What's it all about, Alfie?

There are times when everything seems to be clicking. When you're on top of the world, things are going your way, and it seems that time flies.

And then there are the other times.

Times when time itself drags.

You wonder if you're up to finishing the next hour, let alone the day. When it seems that there is nothing that's going to get you moving through the day. Really bad times.

Well... the last few days have been like that. Things with the kids are troubling - hey, they're teenagers, and if I"m not worried, then there's something really wrong with them - or me. But still... there's worry, and then there's the grief only those that love you can fling your way.

So I'm trying to work through it. Trying to keep busy and let time travel by, and in doing so, give the kids and me a little break from one another. That's all it takes - really. A little change of view. Get started back at school and things will change. With that change, maybe we can reach each other again.

I know it's just a simple matter of a few years. After college, they'll be great people again. But I'd hate to think that the last days they are here in the house are going to be miserable. That's not a lot of fun for me - or them.

Well... there's not a lot I can do about it other than what I am doing. I just hope it all works out.

This morning I noticed that there were additional bugs found in the WordPress 2.8.2 security upgrade, so out comes 2.8.3. The release notes from the WordPress Blog are simple:

Unfortunately, I missed some places when fixing the privilege escalation issues for 2.8.1. Luckily, the entire WordPress community has our backs. Several folks in the community dug deeper and discovered areas that were overlooked. With their help, the remaining issues are fixed in 2.8.3. Since this is a security release, upgrading is highly recommended. Download 2.8.3, or upgrade automatically from your admin.

Given that upgrading is so simple at HostMonster with SimpleScripts, it's a no-brainer. If there's a security update, I want to get it. I've got a lot stored in this guy, and keeping it safe is a key concern for me.

There's a new beta for NetNewsWire 3.2 (3.2b13) and it fixes several bugs while working it's way to a complete feature set. Brent S. has said that this is an intermediate version on the way to 4.0 and adds the syncing with Google Reader. At this time, clippings are back but they don't sync - he's working on a solution.

New icon as well, by Rogue Sheep. Nice. Still a favorite way to get up to speed on what's going on each day.

Once again the Firefox team has shipped a "stability and security" update 3.5.2 to patch some holes in the browser. Being a popular browser that's now been downloaded 1,000,000,000 times (lifetime), makes one a tempting target for hackers, and that's the reason for the updates. No big deal, the restart is handled well.

This morning I saw that Colloquy 2.2.2 was released with a required update that you get to Tiger (which is still pretty old) to use. I'm betting there are a lot of little bug fixes - probably a few crashing bug fixes, as the app is pretty darn stable as-is. If you want to have an IRC client, this is the best I've ever seen on the Mac.

This morning I saw that VLC 1.0.1 is out, but interestingly enough, it wasn't available from the "Check for Updates" within VLC 1.0. Odd, but maybe they think this is a minor update and they didn't create a package to be downloaded/updated the other way. Seems reasonable, but I still wish they had release notes, or at least made them easier to find. I just couldn't find them on the site. Very odd for an Open Source project.

Anyway, got it so that I can keep ripping DVDs when I want to see them on my iPhone.

OK, things are looking a lot smoother this morning. I've been able to get everything I needed from TimeMachine, the laptop is running well, it's got another 180GB of storage (up to 500GB from 320GB) which is always helpful, and things are coming back into a comfortable swing.

In this experience, I have to say the surprising moments were these:

• The Apple Store had no drives. Why on earth not?
• The drive was only $129 at Fry's. Again, so inexpensive, why not have a few on hand, Apple?
• The replacement of the drive was easy. Thanks, Apple. It could have been a lot worse.
• The original drive was a lemon because it didn't even last a year. Sad, but it happens.

So things are kicking right along. I've got a lot of little things to watch today and it should be a nice, easy day.

It's good to be back in the saddle.

When I was rebuilding my laptop, I started Firefox, like I always do, to open up a set of pages to HostMonster so that I can see what is going on there with all the sites I host there. Well... I noticed that WordPress 2.8.2 was out, and so I went to the SimpleScripts console at HostMonster and upgraded all my installs to 2.8.2.

The SimpleScripts install really is just about as easy as it can be. There's never a problem with the updates, everything is saved, they are fast, close to the release dates of the packages. Really, it's far better than the other package installer I used at HostMonster. Nice.

During the rebuild of my laptop this morning I got another update notification - this one was from Growl for 1.1.6. This one even had release notes! This is the messaging system that a lot of Mac software uses, and I have to say, when I first saw it I thought "Why?", but now that I'm using my Mac as everything, it makes a lot of sense. Get the notifications you want to see as you want to see them. Nice.

Anyway, the fixes look like they will help, and with Snow Leopard on the way, it's nice to see these packages getting updated.

This morning, as I was finishing the re-build of my laptop, I got a notice from Perian that 1.1.4 was out, and so I updated that right away. Perian is the QuickTime plug-in that allows it to play a ton of additional file types, and since I still get a lot of media from family and friends that was created on PCs, this is a really nice thing to have.

Super nice thing to have.