Tips for a SAFE wireless network.

My friend John gave me an excellent link today, for those of us out there with laptops that have built in wireless adapters. We have three in our household and I found this an interesting read, although of course our network and wireless activity is so freaking secure, and we USE software and hardware FIREWALLs (hell-O freaking people who don't- pull your heads out of your asses!) so this really doesn't apply to us as much as it is good information to know, maybe some of you out there will find it interesting.

And this spawns today's Tip- Things you need to do to have a truly "secure" wireless network.
By Meagan:

1. Change the SSID. Duh. No more "linksys"
2. Disable the broadcast on the SSID
3. Change the IP address of the router from the default
4. Change the Administration Password on the Router (duh again)
5. Limit the Number of IP Addresses you hand out over DHCP. Count your maximum number of computers and enter that number in the number of IP Addresses you can have handed out at once.
6. Enable a Wireless MAC Filter. Enter the MAC Address on each Wireless Device. You can determine the MAC Address of the machine by going to a command prompt and typing ipconfig /all and hitting enter. It is listed as a Physical Address and is a hex number (0-9, a-e) and is seperated at two digit intervals with a dash... (or in the MAC Filter window of your router properties, it is by colons) Make sure you choose the MAC Address for the WIRELESS ADAPTER.
7. Generate a 128 hexadecimal 26 Digit WEP key and KEEP IT SECRET and in a safe place (safe place does not mean in a word document whose name is "WEP KEY" or "password.") Only give this WEP key to trusted sources, or better off NO ONE and if you let someone use your wireless network, give out your key, and then they leave, you can always change the key after they leave.
8. Enable the Hardware Firewall on your Router. Don't have one? Buy a new Router with a built in firewall.
9. If you have strictly 802.11b or 802.11g wireless devices, set your router to accept one or the other, instead of mixed. When we have a friend come over who uses 802.11b, I have to go to my router to change the setting to mixed so he can get one the network, but it only takes a second and it ensures that no war driving SOB is going to get onto my network with a 802.11b.

If I have lost you, I apologize. If you don't know what you are doing, HIRE SOMEONE. And I mean SOMEONE who does know what they are doing. For god's sakes, if you haven't done these things, your network is not secure, and neither is any of the information you are transmitting over your wireless network, including your passwords.

BE SAFE.

This Blogs a Rockin (Don't Bother Come on In)

So this whole blogexplosion thing is really working out nicely. I am meeting all KINDS Of people like me. It's awesome.

I am currently being featured on two blogs, with three other bids in- I would be so thrilled if I could get those too, that would mean I am featured on 5 blogs this week. How fab would that be? new friends and enemies coming from 5 new locations? Awesome.

I am bidding on a rent at Diner Bitch, KSHippyChick, and Faerielicious (her template kicks ass. I love to draw faeries and have several of froud's faeries books and spiderwick books.) and I am being "featured" on Fashionably Late and a Table for One.

So do some clicking around and maybe you will see me out and about. Pimpin My Blog.

I did find another site whose template I liked. And I like a post or two, so I am not blogrolling her yet but I will be back to see if it will be a regular read for me, and it is- BAM! To the sidebar with it. So go Visit Lost in Wisconsin if you are bored. I would have rented from her this week, but even though she is not currently renting, she hasn't put up an offer with a price to rent, so I can't make an offer. Just like Christie hasn't put up an offer yet, even though she isn't renting anyone. SO there are two blogs I would like to make offers on, but I can't.

20 Questions. Plus Five.

I found this while blog rolling. I thought it was neat. I am not going to do the tag part, to spare you all...

1. When you looked at yourself in the mirror today, what did you think?
I love my hair.

2. How much cash do you have on you?
$5.61 and a quarter on the floor under my desk that I am too lazy to pick up.

3. What is a word that rhymes with "TEST"?
Arrest.

4. Favorite planet?
Earth. Hell-o?!

5. Who is the 4th person on your missed call list on your cell phone?
Oh jeez this is work?! My sister Liz.

6. What is your favorite song right now?
Coheed and Cambria -“Always and Never.”

7. What shirt are you wearing?
A tourquoise ¾ sleeve shirt with a boatneck, and a side tie sash thingy that has a beaded flower pinned on. I bought it to wear when we got married but found another one. I never got around to taking this one back and today I decided to just take off the tags and keep it. I should have worn a less complicated shirt today, because I don’t feel my description has done justice to how cool this shirt is.

8. Do you "label" yourself?
Um. Yes. Likely an perfectionist control freak, or you can just call it OCD.

9. Name the brand of shoes you're currently wearing now:
ummmm…. City Sneaks.

10. Bright or Dark Room?
Bright unless it is night. WTF?

11. What were you doing at midnight last night?
Watching the Dog Whisperer that I had Tivo’d

12. What is a saying that you say a lot?
Fabulous. Or perhaps “whatever”

13. Who told you they loved you last?
Evan

14. How many days of work did you miss this week?
ZERO as opposed to last week when I was overtaken by the sickness and missed 2.

15. How many rolls of film do you need to get developed?
None I am all digital.

16. Favorite age you've been so far?
I would say 22 or 23, but I like my job and my ability to make enough money to make ends meet, so I might be better off saying 27. Although 17 was fun. College. I don't know.

17. What is your current desktop picture?
A boring blue swirl, windows XP style. I had something…. But I got tired of it and haven’t had time to search for another.

18. If you had to choose between a million bucks or to be able to fly, which would you choose? This one is tough. Because if I could fly, I could make all the money in the world. I would be famous. So I would have to say Fly.

19. Carmen Electra or Pam Anderson?
Pam. Carmen has always struck me as skanky. I know pam was with Tommy and has hepetitis, and they always say “I fucked the 80’s” for Pam (I have watched her Roast like 5 times) but I just have an instant dislike for Carmen. She has always looked more skanky to me.

20.Who would you love to reunite with?
Tonya Roberts. And my classmates from College.

21. When was the last time you said, "I am sorry?"
About 2 minutes ago. My friend Anya is on bedrest (pregnant) and I am going to clean at her house tonight and setup for her shower tomorrow. I was scheduled to go to a slidemount (scrapbooking) class tonight and we both had to cancel. I felt terrible, but that’s what happens when things come up.

22. Who has the cutest blog in your click?
Me. No just kidding. I love Christie’s, I swear it changes Every FREAKING day. I just went there to grab her link for this question and it had changed AGAIN. She scares me with her changing. How DOES she do it? So dedicated.

23. What did you eat last?
Hmmm… vanilla ice cream with chocolate sauce, last night before bed. But it is 11am and I haven’t eaten yet today, so I am thinking that will change soon.

24. What kind of car do you drive?
Black Grand Prix GT.

25. What do you plan to accomplish this year?
Honestly? Okay, I will be honest. But don’t quote me on this. Have my husband’s baby. Get our new furniture, get it paid for, and finance a dining room set before Thanksgiving. Get my job title changed from “Computer User Support Specialist” to “web and graphic designer” and get the pay raise that I deserve for the web and graphic design work that I have been doing for 3 years.

Ficken Chingers

Check out the New Renter for the week: Ficken Chingers

I have been running into her blog all over the web lately, last week she was a guest at GIGotti's and now I am pleased to have her here!

Do yourself (and me) a favor and go to visit her! Click on her link above or you can find her screenshot over on the sidebar below my profile.

Whenever I read her profile description, I think of her "shaking her ass on the hood of whitesnake's car."

Enjoy!

Calendar Girl. Lesbians Love Hockey. It Does a Body Good.

Someone needs to change my calendar. I have one of those calendars that is marge with little wooden blocks that have numbers, and every day you rotate those numbers. I count on those blocks. That calendar is the where I *glance* when I need to know the date and I don't want to lazily alt-tab to my outlook and change views to the calendar to see the date. Problem is that lately, I haven't changed the numbers.

I am starting to wonder if the problem might be that they are across the room and I have to get up to change the numbers. So whenever I realize they are wrong, I think "I will change them next time I get up" and then when I get up, I have already forgotten until the next time I sit down and try to look at the date. Damn girl, just get up and change the freaking numbers! Nah. That's okay. I'll get it next time I get up.

For a while I had a good thing going, where I would change them each night before I left so that tomorrow they would already be correct. I need to get back in that habit.

Can you believe I can make an entire post out of a damn wooden block calendar?

Okay, so I just got up and changed it. To tomorrow. LOL.

This reminds me that I have Calendar Girls Tivo'd at home and haven't gotten to watch it yet. I can't wait to see naked old ladies. You know, this may creep you out, but this is the second time naked old ladies have crossed my mind today. Don't ask. I will be a naked old lady someday. I am almost halfway there.

I am seriously considering moving some of my "tree" plants (ficus, cheffelara, etc) back into the living room from the porch. Problem is once the furniture comes, there will be no room in the living room. IF the furniture ever comes. Thanks Sofa Mart. My confidence in you is waning.

I really need to see a hockey game. Soon. I need to arrange that with my sister and our hockey fan friends. Both of our SO's (men) don't like hockey. Even lesbians like Hockey. I LOVE Hockey. It gets you all worked up (catch my drift?) It's an interesting thing when we have to get a group of rowdy girls together to go see a hockey game because the menfolk don't want to go.

Blogger has scheduled an outage today 4pm PST, so when you come on over and don't see my blog, don't panic. It will be back.

They make these cool treats in the cafeteria at work, they call them macaroni and cheese triangles or "wedges". They are like these battered triangles with macaroni and cheese inside. mmmmm.... They sound creepy and unreal but they are DELICIOUS and $1.75 for 6 of them. Heaven. Almost like Fried Cheese Cubes/curds. It does a body good!

Good Day Sunshine

Today is a good day. My friend CB Is back in business and I am going to have lunch with her. I missed her and I have SOOOO Much to share. At least three good stories to tell her. Today I make a wal-mart trip after work. I made a doctor's appointment. I will ship my rug back to get a new one with the right colors. Our furniture still isn't here but I am TRYING to be patient. Trying desperately. To be patient.

Other than that, its just a normal wednesday. And for once, I can totally appreciate that.

Have a nice day.

Post Secret

Have you been to postsecret? It's where people submit their secrets "secretly" on the back of postcards and they are posted on the internet for everyone to read. These two are my favorites.

Here to Drop some Stones....

Well, today was a doozy. Earlier this morning you may recall that I blogged about how crappy my morning was, and that I was frustrated at a person with whom I had interacted, but whom I didn’t name for protection of their privacy and of others involved. Well they apparently read my blog, and got upset, and decided to call me at work to tell me all about it.

The first stone that came hurling my way contained an accusation that I needed to get my facts straight.

The second stone said that my husband is a liar.

The third stone stated that I am taking advantage of someone very dear to me, for whom I have the utmost respect and I would do just about anything for. Not to mention that I owe much gratitude and appreciation to that person.

The third stone was followed by two smaller stones, we will call them 4 and 5. They were elaborations on stone number three, and they were clarification that stones 3 through 6 were going to be personal attacks at me and my family, which were none of the stone throwers business and had nothing to do with the situation.

Then there was that 6th stone that said my blogging the situation was immature, and stone number 7 was the throwers expert opinion that my help was not necessary, which in my mind also made it not appreciated. And therefore never to be offered again to the stone thrower.

So I sat around with these stones for a little while this afternoon…. I kept them on my desk at work and I thought about all the things I could attach to those stones and throw back. I thought about the ironies of some of the things that were said to me.

I thought about stone number 6, and realized that blogging must not be so immature, otherwise why would all these people be reading here, and connecting with me, and commenting, and getting to know each other. Why would the thrower of these stones be reading my blog if it were so immature? Do we not all have adventures in everyday life? Is it a crime to share them? Am I just to brutally honest?

I removed my earlier post.

It was very obvious to me that it had made the stone thrower angry enough to throw stones at me. I hadn’t set out to make that person feel badly about themselves. As a matter of fact, that post had little, perhaps absolutely nothing, to do with the stone thrower, and a whole lot to do with allowing me to vent some frustration and share with my friends something that caused me undue stress and frustration. After blogging about the situation, it had been lifted right off my shoulders. It enabled me to go about my daily routine and help out many computer users who were grateful and appreciative for everything I could do to help them. Had I not blogged about it, I would likely have remained frustrated and may have taken the frustration out on people who didn’t deserve it.

I decided that by removing my post, I was in a way altering history. My history. I was acting as though my being upset this morning didn’t even happen. It made me feel sad. After all, isn’t that what a blog is all about? Documenting life in all it’s ranges of emotion and taking the good with the bad? Being a real person? I can’t expect the stone thrower to understand that. They don't understand what we bloggers do. And I won’t expect them to understand. It doesn’t matter. I have saved the post. I can insert it into my history at any point in time, if I so desire. But really it served it’s purpose. It made my day go well and allowed me to go about my business without being frustrated.

So as my work day finished, I took those stones, and instead of throwing them back at the stone thrower, I dropped them.

I dropped them on the ground and I walked away.

I didn’t need them. By attempting to make my life miserable, the stone thrower succeeded in making me realize all the people who make my life so wonderful. It brought me closer to them when it was intended to tear me apart from them. My husband, who loves and appreciates me and who makes me smile even when things seem tough. My dogs with their big eyes and unconditional love. My family and my husband’s family, who are loving and supportive and help us through difficult times- even when you think there is no way that they could understand- they do. My friends who make life fun and share interests and laughter and even tears.

Dropping those stones was the best decision that I made all day. They became stepping stones if you will, to a better place. Dropping them instantly gave me a very calm, collected feeling and a very sad glimpse at the stone thrower, all alone in their glass house.

May this blog continue to allow me to drop stones and move forward with what is important in my life. I will not let one person's opinion stop me from doing things that I love.

For some reason this brought to mind the story that begins with god giving a man two boxes. God told the man to put his worries and sorrows and fears into one box and his joys and happiness into the other. When the man went back to the boxes, the box of worries was empty. When he asked God where the worries all went, God told him that he had taken care of them. This blog is a lot like a worry box. Once I am able to write it down, I can let it go. I can stop stressing about it and I can move forward with what is important. I can pay attention to all the things in the happy box and let the worries go. How immature is that?

Reposting. Because it is MY blog and I can. End of Discussion.

Let's talk about my morning, m'kay? No? Well this is my blog. See how this works? mmmwaaahahahahahaha!

So after a late night, I had to drag my ass out of bed. I was doing good, right on schedule. I was in the basement in the laundry room (where we store all the clean clothes, you know?) in my underwear and a tanktop (visualize, visualize) and the phone rings. Husband is incapacitated (different than decapitated) and All I can hear is someone bitching on my answering machine about how "it's time to get up" and she has "a lot of work to do" and Ya di FREAKIN da. So I RACE up the stairs, trying to catch the phone, and get to it JUST as she hangs up.

So I am PISSED. After I have spent 13 hours, the billable equivilent of $400.00... setting up a network for you FOR FREE, do NOT call my house and place a bitch-ass-rant on my answering machine that it is "time for me to get up" and answer your call because you are computer illiterate and Windows XP is giving you a major freaking breakdown because you are used to Windows 98. (I do not mention the $400 because I want to or intend to bill it, but because people who PAY me for work do not talk to me like that or leave me messages like that, so people who do not pay me, certainly will not be talking to me that way. Note: I would never charge the person who I am actually doing this work for, because I owe them more respect than I can probably ever work off.) Oh no you did NOT just go there with me while I am in the basement in my underwear trying not to be late for the job that sends me home with a paycheck every week, because I was up till 2am working on your problem that out of the kindness of my heart I made into MY problem, without asking for any money because I feel that's what friends and family are for.

Steam. Fucking STEAM coming out of my ears. So I call back.

And holding on to the last bit of politeness in my body I try to explain to her that there is no password to get on the machine and that all she has to do is click the pretty little flower icon next to her OWN name and she can get into the machine and do all of her work. She insists that there is a password. I politely tell her (although exasperated) that I was on that machine until 2am and that I am POSITIVE that there is no password and that the machine did not wake up and decide to put a password on in the middle of the night. It is my **previous experience** (with this person and with other users) that she is probably already logged into the machine and trying to access a website that is asking her for a username and password that she doesn't remember because on her OLD machine she told it to remember everything for her because she could not. Or WOULD not remember them herself. Yet she insists that she can't "get into the computer"

Well, after that episode, in which I tell her to use another computer for her work until *so-and-so* who is computer literate, gets there to help, she relaxes a bit.

So I race back downstairs, not 5 minutes late, throw on my clothes, race back UPSTAIRS, insert earrings, adhere deoderant, and when trying to get the HELL out of there and get to work, I slam my hand in the door. Fabulous. And not a little slam. One of those pinching slams that made me feel like my thumb or perhaps at least the thumbnail would be falling off soon... and I would have no thumbnail like my grandpa.

So I run screeching and stomping to the kitchen to put cold water over it, trip over two dogs who have rooted their asses in my path of travel, and by the time I get my hand under the water it is stinging and I am cursing and bawling and have the big crocodile tears rolling down my face in a river of fresh mascara and eyeliner. Husband (still incapacitated) is yelling at me through the vents "what's wrong, what did you do? (voice laced with concern, but not enough to get off the toilet)" and I scream "I slammed my fucking hand in the door (wild ranting madwoman tone)" and he yells back "Calm down, I thought you cut yourself badly by the way you were cursing and crying." ....

If I were a lion, I would roar. A real "I will put your head in my mouth and snap your neck like a toothpick" kind of roar. Not an MGM lion kind of roar but a serious "you just tried to steal my lion babies" kind of roar. But I just cry and pace and curse until it is out of my system. I unwrap my hand from the kitchen towel, check to see that I still have a nail, disappointed that I don't have a giant bruise that matches the pain in my thumb.... mop the mascara and tears off my face, and stomp off to work.

tagged meme

I've been tagged by Christie.... Damn you!

Four Jobs I've Had in My Life:
(these are all previous jobs, If I talk about my current one they will fire me.)
1. For Ken. Took Down Grain Bins, Drove Truck and Hauled Chemicals for Agricultural Spraying.
2. Worked for Pioneer as a crop scout and field statician (all corn related)
3. Worked as a bookkeeper at a local chemical/fertilizer/seed plant
4. Bookkeeper at a Grain Elevator, also weighed in grain, took samples and tested, sold grain to the river, bought grain from farmers.

Four Movies I Could Watch Over and Over:
1. Dazed and Confused
2. Footloose
3. Dirty Dancing
4. The Notebook

I Have Lived:
1. My parents House, Sheffield, Illinois
2. My house, Wyanet, Illinois

Four TV Shows I Love to Watch:
1. CSI Miami
2. Desperate Housewives
3. Grey's Anatomy
4. Family Guy

Places I Have Been on Vacation:
1. Altus AFB, Oklahoma
2. Tyndall AFB, Panama City Florida (beautiful private Air Force Beach there)
4. Orlando Florida (Disney), Ft Meyers Florida, Sanibel Island, and Isle of the Palms South Carolina (one trip)
5. Vancouver, Canada (got married)
6. Menomonie, Wisconsin (the Menomonie by Eu Claire, home of stout university) and Mall of America at Minneapolis/St Paul Minnesota.- oh AND Wisconsin Dells.

Four Websites I Visit Daily:
1. Wizzywigz
2. I Miei Pensieri
3. The Other Tina
4. Salacious Gossip and Heresay

Favorite Foods:
1. Pizza. Yummy. Cheeseburger from Lous LaGrotto, Spaghetti Pizza from Maria's or Angelo's II, or Stuffed Spinach from Bellucios.... Or anything from Caseys.
2. Lasagna or Spaghetti with Garlic Bread (w/cheese)
3. House Fried Rice or Moo Goo Gai Pan
4. Tuna Sandwich. Homemade or Subway.

Four Places I would rather be:
1. In Bed sleeping
2. In bed having Sex
3. In bed reading
4. In the bathtub (reading, sleeping, or having sex)

Four People I Am Tagging With This Meme:
1. Wizzy
2. Tina
3. Landismom
4. Ace (although I don't Ace reads my blog, this would be the time to find out)

1am and I pissed off my body...

(to the tune of "saturday night, and I aint got no-body." Sing it now....)

I am getting cranky. It is 1am and I just walked in the door. Seriously and literally. I have been working on that wireless network and putting in new computers.... again.... tonight.... after 8.25 hours at my full time job, I spent 6 hours on the other job. And then just as we are finishing, we put a computer in place, and it won't connect to the network. And we discover that the patch cable that was run previously has gone bad. And we need to run a new one, underneath the office building, into the basement. In the dark. Without a drill, through a hole that is too small. So we ended up improvising with a cable run all across the office to the wireless router, and leaving to call it a night (technically a morning) I am so fucking (yep, the F word, "partial profanity" be gone) exhausted and cranky. The upside is that I got to drink 4 glasses of wine while working and listed to my ipod, which made the time go faster.... up until the time I lost the buzz and started to get edgy and bitchy. And now I just have "wine heartburn" and no clean clothes to wear to work. Lucky me. Tomorrow. Sleep. After work. I promise to myself. Self, let me apologize for the physical and emotional stress that I have put you through since Sunday. Brain, take a rest, sleep sleep.

The Horse's Mouth

This is a very very very cool blog. If you have a question about our troops in Iraq, why not ask them? http://www.askthesoldiers.blogspot.com/

And while you are at it, visit GIGotti at his blog "across the pond" which is located at the tippy top of my blogroll. How cool is he, blogging from Iraq? And I think I have distractions in my everyday life? LOL.

Shopping List....

Bread.
Vodka.
Orange Juice Concentrate.
Excedrin Tension Headache.
Pantyhose.
Bottles of Sprite (for Vodka Slushies.)
Orbit Gum- Peppermint.
Pick up 1 hour photos.

Hammer Pants Versus Buttafuoco Pants

Hammer Pants?

For some reason the internet has removed all references of the buttafouco pants.
Do you remember the ugly pants that guys wore that were like crazy patterned NFL team pants, and Joey Buttafouco was wearing them on TV around the time of the shooting? We all started calling those "buttafouco pants" but now I can't find even a picture of them. Anyone know what I am talking about?

Hmmmm.......
The Decision is a tough one!

I said the F Word

I was on blogexplosion today and ran across my site in their listings. I kind of giggled because my site had this little "clause" under it in red bold letters. It said "Contains parital profanity" (see above)

Partial? How is something partially profane? I have said the F word. Oh who am I kidding. It's my blog. I said Fuck. Who cares? Big deal? I also said Breast. And I think I said Boob once or twice. And that is partial? What does it take to me it "full" profanity? Cock (it's a rooster) Pussy (it's a cat) Hmmmm.....

Now I am on the quest for full profanity. Hang on as we embark.