For those wondering, we were not hacked by angry baptofundies this afternoon. But a series of unfortunate events has left us without most of our graphics for the next 12 hours or so, at least.
I think this is the first post I have ever made without some kind of graphic tchotchke to spice up the look. It feels so . . . inadequate.
Here's why: High winds broke a power line today not far from where I live. The downed power line caused a fire as well as a power outage that affected people from here to Santa Barbara. The power went out at Grace to You around 3:00pm, and since that's where the servers for The Spurgeon Archive physically reside, most of the graphics posted on this blog became instantly unavailable.
I figured there was little point sitting in my office in the dark for the next two hours, so after a few minutes I packed up and came home. On the way, I drove by the downed power line and watched a couple of helicopters drop water on the resulting fire. It was a sizeable fire, but they had it mostly out by the time I drove by.
As a matter of fact, when I got home, power was just coming on again at the house. Everything worked just fine except my Internet connection. So (assuming the outage must be Time-Warner Cable's problem) I waited three hours for them to get it fixed.
Nothing.
So I called and talked to a very friendly support guy for whom English was definitely not his first language, but we overcame that little obstacle and he stepped me through some tests that showed my Internet connection was actually working, and my network router was also working, but for reasons no one can explain, the Internet wasn't accessible through my router to any computer on the network.
So I've plugged the Internet cable directly into the computer, which enables me to get online, but I think I may need to get a new router tomorrow.
Meanwhile, when I got online, I noticed that The Spurgeon Archive and my stash o' graphics didn't come back online when the power did. I hope that doesn't mean the Spurgeon Archive servers got fried in the brownout, too. If so, it may be a looong time before we get everything back up and running.
In the meantime, Bob Bixby, enjoy our new look.
Phil Johnson
Addendum, 8:30 pm
hh. I see Bill Fickett has managed to get 
back on line tonight. That's better already.Here's the obligatory Pyrographic, a personal message to Bill Fickett:
5 comments:
stupid question, i know - but you did try rebooting the router?
The other thing you could try is clicking the reset button (assuming there is one) and configuring the thing again.
I'm not much of an electronic engineer, but I do know that the electronics in those kinds of boxes are pretty vulnerable to spikes in power. I've had a number of PCs suffer over the years from lightning and other surges - consequently now, I normally unplug everything now in the result of an electrical storm.
I thought it must be my browser. Actually right now it's downloading with the grpahics - but much faster and easier for me. So whatever has changed is good from here.
I've been saying the word "tchotchke" for years, but have never known how to spell it. THANK YOU PHIL! :-)
I'm disappointed. And here I thought either Providence was substantiating my concern or revival had broken loose among my Pyro friends. Come to find out it was just a glitch.
Oh, well. . .
Well Bill I just don't think that Phil's into the Amish aesthetic and I for one am very glad of that fact. Not to mention that who would have thought that a graduate of MBI would know yiddish! What a mensch you are Phil!
Post a Comment