I Owe My Mother

1. My mother taught me TO APPRECIATE A JOB WELL DONE .
 "If you're going to kill each other, do it outside. I just finished cleaning."

2. My mother taught me RELIGION.
 "You better pray that will come out of the carpet."

3. My mother taught me about TIME TRAVEL .
"If you don't straighten up, I' m going to knock you into the middle of next week!"

 4. My mother taught me LOGIC.
" Because I said so, that's why."

5. My mother taught me MORE LOGIC.
"If you fall out of that swing and break your neck, you're not going to the store with me."

6. My mother taught me FORESIGHT.
"Make sure you wear clean underwear, in case you're in an accident."

7. My mother taught me IRONY .
"Keep crying, and I'll give you something to cry about."

8. My mother taught me about the science of OSMOSIS .
"Shut your mouth and eat your supper."

9. My mother taught me about CONTORTIONISM.
"Will you look at that dirt on the back of your neck!"

10. My mother taught me about STAMINA .
"You'll sit there until all that spinach is gone."

11 My mother taught me about WEATHER.
"This room of yours looks as if a tornado went through it."

12. My mother taught me about HYPOCRISY.
"If I told you once, I've told you a million times. Don't exaggerate!"

13. My mother taught me the CIRCLE OF LIFE.
"I brought you into this world, and I can take you out."

14. My mother taught me about BEHAVIOR MODIFICATION.
"Stop acting like your father!"

15. My mother taught me about ENVY.
"There are millions of less fortunate children in this world who don't have wonderful parents like you do."

16. My mother taught me about ANTICIPATION.
"Just wait until we get home."

17. My mother taught me about RECEIVING .
"You are going to get it when you get home!"

18. My mother taught me MEDICAL SCIENCE.
 "If you don't stop crossing your eyes, they are going to get stuck that way."

19 My mother taught me ESP.
"Put your sweater on; don't you think I know when you are cold?"

20. My mother taught me HUMOR.
"When that lawn mower cuts off your toes, don't come running to me."

21. My mother taught me HOW TO BECOME AN ADULT .
"If you don't eat your vegetables, you'll never grow up."

22. My mother taught me GENETICS.
"You're just like your father."

23. My mother taught me about my ROOTS.
"Shut that door behind you.  Do you think you were born in a barn?"

24. My mother taught me WISDOM.
"When you get to be my age, you'll understand."

25. And my favorite: My mother taught me about JUSTICE .
"One day you'll have kids, and I hope they turn out just like you"

GEORGE CARLIN'S NEW RULES FOR 2008

New Rule 1:
No more gift registries. You know, it used to be just for weddings. Now it's for babies and new homes and graduations from rehab. Picking out the stuff you want and having other people buy it for you isn't gift giving, it's the white people version of looting.

New Rule 2:
Stop giving me that pop-up ad for classmates.com! There's a reason you don't talk to people for 25 years. Because you don't particularly like them! Besides, I already know what the captain of the football team is doing these days --- mowing my lawn.

New Rule 3:
Don't eat anything that's served to you out a window unless you're a seagull. People are acting all shocked that a human finger was found in a bowl of Wendy's chili. Hey, it cost less than a dollar. What did you expect it to contain? Lobster?

New Rule 4:
Stop saying that teenage boys who have sex with their hot, blonde teachers are permanently damaged. I have a better description for these kids: "Lucky bastards."

New Rule 5:
If you need to shave and you still collect baseball cards, you're a dope. If you're a kid, the cards are keepsakes of your idols. If you're a grown man, they're pictures of men.

New Rule 6:
Ladies, leave your eyebrows alone. Here's how much men care about your eyebrows: Do you have two of them? Good. We're done.

New Rule 7:
There's no such thing as flavored water. There's a whole aisle of this crap at the supermarket -water, but without that watery taste. Sorry, but flavored water is called a soft drink. You want flavored water? Pour some scotch over ice and let it melt. That's your flavored water.

New Rule 8:
Stop screwing with old people. Target is introducing a redesigned pill bottle that's square, with a bigger label. And the top is now the bottom. And by the time grandpa figures out how to open it, his ass will be in the morgue. Congratulations, Target, you just solved the Social Security crisis.

New Rule 9:
The more complicated the Starbucks order, the bigger the asshole. If you walk into a Starbucks and order a 'decaf grandee, half-soy, half-low fat, iced vanilla, double-shot, gingerbread cappuccino, extra dry, light ice, with one Sweet-n'-Low, and One NutraSweet, 'ooooh, you're a huge asshole.

New Rule 10:
I'm not the cashier! By the time I look up from sliding my card, entering My PIN number, pressing 'Enter,' verifying the amount, deciding, no, I don't want Cash back, and pressing 'Enter' again, the kid who is supposed to be ringing me up is standing there eating my Almond Joy.

New Rule 11:
Just because your tattoo has Chinese characters in it doesn't make you spiritual. It's right above the crack of your ass. And it translates as 'beef with broccoli. 'The last time you did anything spiritual, you were praying to God you weren't pregnant. You're not spiritual. You're just high.

New Rule 12:
Competitive eating isn't a sport. It's one of the seven deadly sins. ESPN recently televised the U.S. Open of Competitive Eating, because watching those athletes at the poker table was just too damned exciting. What's next, competitive farting? Oh wait, they're already doing that. It's called "The Howard Stern Show."

New Rule 13:
I don't need a bigger "mega" M&Ms. If I'm extra hungry for M&Ms, I'll go nuts and eat two.

New Rule 14:
If you're going to insist on making movies based on crappy old television shows, then you have to give everyone in the Cineplex a remote so we can see what's playing on the other screens. Let's remember the reason something was a television show in the first place is that the idea wasn't good enough to be a movie.

New Rule 15:
And this one is long overdue: No more bathroom attendants. After I zip up, some guy is offering me a towel and a mint like I just had sex with George Michael. I can't even tell if he's supposed to be there, or just some freak with a fetish. I don't want to be on your webcam, Dude. I just want to wash my hands.

New Rule 16:
If you ever hope to be a credible adult and want a job that pays better than minimum wage, then for God's sake don't pierce or tattoo every available piece of flesh. If so, then plan your future around saying, "Do you want fries with that?"

Happy New Year!!

Well it has been far too long since I graced the pages of my blog, or updated my photo gallery.  Well that is about to change (at least I hope).

On the photo front, I've broken down and have a new laptop (a Dell XPS), and most importantly Adobe PhotoShop and Adobe Ligthroom.  Let me start off with saying Lightroom rocks. No knock to gimp and dcraw, but I never quite got the juju for messing with RAW files on my FreeBSD boxes. Additionally not have any real colour management has been an issue.  Now that I've been shooting RAW and comparing to the JPEG output, it's making me kick my ass that I didn't shoot RAW all the time.  To use a photographer pun

Now I've seen the light!!

Citrix 2k3 Tuning Changes.

After much work, here are some common Citrix 2k3 tuning changes I often make:


HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\TCPIP\Parameters

• DWORD MaxUserPort and set to 65534 (new entry)
• DWORD TcpWindowSize and set to 65535
• DWORD MaxFreeTcbs and set to 72000 (new entry)
• DWORD MaxHashTableSize and set to 65536 (new entry)
• DWORD TcpTimedWaitDelay and set to 60 (new entry)
• DWORD KeepAliveTime 300000 (new entry)
• DWORD KeepAliveInterval 1000 (new entry)
• DWORD TcpMaxDataRetransmissions 10 (new entry)
• DWORD NumTcbTablePartitions 4 *<numcpu> (new entry)

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\TCPIP\Parameters\Interfaces\{OID}

• DWORD TcpAckFrequency 13 for gigE 5 for FE (new entry)

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Citrix\XTEConfig

• DWord MaxThreads 255 (new entry)

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\Current Control Set\Control\File System

• DWORD SecondLevelDataCache <CPU CACHE SIZE> (new entry)

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management

• DWORD DisablePagingExecutive 1
• DWORD SecondLevelDataCache <CPU CACHE SIZE>
• DWORD IoPageLockLimit 65536 (new value)

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\7.0\FeatureLockdown

• DWORD BEFIPrintMe 0
• DWORD bPurchaseAcro 0
• DWORD bUpdater 0
• DWORD bRegisterProduct 0
• DWORD bShowAdsAllow 0

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\7.0\AdobeViewer

• DWORD EULA 0

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\7.0\Updater

• DWORD bShowAutoUpdateConfDialog 0
• DWORD bShowNotifDialog 0
• DWORD iUpdateFrequency 0

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\7.0\Originals

• DWORD bDisplaySplash 0

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main

• DWORD Force Offscreen Composition 1

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\Common

• DWORD QMEnable 0

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\LanmanServer\Parameters

• DWORD IRPStackSize 15 (new value)
• DWORD SizReqBuf 32768 (new value)
• DWORD MaxMpxCt 1024 (new value)
• DWORD MaxWorkItems 4096 (new value)

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Lanman\WorkStation\Paramters

• DWORD UtilizeNTCaching 0 (new value)

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server\WinSatations\ICA-tcp\UserOveride\Control Panel\Desktop

• "AutoEndTasks" ="1"
• "MenuShowDelay"=10"
• "CursorBlinkRate"="-1"
• "DragFullWindows"="0"
• "WaitToKillAppTimeout"="20000"
• "SmoothScroll" = dword:0
• "Wallpaper" = "<advaniswall paper>"

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server\WinSatations\ICA-tcp\UserOveride\Control Panel\Desktop\WindowMetrics

• "MinAnimate"="0"

(NOTE these could also be RDP-tcp)
HEKY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer

• REG_SZ AlwaysUnloadDLL 1

HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Control Panel\Desktop

• REG_SZ MenuShowDelay 10

HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main

• DWORD "Force Offscreen Composition" 1 (new value)

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\ICABrowser\Parameters

• REG_SZ DisabledTcpAddress <IPADDR OF INTERFACE TO DISABLE> (new value)

From some of the following:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/q120642/
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/q158474/
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/324270/en-us
http://technet2.microsoft.com/WindowsServer/en/library/db56b4d4-a351-40d5-b6b1-998e9f6f41c91033.mspx?mfr=true
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/interopmigration/unix/sfu/perfnfs.mspx#EWF

Useful Postgres Queries

Getting a list of dbnames

/usr/local/bin/psql -q -t -A -h -d template1 -c "SELECT datname FROM pg_database WHERE datname not in ('template0','template1')"

Getting a list of name spaces for a given DB

/usr/local/bin/psql -q -t -A -h -d < DB > -c " select schemaname from pg_tables where schemaname not in ('pg_catalog','information_schema') group by schemaname"

Getting a list of tables (including name spaces)

/usr/local/bin/psql -q -t -A -h -d < DB > --field-separator "." -c "select schemaname,tablename from pg_tables where schemaname not in ('pg_catalog','information_schema')"

Getting a list of locks on the DB server (from within a psql prompt)

SELECT procpid, usename ,datname, (now() - query_start) as age, c.relname , l.mode, l.granted FROM pg_stat_activity a LEFT OUTER JOIN pg_locks l ON (a.procpid = l.pid) LEFT OUTER JOIN pg_class c ON (l.relation = c.oid);

Looking at what is connected to a given Database name (from within a psql prompt)

select * from pg_stat_activity where datname='< DB >';