The Plan To End All Plans

Or so they say…

Incoming from the 6000 miles… hosting company far, far away – via The Guru:

Domain: 6000.co.za
Server: walter
Plan: The Plan To End All Plans + Turbo Package

We are scheduling maintenance for your server (Walter) on September 8,
2011 between 4:00am and 7:00am CDT in order to switch from the
standard MySQL to Percona – an improved version of MySQL. The process
will take at least 15 minutes and involves shutting down MySQL,
installing Percona, and starting Percona. During this time, anything
that requires a MySQL database will be unavailable. Examples include
WordPress, Drupal, and similar script applications. Websites that do
not utilize a database, email, and ftp will remain online and
operational during this maintenance.

While this maintenance can sound worrisome, fear not! This change will
not negatively impact your websites! In fact, database performance
should actually increase! Additionally, Percona allows us to view
statistics on a user by user basis which in turn will allow us to
better identify those users abusing resources. This alone will help us
to provide a more stable server for everyone involved.

Basically, at first glance, it seems like it’s just a quick heads up about a bit of server downtime for an upgrade, but apparently there’s so much more to it than that. The “The Plan To End All Plans” label suggests that the installation of this Percona thing (which I think is a small town in central Italy), is the biggest, best and indeed, ultimate attempt to increases database performance, detect abusing users and provide greater server stability on “Walter”.

The upshot of naming it thus does, however, create some concerns. If I should find that my database performance is not increased to my satisfaction, then there’s actually no point in my hanging around and waiting for the next upgrade  – this, after all, is The Plan To End All Plans. There is no plan after this.
If I am dying, post-upgrade, for better server stability than I am getting – I should go elsewhere. After The Plan To End All Plans, there are, by definition, no further plans to improve my user experience.

Of course, on the flip side, should I be an abusing user (wittingly or not), and my user abuse is unidentified, even after The Plan To End All Plans, then I’m home free. After all, if the local Carabinieri are unable to detect my naughtiness now, they never will be. There are no further plans after The Plan To End All Plans. This is it – the final throw of the dice.

All in all, it seems to suggest that once we’re all done here, I will be stuck with a hosting package which will never be upgraded again; and while it may be fitted with a Turbo Package and a Tuscan conurbation, even when a new, improved Turbo Package and a town with more residents, charming houses and fantastic cuisine comes along, given that the final dice is to be thrown between 4:00am and 7:00am CDT September 8 2011, those things will pass me by.

Of course, in the meantime, before those improvements aren’t made, 6000 miles… will be the ultimate display of rocket-fuelled, Turbo Package-charged, database-refined wonder.
It will be The Blog To End All Blogs (again).

Although we might not be around for 15 minutes around lunchtime tomorrow.

You have been warned.

My kingdom for a post…

A post, a post… My kingdom for a post. According to Mr Shakespeare, so speaketh Richard III back on Bosworth Field back in 1485, although in the throes of battle, he was misheard and his request was mistakenly thought to be for a horse. Looking back, just speakething (albeit boldly speakething) about wanting a horse would be a  rather short-sighted thing to do when one considers that if he were to blog about it his need, he could then tie it in to Facebook and twitter, reaching a much wider audience and hugely increasing his chances of securing some equine transport.
Richard III was a canny fellow and what he really wanted was a blog post – and through that, a horse, escape, freedom and the chance to fight another day.
Sadly, Richard III was with MTN and had failed to activate his roaming option before arriving in Leicestershire. Thus, there was no connectivity, no chance of any blog post, no horse and – as history tells us –  no chance to fight another day.

So it is with me. Because of my enforced bed rest, I haven’t been doing anything and moments of inspiration for suitable blog post topics have been few and far between. This explains why inspirational blog posts have also been few and far between.

However, there is some good news: @JacquesR came to the party with some inspiration via Facetube earlier and a link to some very interesting long-exposure pics on design milk:

The pictures are taken on the New Transit Yurikamome – a rail system in Tokyo, Japan and are by Flickr user AppuruPai and there’s plenty more Yurikamome goodness in her Yurikamome set.

Theatresports

As this post publishes itself (via the magic of WordPress), I will – if all is going according to plan – be lying on a bed in an operating theatre in a hospital deep in the Southern Suburbs (no, not that one – I want a decent chance of survival) with a highly accomplished and highly expensive surgeon delving inside me like they do on Grey’s Anatomy.
I’m not particularly looking forward to this. My last “proper” op was when I was 7.
The aim of this one from my point of view is twofold: it will hopefully sort out the medical issues I have had recently and it will give me a chance to flirt with the nurses on the recovery ward.
In addition, I’ll be handily placed for the local A&E department when my wife reads this.

Pre-posting this is a bit of a risk: previous pre-posts about big events backfired spectacularly. I can only hope that that incident was a one-off. I can’t afford similar disasters with today’s operation.
Although the thought has occurred to me that it would be unlikely to be cancelled because of heavy snowfall.

Anyway, I digress. Often. And this time it’s probably because of pre-op nerves. See, much like when one reads a newspaper story about an event that one witnessed and one  realises just how inaccurate the papers are, so it is with being a patient in a hospital when one has, for much of one’s life, worked in and around the medical profession. That smooth veneer of cleanliness, knowledge, professionalism and caring that you see as an outsider actually often covers a multitude of sins. I would prefer to be ignorant of these things for the next few days.
Indeed, the run up to this op has been plagued by poor service, misdiagnoses and ineptitude at virtually every step. It doesn’t fill me with confidence.

Still, it should all be plain sailing as long as the bloke with the knife has had his morning coffee (maybe the pre-op nil-by-mouth thing goes for surgeons as well).

All being well (but most especially me) I should be back blogging “soon”.
Maybe  even sooner than that if I manage a couple more pre-posts before Thursday today.
You’ll never know the difference.