Dave’s Ramblings

Gab’s first band concert at her new school was last night… Our take… WOW! what a tremendous difference to see and hear. The kids were actually great, and best of all they were really ‘into playing the music’. All of the bands, 6th, 7th, 8th, grades put her old school to shame quite badly. It was nice to see them playing some more contemporary tunes instead just the old classical stuff. A fantastic band program they have got going. Gab had pretty much tossed the clarinet aside for other things before the move, now she’s right back into the groove and will hopefully continue forward, the kids looked like they were really having a good time. We’ll see how she does for the High School band next year, that should really be interesting.

Overall her new school has things figured out, for lack of a better way to explain it, the teachers and people actually KNOW who Gab is, they care and actually make the kids accountable for their time and where they are supposed to be and when.

Nobody at her previous school could even find their asses with both hands and a flashlight. Angel and I spent the rest of the night chiding ourselves for not moving our boys (now grown and moved on in life) to the new district, perhaps they wouldn’t have fallen into that proverbial ‘crack’ and been allowed to just skate through completely unnoticed and with the administration completely unconcerned. They were just warm bodies that carried $8K a year into the school district.

Still fighting trying to get some sort of criminal action taken against the boys that accosted Gab on the school buss a while back. No returned calls, the few times I was actually able to get someone in person or on the phone, promises made for that day are now weeks and weeks past due. Now even the District Attorney for the county seems to be dodging it…. Not sure how much longer I can retain my frustration, it’s so tempting to pick up the phone and call the newspaper and local TV stations with a really juicy scoop for them. Maybe a tap dance on the state DA’s desk would get someone off their dead asses.

PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island (AP) — A detective was killed with his own gun at police headquarters in Providence, Rhode Island, Sunday by a suspect who was not handcuffed and managed to get hold of the weapon, the police chief said.

Esteban Carpio escaped after the shooting but was captured after a struggle a few blocks away and charged with murder on Sunday night, police said.

More on CNN.

I can’t stand when things like this happen, being a 15 year veteran of Law Enforcement myself, and actually having spent all of my pre-teen years growing up a few miles from this location. It’ll be interesting to see what else unfolds from the investigation like how a seasoned cop would allow his sidearm to be taken from him… Hope they had video tape rolling in there… mandated in most states I know, but Rhode Island has always been one of those quirky states for laws.

You are .inf You are informative. When you are gone you make life very difficult for others.
Which File Extension are You?

For those not yet aware phpBB has released another update, now up to v2.0.14. Mostly some minor bug fixes, but also some potentially vulnerability patches as well. Patch up now before we see any more exploits roaming about. The ‘Official’ announcement, patch files, and more more is located here. There is also a mailing list that you can sign up for to receive email alerts of any changes or updates to the base code on their site.

For those still not running the latest version of phpBB, I suggest you update IMMEDIATELY, our boards are still taking and subsequently rejecting over 6,000 hits a day from the santy worm. If you need assistance with adding rules for your .htaccess to stop these little nasties just let me know and I’ll happily post them here for your use. They’ve been employed since the worms first showed up and have shown to be most effective, but still not a replacement for updating your software! Even extremely heavily modified forums such as ours are easily updated.

WTF is an INVALID SKIM KEY? Okay I had to give in and call the dealership on this one. This was the results of searching for the error code being thrown by Angel’s Durango, she complained it would start and immediately die on her, repeatedly. I figured either there’s water in the gas, somethings gone terribly awry, or she’s lost her mind and not fully starting the engine, this truck is like 8 months old with 6K miles on it. So I got home and looked for any error codes in the computer.. P-0513, hmm okay we got something here… INVALID SKIM KEY is the only thing I can find…

I found out what the hell it is now, and as it turns out it’s pretty much what it sounds like. Part of the anti-theft package that I must have been gouged horrifically for, at start up the computers actually scans for a microchip that is stored in the key itself, no chip found or wrong chip = kill engine. Neat feature, to a point, no chip found too many times = computer shuts down period, it will not run anymore until reset by the dealer even with the right key! This of course means a tow truck ride for your ride.

Fortunately that limit has not been reached yet, the service guy told me some are set at 5 others at 10 wrong tries before shutdown, Gee isn’t that helpful. So Angel now has my key with presumably a good chip in it, it’s working, so she can get her stuff done, and I get to take it in to the dealer sort out what happened to her key, of course I have to take the truck and both keys, anyone want to take bets there is only one more “you used the wrong key” left on the counter and I’ll blow it before I can get it in?

Like I said, pretty cool anti-theft deally. I’m afraid to ask how much that cost me, I suppose in the city it would be nice to have but we’ve always lived way out in the sticks, my idea of locking a trucks means turning off the ignition but leaving the key there or dropping the keys on the floor by the seat so I can find them later.