I was greeted by a stream of loud and high pitched beeping from my server when I returned home on Friday. Panic set in that very moment, but it didn’t last. Within seconds, I had ascertained the source of the problem, and although it was worrisome one, it wasn’t the end of the world, at least not quite yet.

My first thought was “Doh! Server’s overheating!” but cooler minds prevailed. If the server had indeed overheated, it would have shut itself down instead of beeping madly, and it was still responsive. Well, I thought, the only other thing in the server that had an embedded beeper aside from the motherboard was the RAID controller card, so it had to be that. I have a RAID 5 array, consisting of four hard disks set up on the server, and a quick check showed that the status of the array was ‘critical’, with one drive failing.

In a RAID 5 array, a number of similar capacity drives are used, with the equivalent of one of the drive’s capacity being used for storing parity bits. Thus, a RAID 5 array can sustain the loss of one drive before data is irrecoverably lost.

So what did I do? I ran out the next day, bought myself a new 500 GB drive for SGD$87, replaced the failing drive, and a disaster that would have involved a very painful loss of data was averted. Since my RAID controller (a rather dated Highpoint RAID 1740) supported online rebuilding, no downtime was incurred at all.

Lesson to be taken from this: Data is precious and you never know when a drive could fail on you. If your entire life resides digitally on your computer, make sure you have a backup plan.

“A biological weapon did not just go off here, but it sure as hell look a lot like it did.”

That was what I though when I returned to camp this morning. All guard duty personnel were wearing protective face masks, and two tents had been set up outside the guard house to screen incoming people. It reminded me a lot of the scene from a reason episode of 24, after a biological agent was released and respond teams from the CDC arrived to cordon off the area.

In the evening as I was leaving the premises, I noticed that no longer was anyone donning protective face masks. Someone up there must have awoken their senses and realized that it was a measure too extreme. If their intention was to show the population that they have matters under control, all they’re doing is to create more of a panic by making matters seem more serve than they actually are.

I was having a pleasant conversation with my close friend and fellow blogger Stargrace this morning, and the topic of Lord of the Rings Online came up. It turned out that we both played Minstrels, although it was about two years ago since I last played, and only one a trial account too. I was struggling to recall what level my Minstrel was and remembered that I had saved a few screenshots on flickr then. Feeling awfully lazy, I decided to do a Google search for “mythokia lord of the rings” instead of keying the entire length of my flickr address in, and result #9 caught my eye: http://www.myfoxboston.com/dpp/news/local/Video_game_technology_could_fuel_economy_020809. (Hint: Look at the credits below the picture on the left).

Turns out that of all the pictures available in the sea of creative common licenesed images out there, mine was picked out to complement the news article. Look ma, I’m in the news! Gotta love how serendipitous events on the Internet occur. It’s one hell of a stroke of luck/chance, but it did place a smile on my face.

In a time where keywords such as ‘recessions’ and layoffs’ steal the limelight of every major news program and most people are kept worried if they might be the next casuality of an unforgiving economy, the lack of job security can be a scary thing.

Where I am, I am almost oblivious to the fact that there is an economic crisis out there. There can be no better illustration than that there is a cyclone around me, and I live right in the eye of it, oblivious the wreckage that is going on. Events of the outside world has very little impact on the life of a soldier spending 6 days a week stationed in the barracks. At the same time however, being in the eye of the storm also traps me in there, and I can’t leave. I have one thing few people have these days – job security, and too much of it. I’m assured a job for the next 1.5 years. I can’t resign. I can’t be laid off. On the contrary, if I perform poorly (such as being send to the detention barracks), I get even more job security (extension of service period).

Too much job security can be a scary thing.

The arrival of Chinese New Year came with a few discontiguous off days from the army, the most that I’ll probably receive for a long time to come. A day off the previous Friday, the regular weekly off on Sunday, followed by Monday and Tuesday, which corresponds to the first and second day of the Chinese New Year. Chinese New Year festivities last for fifteen days, with the first two being the most important of all, since this is when people would visit their relatives and close friends.

I don’t know what to do with all that time. Today’s Tuesday and it seems that I’ve wasted the entire duration of my off pass doing absolutely nothing. I’m starting to dislike holiday seasons. The problem with them is that there’s too much cheer in the air, too many smiling faces, and I can’t get into the mood of that. Holiday seasons seem to serve as a reinforcement to my feelings of  isolation and disconnection from the world.

I haven’t been writing not because I don’t have anything to write about, I do. So why don’t I? Two reasons mainly.

One, it’s because what I have to say are too personal for me to be comfortable to leave hanging out. I’ve a huge paranoia about people using what I say against me, especially on the Internet where everything is logged and archived. Judging by the tendency of public figures having their past dug out and used against them, I wouldn’t say my paranoia is all that unfounded.

Secondly, I just can’t seem to find the energy to talk about things. This is one of the most happening periods in the world, and I’ve a lot  of comments on current events, ranging from the inauguration of US President Obama to Singapore’s 2009 budget and handouts (which I concur with the comment from an opposition that “people would be hard pressed to decide to spend it on salt or sugar”). Phrasing them into words however, it feels like a mammoth effort.

I hope the rest of you are faring much better. Happy (Chinese) New Year to all.

I finally decided to let my Dreamhost account go. Having to live on the miserly pay given to National Servicemen here isn’t easy, and although US$10.95 a month could be considered a small amount, all these small expenses add up. Besides, it was under utilized – running just a blog which gets roughly about 10 hits a week. The cost could no longer be justified.

It’s possible to survive the tubes of the web without a single cent these days. In lieu of my web host, I’ll be using the following services:

• WordPress.com for the blog itself
• Flickr for any pictures present in the posts
• Drop.io or Amazon S3 if I need to distribute files to a number of people
• Syncplicity for backup

That’s it, the Internet survival guide for the tough times.

The past few times that I’ve lifted my pen and place the tip of it against the paper of my diary, a question pops into my head, “why do I want to keep writing?”. I think people write because they want to store a memory of an event that they could look back on one day, similar to that of taking a photograph.

Looking back at the events of the past weeks, there isn’t a single thing that I would like to look back on in future, assuming I get there. Just like how no one takes a picture of another person in tears, I hardly have anything pleasant to draw from. Should I still choose to pen down those unpleasant feelings which seems to be getting worse each day? And to what end? What would I accomplish by doing that?

(Backdated post)

The first, and most probably last live hand grenade flew from my hand today and exploded.

We were given a tour of the grenade range when we arrived at the grounds, and proceeded to throw a practice grenade followed by a live one.

The pin on the practice grenade was a stubborn one. With all my strength, I couldn’t twist it out if my life depended on it, and had to hand it off the annoyed sergeant beside me who got it out on my behalf, and then passed it back to me. I’ve to admit that handing a grenade, even a practice one with barely any explosives to another person with the pin already out is rather scary business.

Fortunately, the pin came off without much of a struggle on my actual throw. I pulled the pin out, handed the pin to my platoon commander who was standing beside me, got that ‘okay’ tap on my shoulder, flung it and dived behind the protection of the grenade bay right away. I wasn’t scared, but once again, military equipment is always provided for by the lowest bidder, so it was a “boy, I’m glad to have got rid of that” feeling the moment it left my hand.

(Backdated post, excerpt from diary)

Guard duty came down on me and my buddy unexpectedly today.

I’m one of the rare ones that have bene looking forward to doing guard duty with enthusiasm rather than distaste as it would be a break from the routine life of doing physical training daily. Also, I wanted to be able to put a rest to the so-called “paranormal sightings” that have became urban legends around here.

If I recall right, a total of sixteen people from my company had guard duty on the same day. We had an early dinner and were taught the parade skills required for the flag lowering ceremony since it’s the guard duty personnel that graces it. I was nervous because I’ve always been poor at parading. Fortunately, our two guard commanders were rather nice fellows and basically told us to just follow the person standing in front, who in turn was following yet another. Mistakes were made, but thankfully, no verbal abuse was dished out.

We were then marched off to the guard house where roles were assigned. The pair of us took the prowler role, which involves patrolling around rather than the sentry role, which involves being rooted the same spot for the duration of the shift. Each shift lasted two hours, followed by four hours of rest, and three pairs of guards rotated shifts.

Since I had the third shift, the pair of us headed up to the guard house bunk for a rest first. My oh my, the bunk was in an abysmal state. The place was a congregation of dust and the wall lined with cobwebs. It also felt like a furnace in there which left me unable to sleep. To add insult to injury, there was a dead cockroach near my bed, with an army of ants busy devouring it. It was the modern version of a forlorn inn.

My first shift started at 1130h. The first round around the camp was entrilling. As a recruit, I’ve never had this much freedom before. To be walking around at night without supervision – this was new! Between the pair of us we were supposed to keep a distance of 1 meter to 3 meters. This was perfect for me as I get to enjoy a rather solitary walk, something that was much needed which I have not had in a very long time. The walk was peaceful. There were no interruptions from any source, be it living or dead.

The second round however, was a lot less exciting. My feet and neck were sore by then and I just wanted to get over it as soon as possible. The euphoria of doing something new had worn off.

Once the shift was over, the pair of us went back up into the guardroom bunk. This time, despite the poor condition of the room, sleep came quickly due to exhaustion, until four hours later when the second shift begun, and then it was breakfast, and I was back at my company’s barracks, where another round of sleep soon came. The bed at company line never felt this good.

We started on our BCCT (Basic Close Combat Training) on Monday, which is basically unarmed combat, kung-fu fighting, martial arts, or whatever you want to call it. The primary distinction, which we were reminded again and again by the instruction, from traditional martial arts is that while the various forms of martial arts are usually governed by rules on where to or where not to hit, no rules apply for BCCT. The objective for us to fight to disable or kill, not to score points. It was one of the rare lessons that I enjoyed, because it’s something that would be beneficial too in civilian life. It never hurts to be able to defend one’s self.

The distance covered by the route march took a step up too, we’re now marching 6 km instead of the 4 km previously. The increase is rather minor though and I barely had any issues with it, with the exception of my arms going numb as per normal due the load of the field back crushing down on both my shoulders. Furthermore, we were rewarded with an unexpected break when the safety rover that was trailing us broke down at the 5 km mark and we had to wait for it to be fixed. Safety rules dictate that during the route march, a safety rover has to be present in the event that someone needs to be evacuated for medical attention.

Right after the route march, a huge cleaning campaign was launched. There has been a number of people falling ill, first due to water contamination issues, which although the problem was rectified, the number of sick kept rising. The upper echelon didn’t have a clue as to what was going on, so the blame fell on us for not keeping the barracks clean.

We were introduced to the SOC (Standard Obstacle Course) this week too. The SOC comprises of 11 items, but we were only taught 6 thus far. There’s a video here on YouTube if you’re wondering what it’s like. So far we’ve covered the low wall, parallel bars, stepping board, low rope, horizontal beam and the swinging bridge. The low rope is the only one I can’t clear so far.

We received two days off instead instead of the usual one this weekend because Monday is Deepavali, which is a public holiday here in Singapore. Hardly matters though, it’s equally lonely in or out of camp.