Things are rough these days. How's everyone handling it? -- ========================================= Jeff Brace Vice President & Board Member, VCF East Showrunner Vintage Computer Federation http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org
Work is keeping me surprisingly busy. Can be a challenge having everyone home all day everyday, but we’re hanging in. On Thu, Mar 26, 2020 at 11:43 PM Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Things are rough these days. How's everyone handling it?
-- ========================================= Jeff Brace Vice President & Board Member, VCF East Showrunner Vintage Computer Federation http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org
I am adding my DEC 3000 to my home network at the moment after a long day. Got in some disc golf earlier, it was beautiful. Kids home, Kennett Classic closed, but still doing a lot of web design work, never busier. B On Thu, Mar 26, 2020, 11:44 PM Dean Notarnicola via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Work is keeping me surprisingly busy. Can be a challenge having everyone home all day everyday, but we’re hanging in.
On Thu, Mar 26, 2020 at 11:43 PM Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Things are rough these days. How's everyone handling it?
-- ========================================= Jeff Brace Vice President & Board Member, VCF East Showrunner Vintage Computer Federation http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org
Things are rough these days. How's everyone handling it?
I drive to work everyday. Huge building (over 20 floors.) I get rock star parking every day. 1st floor closest spot to the entrance. I touch nothing going in really. Sit at desk, 2 other coworkers are there usually. I go to the mall everyday for lunch, it's attached sort of to the building. There is maybe 3 to 5 food places open for carry out. Once again, basically touch nothing. Almost every store in the mall is closed. It's like watching the Dead Mall series on youtube where the music is playing and all the stores are missing except the stores are there in one of the wealthiest malls in the USA. It's eerie, I want to shoot some video of it. Traffic last week was way lighter than this week. Even though traffic is light, people still do below the speed limit and stuff which plugs the roads up. I was looking out at the beltway and this week it seems like big rig traffic is up quite a bit. Personal projects... been re-belting a nakamichi tape deck, working on an arcade system that boots from a raspberry pi to load the games into the hardware (Sega Dreamcast) and reading forums releated to computer stuff, SCUBA diving and reddit talk of the virus thing. Friends chatting on Slack, Discord and IRC. The downtime is kind of relaxing not having some geeky social thing every night but at the same time it seems off. Part of me feels bad for not getting more project stuff done, or dabbling with music instruments more or something... but I'm still pretty zapped after working all day. The customer I work for just doesn't let up and always has a backlog of work. They laid off 10% last Friday I think and news is talking potential bankruptcy so no idea what that means for the future. I had planned on taking a trip to Florida in mid to late April to get some diving in, run some laser show stuff with friends at Kennedy Space Center and take a break from work. But all those plans got trashed. So many events delayed or in limbo it's not funny. I seriously regret not getting a haircut two weekends ago, but a friend was in town and figured I would spend time doing fun stuff with him instead. I regret that one. I hope everyone is safe and doing well. - Ethan
On Thu, Mar 26, 2020 at 11:42 PM Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Things are rough these days. How's everyone handling it?
Doing fine. Working from home - no travel to customers right now, of course. All of my upcoming projects still have fluid start dates. I did just have a bang-up annual review at least. For projects, I'm working on different things every couple of nights - this week has been fiddling with VFD Pole Displays and committing code to LCDproc to support them. I'm also sorting through bins of components and trying to combine things so I don't have the same kinds of parts in four different cabinets. I probably have more resistors than a Peace March. Plenty of home repair and hobby projects to fill the time. Cooking a lot more, our stores have shortages like everywhere but they are doing an OK job keeping a lot of items stocked. Gas here dropped to between about $1.56 to $1.75 most places, not that I'm using a lot. The times I've been out to the store, there are a few cars, but there's no rush hour anymore. I had a lot of events planned for March-May, not just VCF East. I've cancelled several PTO days because they were all to give me long weekends for travel. Now, they are back into my bank to keep in reserve for potential sick leave. At some point here, mid April, it's looking like, work will pick up again. That will keep me busy for a few weeks at a time (I'm all project-based, not tied to one customer for months).. In between, I can take classes online and work on new technologies and work on certs. I'm definitely looking forward to slightly warmer weather so I can do some outdoor tasks at my Farm. That's probably going to be my big adventure for the summer. -ethan
On 3/26/2020 11:42 PM, Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic wrote:
Things are rough these days. How's everyone handling it? Working 50 hour weeks (healthcare IT), and when I get home, working on the Citadel BBS for the Makerspace, building modem support back into the current version. Seems I'm the last user making use of the feature.
The Digi 77000889 8 port card I have does not want to play nice with the Multitech modem bank... Martin
Isolated. Nice to see what others are up to. Inspiring. AC Moore was 95% off last week so I have enough materials to last through... probably forever. Been roller skating on nice days. Walking on boardwalk is still allowed in Ocean Grove but there are metal street signs posted about keeping social distance. It makes it look too permanent. Also there was a large drone circling over Asbury Park to monitor social distancing. That was disturbing. Sent from Yahoo Mail for iPhone On Thursday, March 26, 2020, 11:42 PM, Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote: Things are rough these days. How's everyone handling it? -- ========================================= Jeff Brace Vice President & Board Member, VCF East Showrunner Vintage Computer Federation http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org
Enjoying the vacation, for now. Sent from: My extremely complicated, hand held electronic device.
On Mar 26, 2020, at 11:42 PM, Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Things are rough these days. How's everyone handling it?
-- ========================================= Jeff Brace Vice President & Board Member, VCF East Showrunner Vintage Computer Federation http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org
Since I live 5 blocks away from my job I am the only person getting into the office. It has been very very busy
I already worked from home, and 99% of my workplace's stuff can be done from home, so not a lot has changed for me work-wise except that I'm finding it hard to concentrate on work with the whole Impending Doom thing going on. Been enjoying seeing everyone else's cats and dogs and kids on video chats, though, as well as feeling some mild bemusement when folks suddenly understand how frustrating it is to get a "you there?" chat message without the actual question attached. I'm lucky, my job isn't letting anyone go, and they've taken this extremely seriously and been proactive about establishing good work-from-home practices (and more importantly, documenting and communicating them well). Benefit of working at a cybersecurity company who's been shifting toward the cloud in recent years, I guess. If anyone is suddenly jobless (or looking to switch) and fancies anything on this list, I'm glad to offer a referral. Can't guarantee anything about getting hired, especially now (we're doing OK, but probably being cautious), but there's a lot there for many career paths, not just technical ones. https://www.fireeye.com/company/jobs.html - Dave
On Mar 27, 2020, at 9:03 AM, Christian Liendo via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Since I live 5 blocks away from my job I am the only person getting into the office.
It has been very very busy
I work from home anyway, so that hasn’t changed but I do miss going to the gym and Starbucks to hang out. On the computer project side, I have been working on making the Museum’s Sol-20 bulletproof. There were a lot of iffy TI sockets that if you sneezed near them would cause issues. I also reflowed the entire board since there also were some issues with cold solder joints in addition to the crappy sockets. Let’s just say 43 year poor soldering job doesn’t react well to hot and cold cycles over the years. While this unit has been in our museum for a while, it started acting up after the move to the new museum. I think the move might have cracked some cold solder joints from the vibrations of the rolling carts it was on moving though the infoage buildings. I also just ordered some new Tantalum caps so that there shouldn’t be any magic smoke on this Sol20 ever. I only took the motherboard, so at some point I’ll have to recap the supply. I also have a stack of Apple II stuff from a friend to troubleshoot. I may get to those next week. Outside of computer stuff, been doing a lot of minor reorganizing and little projects here and there. If we start getting good weather on the weekends I’ll clean out my shed and my garage some more. Cheers, Corey
On Mar 27, 2020, at 9:03 AM, Christian Liendo via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Since I live 5 blocks away from my job I am the only person getting into the office.
It has been very very busy
Started working from home Tuesday of last week. Took a bit to get used to it from setting up my own work environment and being comfortable at where I decided to plant my work issued equipment. If I were an interior decorator, I'd have a conniption even trying to figure out the best way to organize everything. LOL I haven't been doing much with vintage computing because, although working from home grants me an extra 90 minutes of time recovered from not having to do a round trip commute, I find myself spreading my work out over a longer span of hours during the day, taking more breaks in between. As a software developer, I'm not tied to regular business hours like I normally am when I am office bound, so I'm basically active during all daylight hours. Other than that, I was fortunate enough to have needed toilet paper a few days before the panic buying, and secured my usual quarterly supply of 36-pk 1100 sheet Scott brand product. Water comes from a filtered fridge dispenser, and I trek out every couple days to a convenience store for milk, and am able to pick up a loaf or two of bread when I'm there. I don't mind paying the premium price on bread at the convenience store because I'm saving over $50 per week on fuel from the normal commuting cost. Hopefully you all are hanging in there, staying safe, and looking forward to seeing you all at the next opportunity to attend a Workshop, or VCF East, whichever comes first! Jeff Salzman On Fri, Mar 27, 2020 at 11:12 AM corey cohen via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I work from home anyway, so that hasn’t changed but I do miss going to the gym and Starbucks to hang out.
On the computer project side, I have been working on making the Museum’s Sol-20 bulletproof. There were a lot of iffy TI sockets that if you sneezed near them would cause issues. I also reflowed the entire board since there also were some issues with cold solder joints in addition to the crappy sockets. Let’s just say 43 year poor soldering job doesn’t react well to hot and cold cycles over the years. While this unit has been in our museum for a while, it started acting up after the move to the new museum. I think the move might have cracked some cold solder joints from the vibrations of the rolling carts it was on moving though the infoage buildings. I also just ordered some new Tantalum caps so that there shouldn’t be any magic smoke on this Sol20 ever. I only took the motherboard, so at some point I’ll have to recap the supply.
I also have a stack of Apple II stuff from a friend to troubleshoot. I may get to those next week.
Outside of computer stuff, been doing a lot of minor reorganizing and little projects here and there. If we start getting good weather on the weekends I’ll clean out my shed and my garage some more.
Cheers, Corey
On Mar 27, 2020, at 9:03 AM, Christian Liendo via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Since I live 5 blocks away from my job I am the only person getting into the office.
It has been very very busy
On Mar 27, 2020, at 11:44 AM, Jeff Salzman via vcf-midatlantic <vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I haven't been doing much with vintage computing because, although working from home grants me an extra 90 minutes of time recovered from not having to do a round trip commute, I find myself spreading my work out over a longer span of hours during the day, taking more breaks in between. As a software developer, I'm not tied to regular business hours like I normally am when I am office bound, so I'm basically active during all daylight hours.
Hey, on this note, I've been working from home with moderate ADHD and, more recently, children, for over a decade. If anyone is having trouble with focus, boundaries, or other things getting used to WFH, I am absolutely happy to walk through some things that have worked for me, especially if you are neuroatypical and find that a lot of the popular advice doesn't. - Dave
I've been working from home for 2 weeks. Things haven't slowed down for me personally... quite the opposite. We closed all of our doctors offices on Monday, and they might stay closed through April 20th. Some staff is now working remote, and we've been getting everyone set up on VPN. If only people would read the documentation we send out.... Project wise, I've been fiddling with the NCR PC4 I picked up a few months ago... need to diagnose the RS232 port next. I've also got an HP plotter I need to get making some fancy pictures... Thanks, On Fri, Mar 27, 2020 at 1:31 PM David Riley via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
On Mar 27, 2020, at 11:44 AM, Jeff Salzman via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
I haven't been doing much with vintage computing because, although
working
from home grants me an extra 90 minutes of time recovered from not having to do a round trip commute, I find myself spreading my work out over a longer span of hours during the day, taking more breaks in between. As a software developer, I'm not tied to regular business hours like I normally am when I am office bound, so I'm basically active during all daylight hours.
Hey, on this note, I've been working from home with moderate ADHD and, more recently, children, for over a decade. If anyone is having trouble with focus, boundaries, or other things getting used to WFH, I am absolutely happy to walk through some things that have worked for me, especially if you are neuroatypical and find that a lot of the popular advice doesn't.
- Dave
-- Jason Perkins 313 355 0085
I’m in the same boat as many here. Working from home full-time on a new gig I just started this week. Of course, many TRS-80 projects continue to be on the queue. If anyone here is interested we’re having another live TRS-80 Trash Talk on Zoom tomorrow at 4pm EDT. I know you’re all on Zoom now so there’s no execuse! :) Everyone is welcome even if you don’t own a TRS-80. Maybe you’ll learn something you didn’t know about one of the original trinity microcomputers. https://zoom.us/j/567066261 <https://zoom.us/j/567066261> Take care, Pete
Holding up OK here in Northeast Ohio, We have implemented daily cleaning of various items around the house, such as keyboards, mice, remotes and phones. Also general disinfection of surfaces with a bleach water solution. As for the stores, some have paper products most do not, after an initial rush for meat, bread and milk once the governor started locking things down, it has calmed down a bit. It has given me a chance to teach my niece about making bread, in both the easy way (bread machine) and the hard way (mixing kneading and baking). I go for a walk every day and do some at home exercises since the gyms are all closed. Play tech support for everyone in my family who is having to do stuff from home now. Upgrades and maintenance also happened to the in home network to make sure there would be a smooth transition. I have also taken to cleaning up the workshop and the attic as well as trying to do one project per day or at least start one project per day in the workshop. I have a tone of those (I'll get to it when I have time, projects, well now I have time). So far I have refurbished a Panasonic AJ-D750 DVCPRO deck and installed an SDI interface card so I don't have to capture digital video through analog ports anymore, other video gear has also been getting needed maintenance and the capture/editing area has gotten a much needed organization. This has helped speed up the digitization of some IBM S/36 instructional cassettes that I have. I am also setting my Amateur radio gear up, to that end I am refurbishing all the gear that has not been used in a while (just ordered some new tubes for my Kenwood TS-520SE), also just got in the 10-80M dipole and as soon as it stops raining I will be going up a ladder to mount it form the trees. I keep informed by watching governor DeWine's 2PM daily news conference for Ohio (it is trending as Wine with DeWine), along with other sources such as NPR and BBC news. On Thu, Mar 26, 2020 at 11:43 PM Jeffrey Brace via vcf-midatlantic < vcf-midatlantic@lists.vcfed.org> wrote:
Things are rough these days. How's everyone handling it?
-- ========================================= Jeff Brace Vice President & Board Member, VCF East Showrunner Vintage Computer Federation http://www.vcfed.org/ jeffrey@vcfed.org
-- Matt Patoray Owner, MSP Productions KD8AMG
Seems like some are busier with their jobs and most can work from home. And some (like me) I'm glad for the break from the daily grind and barely getting enough sleep. I'm actually able to get a full night's rest! I've been walking daily which is good for me physically and mentally. I started out with 3 miles per day and am up to 7 miles (not all at once). At night when it is clear, I'm starting to use stargazing apps to explore stars, constellations, planets. From a very young age I loved astronomy, but have had very little time to explore that as a hobby for quite some time. Economically I'm good for now, albeit unemployed. I should be fine for another two months before there are problems. My main job is substitute teaching and since no schools are open, I don't work. So I filed for unemployment. It took a few days because the website was overloaded. Still waiting to hear back after a week. My side job Uber driving could continue, but I don't feel safe doing that. And even Uber Eats I don't feel safe enough even though it is just food pickup and delivery. I've been supporting my volunteer job at Taekwondo by teaching from home via Facetime and Zoom. It helps me to keep fit and interacting with people. Haven't done any VCF related stuff as that isn't a priority now. I have taken care of long neglected tasks like putting on my anti-glare protector on my iPhone that I got for Christmas. And seat covers on my car that I have had for over 2 years (now I can easily clean up messes by Uber riders, ewww). And now I can finally finish my studying for my third and final teaching exam, that I have been too busy to study for that past 6 months. My goal is to get a full time public elementary school position by next September. Then I would at least have a salary job where I can work from home and still get paid when disasters like this happen. I envy those in positions where they can work from how. All my jobs are interacting with people. Anyway scheduled my teacher exam for April 17, but that may be pushed back depending on whether Brookdale opens its testing center by that point. Other projects I have lined up include cleaning up my room, storage space (including organizing my vintage computer collection and selecting items for sale), etc. I'm thankful that I'm in a position where I'm living with family and can get support from them while unemployed. I have no idea what I would do if I was on my own. I empathize with those who are in much more dire economic positions. Keep in touch everyone and don't hesitate to reach out to me for any reason. Take care, stay safe and healthy!
participants (15)
-
Bill Degnan -
Christian Liendo -
corey cohen -
David Riley -
Dean Notarnicola -
Ethan Dicks -
Ethan O'Toole -
Jason Perkins -
Jeffrey Brace -
jsalzman＠gmail.com -
laurakid -
Martin Flynn -
Matt Patoray -
Peter Cetinski -
Sentrytv