whatever she wrote back i didn't bother reading. i figured she was apologizing for the way her son was acting, and whatever it was she said it was probably awkward and i wanted no part of it. but i thought about a response and got up just to fire off some text. i said i was sorry for some of the harsh things i said. i told her she would always be welcomed in boston (the keyword being "she" and not her son) and that my only regret was we didn't get to do more. i went back to sleep, figuring i'd diffused the situation.
later i heard the pinging of text, but i ignored them until i finally up around 9am. the new text that she sent seemed strange. was she actually angry? because she said something about never returning to boston nor seeing me again. that's when it dawned on me: all that text she wrote earlier wasn't to apologize, it was actually to chew me out. what did she expect, reading my "online diary?" nothing i wrote was untrue, and i would not apologize for telling the truth, no matter how embarassing it might be for her. i then took the next 10 minutes to find some PHP code online to ban all traffic from china from seeing my weblog. i should've done this from the start.
times like this makes me wonder why i bother keeping this blog which is really just a personal online diary. maybe i should make it private so only i and a select few can see it. usually i'm more diplomatic with my critiques, especially if know the party in question might read the blog. i stand by what i write, everything is the truth, or at least the truth as how i see it, regardless of hurt feelings. i felt bad initially, but as the day wore on, i started to not feel anything about it. funny how i thought wangyang would side with me, when of course she'd side with her with son. i'm still traumatized by their stay: this morning yet again i thought they were still here and i was worried where to take them.
even though it was a beautiful day outside, i spent the whole day indoors waiting for several packages. the most important one was from UPS, which may or may not be my macbook pro logic board, fixed in a record amount of time of just a day before being supposedly shipped out. however i checked the departure location and it was someplace in maine, when the repair shop is in new york city.
a package from amazon arrived in the late morning. four separate orders made during 2 days of amazon prime, consolidated into a single box: the asus RT-ARCH13 router ($45), arctic MX-4 thermal paste ($6.84), 64GB sandisk microSDXC card ($13.99), and 10pak of aqua seal washers ($10.52, for my tub faucets).
i spent the rest of the afternoon playing with the asus router. first i copied down all the static addresses and forwarding ports for all my raspberry pi devices and one webcam from the old TP-Link TL-WR841ND v9 router with DD-WRT. while looking through the settings, i saw it had NoCatSplash, a captive portal feature. i'll look into it some other time. next i swapped out the old router with the new asus router. first thing i did was to update the firmware. i noticed that the asus is configured for 192.168.50.xx, but all my previous routers had been on the 192.168.1.xx network, so i changed it to what i know. the RT-ARCH13 doesn't have as many features as the asus RT-AC68U router at my sister's place, but we're talking a 3x price difference and you get what you pay for. but for what it is, the RT-ARCH13 is good enough. it has dual-band 2.4GHz and 5GHz and i was curious to try the faster speed to see just how fast it really is. using speedtest.net, 2.4GHz 40Mbps/8Mbps (download/upload), while 5GHz gave me upwards of 60Mbps/8Mbps (the maximum speed i pay for through comcast), so there really is a difference.
next i tried connecting the new router to the asus network app. i couldn't figure out how to do it, and thought maybe the app can only connect to a single router at a time (in this case my sister's router which i can monitor remotely). but then i discovered that adding a new discoverable router is actually located on the Insight page, which isn't that intuitive. once i found it though, it was easy to add the new router.
i tried the VPN function. i thought maybe it can be split via band, but once activated, the VPN affects all devices on the network. it took a while to get it working. i added the openVPN client profile (both UDP and TCP, but everytime i activated the VPN, i wouldn't be able to access the internet. finally i found the trick: change the WAN DNS servers to google's servers (8.8.8.8, 8.8.4.4) instead of just automatic. that fixed it and i was able to get online. i ran speedtest on both UDP and TCP, speed reduced to just 16Mbps/5Mbps. based on the speed reduction, it makes more sense to use VPN locally instead of network wide.
the UPS package finally arrived around 5pm. it was not the logic board after all, but 3 canisters of compressed air ($7.62). i was a little disappointed because i'd already psyched myself up to possibly getting my macbook pro back again, but also a little relieved that it takes more than just a day to fix the motherboard. hopefully it gets fixed by next week. with the compressed air, everything i ordered from amazon arrived today, including a replacement halogen bulb for the bathroom.
i ordered a replacement battery for my old 2006 macbook pro. i wasn't planning on it, since i don't plan on using this laptop very much once my other computer gets fixed (or i buy a new one), but i accidentally jostled the power cable one too many times, and everytime the mac just shuts down, since it's running entirely from external power. a new battery doesn't cost that much ($20), and sending it to belmont for some reason means it'll arrive on saturday (sending it to cambridge won't get here until next monday).
i tested the DBJ-2 antenna, this time hanging from a backyard tree branch, away from any obstructions. the feed cable wasn't long enough so i had to snake it through my bedroom window with the TYT radio on the desk. i wasn't able to receive my father at all from belmont (although using a 5W maximum baofeng radio). he also couldn't receive my transmissions on high power on 2m, but on 70cm simplex he was able to hear me, the signal getting clear and stronger the more power i fed it, although there was no difference between medium-1 and high (8.82W vs 15.5W), both with an SWR of 1.0 and a clarity of 80%, much better than the DBJ-2 mounted on the bamboo pole from the side of my house yesterday, which only had a clarity of 50% on high power. however, yesterday i was also able to transmit on 2m simplex to belmont, with 40% clarity at a high power of 35W.
for dinner i warmed up the leftover broccoli cheese shells i made yesterday. i heated everything but only managed to eat half. it's not that good, i wouldn't be sad if i didn't have to finish the rest tomorrow night.