Linux nerd and consultant. Sci-fi, comedy, and podcast author. Former Katsucon president, former roller derby bouncer. http://punkwalrus.net/
I was in a discussion the other day about this, and someone brought up the “freedom vs. security” as the kind of “trade” someone assumes if they would, with complete freedom, fuck up someone else because they had no restrictions. We were discussing how the reason most laws exist is because somebody fucked it up for someone else.
I read somewhere that stainless steel (like common household items, which also has some chromium in it) would outlive plastics, and could even survive in geological strata like fossils, escept they will last indefinitely. Recently, I saw some “premium toy site” sold “high quality stainless steel” butt plugs. Assuming it’s not being superfluous (one reviewer said “it’s nice and heavy,” and I don’t use butt plugs, but that’s a quality one wants?), this could confuse a lot of fossil hunters, especially 304 and 316 stainless, which has been known to last hundreds of years under the sea. 316 stainless steel, for example, is widely used in marine applications like boat hardware, underwater structures, and offshore platforms.
A friend of mine started the anime meme “Is this a butterfly?” She’s actually employed as a translator for anime, so it made sense.
Also does anyone still port knock these days?
If they did, would we know?
Basic setup for me is scripted on a new system. In regards to ssh, I make sure:
My systems are not “unhackable” but not low-hanging fruit, either. I assume everything I have out there can be hacked by someone SUPER determined, and have a vector of protection to mitigate backwash in case they gain full access.
About 4 days. multiple times. I was really poor once. I used to take Tylenol and Tums to keep away the hunger pains, and I am surprised I still have a liver and kidneys.
Kept women with Instagram influencer vibes selling Lulu Roe or whatever. Usually has a job listed as a “realtor” but don’t actually sell houses. Houses are always McMansions with gray floors, white walls, and vaulted ceilings. They have kids are named Jaydenn, Ashleigh, Brittany, Colt, and Madison. Their skin is tanned, taught, and they always smell of product.
Electrical power? I mean, not including camping, I think 4-5 days after a major storm.
The record is my maternal grandmother who lived to either 86 or 89, depending on what birth record you use.
I have a kaleidoscope for the blind.
One of only 150 or 250 made (I forget which). The artist (Reinhold Marxhausen) got Alzheimer’s in his final years, and is probably dead now. It looks like a metal blob, but the inside is hollow and it has are springs that vibrate and make tones to the slightest touch and heat change. Just shake it and hold it to your ear. It makes different and unique sounds depending on who is holding it, the weather, the air temperature, and so on.
I got it from a kaleidoscope collector, who sold it to me because the small handmade box it came in was damaged in shipping, and it wasn’t worth as much without the box. I keep it in a handmade suede bag.
Edit: I made an Imgur post about it: https://imgur.com/gallery/kaleidoscope-blind-Ab8Xz
Not mine, but from a post: First, you’re never going to win a head-on battle with an adversary that’s got you outgunned. That’s not the point of the Resistance. The point is to create friction, make it hard for your adversary to operate, to increase transaction costs.
Second, resistance doesn’t have to be a dramatic act. It can be a small act, like losing a sheet of paper, taking your time processing something, not serving someone in a restaurant. Small acts taken by thousands have big effects.
Third, use your privilege and access if you’ve got it. He and his buddies stole weapons from the Nazis by driving up with a truck to the weapons depot, speaking German, acting like it was a routine pick up, and driving away.
Fourth, part of the third point really, sometimes the best way to do things is right out in the open. Because no one will believe something like what you’re doing would be happening so blatantly. All good Social Engineers know this.
Five, bide your time. But be ready for opportunity when it strikes. Again, your action need not be dramatic. Just a little sand in the gears helps.
Six, and this is a no-brainer, operate in cells to limit damage to the resistance should they take you out. Limit the circulation of info to your cell, avoid writing things down and…
Seven, be very careful with whom you trust. Snitches and compromised individuals are everywhere. My dad was arrested because of a snitch. His friends weren’t so lucky, the Gestapo machine gunned the cabin they were in without bothering to try and arrest them.
Eight, use the skills you have to contribute. Dad was an electrical engineer. When the Nazis imposed the death penalty for owning a radio (the British sent coded messages to the Resistance after BBC shows) he said he became the most popular guy in town.
See, I think one of three scenarios might have happened:
As a writer, one of the aggravating tropes we have to follow is, “make the story believable,” when reality sometimes doesn’t align with “a good story.” Some criminals are really that stupid, and some armchair theory, based on decades of movies, books, and TV shows, you expect “hey, this is what they SHOULD have done is.” And they didn’t. It’s like when a chessmaster has to watch complete amateurs play chess. “Obvious strategies” are ignored, and basically both players are just not thinking past their last move.
Yes. Most of them were east-to-find solutions on the web, or someone else giving me access. “Can you reset my password on Blah?” “Try TempP@ass123.” “I’m in, changed password. Thanks.”
A few times when I am really acting like a Senior Linux Administrator is figuring out a kludge or back door nobody had thought of. Recently, a client told me that the former admin had left and didn’t leave the password to over 300 systems (it turns out he did, the client was clueless, but I didn’t know that in the moment). I found every system the admin had access to, and looked for a dev box where he had access but I could take down during production hours. I took it down, booted into init with /bin/bash, changed root password, brought it back up. Then I checked his home directory to see what public keys he had. Based on that, I checked to see if there were any private keys on the bastion systems that matched as a pair (using ssh-keygen -l -f on each pair to see if the signatures matched). They checked which pair had no password. That was pretty quick because I quickly discovered a majority of these cloud systems also had an ec2-user that could escalate to root via private/public key pairs (it is supposed to be removed for security reasons, but wasn’t). Within a few hours, I had full access back to all their systems. Without taking down production.
I was 38? Not sure. I was a teetotaller. I didn’t drink because alcoholism ruined both sides of my family, and I didn’t want to even be tempted. Drinking and being drunk had no appeal. When I drank ANY alcohol, my face would swell up: lips, tongue, sinuses, and throat. And that was stuff like Nyquil, or my wife at the time always wanted me to “just sip this foo-foo drink, and tell me it’s not great!” My wife drank (responsibly) and liked big, fruity drinks, and she always wanted me to taste what she was having. My lips would swell up, but I always figured that was because I never drank and was a lightweight.
I was at a friend’s wedding in Salem. Her side had maybe 5 people. The groom’s side had over 100. The groom’s side was Greek, and despite my multiple attempts to rebuff their stuffing wine down my mouth, it ended up happening because of stupid peer pressure. I probably had 2/3rds of a bottle. I felt like I had the biggest ENT infection ever; I saw amber, and then blacked out. Only I didn’t. I was later told that “your face was red, but it was hard to see in all the dim lighting (it was an outdoor event). You seemed a little out of it, but I was drunk, soooo…” I woke up at the groom’s brother’s house in their guest bed. No memory of how I got there. I wasn’t sick, as apparently I drank a lot of water, but I was pretty fucking terrified.
Everyone said I was nice, chatty, and I know I was awake because I texted sexy things to my wife. “Oh my god, you’re drunk, and I am not there to see it!” was one of her replies. Shit. My nose was runny, I could barely swallow, and when I looked in the mirror, it looked like I had rosacea. When I went down to the kitchen, the bride and groom were there, and my friend said “you don’t look so good.” I told her what had happened, and she got REALLY angry, since it was her father in law who had made me drink (he claimed if i didn’t drink his imported wine, he would be insulted, and it was bad luck). I drank lots of water, and eventually, the swelling went down and I could breathe normally. No sir, I didn’t like it. I didn’t see the appeal of being drunk.
Later, I decided that I wasn’t mad about it. I had decided to just deal with the effects of alcohol instead of making a scene at a Greek wedding. “I can now say I was drunk once, I didn’t die or make a fool of myself, and I still didn’t like it.” It kind of cemented “I will never drink,” and I still haven’t at 56.
A few years later, they were doing an allergy test, and it turns out I am allergic to alcohol. Not like anaphylaxis, but something called “flush” which is common with Asians, apparently (I am not Asian). That’s why my body reacts that way, only I didn’t know it because I never drank.
I look at it like, he kept us safe! Couldn’t hurt, right?
Give them time to write it up! They police are having problems with the shared Google Doc permissions.
The DC Metro system has no public bathrooms. This causes problems, if you can imagine. I was starting my first week of work in Silver Spring, and as I was exiting the station, there was a woman in leather spandex stirrup pants yelling at the station manager she needed to use the bathroom. The station manager told her “we don’t have bathrooms, lady.” Back and forth as I passed them. Then the woman just said, “A-IIGHT!” backed up, pulled down the spandex, pulled aside her thong, squatted, and dropped a huge, coiling log right in front of the turnstiles.
We had a homeless (?) guy named “Gandalf.” he was named that because he wore a stadium jacket with a broken zipper, tied at the waist with a rope, big floppy hat, and a cane. Used to rant in tongues. Near where I worked was the (now former) Discovery Building, and during “Shark Week,” they put a HUGE inflatable shark “through” the building (head on one side, tail on the other. This thing was stories high). Gandalf used to spend time across the street, shouting biblical phrases at it like he was banishing some demon. Thanks for keeping us safe, Gandalf.
Before they build the STSS, there were “gangster types” that would hang around, gun handles poking from their waistbands. That stopped the DAY after football player Plaxico Burress nearly shot his dick off in a nightclub by having his gun stored in a similar way. Never saw guys flashing their gun like that since.
I have been using Kubuntu as a daily driver for almost 10 year now, and never regretted it. I had one Windows box for things like special cases (like dumb website forms that won’t let me use Linux), Pearson Vue exams, and edge cases related to work, but it’s on standby as a secondary system I RDP into. I am not a gamer, so I didn’t need it for that. I saved so much money not having to buy hardware in the last decade or so.
Sadly, Windows 11 won’t work on anything I have (TPM issues, too old), so I recently got a cheap Windows 11 laptop before the tariffs hit and I pay more for dumb Windows-only reasons.
Linux all the way, man. Gave me a career, a life, and my hardware back.
I usually do if the feeling is mutual. Like, if I am always the one reaching out, I’ll eventually stop, and usually they don’t even notice.
No. I have known a lot of attractive people get bullied by jealous bullies. Imagine you’re attractive, guys checking you out, and girls who work HARD to get noticed see you get noticed without much effort. You may even be, “no thank you,” like you have a choice. And they will seethe because they think it’s unfair you “have it so easy.” Logic and reason do not apply to bullies, they only know how to “preemptively retaliate” to keep the status quo in their head,