Concepts in the Paradox

I was backing up my work computer, which is running Gentoo with the ext3 file system, to my portable hard drive when I noticed a bunch of errors when rsync was done backing everything up: unable to chown.

I sat back and thought for a second, “what is going on here?” Then it hit me: I use the portable drive on multiple machines, so I had formatted it as FAT32 to give it the most compatability. Usually when I do a backup it is to another Unix-like machine, so the permissions are preserved.

I left the files as-is on the backup drive, since I was only getting my home directory and I down care what state the files are in as long as I have a spare set. Next time I’ll remember to use tar, which will preserve ownership and permissions when ran as root.

As I was rushing out the door this morning, I couldn’t find my cell phone. Normally, I try to place things I normally keep in my pocket in a common space: keys go on the key post, wallet goes on the counter, and the cell phone goes on the charger. Last night I fell asleep after calling my parents, and didn’t bother to put the phone back on the charger.

Late for work, I didn’t want to rip up the house looking for my cell phone, but I knew the one time I left my cell phone at home I’d get an important call, or I’d get stranded somewhere and need it. I don’t have a home phone any more, so I couldn’t try to call myself and follow the ringing. So I was stuck, what is a geek to do in such a situation?

So I went on IRC and looked for someone who had said something in the last 5-minutes. That’s when I came across ptweak grumbling on about WindowsCE.

“Hey, could you call my cell?” I typed to him.

“Calling you now…” he said, though I paraphrase IRC. “Calling u now lolz” is usually is what is put into an IRC channel.

It was then I heard the happy ringing of my cell phone. I wondered around the house until I noticed it was my sofa tha was ringing. I reached under the cushion, grabbed my phone, sent a message to Ptweak to thank him, and I was out the door.

To think, I can go online, tell someone to call my cell because I lost it, and seconds later I find it.

Who needs a second phone line when you have cable Internet and IRC?