The Taber Family Blog

I finished the last piece of my home web/mail server migration today! Several weeks ago, my home web/mail server went down with a bad power supply fan, which meant all of my web sites and email services were no longer available to my family and paying customers.

First some history: In the not too distant past I actually ran all of these services from multiple rack mounted servers in my garage, but over the years and after paying way too many high PGE bills, I consolidated all of my servers into a single Dell small form factor server running on my desktop. My PGE bills naturally went down, but I was still at the mercy of how reliable my DSL connection to the world was each day. And with a business DSL connection, the fastest upload speed I was able to get in the comfortable price range was 768 megabits per second. Not nearly fast enough for a robust email and web server environment in my opinion.

Well, when this little Dell went down a few weeks ago, it occurred to me that the time had come to end this home server experiment and move all of my sites and services into a hosted environment. But I couldn’t do all of that overnight, so I quickly ordered a replacement fan for the Dell server and until that arrived, I was able to continue operating the server with the case open and by pointing a small fan at the open CPU. This kept things cool enough to run each day. When the replacement power supply arrived, I was able to get that installed in a record 10 minutes (for me anyway), close the server case and resume normal operations!

The next step was finding a suitable Linux-based hosting provider with affordable monthly rates, shell access and the type of granular control I would need to continue hosting my websites and email. After evaluating a few candidates, I settled with a company called HostMonster.com. In addition to unlimited domains, unlimited email accounts, unlimited server space and unlimited bandwidth, the price per month dropped to an incredible $3.95 if you paid for three years up front. Sounded like a great deal, so I signed up and started the migration process for all of my websites and email customers.

Fortunately with shell access and using rsync over SSH, I was able to upload/copy all of my data (and there was a lot of it) over to the new HostMonster server. The migration process took a number of days, since my upload speeds from the house are so slow.  A couple of highlights include that HM used the Dovecot IMAP mail server, so the formatting of my existing mail boxes was exactly the same as where they would ultimately be hosted. What a time saver! Setting up Apache and the various domains was pretty easy, in addition to keeping things clearly compartmentalized on the server too. I’m also very happy with being able to offer my customers a much better webmail experience too. Not only does HM have SquirrelMail (which my customers had already been using), but Horde and RoundCube webmail are also available.

The last phase of my server migration involved moving my entire Nagios server/services monitoring application from my home server to the Amazon EC2 Cloud. I got this done today. Essentially I brought up a new server instance in the Amazon Ec2 Cloud, installed all the LAMP stack requirements and then installed and configured Nagios. I was able to save a great deal of time by rsyncing my existing plugins and configuration files from the old server. With a few tweaks here and there, Nagios came up clean and is now monitoring all of the sites and services offered by my employer. And I can sleep better at night knowing that the monitoring is now being done outside of my home network, which can be spotty on its own, and lead to erroneous notifications.

And finally, the coup de grâce. I was able to power off the little Dell home web/email server this morning. Sleep well buddy, you done good.

In Winters

On Saturday, Denise and decided to take our first Fall bike ride. The ride was actually my first in nearly a year and something I had been looking forward to for a long time. We felt we could make the 18+ mile ride into the small city of Winters and back, for a nearly 40 mile ride. We left Vacaville at 10am and as luck would have it, we suffered our first flat tire just outside of Vacaville, near I505. I had never changed a flat tire on a road bike, so this was a good learning experience for me, although I can honestly report my mood wasn’t the most pleasant at that point.

I got the tire patched and repaired in short order and we rode on northward. The fall weather was great for riding and as we got about 2 miles outside of Winters, Denise suffered a flat tire. Our second of the day! Seems like I might have angered the biking gods somehow this day. Nevertheless, we pulled over into a nearby walnut tree orchard and I repaired my second tire of the day. By this time it was getting into the early afternoon and neither Denise and I were in the mood any longer for the ride back. So we stopped into a local Winters coffee shop, called a close friend (Sara D.) and were graciously taxied back to Vacaville. We got in a solid 18 mile ride and for my first lengthly bike ride post-treatment, I think I did pretty well. Although when I got back home, the tidal wave of hurt and fatigue came over me, pretty much keeping me out of action for the remainder of the day. If anyone has any road tire advice, feel free to let me know!

Next time (hopefully soon), I’ll pre-load more calories and we’ll make the ride there and back. Can’t wait!

Mt. Shasta

Well after a 5 1/2 hour drive back into Vacaville on Tuesday, we finally made it home. Just in time to attend Elizabeth’s 4H awards event in Vallejo. Yeah, I know..more driving. Actually the drive home was very relaxing and beautiful as we drove through the rest of southern Oregon and into some scenic mountainous country of northern California. I always love driving past

Shasta and seeing it looming in the distance. However it was a little disappointing driving past Lake Shasta as the water line was quite low. I can’t imagine how low the boat launches must be to get boats into such low water. I was also amazed to feel the change in temperature from Ashland (46°) into Red Bluff (82°). Quite dramatic!

Elizabeth's 4H Award

The 4H awards event was pretty long at just about 2 hours, but it was great to see all the 4H’ers and their various awards. 4H is a very well run organization and takes good care of all it’s members who in turn work very hard. Elizabeth won an award for her presentations for her rabbits.

The Hood Canal

In Ashland, OR

At Safeco Field

Wine in Woodinville

We’re having such a great time on this 1+ week vacation to Seattle and our trip back through Oregon and into California. We had originally intended on flying back, but the lure of a nice drive back home was much too strong for Denise and I. So on Sunday, we took the ferry into Seattle with my parents and rented a car from Avis for the return journey home.

With no agenda whatsoever, we began our drive south through Washington, hoping to make it to at least Roseburg, OR before nightfall. Denise thought it would be nice to stop in a visit her friend Julie B. in Vancouver as we passed through. Julie and her family had moved from Vacaville to Vancouver only the week before, so we’d be seeing her family’s new home here in WA. We spent about an hour’s visit in Vancouver and headed south, driving through some of the most beautiful landscapes I’ve seen. I typically fall in love with places we visit pretty easily, and seeing WA and OR was no exception. I’d move up here in a heartbeat. Cooler temps, more rain and beautiful scenery make for a great place to live and work. And with the economy tanking, house prices with acreage are amazingly affordable.

We pulled into Roseburg at about 9:30pm and promptly had a nice dinner at a local steakhouse. After a restful night’s sleep, we were off once again, trying to get to Medford and Ashland for the next night. It was foggy and cold most of the trip and when we arrived in Ashland, it was still very cold. Probably in the high 40′s. We did some shopping in this picturesque little town and found a nice B&B named the Lithia Springs Resort. Ashland is known for its Shakespeare festival and we were hoping to catch a show, but all the stages are dark on this particular Monday. So we went out to listen to some live music at a local bar/cafe and then found our way back to the B&B for the night. Brrrrr, it’s cold up here when the sun goes down.

There are a lot more pictures here.

Well, let me start off with yesterday actually. We started the day in Roseburg, OR and drove through the Umpqua Valley looking at beautiful valleys, mountains, farms and rivers. This is such a pretty part of the world and if you have the resources and time, living out here would be wonderfully private and peaceful; not to mention gorgeous. There are quite a few Pinot Noir wineries around this region, but they all open at 11am, so we weren’t able to pop into any of them as we passed through.

We found our way back to I5 and headed north toward Portland and on to the Seattle area. As we entered into Washington, the skys turned darker and we started to get some rain. The variation in weather was dramatic from Vacaville’s hotness, to the mild late September weather in the Pacific Northwest. It began to get a bit chilly and the forecast for the entire week included the chance of rain every day. We stopped off for lunch in the little town of Centralia, WA at a great little beer pub called McMinimen’s Olympic Club.

We stopped later on at the giant Cabela’s outdoor store in Lacey, WA and finally made the final drive into Port Ludlow and to my parent’s lodge. Cloudy skys, sprinkles of rain, but nothing bad enough to spoil our arrival.

And then today we woke up, had a yummy breakfast in Chimacum at the Chimacum Cafe. Fantastic comfort food! And the scenery around here is simply beautiful and the people are so nice and friendly. We took a brief tour of some nice properties for sale in Port Ludlow and finally headed back to the house to get ready for the trip into Seattle for the A’s and Mariner’s game tonight.

My parent's wedding location

In front of the B&B

Inside the Black Sheep Pub

Denise and I left this morning on our week’s vacation to Seattle. We’re spending time with my parents at their Port Ludlow home and some other cool things around the area. One of the highlights for this week is our planned attendance at the Oakland A’s and Seattle Mariner’s baseball game on Tuesday night at Safeco Field. I’m stoked!

Anyway, we started our drive this morning and made it into Ashland, Oregon for a nice lunch at a great little English style joint called the Black Sheep Pub. I really enjoyed the pub styled interior and the food was great. They even had a live performance by a group of players, enchanting us with some Irish melodies.

Ashland is such a pretty city, and this time of year is particularly exciting because of the world renowned annual Shakespeare Festival. So many theaters around town, all playing various plays by the festival’s namesake. We’ll have to come back through here and catch a few of them and see some more of this beautiful little hamlet.

Our evening ended as we pulled into the city of Roseburg. We’ll stay here for the night and head out in the morning, possibly making the rest of the journey into Port Ludlow.

More to come..

Elizabeth and Rose (and friend)

Denise, Lauren and Elizabeth traveled to Stockton on Saturday to attend a 4-H event. Although there were so many other rabbits entered into this event, Elizabeth’s mini rex rabbit Rosalina landed a first place ribbon for “Variety”. She was extremely excited about this and told me her rabbit would most likely get a “leg” for this. I had no idea what this meant so I had to look it up. Below is what I found:

“Leg - a leg is earned by winning in an ARBA-sanctioned show as long as there are three exhibitors and five rabbits competing for the win.  For example, first place in a class of five or more bunnies showed by three or more different exhibitors would earn a leg.”

Lauren will be getting into raising a rabbit very soon as well. Her future mini-lop is to be born this week and soon after she’s weaned, we’ll have another rabbit in the house. I believe her name will be Daisy!

Just a quick follow up to my two Dr. appointments from a week or so ago. Undergoing radiation to the neck can have some nasty side effects to a person’s thyroid, so it’s a good idea to have this checked with your blood work periodically. I was called by Dr. Woolf’s office today and he indicated that my thyroid results are normal. Yippee!

Doomed Pinata	Wyatt
Taking a swing	Elizabeth
Elizabeth	Lauren taking a swing

Two weekends and two swim day birthday parties. Wyatt’s 16th birthday was on the 19th and he had some friends over last weekend for a great birthday party. They mostly swam in the backyard, but it’s 2009 and almost all boys his age have laptops now, so there was a lot of networked online gaming between all these boys too. They really enjoy World of Warcraft. We got a nice pinata for Wyatt and everyone did very well smashing it to pieces and raining down the candy.

And then this weekend, we had Lauren’s 11th birthday party. Even though Lauren’s 11th birthday is on the 1st of Sept, Saturday was a great Summer for a party and swimming. It was quite warm (102 actually), so we set up the shade room in the back yard for the kids to find a place out of the sun. Lots of Lauren’s school friends came and the whole rest of the day was filled with swimming, eating, birthday cake, presents and lots of fun for kids and adults alike.

I’ve got two appointments with my doctors today. One with Dr. Woolf in the morning which will be a general check up of my mouth and throat and later this afternoon I’ll meet with Dr. Vikstrom and get my blood checked. I’ll post a follow up later today.

Well I had those two appointments and they both went very well. Dr. Woolf poked, prodded and stretched my jaw and said everything looks great. I still have some scarring on my jaw muscles, which explains why I can’t open my mouth as wide as I used to, but he told me some ways I could slowly regain my ability to open my mouth wide again. This is a drag still, because I can’t eat things like hamburgers, sandwiches and other large things, without having to smash them down to size.

I also met with Dr. Vikstrom and he also said things seem to be going well with the healing. My face is clearing up slowly, and I’m getting a little weight back. My lowest was 188, but I’m now weighing in at about 194. So there’s some progress I feel good about. I also had my blood taken for several tests, including making sure my thyroid is functioning properly and didn’t get fried by the radiation (which is pretty common I guess).

So the new was good and I’m doing well each and every day. Still can’t eat anything even remotely spicy but most things are back to normal, except I still can’t drink wine. Whaaaa!