Winter storm watch-Akkkkk!!!

Why am I in a panic? Oh gee…. been sick, been busy at work, and No Time To Shop!!! On top of that, we have a winter storm warning and that means not fast easy trip to one of the big shopping centers. Unless I can pursuade George to drive tomorrow, I will be giving everyone IOU’s or cash in a card.

I usually don’t wait. I usually have everything bought, wrapped and under the tree by now. Not this year though. Between crazy clients, our bank loosing our statement, (don’t ask… don’t EVEN ask) and me getting sick right after finals, I’m behind.

Oh, and it is cold. Windy and Cold! My office is like an icebox. Even my little heater isn’t helping.

Kevin and George are happy though. They’ve been playing with the new antennas and hope to order more next year if they work out alright. They have one of the Ubiquity bullets set up in the windy zone out at the one ranch that blows an antenna every few months. If it lasts a month, our supplier had better be ready for a bulk order.

Meanwhile, Mr. Clark is still pissed at me. I think he had great plans for those balls… Oh well.

Snow!

(originally posted on December 3rd, but somehow got lost in the dregs of the internet)

Oh gods it was cold this morning! It snowed last night and we woke up to about 4 inches of the stuff. Mr. Clark was not ammused. He took a few steps out into the snow and leapt back inside. I got ready for work and headed off.

The truck took forever to start, so I was frozen by the time I got to work. George didn’t have the heat going for very long, so the office was cold. So, I wore my coat until it did warm up.

We are getting new antennas next week. Ubiquiti has some new toys. We started using the big Power Stations. They were the only thing that would reach into some of the valleys we have to deal with. Then they came out with the Nano Stations. Very compact and far more usable than the others. Now there is the PicoStation and the Bullet to choose from. George and Kevin were drooling all over the keyboard. We are getting 6 PicoStations and 2 Bullets to play with next week. It will be interesting to see how they work in comparison to the older stuff.

By the time I left work, most the snow had melted, but it was still cold. I guess I’d better dig out the long undies and heavy sweaters. Especially as I suspect George rather buy new antennas than put money into heat. I swear that office never got above 60 today.

Life in a war zone…

At least that’s the way it feels to me! I’ve been so busy this week, that it is the first time I’ve had to read email or post here!

Friday, we were down again. Once because of the hacker, once because of the phone company. They were sure that WE were some how responsible for the local DSL connections being screwy. Once we explained that we ran our business on multiple T-1 s at multiple locations and had no interface with the local phone system except for the land line on my desk, they shut up. By the time I left, George and Kevin were setting up a directional antenna in the back yard. They started to explain what they were doing, but after a whole day of arguing with the phone company, I really didn’t care.

Monday the office was strewn with cables going from the server room to the antenna to the laptop with the Wi-spy connection. Our connection was down again. George had taken it down so that he could check some cable bundles. So, I answered the phone and routed Kevin to various jobs.

Meanwhile, George was using the antenna on the back porch to check the signals coming off of the antenna farm up on the hill. Hughes has about eight antennas up there. George was trying to see if the signal matched our hacker. The hill was in the general area he and Kevin had triangulated the other day. He wasn’t too talkative, so I just left him alone.

Tuesday and Wednesday was pretty similar. However, I walked in this morning and George had a grin on his face that was so full I was afraid it would meet round the back and the top of his head would fall off. I asked him why he was so happy.  especially after the week we’ve had!

George handed me a sheet of print outs. Stuff from the Channelizer analysis. I looked at them and felt sort of dumb, because while I understood that they matched, I wasn’t sure what it was I was looking at. I asked George what it meant and he explained that he had the finger print of our hacker. Enough of one that he sent a feedback loop to slap the guy. Then he dragged me outside to look up the hill towards the antenna farm.

First thing I saw was the Hughes truck at the house just below the crest of the hill. Up on a ladder was a Hughes tech replacing one of their rather expensive panel antennas. I pointed that out and George just smiled again. I also noticed that the big directional antenna was gone. We went back inside.

George then explained that he’d figured out that someone at Hughes had used the network connection of the guy up on the hill to help focus the hack attack.  What he had done besides hack us was disrupt the entire DSL connection for the neighborhood and burned out the guy’s antenna. All I could do was giggle. Yes, we’d been down for a few days and had business disrupted, but… we weren’t out any equipment. In fact, George and Kevin had gotten really good at using Wi-Spy. However, Hughes was having to replace antennas. Ahhhh… Karma!

Techs blowing in the Wind

George and Kevin went out on at least two service calls where the wind had blown over the customer’s antennas. I thought they were joking at first, but no! Winds hit nearly 45mph at one point. Of course in the middle of this, they had to go up to the NOC as well. (Network Operations Center) Pretty fancy word for a 10ft X 10ft Tuff shed. Kevin thought that they were going to have to go up the tower, but luckily, all they needed to do was reset the server. The T-1 hiccuped. Not surprised really. Any time the wind blows or there is too much rain, all the phones in town stop working. I think that Mr. Bell put in the original lines! I’ve learned that the company does almost as many phone line repairs as they do computer repairs because the local service is so bad. Wiring that looks like spaghetti or so brittle that when you go to hook it up, it turns to powder in your hand.

George had to crawl up a ladder at one house and ended up hanging onto the roof with one hand and adjusting the antenna with the other. Kevin held the ladder still. They finally called it a day when they put the ladder up at one house and before they could climb it, the wind knocked it off the building. When they came in, George’s hair looked like someone had given him electric shock treatments. It literally stood out at all angles.

Meanwhile, I got to chase papers all over the office. I had my window open to catch a bit of the breeze, and before I knew it the wind had literally swept my desk. It took me twenty minutes to pick things up. Oh, and ten to close the window. It stuck!

Today was the busiest phone day as well. All the monthly subscriptions were up for the wireless service and everyone was calling in for instructions on how to sign in again. I don’t understand what is so difficult. You pay for the Internet on a monthly basis. Every month you sign in just like you did the month before. Idiots! Or, as Jake says… “It’s a Pebdac error.” (problem exists between desk and chair) Jake’s other favorite is an Id-10-T error. (idiot) Yes, more of those fun acronyms. Whee…..

When I wasn’t chasing papers and answering the phone, I actually got a set of minutes typed and some figures loaded into a spreadsheet. Wheeee!

Now it’s off to bed with a good book. I’m worn out.