Calendars and Clocks and Computers and Coffeeshop
I had a kinda busy/kinda productive couple of days (with help from a couple of people). But I can't shake the feeling that there was something planned for today that I forgot to write down.
I know my VCRs won't automagically switch to Daylight Spending Time[1] tonight, but I think that one of them will try to do so on the old date and need to be set back then. I'm not sure which of my computers will/won't automatically spring forward; most won't, but at least one got a batch of OS upgrades installed that may or may not have included a DST patch. I'm not sure whether to expect next year to be on the new schedule or the old schedule, so I hven't decided whether to patch the ones that need to be patched by hand, or just stay up tonight to set their clocks manually.
There's been a major flurry of activity on the lowest floor of the house across the street, ripping out the bricked-up windows, installing widowsills, patching the mortar in the outside wall, redoing some of the masonry inside, fixing up the floor. I've lost track of what permits the owner has gotten -- it sounds as though the first round or permits were to allow him to do the work that was required to apply for the second round of permits, or something -- but the coffee shop he wants to open seems to be back on track. He said his proposed paint and signage sailed through the community associating meeting easily (it's a historical district, and there are a bunch of rules related to that regarding what is allowed on the street-facing sides[2] of houses here). There's no glass in the windows yet, and there's a couple of big storefront window openings still bricked up that I'd never noticed until he pointed them out, saying they'd let in a lot more light when he opens those up.
Why do I feel funny about setting up a computer in a tower-style case on its side? I never hesitated a moment in setting up a desktop-style case on end. And I can't think of a mechanical reason[3] not to put a tower case on its side. It just ... feels wrong, and the fact that it feels wrong and I don't know why feels even more wrong. (It's not quite a strong enough feeling to stop me from doing it, to fit computers into the rack, but it'll take me a little while to get used to seeing them that way.)
Now if only I could either shake this feeling of having forgotten something, or remember what it is I've forgotten ...
[1] vvalkyri pointed out an interview on NPR about daylight saving time, in which it was pointed out that a) DST doesn't actually save energy because what we save on lighting is more than offset by gasoline used to get to various events taking advantage of the evening light, and b) the main proponents of DST have been business interests because the main effect of DST is that people spend more time shopping when they have extra daylight after work! So it occurs to me that since we are not "saving daylight" (there are still the same number of daylit hours) nor saving energy, the name ought to reflect the true purpose: spending. Hence "daylight spending time", which fortunately uses the same abbreviation as the official name.
[2] I know, the "street-facing side" is usually referred to more concisely as the "front". But the storefront in question across the street is actually the side of the house it's under; the front of the house is on Fulton Ave.
[3] I've heard that hard disks don't like to be formatted in one orientation and then used in a different one, but a) I don't know whether that claim is legitimate, b) if it doesn't turn out to be completely bogus, I don't know whether it applies generally or only to particular generations of drives, and c) for most of the spare drives I've got lying around waiting to be stuck into computers, I have no idea what orientation they were used in by their previous owners anyhow.