’ to lack documentation and it works like shit or not at all in Windows.

I used the ‘hard’, ‘command line’ like way on Windows, only to find that the ‘supposed’ good documentation is wrong, and guess what — Doing it from the command line on Windows works ____better____ then the GUI once you figure it out.

Time to roll on the freaking floor laughing until my sides hurt !!!!

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Well, it’s been almost 4 hours or more since I took a ‘break’ from SWAT4… A few min to lay down, then get back to work was the plan.

Family has such a great way of fscking you over, don’t they?

Writer’s Block: Define Cheater

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What is your definition of cheating?

Live Journals Writer’s Block

Hmm, guess it depends on the subject.

Strangely when I’ve got to use mg or emacs instead of vim/vi for some thing I often feel like I’m cheating on an old friend… LOL

Generally I define cheating as unfair advantage, being able to fire 2*as fast for example or shooting through walls, spawn raping, etc.

And as to the ‘other’ kind of cheating that comes to mind — not worth doing.

Groaning spider

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So flib’n tired….

Ma is pissed off because the A/C isn’t running a lot, so she can’t sleep, for crying out loud how did she ever stand Florida for 30 years?

The less Ma sleeps, the less work _I_ get done, which is bad because that is more time she spends trying to piss me off. I think it’s fair to say at this point, the more time I spend around my family — the more misserable they make me… Productivity isn’t even possible around them.

I wish I knew some thing about electrical wiring and manipulating A/C units the ‘hard’ way, maybe if I did, I could try to hot wire the bloody thing into running for her or fry myself in the process: which would solve the problem too LOL.

Oh what joy it would be… To actually be able to have a /productive/ day and get some sleep at night too, sheesh… I can’t remember the last time I could get a decent nights sleep, maybe the early 1990s or late 1980s? For some one born in ’88 that sucks lol.

*Sighs* with luck I can at least have time to deal with my mail tonight, it would be kind of nice if I could get some work done tonight, as opposed to having to go to work in the morning, be driven batty, and kept from doing any thing worth doing until after dark… As f’ing usual in this rats nest, I always got stiffed on time to do things but dragged into hop’n, skip’n, and jump’n about to do every thing else but what I’ve got to get done.

I need a freaking vacation