Back in June of 1995 I wrote a piece for our Wimsey's Digital Rag online magazine (the forerunner of this site) titled Community Standards and the Internet. At that time the article notes that there were about 4.5 million+ computers and about 30-50 million people on the internet, and that with even this few, the cost of vetting the content that passed through the typical ISP would be so onerous that "we should all sell shoes instead."

At that time various legal jurisdictions were threatening (or had actually done so) to impose anti porn and hate laws that would have made the likes of Microsoft leave Washington state rather than face the prospect of the legal consequences of having customers on its network systems.

At that time it was almost reasonable that the legislators didn't understand the technologies they were trying to deal with - it was so new that the paint was not yet dry.

Today however, the fact that legislators propose such stupid laws as SOPA and then turn around and boast of the fact that they don't have a clue about the technology is not only unforgiveable, it is down right criminal. Our governing legislators should be held personally accountable for their wonton ignorance of such a basic piece of today's infrastructure as the internet now is. 

Here in Canada the same goes for the Conservatives and their unprecedented bullheadedness over the Digital Rights Management aspect of the new Copyright law and for the stupid concepts contained in the "Lawfull Access" portion of the new crime bill. 

If no other way, then they should be held accountable at the polls - "none of the above" works for me. 

Let your MP, MLA, Senator, Congressman, etc. know your feelings - email, snailmail, phone - whatever - but tell them you will NOT vote for them no matter what if they continue to be so ignorant.

richard

I thought I had an ulcer, so I was on an ulcer diet. Two weeks later this will be moot, but for now I've got a problem. This is a bit of an aside to my battle with the cancer that eventually was shown to be the real problem as opposed to the ulcer, but I'd written it as part of one of the stories, then edited it out for a bit of brevity. Here I present it as a stand-alone story of how I dealt with what I've been told is not an uncommon problem, in a way that is novel and as far as I'm concerned, effective. The alternative is surgery if you can't untwist the bowel somehow; either that or death.

The problem in this case started because the ulcer diet has not much roughage so I got constipated - and with my otherwise fairly sensitive stomach I've always shied away from laxitives. Now, here it was the 3rd day in a row that I'd done myself some harm by "pushing" too hard. I'd caused my intestines to fold back on themselves and stop the flow from my stomach to my bowels; this is not good.

I've had this malady before, but in the earlier cases it was caused by stress and simply cramping up my stomach "in knots" to the point where things started backing up and not working. This is similar to what I'd had at age 2 with a "bowel intussusception" that required surgery - and in my case the invention/creation of the tools and techniques to perform it on an infant; the reason that it was written up in the medical journals of the time.

I present here my method of dealing with this problem in hopes that it might help someone. I've discussed it with nurses and doctors and they at least say "it doesn't appear to possibly hurt, and if it helps then that is a plus." I'm not a doctor. I'm just a person who tries things and tells people what I've found that works, in case it might help them too.

This article has spawned a request for me to speak at VANLUG (Vancouver Linux Users Group) technical meeting on Monday, January 16, 2012. See the notes at the bottom for links about this.

My lawyer phoned me the other day and asked me my opinion on using one of the "cloud" services to access his files when he is out of the office - using his cell phone or his laptop. "Is this a good idea?" was his question. "A bunch of us are sitting here talking about one such service and it sounds pretty good - what is the catch?"

It's like he enjoys feeding me the straight lines just because he likes to see me bat them out of the park, to mix a few metaphors so to speak.

My first response was "why do you want something that you've already got? You have your files on a server that has an internet facing link. All that is needed is a bit of security setup on your laptop and you're good to go."

Of course that's not the only thing that needs setting up, but it is almost that easy, at least for him. The question is, why isn't it a good idea for his friends if they don't already have such facilities at their own offices? Lots of answer if you read on.

Concensus is that the first person to reach the age of 150 is already alive, and that the first person to reach the age of 1000 will be born some time in the next 30-50 years.

Scary thought - what do you do if you get 75 years of good health and 925 years of dementia?

Or if you get 800 years of good health and 200 years of living with a colostomy bag and leaking fluids in all directions, beholden to nurses and friends and loved ones for everything for longer than most of us would ever dream of living totally.

The quality of life makes the difference of whether life is worth living at all.

Morbid thoughts about the elephant in the room.

I started writing this because I'd just found out that I didn't have an ulcer. What I did have was not at that time determined (it has since been confimed as cancer) but I figured whatever it was was likely life threatening.

Since then, my youngest brother has gone into the hospice for the last time and may not last until his birthday in a few days. Lots to think about. Some of it is here - maybe not as organized as I'd hoped but maybe you can find something to take away that will help you in your daily life.

I write because I must - I hope what you read is worth it but just writing it is worth it to me. Thanks for being a reader...

The ongoing story of my discovery that instead of an ulcer, I have cancer. Here's part one.

I left off part one as I hit the front door of the emergency department at Maple Ridge Hostpital.

I'd been here myself before only two weeks earlier. I'd also been here with my wife, Shirley, only two days before, and she was still here in the hospital somewhere. 

It was about 4:30AM and I was being taken into emergency at Maple Ridge Hospital by a pair of paramedics after a brief ride sitting up in the back of the ambulance.

I'd met them at the door, and, after cautioning them not to step on "Tracy's lawn," refering to the new lawn installed recently for me by my neighbour and their compatriot paramedic whose side-business is spraying new lawns with seed and mulch mix from a neat little trailer she keeps in her front yard here in Pitt Meadows, they came and we walked back to the ambulance.

I was groggy from lack of sleep but otherwise really in pretty good physical shape. I just didn't trust myself to drive even the few blocks to the hospital for fear of falling asleep at the wheel. In previous weeks I'd noticed this tendancy if the road was too unbroken by stop lights and traffic for any more than a few minutes, and by now I'd had no sleep for over 30 hours, not just the average 3 hours sleep per night I'd been pretty much existing on for the previous 6 weeks or so.

So instead of having them struggle with the gurney, I simply got into the back of the ambulance and sat down in the jump seat behind the driver. They strapped me in, we were off, and here we were. I was about to enter the world of British Columbia's medical system with a real problem, not just one that needed a bandaid, and along the way I was going to deal with all aspects of such a visit, from food to cleaning to nursing to facilities and all. So come on, let's go...

Another in the series on my cancer. I'm up at 1:30AM after having had to deal with pain, so it is fitting that I start this article on pain and how I think I've finally come to an understanding of the medical peoples' view of it versus my view of controlling it.

Over the now 16 days I've been here in Maple Ridge Hospital, I've been on several different regimes of pain controlling medicine. Initially I was on Intravenous (IV) drip with a bag of morphine every 4 hours added to the base fluid system. This is what allowed me to sleep finally after all the nights I'd spent simply having back pain from trying to lie down, and it worked well for that.

What I have to remember and to tell the medicals about my particular pain trials is that it is, and at least for now really will always be, about the pain that manifests itself as back pain, growing when I lie down, and keeping me from sleeping. As I had to explain to the nurse just now, the pain of the incision and surgery really is secondary to this other pain, and that the surgery, while absolutely having done good in and of itself, didn't relieve me of the whole initial pain.

More than that, I've noted over time that this "base" pain is growing where I fully expect the surgical pain to lessen and eventually go away. This is likely not typical. My cancer seems (and for now I'll simply say is, as I don't yet have any definitive info on overall progress from the biopsy, nor on it's actual type or prognosis - you may learn that in one of the articles that shows up prior to this one being finished and published - but at this point I simply don't know) to involve an interaction between the liver and colon and/or lymph nodes that is the root cause of this base pain. I'm presuming that the surgery did not "get it all" since in fact the surgeon said as much just afterwards. Whether or not chemo and/or radiation will do the trick is yet to be seen or even offered. 

So the base pain is not going away, and yet the medical staff want me to go home - and so for that matter do I. I just want to know that at home I'll be able to deal with this pain well enough that I don't end up back in emergency, having relinquished my bed to someone "sicker" than I am on the theory that I am well. I'm not well, but the question really is, am I well enough to continue my eventual therapy as an out patient to the cancer clinics, etc? Or should I stay here in direct touch with those who can change things as and when necessary to at least keep me sane enough to make rational decisions on what is next? That's my goal in this initiall stage of pain management as you'll see...

This is the first of my ongoing series of articles on my dealing with cancer starting in November of 2011. If you are squeamish or don't approve of the use of medically correct (or in some cases simply pragmatic) terminology then you might check out the lead in to the topic on my blog before you read further. richard

I'd had a sore back; nothing peculiar since we were renovating the house and of course there's always lots to carry and move and shift and push against when you're doing destruction/construction that in our case involved every door in the house, all the floors and a lot of cleanup of the yard. We'd not done any major renovations since moving in almost 18 years before, and it was time.

So I backed off a bit on the physical and let my cousin Marian and by friend Ken do much of that part of the work. Besides, I'm the breadwinner of the family and had to keep the finances flowing, so I spent more time in front of my computer and working on customer projects.

Eventually part of the backache went away, but another part didn't. In fact, it started to get worse - to the point that some nights I'd lie down to sleep and immediately have to get back up and sit on the edge of the bed moaning with pain. Again, nothing really peculiar. I'd "cheated" on the not doing anything physical - stepping in and lending a 3rd hand when needed, pruning bushes and trees and carrying stuff to the trailer to eventually take to the dump; nothing "heavy," but not exactly "nothing" either. And besides, this pain was shaping up to be similar in many fashions to ones I'd had in the past, ones associated with stomach ulcer. 

I'm kind of prone to stomach ulcers you see. I have a fairly acid stomach and can't tolerate (or so I found out by experiment) hard liquor in any even reasonabe quantity - I'd get a bleeding ulcer at the drop of a hat so to speak

I was invited to a Robbie Burns dinner back in about 1999 by my good friends David and Jose Ingram. The evening progressed and along with all the Haggis and other Scottish festivities I found myself the recipient of about 6 or 8 shots of fine, single malt, scotch whiskey. Some were the second shots I'd take when buying a round of similar fair for my friends, some were their shouts to me. What could the harm be? I normally only drank wine and beer, and that evening I put the whiskey on top of a wonderful dinner as well.

Right... That was Friday evening and by Sunday morning I had a full-fledged bleeding ulcer attack, complete with obvious blood in my stool. To the doctor I went on Monday. Wednesday, when he used a gastro endoscope on me his comments were, "I can see where the ulcer was, but it is well on its way to healing and should be gone in a week or so"

That's been my most recent experience with ulcers, but this one was a bit different; it was sneaking up on me, taking far longer than normal to really manifest itself, and showing itself as back pain it seems.

So I went to the doctor and said "Doc, I think I have an ulcer." To which his reply was, "OK - what are the symptoms that lead you to this diagnosis?" and we went on from there. Knowing what I do know about ulcers (I'm sensitized to the word ulcer as my father died on the operating table while being treated for a bleeding ulcer) what I had compiled was in fact a pretty good diagnosis, except for the pain in the back. Yes, it also manifested itself at times as the classic pain just under the sternum - that "burning" sensation that I typically get when I'm hungry and many others get from acid reflux but which is also a classic sign of a duodenal ulcer; and it was the back pain that had me stumped.

Ahhh... he said, but it is not unknown for ulcers to show up as back pain, a fact I had not known. So he gave me some samples of a new "proton pump inhibitor" (acid reducer pills) to try, and said "4 to 6 weeks should clear this up," and I went on an ulcer diet.

That should have been the beginning of the end of it, but it wasn't; not by a long shot as things turned out.

Unlike Harrison Ford in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, I didn't choose wisely. In fact, there was no obvious information on which to base the choice, I simply picked one of the two RAID 1 drives (mirrors) and removed it - and the system immediately started to run faster; at least for about a day.

A lot of analysis had been done up to that point, and finally one screen, updating every 1/10 second, showed me that the process that was sticking the system up was to do with the RAID 1 drives on the root partition.

I'd had no hardware errors reported by smartd or RAID errors by mdmonitor.

The only thing I had done recently was update the kernel to the latest version on Fedora Core 14, the OS version on the system. Could this have done something? I found an obscure reference to running RAID and problems with Western Digital Caviar Green drives - this system uses Caviar Blacks, but... maybe.

So I broke the mirror. 

mdadm /dev/md0 --fail /dev/sda3

I could have chosen /dev/sdc3, but that 50/50 chance somehow made me type the first drive's name instead. It didn't seem to be a specific hardware problem with one drive but instead simply using the type of drive in a RAID, so no obvious reason to choose one over the other.

Then the problem surfaced again, but by this time I'd re-formatted and tested the removed partition (thank goodness I didn't do this to the rest of the drive), and there was simply no way back. Two days later, I'm still recovering files from the other partitions and getting the system back running all the various things it ran. Looking back, I'm not sure that there was anything I could have done differently except had the good luck to pick the correct drive - in general I don't gamble because "if you don't play, you can't lose" - in this case I lost.

It all started with the Linux server system I host becoming slower and slower. The real load on it at this time of year is trivial, so load should not have been a factor at all. I started looking for other reasons: denial of service attack, huge directories (some of which are growing to contain millions of photos at this point) and a number of other things went through my head and were tested and didn't show as the real cause.

Meanwhile, the all-year core members of Hancock Wildlife Foundation (the major tenant on the system) were starting to really complain - their sessions were disappearing, posts were duplicated, response to simply looking at some of the pages was measured in minutes at times.

The steps along the way to full recovery of the data should prove interesting if you're faced with similar problems, no matter whether caused by choosing wrongly as I did, or by real hardware errors. Sometimes the best data is on the "failed" drive - and getting it off once the other drive is toast is not an easy task.

Sent by email to: Stephen Harper <HarpeS@parl.gc.ca>, Randy Kamp <KampR@parl.gc.ca>

Dear Mr. Harper and Mr. Kamp

I've just finished watching the video at http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/6042/125/ and urge you to reconsider your position on this legislation that would effectively eliminate privacy in our communications.

Would you support a bill that would force all couriers to open and copy the contents of every package/letter they carried and give the copy to the police? I sure hope not.

Would you support a bill that would force all doctors, lawyers, and other agents to report to the police every time someone came into their office? Is sure hope not.

In effect, this "lawful access" legislation is exactly that - forcing ISPs to spy on and gather information not just on those officially suspected (through the use of time-tested judicial oversight in the form of warrants) but EVERY SINGLE PERSON! You included!