Perhaps I spoke too soon.  Monday I reported that my Internet connection was fixed.  Yesterday I had trouble again.  It’s an odd problem.  Something between my computer and RoadRunner’s server is dropping packets occasionally.  We ruled out my Linksys router by removing it from the system.  We ruled out my computer by hooking a different computer directly to the cable modem, and also by pinging from the server end.  Today we swapped out the modem.  Same problem.  I still suspect that there’s a problem in one of the “boxes” between here and there, and it seems to me that they’d be able to pinpoint the trouble fairly quickly by studying the pattern of trouble reports.

Although it’s possible that they’re not getting many trouble reports.  I only notice the problem if I try to send a large file.  Intermittent packet loss doesn’t seem to affect normal email messages (a few kilobytes) or FTP of small files (tens of kilobytes).  And I seem able to download without trouble, although sometimes quite slowly.  The technicians that they send to customers’ houses seem quite capable at tracking and fixing local problems, but they don’t appear to have any ability or authority to diagnose issues that extend beyond individual property lines.  They also seem incapable of or unwilling to run any but the most basic tests.  Ping tests are okay for most things, but they don’t simulate uploading a three megabyte file very well.

I get to wait for the technician to call me at work tomorrow so I can once again drop whatever I’m doing and rush home so he can fiddle around with things a bit and then say, “There must be a problem somewhere else in the system.  I’ll report it to the office and it should be fixed within 48 hours.”  What a way to run a business.

On a happier note, somebody at Sprint PCS finally figured out how to get text messaging working on my phone.  I spent almost two hours with their technical support people last night and filed yet another trouble ticket.  By some magic, I managed to receive a text message on my phone this morning.  It only took three weeks, four email messages, and eight calls to Sprint PCS technical support totaling about six hours on the phone.  Some customer service, huh?

The last week has been pretty crazy, with more going wrong than right, but I guess that’s the way it happens sometimes. Anyway, sifting through the short items:

• It only took Time Warner a week to find and fix the problem that was preventing me and others in the area from uploading anything. I couldn’t even send an email message that was longer than three or four kilobytes. I guess I should call RoadRunner and see about getting a partial credit for the lack of full service.
• Debra and I headed out for a long ride early Saturday morning. The plan was to ride to San Marcos and back–approximately 120 miles. We made it to San Marcos in a little over 4 hours, took a break, and headed back home. The wind was a little stronger than we had planned, and then it started raining. Riding in wind-driven rain is one of the more dangerous activities you can engage in on a bicycle, so we pulled off to wait it out. When the rain didn’t let up after a while, we finally called a friend to come pick us up. So we got 66 miles instead of 120. Not a problem, really, as we’re both ready for the long ride. But Debra would have been more confident had she been able to complete 120 miles. Perhaps this coming weekend.
• I’m still going ’round and ’round with Sprint on my text messages problem. I thought we had it fixed on Friday, but I wasn’t able to test it due to my cable problems at home. Today’s test shows that it still is not working. So I guess I have to call again.
• I got another one of those email messages from CapitalOne, containing my name and the last four digits of my credit card number. This bothered me (see March 18) because the links in the message go to capitalone.bfi0.com. This apparently is legitimate: CapitalOne contracted with Bigfoot Interactive to do some marketing. Legitimate, perhaps, but stupidly executed. It looks like phishing.
• I reviewed Clever Internet Suite for .NET last week. If you need to parse Internet content (especially HTML pages and email messages), you’ll save yourself a whole lot of time with these components. I guarantee I’ve spent more than $60 worth of time trying to write comparable code.

Plenty more to talk about here once I can clear my desk of pressing items.

I find at least two things wrong with the warning label on our new bottle of Palmolive dishwashing liquid:

Warning: Keep out of reach of children. Do not mix with chlorine bleach to avoid irritating fumes.

1. First, what parent would buy dishwashing liquid that they need to keep from their children? I thought the whole idea was to get the kids to wash the dishes.
2. More importantly, I was wondering if I could mix the product with chlorine bleach for some purpose other than avoiding irritating fumes. Come to think of it, maybe the label is implying that there’s some other way to make the stuff not smell so bad. The warning is ambigious. I think whoever wrote it meant to say, “To avoid irritating fumes, do not mix with chlorine bleach.” And no, I don’t think I’m being overly critical here. Sentence structure has meaning. Doesn’t anybody proofread these things?

The shoulder is an incredibly complex joint. Three or four bones and ten or more muscles all work together to give the shoulder a wider range of motion than any other joint in the body. When it’s working, it works quite well. But injure any one of the muscles and you begin to lose strength and flexibility. If an injury is left untreated, the other muscles–especially the four muscles and tendons that make up the rotator cuff –will compensate, further reducing strength and flexibility. The problem often gets progressively worse, causing other muscle groups to stiffen and resulting in chronic back and neck pain.

I suffered an AC separation of the left shoulder in 1994. The emergency room physician gave me a sling and some painkillers, and referred me to an orthopedic surgeon. The orthopedist told me to take it easy and let the shoulder heal. So I did. I injured the shoulder a couple more times less seriously in the late 90s while mountain biking. I began to lose flexibility and strength, and I had to sell my trampoline because I couldn’t tolerate the pain that jumping on it induced in my shoulder.

My doctor sent me to an orthopedist who took X-rays and told me that I was getting old. He explained that the AC joint injury was getting worse and the only way to fix it would be through surgery. With no guarantee of making things better, and the possibility of making it worse, I declined and grudgingly accepted the idea that my body’s starting to wear out. In the five or six years since then, two other doctors have said pretty much the same thing.

About three months ago I began experiencing upper back and neck pain. I put it off to long hours on the bike at first, but it got to the point where I couldn’t sit still for more than five minutes, and the only time I wasn’t in pain was when I was sleeping. At the same time, my shoulder was becoming even less flexible to the point where trying to raise my hand over my head would cause excruciating pain. Figuring that I could at least take care of the back and neck pain, I made appointments with a massage therapist and a chiropractor.

If you’ve never had a professional massage, you don’t know what you’re missing. I’m not talking about some scantily-clad lovely lady rubbing her hands over my body–I can get that at home. No, the massage that I received last Tuesday wasn’t even comfortable. Forget arousing. Kathy combines massage with trigger point therapy, and the results were nothing short of miraculous. My muscles were a little bit sore the next day, but the pain in my back and neck had reduced, and my shoulder was noticeably more flexible than it had been in years.

The chiropractor has been using some electrical therapy to help loosen my shoulder. He places an electrode on the muscle near my shoulder blade and turns on the juice. Every five seconds, a slowly building electric charge causes the shoulder muscles to flex, and then relax slowly as the charge is reduced. Each visit also includes a spinal adjustment–something I’m not entirely convinced is required, but it seems to help.

I’ve always been suspicious of massage and chiropractic therapies, but I can’t argue with the results.  In the last two weeks I’ve visited the chiropractor four times and the massage therapist twice. The back pain is almost completely gone and I’m actually using my left arm. I’ve been learning more about the shoulder joint and how to stretch and strengthen the muscles. It’s almost certain that my AC separation 10 years ago also included a rotator cuff injury that has worsened over the years as it’s gone untreated. It will take time–maybe a year–to rehabilitate my shoulder, but I should regain full use of it.

In retrospect, it’s my own darned fault for letting things go this long.  I didn’t even research the injury, but instead trusted that my doctors would give me complete information.  I know better than that.  I’ve actively participated with my family doctor on a number of other issues recently, and with the cardiologist in developing a diet, exercise, and medication regimen to address my family history of heart disease.  Perhaps those recent experiences lead me to re-examine the shoulder injury.  Whatever the case, I got another reminder that my health and well being is up to me.  Doctors and other health professionals are there to help and advise, but it’s up to me to research and approve the appropriate therapies.

It must be my time for trouble with technical support. If you’ve viewed my site the last couple of days, you probably noticed that things were a little “off.” I had trouble uploading my changes on Monday night. RoadRunner’s technical support line had a message saying that they were doing some maintenance and that customers might experience some outages. So I went to bed.

I called RoadRunner again on Tuesday night when I still had troubles. Their message this time said “Due to network maintenance, customers with data modems should reset their modems, routers, and computers.” I followed their instructions, turning everything off and then bringing everything back up in the order they specified: modem, router, computer. Still not working.

After 10 minutes on hold, Kathleen at RoadRunner answered my call. I explained the problem and that I had reset everything as suggested. Her response: “there must be something wrong with the server you’re trying to upload to.” I told her that I didn’t think so, as I was able to upload to it from a computer that was not on RoadRunner’s network, and I also have trouble sending mail through RoadRunner’s server. After going ’round and ’round for a few minutes I finally asked, “Is it possible that there’s a problem with RoadRunner’s network?” Heresy!

It took a little more prodding before she offered to test my modem. Wonder of wonders, “Oh, my. I’m seeing 27 percent packet loss on the round trip, and these are very small packets. We’ll need to send a technician out there.”

Does Time Warner understand that most people have jobs where they can’t just take off at a moment’s notice? She wanted to send a technician out on Wednesday. When? “Sometime during the day. They will call 30 minutes before.” Excuse me, but my office is a 40 minute drive from home when there’s no traffic at all. Debra works about 15 minutes away, but neither of us can just drop what we’re doing and head home. And why do they need me there anyway? All the connections are outside. Can’t they just plug their network analyzer into the outlet box on the house and diagnose the problem? In the seven years I’ve had RoadRunner service, I’ve never had to bring the technician into the house. They’ve done all of their diagnostic and repair work outside. Considering the amount of rain we’ve had recently (including an impressive hail storm on Saturday afternoon), it’s quite likely that the problem is in one of the outside connections.

But what the heck do I know? I’m just a stupid customer.

If I was a screamer, the customer service representative at Sprint PCS would have received an ear full. I called today to check on the status of the trouble ticket that was filed last Monday, which was a follow-on to the trouble ticket that was filed the week before.

Once again, and as I had expected, Sprint’s “engineering department” responsible for handling the trouble tickets failed to notify me that the ticket had been closed. The helpful customer service representative, referring to the engineering department’s reply, began explaining to me the finer points of sending text messages from a 2g (second generation) phone. I quickly stopped him and explained that I don’t want to send messages, but rather I want to receive them like I used to. I got another one of those blank looks over the phone.

According to my helpful CSR, the two previous trouble tickets did not clearly explain the problem. I find this somewhat mystifying, as the two previous CSRs I spoke with seemed intelligent enough to write a two-sentence explanation of the problem: “Customer cannot receive text messages, even though he was able to previously. Our system inexplicably blocks text messages sent to his phone.”

In any case, after burning only 20 minutes of Sprint’s toll-free technical support time, yet another trouble ticket has been created and the estimate is 36 hours for a response. I’ll be on the phone to Sprint Wednesday morning. Any bets on the outcome?

Today’s news has an article, Study: Abstinence Pledgers May Risk STDs, the first line of which reads: “Teens who pledge to remain virgins until marriage are more likely to take chances with other kinds of sex that increase the risk of sexually transmitted diseases, a study of 12,000 adolescents suggests.” The article goes on to explain that many of these “abstinence pledgers” engage in oral or anal sex.

That’s some weird kind of abstinence that I failed to learn about. As far as I can remember, “abstinence” meant refraining from engaging in any kind of sexual activity. There are those who dismiss the study as “bogus,” saying that the youths involved must not have really pledged abstinence. Whatever the case, there appears to be some disagreement about what exactly is considered sex. I thought I’d clear that up, and there’s no delicate way to do it.

• If it involves touching a penis for any reason other than waste elimination or hygiene needs, it’s sex.
• If it involves touching a vagina for any purpose other than waste elimination or hygiene needs, it’s sex.
• If it involves manually or orally stimulating any part of another’s body, it’s sex. That includes “French kissing,” which in my mind is one of the most intimate acts imaginable.
• In case there’s any question, rubbing her breasts through her clothes is sex. Her hand in his lap is sex.
• The lack of an orgasm does not change the definition of the act.
• Yes, masturbation is sex. Get over it.

Once researchers, sociologists, government, media, parents, and children can get those definitions straight, then perhaps we can have a real discussion about teenage sex.

Don’t take the above to mean that I fall into the “abstinence only” crowd. I don’t, but I do believe that people should exercise restraint. I’ve seen enough of the physical and emotional damage caused by casual and indiscriminate sexual encounters to understand that there is more to sex than just the physical act. There’s still some question as to whether that “more” is part of our genetic programming or the product of our social upbringing, and I think that question needs to be answered.

Sex is a natural part of life, and a large part of who we are. Teaching children that sex is evil or dirty is doing them and society a great disservice, and I think actually increases the incidence of underage sex. There’s nothing quite as attractive to a teenager as doing something forbidden, especially something that feels so good. For good or ill, sex is pervasive in today’s society. Children are naturally curious, and if they don’t learn about it from their parents they’re going to learn about it from somewhere. It’s likely that neither the source nor the lessons learned will be the parents’ preference.

Sex education in schools shouldn’t be necessary, and in any case can only explain the mechanics of sex, the possible physical consequences, and methods used to avoid those consequences. My parents explained all that to me one evening when I was eight or ten years old. They spent years teaching me, not that sex is dirty or evil, but that it’s one of the most wonderful gifts that we have, that giving the gift indiscriminately cheapens it, and that saving it to share with the person we love is priceless.

Cleaning some short items from the In box…

• Reader Roy Harvey was the first to let me know that it was Lilly Tomlin’s Ernestine character on Laugh-In who immortalized AT&T’s legendary customer service, not Carol Burnett.  I’ve corrected my March 14 entry.
• I don’t know how concerned I should be about Page Hijack: The 302 Exploit, Redirects and Google, but it’s interesting reading.  I’m continually amazed at the different ways that malicious users or nefarious spammers can make things difficult.
• I got an email the other day purporting to be from my credit card company.  It looks like an official communication, complete with the correct last four digits of my account number.  However, the links go to capitalone.bfi0.com rather than www.capitalone.com.  I tried the bfi0 address plain, without the identifying tag at the back of the URL, and got a blank page.  Sounds like a scam to me.  What bothers me is that, if this really is a scam, somebody was able to link my email address with my credit card account number.  At least the last four digits, that is.  I’ll be keeping a close eye on this account.
• Building a 3-column layout using CSS rather than HTML tables is something of a challenge, depending on what exactly you’re trying to do.  I spent a lot of time on my 3-column template for WordPress.  The best CSS layout tutorial site I’ve seen is Perched Upon a Lily Pad, which shows a 3-column layout with an explanation, and the entire style sheet is available if you view the source.  Very nicely done.
• Back in the DOS days I and everybody else used PKZip to compress files for transmission.  PKWARE is still around making compression tools, but they don’t appear to offer a free or shareware version anymore.  WinZip is pretty much the defacto standard for compression tools on Windows, although even it’s not really necessary since Windows XP includes zip compression built into Explorer.  But it doesn’t work from the command line.  There are command line tools available for WinZip, but you need the GUI version installed if you want to use them.  The best command line tools I’ve found are the Zip and UnZip utilities from Info-ZIP.

I’ve been following this one since last week, waiting for some sort of resolution. It’s ended, I think, and in the way that I would have predicted.

For the past 10 years, the United Auto Workers union has allowed members of the 1st Battalion, 24th Marines reserve unit to park at the union’s Solidarity House headquarters in Detroit. Last week UAW officials told the Marines that they would no longer allow foreign cars or cars that have pro-Bush bumper stickers. Much public outcry ensued on both sides of the issue. The commanding officer, Lt. Col Joe Rutledge, did what any good Marine would do: he ignored the political B.S. and made alternate parking arrangements for his troops. When the UAW reversed its decision in the face of public outcry earlier this week, Rutledge said that his Marines wouldn’t be parking at the lot anymore. “Either you support the Marines or you don’t.”

I can’t imagine what UAW President Ron Gettelfinger was thinking when he put those restrictions on the Marines’ vehicles. How could he misjudge public sentiment so badly? As a former Marine reservist he had to know that restricting the parking privileges of any Marine in the unit would be viewed by the other Marines as a slap in the face to all of them. If nothing else, Marines stick together.

You’ll notice, though, that the Marines handled this peacefully by making other parking arrangements. You didn’t see the Marines roughing up UAW members or vandalizing the UAW’s property, and you didn’t hear them whining about being oppressed or discriminated against. No, they just went about their business. One wonders if the UAW would have done the same had their positions been reversed.

To be fair, the UAW has a long history of supporting U.S. service men, and continues to do so. The initial decision to restrict the parking privileges was a very stupid move on the part of the union leadership and (I hope) does not reflect the sentiments of the union’s rank and file.

Full details:
  Parking Feud (WXYZ TV)
  Marines driven out of UAW lot (Detroit News)
  Marines snub UAW olive branch (Detroit News)

I’m still not sure if my increased Web traffic is from real people visiting the site or if it’s from referral log spammers.  My referral logs show huge numbers of links from poker, porn, and prescription sites (the “three Ps?”), but the distribution of pages visited hasn’t changed much.

I’ve mentioned before the possibility of a browser exploit that would spoof the HTTP_REFERRER field.  This doesn’t have to be done with a browser exploit.  All you need is a proxy.  There are many Web pages that suggest users access the Internet through anonymous proxies.  These proxies can block cookies, advertisements, popups and other spam, and also prevent Web sites from gathering referral information, operating system and browser statistics, and other such data that the browser can send.  That’s all to the good.

However, going through an anonymous proxy doesn’t really make you anonymous.  It just makes you anonymous to the Web sites that you visit.  The proxy service that you go through can easily keep track of all the information that passes through it.  It can track your entire browsing session:  the sites you visit, the order in which you visit them, how long you spend at each site, and even any information that you provide to the site in the clear.  This includes cookies, and passwords that you enter on non-secure sites like Yahoo Mail and other Web mail sites.  This is in addition to the browser and operating system statistics that all Web sites can capture.

By using an anonymous proxy, you preventing the majority of Web sites from learning anything about you, but giving a single site (the proxy) the ability to know everything about you.  Now I don’t know about you, but I’m not real comfortable with that idea.  It’s bad enough that somebody at my ISP could, if he wanted, sniff my traffic.  I trust them just because I have to.  It’s another thing entirely to trust a free anonymizer service that I know absolutely nothing about.  If you’re contemplating using one of these services, I suggest that you investigate it thoroughly before you subscribe.

The other thing that an anonymous proxy could do is sell referral log placement.  Since a lot of Web traffic goes through the proxy, and the proxy is going to blank the real HTTP_REFERRER field, there’s nothing stopping it from putting whatever the operator wants in that field.

Since I don’t have access to the raw Web logs for my site, I don’t have enough information to determine if this is really happening.  If you search the Web for “anonymous proxy”, you’ll find a long list of sites that provide “anonymous” browsing services.  Some are probably legitimate, but I suspect that many are not.