Come alive

by | Jan 5, 2012 | Blog, Quotes


Ask not what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive… then go do it.
Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.

~ Howard Thurman

Pool

by | Jan 5, 2012 | Mobile Photos

  • Camera: SGH-i937
  • Taken: 5 January, 2012
  • Aperture: ƒ/2.65
  • Focal length: 4.03mm
  • ISO: 50
  • Shutter speed: 1/20s

Better Windows file copying and moving with Teracopy

by | Jan 4, 2012 | Blog, Software

I’m not sure how I missed this one.  I remember trying Teracopy a couple of years ago but for the life of me I don’t remember why I didn’t keep using it.
Now that I’ve installed it again I wonder how I’ve got along without it all this time!  I have my usual utilities I install (Notepad++, Filezilla, Firefox, VNC, etc.) and now I’ll add Teracopy to that list.
Windows file copying is better than it used to be for sure but Teracopy just puts the polish on this highly used task.
I’m always copying files here and there and moving them and Teracopy just does a better job of it.  It’s faster, it has error recovery (one of the biggest frustrations with the built in Windows copying), pause and resume and more.  Head over to their website and check it out.  It’s free though there is a paid version that adds a bit more functionality that I haven’t tried but am very tempted to.

Current Book: Einstein biography by Walter Isaacson

by | Jan 3, 2012 | Blog, Books/Reading

20120104-000231.jpg

One of my New Years resolutions is to read more this year. The book I’m currently reading is Einstein, His Life and Universe by Walter Isaacson. I haven’t actually finished the book yet. I’m close to finished and do recommend reading this book. I enjoyed Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Job so much I decided to see what else this author had written and found this as well as a biography of Benjamin Franklin.
I enjoy Walter’s writing style and this book has made me think way more than I planned on. When he writes about Einstein’s theories he gets very technical and in depth. Sometimes it’s almost a physics or math text book in the explanations but done so in a much more enjoyable way than I remember physics and math being in school! This is a great biography that gives great detail into the life of Albert Einstein.

Home furnace keeps shutting off, super easy and cheap fix

by | Jan 2, 2012 | Blog, Miscellaneous

I’ve been having heating issues at home with the arrival of cold weather. Our thermostat is set on 68 most of the time. I’d notice the temperature would be 66 or 65 and the heater would not be on. Turning off the heat at the thermostat and back on seemed to get it going. After a few weeks of this I decided to replace the thermostat.

20120102-015745.jpg
This seemed to fix the issue and I praised myself for not having to pay for an expert to come out and do something simple for me. Until it started to not heat again a couple of weeks later.
Still determined not to pay someone big bucks I went to the greatest source of human knowledge and inspiration since God gave us the Bible, the Internet.
The main fan comes on right away, the heating element by the blowers lights up red hot then all three jets come on for about 4 seconds and promptly shut off.
It does this about 4 times and quits.
I noticed some led lights and they indicated low flame.
Googling this gave me some instructions on cleaning the flame sensor, a metal rod that sits in the midst of the flame and looks like this image:

20120102-014333.jpg
The instructions were to remove this and clean it with sandpaper. Apparently it gets dirty and fails to register the flame is working properly. So far this appears to have fixed the problem.
We’ll see if I once again avoided having to have an expert come out charge me big bucks!
Beware: I am not a heating and air expert just a DIYer with Google. You have been warned.
Here’s a sample link of the advice I used to get mine working: