2011-12-29 19:36:00
In the new year things will get serious!
My kendo glasses are being made, so I can start wearing my men. That completes my bogu, as I've already been wearing the do, kote and tare. Which means that yes, I'm going to get into real geiko and I can compete in shiai! And as I have mentioned before I'll jump into the deep end in 2012! January will see our next kyu examinations and in February I'll join the kyu-grade tournament.
This will require a few last preparations:
The design for my zekken is shown on the left. Along the top is the name of our dojo, Renshinjuku (錬心塾) and along the bottom is my surname. The middle is a repeat of my surname, but in katakana, which reads SURATA. The fine folk at kendo24 are on holiday this week and my favored shinai (the "kenshi" model) is sold out, so I hope my order will reach Almere in time.
kilala.nl tags: kendo, sports,
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2011-12-28 17:32:00
If you don't want to read about proverbial nuts, as opposed to the arachis variety, stop right now. Because that's what this post is about. Balls that is. Testes. Cohones. Scrote. Just scroll past this blogpost and read about sports and My Little Pony. You have been warned.
For as long as I recall (which is about as long as I've been aware of what's going on in my nether regions, aka teenage-hood) my right testes has been significantly larger than the left one. 2x4 cm versus 4x8 cm, so quite a difference in volume. I recall wondering about it when I was forteen or fifteen. Since that time two GPs have taken a gander, have prodded and squeezed and sent me on my way. "Nothing to see here. Looks normal."
Being a reasonably educated young man I've learned about testicular self examination, which is basically summed up to me as "size or solidity doesn't matter that much, but sudden changes do!". So when about a year ago I started to feel changes I got worried. It seemed that the right nut had gotten slightly bigger, it was tender and the lower part had gotten harder. So! Time for another examination!
Luckily this GP seemed a bit more thorough. Out comes the flashlight and there we go: hydrocele testis. Basically, part of the ball has become filled with fluids and because of the tension it starts to hurt more and more.
For now the course of action is clear: we have no idea whatsoever what could be the cause (there are manifold possibilities), so I'll go see the urologist next wednesday. Whatever the result will be, it'll end in an operation to get all the fluids out.
I've found a great pamphlet explaining about hydrocele testis and the operation. it's in dutch though.
EDIT:
Originally I was going to use this Cyanide&Happiness comic as a graphic, but I decided against it ^_^
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2011-12-27 12:07:00
Less than a month ago I was lamenting my lack of backbone and the fact that I hadn't gotten back to sports after returning from Japan. Since that day I've run my daily two trips again, which at least counts for something. Today I took a lunchtime break for an extra run around the park. Here's the statistics:
Nice. I'm back to my stats from June. Now I should start doing this more often (bring clean tshirts to the office!) and after that I should make it two laps around the park!
kilala.nl tags: sports, running,
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2011-12-24 11:26:00
This morning I walked into the local SpecSavers to get measured for new glasses. My current glasses have never really worked out properly for me, so now it's within two years instead of three. I have to say that today's measurement was worrisome for me. I'll soon make an appointment with an optometrist, because I wonder if there's something rather wrong with my eyes. Time to get over my fear of eye doctors :(
Left: Sp = -10.25, was -9.50 in december 2009 and -9.00 in december 2006.
Right: Sp = -10.25, was -9.75 in december 2009 and -9.50 in december 2006.
Today I ordered lenses for my kendo glasses, which have priority as my first tournament is up in february. In January I'll go back to the shop with Marli, so we can pick out frames for new day-to-day pairs. At least the price is right at SpecSavers! I'm getting lenses with an RI of 1.6 and they come at 95 euro for the pair. Not a-piece, but for the pair! The SpecSavers will charge me 50 bob to cut them and install them in my frame. That's -still- half of what we used to pay at Pearl!
Kris, if you're reading this: with some luck you'll get to really knock me around, come January! ^_^
kilala.nl tags: health, body, glasses, kendo,
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2011-12-21 20:15:00
A little while ago Dana's christmas present from my mother arrived. As is tradition the parcel also included some chocolate from Fazer. Because it was way too much for us to eat, I took a wad with me to the office. My colleagues quickly took a liking to Finnish chocolate, which has a much fatter/creamier taste than the dutch stuff we're familiar with. After two days of constant nasching Kevin was prompted to put together this lovely pic ^_^
kilala.nl tags: geeky, awesome,
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2011-12-21 20:02:00
Jeez Laweez! </Falco>
There's just no end to the illnesses around this house! >_>
Since our trip to Japan it's been off-and-on-again with flus, colds and other crud. One head cold, two head cold, then everybody down with enteritis. And now Dana's had fevers and a head cold for another whole week. We thought she'd recuperated because two days in a row she seemed fine, but then she crashed again today. She got really clingy and whiney around 1500 and wouldn't stop crying by 1600. She was at 37.2 which seemed normal, but that steadily rose to 38.7 at 1830 and to 39.7 at 2000. So yeah, we're keeping her home from school tomorrow. Again.
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2011-12-19 00:00:00
A few months back we discussed how incorrect log settings can mess with your auditing and logging in "Mind your log files!". Today we'll take a look at another way your logging can go horribly wrong.
Case in point: keystroke logs.
BoKS' suexec facility comes with optional keystroke logging, which allow you to capture a user's input and output. This is particularly handy when providing suexec su - user access to an applicative or super user. These keystroke logs are stored locally on the client system, where they are hashed and filed. The master server will then pull these log files from each client for centralized storage, after which the files will be cleaned from the clients. Optionally, these log files will then be pushed to replica servers for backup purposes.
Things go awfully wrong when the master server's kslog storage is underdimensioned. Once the storage location for keystroke logs is filled, the master server will stop pulling and cleaning files from client systems. This means that $BOKS_var/kslog, which is meant for temporary storage, now becomes rather permanent storage. And since many BoKS administrators leave $BOKS_var as part of the /var file system you are now filling up /var. If the BoKS client system is not protected against a 100% filled /var you are now looking at a very, very nasty situation. You might end up crashing client systems, or causing other erratic behaviour.
TLDR:
kilala.nl tags: boks, sysadmin,
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2011-12-17 19:09:00
Today was the closing of 2011 at Renshinjuku Kendo in Almere (錬心塾剣道 アルメレ). And for this occasion our trainers had set up an interesting day :)
The suburi for warming up were changed dramatically. After the usual jogeburi, we were explained a new "game". Every member of the school would sound off ten strikes in turn and everybody would chime in with a shout of "men!". Since there were fifteen people, that makes for a hundred and fifty strikes. Did I mention it was haya suburi?! (short video of haya suburi) I failed right after my turn, which was after fifty I believe ;_;
I did my best to have great kiai and was one of the few whose counting resounded loudly through the hall ^_^
After that was another fun little game: everybody would take turns hitting fast kote on motodachi for ten seconds straight. The challenge was to do as many good strikes, combining fumikomi, kiai and strike. I managed to get up to 32 although that could've been more had I paid more attention to footwork and relaxation.
After that: kiri kaeshi (another short video), which didn't go too well at all. The kendoka without full bogu were taken apart by Kris to focus on the basics: footwork and strikes. We were all quite sloppy :( Then, more and more basics, including stuff to focus on reaction times and snappiness. It was a great last class for the year and I felt awesome in the end.
Today's big learning points!
I'm very much looking forward to 2012. In january we will have our next exams and in february I plan on taking part in the kyu-grade tournament with Martijn. That means I'd better get a move on with my kendo glasses as I'll need to be in full bogu for the tourney!
kilala.nl tags: kendo, sports,
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2011-12-16 00:00:00
Yesterday served as a reminder that we can all fall prey to stupid little things :)
Symptom: A customer of mine could use suexec su - oracle on a few of his systems, but not on some of his others.
Troubleshooting: Everything seemed to check out just fine. The customer's account was in working order and neither root, nor the target account were locked or otherwise problematic. And of course the customer had the required access routes.
$ suexec lsbks -aTl *:customer | grep SXSHELL
suexec:*->root@HOSTGROUP%CUSTOMER-PG-SXSHELL (kslog=3)
$ suexec pgrpadmin -l -g CUSTOMER-PG-SXSHELL | grep oracle
/bin/su - oracle
/usr/bin/su - oracle
So, why does BoKS keep saying that this user isn't allowed to use suexec su - oracle on one box, but it's okay on the other?
12/13/11 10:00:57 HOST1 pts/1 customer suexec Successful suexec (pid 16867) from customer to root, program /bin/su
12/13/11 10:00:57 HOST1 pts/1 customer suexec suexec args (pid 16867): - oracle
12/13/11 10:01:12 HOST2 pts/5 customer suexec Unsuccessful suexec from customer to root, program /bin/su. No terminal authorization granted.
I thought it was odd that the logging for the failed suexec seemed "incomplete", but wrote it off as a software glitch. However, this is where alarm bells should've gone off!
So I continued and everthing seemed to check out: on both hosts /bin/su was used, on both hosts oracle was the target user and the BoKS logging supported it all. So let's try something exciting! Boksauth simulations!
Obviously the simulation for HOST1 went perfectly. But then I tried it for HOST2:
$ suexec boksauth -L -Oresults -r 'SUEXEC:customer@pts/1->root@HOST2%/bin/su#20-#20oracle' -c FUNC=auth TOUSER=root FROMUSER=customer TOHOST=HOST2 FROMHOST=HOST2 PSW="iascfavvcfHc"
ROUTE=SUEXEC:customer@pts/1->root@HOST2%/bin/su#20-#20oracle
FUNC=auth
TOUSER=root
FROMUSER=customer
TOHOST=HOST2
FROMHOST=HOST2
PSW=iascfavvcfHc
$HOSTSYM=MASTER
$ADDR=192.168.10.20
$SERVCADDR=192.168.10.20
WC=#$*-./?_
FKEY=CUSTOMER-HG:customer
UKEY=HOST2:root
RMATCH=suexec:*->root@CUSTOMER-HG%CUSTOMER-PG-SXSHELL,kslog=3
MOD_CONV=1
AMETHOD=psw
$PSW=ok
VTYPE=psw
RETRY=0
MODLIST=kslog=3,prompt=+1,su=+1,passroot=+1,use_frompsw=+1,su_fromtoken=+1,chpsw=-1,concur_limit=-1
$STATE=9
$SERVCVER=6.5.3
What I was expecting to see was STATE=6 and ERROR=203. But since the ERROR= field is absent and the STATE=9, this indicates that the simulation was successful. Now things get interesting! So I asked my customer to try the suexec su - oracle with me online, while I ran a trace on the BoKS internals. This resulted in a file 10k lines long, but it finally got me what I needed.
In the course of the debug trace, BoKS went through table 37 (suexec program group entries) to verify whether my customer's command was amongh the list. It of course was, but BoKS said it didn't match!
wildprogargscmp_recurse: wild = /usr/bin/su#20-#20oracle, match = /bin/su^M
wildprogargscmp_recurse: is_winprog = 0^M
wildprogargscmp_docmp: Called, wild /usr/bin/su#20-#20oracle match /bin/su^M
wildprogargscmp_docmp: Progs do not match^M
wildprogargscmp_docmp: return 1 (0 means match)^M
wildprogargscmp_recurse: wild = /bin/su#20-#20oracle, match = /bin/su^M
wildprogargscmp_recurse: is_winprog = 0^M
wildprogargscmp_docmp: Called, wild /bin/su#20-#20oracle match /bin/su^M
wildprogargscmp_docmp: fnamtch wild - sumdev, match did not match^M
wildprogargscmp_docmp: return 1 (0 means match)^M
This threw me for a loop. So I went back to the original BoKS servc call that was received from client HOST2.
servc_func_1: From client (HOST2) {FUNC=auth 01TOHOST=?HOST 01FROMHOST=?HOST 01TOUSER=root 01FROMUSER=customer 01FROMUID=1818 01FROMTTY=pts/52 01ROUTE=SUEXEC:customer@pts/52->root@?HOST%/bin/su}^M
And then it clicked! One final check confirmed that I'd been overthinking the issue!
$ suexec cadm -l -f ENV -h HOST2 | grep ^VERSION
VERSION=6.0
It turns out that HOST2 was still running BoKS version 6.0. While the suexec facility was introduced into BoKS aeons ago, only per version 6.5 did suexec become capable of screening command parameters! So a v6.5 system would submit the request as suexec su - oracle, while a v6.0 host sends it as suexec su. And of course that fails.
It's awesomely fun to dig around BoKS' internals, but in this particular case it'd have been better if I'd spent the hour on something else :)
kilala.nl tags: boks, sysadmin,
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2011-12-09 15:15:00
What do I do if I'm down with nausea and enteritis? Cheer up by watching ponies! ^_^
As a former Warhammer 40k fanatic I get a kick seeing my favourite, Apple Jack, commandeer a Leman Russ battle tank. Great work by DA artist Abaddon41 (gallery).
What's even more awesome are the three interactive Starcraft 2 unit portraits made by Yudhaikeledai (gallery). Here is Apple Jack as the terran SVC worker unit. I've always enjoyed RTS games, so it's a bit sad that it took these Flash animations to get me to consider starting SC2 (<_< ;)
EDIT:
For those not too versed in Internet jokes, this post's title is obviously a play on this meme.
kilala.nl tags: geeky,
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2011-12-08 21:21:00
It's been a few months since I got started on my training to cope with my anxiety. So far the training has been mostly educational, explaining the workings of anxiety attacks and their effects on people. After that I've now reached the first practical stage.
Currently I'm going through relaxation exercises, but funnily enough I find them hard going. To be more precise, with the first few exercises I'm bored out of my skull! And calculating that I need to go through each exercise at least ten times on a daily basis that makes for an interesting two months. =_=
Check it out. The exercises come with a CD that you listen to for instructions. For sure the man has a pleasant voice, but halfway through the assignment it gets mindboglingly... well, I fall asleep :)
So. I need to find a way to press through.
kilala.nl tags: anxiety,
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2011-12-06 20:10:00
Yuck.
Last night we had quite a scare! Marli had been having stabbing pains in her abdomen since lunch time, which had been getting progressively worse. It's not a pain she'd had before in her life, and since it was around her stomach we were worried about her gastric bypass. During our phonecall with the local emergency room she described the pain as "7 to 8 on a scale of 1-10, with offshots to 11". So yeah, worried. Nothing pointed at the usual suspect: gastric enteritis. Sure, she'd had a case of the squits earlier, but there was no throwing up at all. Until we got into the car.
The doc at the ER quickly determined it was enteritis after all, or some other gastric virus. Lots of rest and fluids and easily digestible and bland foods. Which is why I stayed at home today, to take care of Marli and Dana.
Speaking of Dana: I didn't suspect her to have enteritis as well, but I reckon she does. Last sunday, while celebrating Sinterklaas in Friesland, she unexpectedly threw up after dinner. But after that she seemed just fine. Yesterday she was fine as well, and today as well. Until dinner time, when she threw up again. So... Maybe a virus after all.
Makes me wonder when it's my turn. I -do- feel sickish to my stomach right now, but that might simply be my body reacting in a panic-fashion to Dana's sickness. Meh. With some bad luck we're all stuck at home all week.
EDIT:
Turns out that the next day -was- my turn. Cold shivers, phoning Ralph on the white phone, etc. Things got better the next day and on Friday I was mostly okay again.
kilala.nl tags: health,
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2011-12-06 16:51:00
Last week I travelled to The Hague to give a presentation about BoKS. Because it's quite a trek between The Hague and Almere I took the train. Better to have myself driven back and forth, than to be stuck in numerous traffic jams and return home worn out. Now, it could have everything to do with the fact that I was re-reading Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou, but I got to thinking about my past a little bit.
By train I passed through three stations that I have quite a bit of history with.
First up there's Station Haarlem. Not that I've traveled there often, but I've always loved the architecture of it all. It still retains many of the original buildings from the early nineteenhundreds, including the waiting rooms, the public lavatories and the station master's building. Absolutely beautiful and I'm sad that it's all fallen into disuse. None of these stunning buildings are being used, at all!
Then there's The Hague itself. I came here on a daily basis three years ago, working for T-Mobile. And would you believe it? I hardly recognize the place at all! Of course, they've been renovating the building for some time now and they're not nearly done. But man, it's weird to see the transformation that place has gone through.
And finally, there's Leiden Central. Way, way back, around 1998/1999 I came to Leiden every week to visit my then-girlfriend Saskia. Even two years after our breakup I still dreaded traveling to that place, thinking I might run into her. Weird huh? But what's weirder is the fact that I do not recognize the station nor its surroundings at all. It's worse than The Hague, there's really not a landmark in sight that I remember! What's weirder is, now that I started thinking about that time, I don't even remember where Saskia lived! To my mind I never even knew her address, but that's of course not true. Based on her landlord's name and entry in the phonebook (weird that I remember -his- name, right?!) I think I've found the address, but I really don't recognize anything about the neighborhood. That's the tooth of time, I guess.
EDIT:
Speaking of times past, let's see if I can't rake my mind and remember some of the stuff I used to be very big on. $DEITY it's hard to recall all of the years properly. I might've made plenty of mistakes.
In 1992-93 I dated the Pallada sisters in turn. Marieke was two years older than me and Bea a year younger. I was as inexperienced as they come and really had no clue whatsoever (^_^ ;) In 1997 I met Maya Deva (through my college's MUD), on whom I had my first college-age crush. That one went unrequited :D Then in 1998, on my first Shire gathering in the SCA, I met Saskia with whom I started a relationship a few weeks later at Polderslot's Knick Knack 1998. That lasted until sometime in 1999, with a tumultuous breakup. In 2000 I met Marli's father in Germany and Marli herself a few weeks after that. Funny story: Marli attended Knick Knack 1998 as well and back then I'd already eyed her, but decided to pursue Saskia instead.
You know? Trying to recall all of this stuff makes me wish I'd started keeping a diary much earlier in my life. Even including this website in all of its shapes and forms one could say I only started in earnest sometime in 2003. Of course, I'm sure that my teenage diaries would've been horribly angsty and melodramatic, but still... They would've made some interesting reading for the adult me.
Being in a nostalgic mood it's nice to see how some of the people from my past have turned out. Maya Deva has worked for Wizards of the Coast, designing D&D modules. She now lives in Groningen and has kids. And the Polderslot SCA group is still going strong, with many of the people I met back in the late nineties. All of them a bit older and many of them with one or two kids. Out of my college buddies, Rene is the last one I've spoken to and that was years ago. I sincerely hope that he's doing well, as he wasn't too well a few years ago. Of Saskia, I have absolutely no clue, though her friend Dineke whom I met in Rotterdam a few times appears to be doing well artist and dancer. Bas, whom I met through archery, will probably still be living in Germany, working as IT consultant. I'm told he also competed on the German national bobsled team for invalids. Ah life... Time races on, don't it?
kilala.nl tags: life,
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2011-12-05 05:22:00
This month marks the official "60 kilos lost" point for Marli, since she had her gastric bypass operation. That's 132 pounds, for the metrically challenged. The doctors already regarded it as a success at 40, which was attained in the eigth/ninth month, but here we are at the thirteenth. Of course we hope that the weight loss is going to continue, as Marli's target weight lies somewhere in the ninety kilos ranges.
As can be expected she now does have oodles of loose skin, but that's something we were both prepared for. And to be honest, that's affecting us a lot less than we'd expected! Sure she's not literally happy about all the loose skin, but at least it's a sign that her weight's going in the right direction! She's also picked up sports again, after having quit swimming a few months ago (which was due to a weird skin reaction to the pool water). These days she has a sub at a local fitness joint... Spinning, jogging, cardio, that kind of stuff. I'm very proud of her :)
Putting the loose skin aside, you wouldn't believe how good she looks in some of her new clothes! Now that she's dropped quite a few sizes in clothing, Marli's started shopping at the more fashionable shops in town. Let me tell you, those clothes look good on her! o_O
Me? I'm still stable at the 72 kilos mark, after my big drop in weight in the first months after Marli's operation.
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2011-12-03 20:52:00
The past few weeks I have been a bit frustrated with myself. Since coming home from Japan I haven't properly gotten back to my sports regime. Only last week have I tried to get back to running on a daily basis, which aggravates me because I walk the same piece of road on a daily basis. So why not run instead of walking?! Well, at least I'm not taking the buss to the office.
Same for kendo. Before the holiday I used to train at home at least once a week, together with Martijn. Of course, these days the weather outside is awful, but I can still train by myself in the attic like I did when I just got started. But I haven't...
But! I'm not quitting kendo! I enjoy this way too much and it's very educational, both physically and mentally. The social aspect of it is also very pleasant, as my classmates are cool guys.
Points to take away from today's lesson:
kilala.nl tags: Sports, kendo, running,
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All content, with exception of "borrowed" blogpost images, or unless otherwise indicated, is copyright of Thomas Sluyter. The character Kilala the cat-demon is copyright of Rumiko Takahashi and used here without permission.
