Exhibit A: Iqaluit, Nunavut, Canada last week
Exhibit B: Edmonton, Alberta, Canada today
It’s currently colder here now than it was in Iqaluit when I was there, but not to be outdone, the temps in Iqaluit have dropped since I left.
Being that my car didn’t start yesterday when trying to leave work and I don’t have a proper way to plug it in (snaking an extension out the front door isn’t proper in my mind), I’m calling in “it’s really fucking cold outside” and working from home this morning.
We land in Rankin Inlet. We’re given the option to stay on the plane or head across the tarmac to the terminal. However, they’re offloading cargo which means the cargo door on the side of this 737-200 is going to be open for a while.. We decide to head to the terminal. I put on my toque and coat. Pull up my hoodie and pull on my gloves. I pick up my laptop bag and tell myself I’ve seen this cold before.
I step off the plane and my breath is immediately stolen from me. -37, before accounting for the wind chill, is worse than I remember. I spend the entire 30 second walk gasping for air. I feel like I’m suffocating. I wonder if I should have stayed on the plane.
I didn’t find the translation book my mother asked for in the terminal, though we waited around for much longer than the 15 minutes we were told on the plane. Unfortunately, it does come time for us to get back on our way. I bundle up again and prepare to be assaulted. It doesn’t seem as bad as I leave the terminal. The wind is to my back. As I round the tail of the plane and turn into the wind so I can get up the stairs, the biting cold tears into the only exposed flesh on my body., my cheeks, nose, and eyes. The kid in the terminal wearing ski goggles had the right idea. I get stuck on the stairs for an excruciating 30 extra seconds as people file onto the plane and find their seats. I turn to deb as I get inside the fusilage and her face is bright red. I imagine mine is much the same.
I also imagine it’s going to be colder in Iqaluit
And it looks like I got the new release of xp, which is XP SP2C. I should have realised something was awry when I notice that it was a new sticker style for the license key, but I didn’t clue in.
So when I tried to install the OS with one of the older discs I have around the office it took the key no problem. However on the first boot, XP required immediate activation. Further to that, when stepping through the activation wizard, no Installation ID was generated.
This is because I used a SP2C cd key with a original SP2 disc. Installing with a SP2C disc solves this problem. A quick search on google and the MS KB didn’t really give me any hints, so I figured I’d post about it here.
While catching up on the month of podcasts I somehow spaced on, came a cross an episode of Security Now that mentioned ctupdate from Heise Security. Essentially, you pick what products you want to create an update disc for, then the language, then the format (cd or dvd) and hit go. It downloads all the updates from microsoft.com and packages them on the cd. From there it uses MS’ Baseline Security dealy to update the machine. Add in the nice feature of it being able to automatically reboot and log in (with an account it creates for this purpose, and delete when it’s done) and it’s quite the tidy little package.
Download it available here.
Decent guide here.
They verified who I was and then told me a qualified for a new FREE phone!! Oooh!! I could have my very own Nokia 6085 if I sign up for a new 2 year contract with them.
I told the guy no thanks, and he sounded confused. He asked why I wouldn’t want a new phone, and I told him I was quite happy with my Treo 680. He said according to their records I had an old Nokia (the last phone I bought from them). I said I wasn’t interested in the Nokia clamshell and wished him a good day.
It really seemed as if he thought I was lying to him….
But instead I offer visual confirmation that the legends are true!