Skype calls

Amp clamp

After receiving a $225 electric bill for the month of December (on top of the $250 gas bill), I was curious to see what my various pieces of gear in the house cost/month. I ordered a clamp amp meter and started sleuthing. I first pulled out the old Pepco bill and after some simple math […]

Fried electrical cable

1/2 of the circuits in my electric panel died… that’s 1 phase into the house out for you electrically inclined folk. Nothing I could do… power company call and wait. It turns out that the problem was a massive short in the underground power cable. The 1.5″ thick cable was nothing but a bunch of […]

Searching for a viable Facebook/Twitter alternative

Spent a decent number of hours over the weekend looking at the field of OSS and private Facebook and Twitter alternatives. Initially, the two that leaped out at me were Diaspora* and Mastodon. I decided to take a shot at installing Diaspora, in spite of it’s messed up name, because it is pro-ported to be […]