I dreamed last night that I sold my miata. Now I'm not saying it was a nightmare, but suffice it to say I could not go back to sleep.

It was so vivid, even to the point of me remembering that I have 5 wheels and 4 tires that I would then need to sell, that never have been on the ground.

I really enjoy this car, and have it almost just like I like it.

DNM

 

Anyone else not in the ‘Where’s My Payment’ system? I filed an extension last year and owed money (usually owe money — I like getting interest on my cash vs the gov getting my interest), so there was no need for putting direct deposit info. I filed an extension again for this year. I don’t exist in the Get My Payment system, and I want my stimulus dollars, but have no idea if I have to do something or if the gov just dropped the ball on missing me in their system?!?

 

Hell, I'm still waiting for my federal refund from last year.

 

If you don't file with direct deposit, you gotta wait for your check.

I'm still waiting for my taxes to be done. I'm pretty sure everything is just on hold right now though.

 

Self employed, no direct deposit. Not in the system either.

 

I reside in the camp of "i believe the individual stimulus should be based solely on a percentage of total income tax dollars paid"

Instead, I'm over here wondering how much I'm going to end up paying for the stimulus checks that everyone else is receiving.

 

I think we, and many generations yet to come, will be paying for this for the rest of our lives.

 

Originally, I was expecting to pay about 3 times that amount back as a taxpayer*. Now that we are freely choosing to give our earnings to airlines even if we don't choose to use them, I believe that number will be closer to six times the $1200 per taxpayer*.

American Airlines will receive $4,100,000,000 in GRANTS, Delta Airlines will receive $3,800,000,000 in GRANTS, Southwest Airlines will receive $2,200,000,000 in GRANTS, JetBlue will receive $685,000,000 in GRANTS, United Airlines and others have yet to work out their "agreements."

*Taxpayers are adults who annually pay more than they receive from the government, by my own definition. Note that the taxpayers who will pay the most for this atrocity won't even be receiving a stimulus check.

 

 

New top arrives today. I’m bittersweet. Old top was Robbins cloth streamline with glass and defroster. Didn’t feel like dropping $800 to get a cloth top again. Went with the factory style Vinyl w/ glass from autotopsdirect for $500 with the new rain rail and tension cables. I’ll miss dropping the top with the cloth in the colder months, me thinks.

 

Curious as to why not cloth?

Also, how long did it last?

I ask because I installed a Robbins cloth top w/ defrost about four and a half years ago, and it's holding up like a champ.

 

That's strange. I thought the conversation went that you were going with vinyl for ease of maintenance. Good choice, though.
I also like the cloth. I used the Aerospace 303 Fabric Guard water repellant on mine for water than runs off like a waxed surface.
DNM

 

Maintenance? I haven't even washed this car in the five years I've owned it, much less sprayed any shiny stuff on it.

The drivetrain gets maintained. The body is pretty much time-limited by how long it has left until it breaks in half due to rust. I'm guessing 3-4 more years, tops.

 

So, it turns out that distribution amplifiers require electrical power in order to function.

They don't specifically state that in the manual, but apparently it's important.

So... yeah. That's why we lost a live-shot last night.

Lesson learned: when instructing the crew to install a new DA frame, and connect important signals through it, be sure to clarify that the power supplies in the frame also need to be connected to a source of AC power.

 

It's one of those things that seems so obvious looking back, but is easily overlooked in the middle of a project.

 

Rather than ramble about a shorthair's IT infrastructure, I'm going to ramble about my own.

I'm looking to massively complicate my home network for fun. Based on what I've seen on The Internet(TM), the Ubiquiti Unifi managed switches and access points are a great, user-friendly option. However, it would seem that their modem solutions can leave much to be desired. A mini-PC running pfSense comes up often as an alternative solution, but before dropping $300 for just the router I want to make sure I'm not massively overbuying or overlooking other alternatives.

And before you ask, the Unifi Dream Machine appears to be a buggy mess. I'm going to be stretching myself enough with the rest of the networking side of things that I don't want to be dealing with beta-testing new hardware for free.

 

This is the true life of a TV chief engineer.

Got a call from the station about 15 minutes ago. The audio console in Production Control 1 is acting funny. It's passing audio fine, but some of the displays aren't working properly.

Talked them through the very complex process of turning it off (pull the power cables from both supplies), then on again (plug them back in.)

Now it's working.

Apparently, this makes me a genius.

 

Ubiquiti wireless gear is really nice. Big fan.
On the router front, our shop installs Sonicwalls. I have (at least) one installed at each of my customers, from a humble TZ300 on up to an NSA 3600 failover cluster that runs one of my bigger financial institution customers and also a local parish government customer. Look into the TZ series for a SOHO application.
This is of course making All The Assumptions, since you didn't tell us what you actually want to DO with this gear. You have to decide if you want a UTM solution or if you want to cobble a solution together from multiple vendors.

 

The cloth top lasted about 10 years and 40-45k miles of spring/summer driving in the Chicago area. I didn’t use it in winter and failed to condition it the last few years of its life due to kids and other life distractions.

 

a happy manager it does not make when the solution is a soft/hard reset that literally anyone could have done. I can relate hahaha