Todd's Place
I don't do these:
  • Last Seen
  • Blog
  • Contact
  • Air Quality

Vivi-in-a-basket

2/28/2018

0 Comments

 
Vivi loves laundry day. Luckily for Vivi, almost every day is laundry day. We do at least one load per day. We love fresh laundry, but not as much as Vivi!
​
0 Comments

Vivi has a dozen birthdays

1/22/2018

0 Comments

 
Vivi doesn't really know what's going on. Sure, her vocabulary is ridiculous. It's just that a 2-year-old brain can only grasp so much. We take advantage of this by making it her birthday, any day we feel like it. What could go wrong?

Vivi never could figure out how to blow out candles. We tried and tried to show her. Then, like everything toddlers do, she just seemed like she knew how to do it all along.

More amazing, Vivi can sing the Happy Birthday song by herself. Super Cute!!
​
0 Comments

Push an iMac 5k Retina, and it will Die!

1/17/2018

0 Comments

 
I push my computers. Hard.

By crushing the disk drives with large compilation jobs, I rarely get even 3 years out of a spinning hard disk or laptop. With a PC, the hardware is modular and super easy to replace. With Apple, not so much. Sketchy Apple hardware design is the reason ifixit exists.

I can engineer the cooling of my PC's to handle the loads. With Apple, you get what you get. As a company, Apple never really "got" developers. So even if Apple built their hardware to handle heavy usage, you can't service and replace parts yourself. iMac's just can't handle huge software work.

For example, my latest software project builds saturate all CPU cores at 100%, while compiling over 1 MILLION source files. This takes 3 hours.

Here I show that, for most of the 3 hours, iMac cooling systems are overwhelmed. The 4GHz base clock rate of an Intel CPU is supposed to be the absolute minimum. Well, here we see that Apple lies, in this case. This was my life for a year, using my iMac as a VM server, using VMware Fusion. BTW VMware Fusion + OS X + iMac 5k  is a great combination!! I'd rather have that software stack on less-than-reliable hardware than a perfectly reliable Windows 10 box.

After a year of intermittent abuse, I came home to a dead iMac. *sigh*

I tried everything. Not a peep or beep. D-E-D DEAD. After a trip to a Mac repair store, and about $1,000, it turns out the entire motherboard was completely fried.

Since Apple hardware is weak (especially cooling) but their software is strong, I'll also put in an order for an iMac Pro. Then we'll see if that lies and dies too... 

Worst case, I'll have to go back to the dev stack we used in my previous company. Apple iMac's a displays/terminals, VMware ESXi servers, dedicated iSCSI servers for the ESXi, remote monitoring and reboot and VPN's for all the things. It's gross, I know. But we have ESXi servers which have survived almost a decade.

Here's hoping I won't have to do that just yet... Fingers Crossed!!

​:)
0 Comments

Christmas Eve in the deep, deep woods of PA

12/24/2017

0 Comments

 
My parents have lived in the deep woods of central Pennsylvania for decades. It is gorgeous, but very remote. There have only been really two tenuous links to civilization, one wire brings power, and another wire brings a phone landline. For many decades, and for my entire childhood there, that was it. No cable TV. No Internet. Nada.

For example, the house is located off a dirt lane off a highway. There are 3 neighbors and you can't even see them. It's out there!

Slowly, and with great effort, my brother and I have upgraded the house over the years. They now have Satellite TV, Mobile Internet, Mesh WiFi, routers, firewalls, iPads, mobile phones, caller ID on their TV, a huge backup generator (for when a tree knocks their power out for weeks), LED lighting everywhere, etc...

Here is a little welcome lighting for when my brother and his family visit later in the week.
​

Then, as if by Christmas miracle, we got a perfect dusting of white snow on Christmas eve.

(In the background is my ridiculous and fun rental car, a 400HP, flame-orange, Dodge Challenger. Highly recommended!!)

Ho Ho Ho! 

Merry Christmas from the Brennan family!

0 Comments

Great translator. Poor egg-courier.

12/19/2017

0 Comments

 
0 Comments

Vivi is sad she can't call Dada

12/12/2017

0 Comments

 
The audio is a little quiet, but priceless...
​
0 Comments

One of my favorite pics from Hong Kong!

11/1/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
0 Comments

Sending Pashu off properly

10/30/2017

0 Comments

 
Nothing like fresh WA farmer's market veggies, and New Seasons fresh pasta, with some fresh basil from our plant!

​Wash it down with Steven Smith Teamaker home-made Exceptional Iced Tea (and organic turbinado sugar). YUM!
​
0 Comments

Pizza Party hosted by the Amazing Erickson Family

10/28/2017

0 Comments

 
Mark has always made pizzas from scratch, even when I knew him as an undergraduate student in Wisconsin. Lovely Kristin is a gourmet pizza chef as well. We are celebrating, so we finished with Sheridan's Frozen Custard, Danish Almond Kringle, and Veuve Clicquot champagne.

The pizza and salad were the stars of the show, with bouncy Maryn presiding!
​ 
0 Comments

Refinishing our fence

10/17/2017

0 Comments

 
The climate in Boston is evil to wood. Torrential rains, frigid cold, snow drifts which bury cars, weeks of humid 100-degree days, damp mildew, etc...

We decided to create an oiled-wood fence, just to see if it could survive. With the miracle of Penofin, wood can survive. With care, the wood will develop a pretty patina over time.

After 3 years, our fence was mildewed and tired. I powerwashed the wood, let it dry out, got skunked by fall rain, let it dry out again, then a group of friends joined me and we refinished the wood.

Much better!

The powerwasher shredded some wood, and the mildew got into the oil, so we did some light sanding. Before and after sanding:
​

I have the best friends!!
​
Picture

It turned out great!
​
Picture
0 Comments
<<Previous
Forward>>

    Author

    I'm an applied-math-research Ph.D. and serial startup founder. I am a recognized computer security expert, fortunate to join the ranks of many, great CTO's. I've founded and seed-funded multiple, successful, VC-backed companies. I'm still at it!

    My wonderful wife and I moved from New England to near the Portland Oregon area. We LOVE the Pacific Northwest, and we've been here a few years now. We have an adorable baby girl, Vivi.

    People here are nice and smile a lot. Vegetables are insanely delicious. Driving is not like Mad Max.

    This blog is very Vivi-centric. Our family just can't resist. :) Also, there are some stupid hacking and geek tricks.


    Archives

    December 2020
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    June 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    January 2014
    October 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Copyright 2012-2021  Todd Brennan