Tag Archives: brute force login attack

2014/09/24 (W) Marilyn Redux

We were up a little before 8 AM and had a light breakfast of fruit and toast with our usual orange/grapefruit juice and coffee. Linda left at 8:30 AM to fetch Marilyn and I stayed home to work on some minor house projects.

Before I got started I got a call back from Darryll at DCM Heating and Cooling. He agreed that the thermostats should not allow the temperature to rise 5 degrees above the set point and offered to bring out new ones. I suggested that I keep an eye on them for a few days and let him know if they continue to work as described in yesterday’s blog post. He said he would check with his supplier to see if they have had any other reports of faulty units. I mentioned that the gas pipe coming through the floor for the kitchen range was too long and he offered to take care of that if/when he was out here to deal with the thermostats. I turned both the garage and library thermostats on and set the temperature up to take the chill off of those rooms since that was where I would be working this morning after checking in with the blogs I follow. I checked a little later and the units had shut off with the thermometers reading only 1 – 2 degrees above the set point; still not right but a lot better than 5 degrees or more.

Karen called from Bratcher Electric at 9:30 and said that they could come on Friday between 9 and 11 AM to convert the whole house generator and do the annual maintenance. That was good news as it will take care of our last propane to natural gas conversion. The new outdoor gas grill and the new gas fireplace logs are just that, new appliances that do not need to be converted. The fireplace logs have to be installed, of course, but we will have someone do that. I will have to attach the extension hose to the outdoor grill and perhaps replace the existing quick-disconnect with the one that comes with the extension hose if they turn out not to be compatible. With any luck both of those will arrive on Friday. If not, it will be another two weeks. We are also waiting on a cover for the outdoor grill.

When I finally got to work on my projects I started by installing the door latch/knob set for the utility closet. I then replaced a duplex outlet in the NNW wall of the garage with a GFCI outlet that would also protect all of the downstream outlets on that circuit. After completing the GFCI installation I discovered that I had installed it at the wrong point in the circuit. I turned off power to the circuit, removed the cover plates from all the outlets on the circuit, and disconnected all the wires to isolate each outlet. I turned the power back on and used my non-contact voltage sensor to find the supply wire. It was in a shallow single-gang box with three 12-2+g NM cables, so there was no way the GFCI was going to fit in there along with all the wires. I wired it up anyway and will get a box extender to create the needed space. The better solution would be to just install a GFCI circuit breaker for that circuit, and I may do that at some point, but I am trying to use up parts I have accumulated over many years of house projects rather than buy new ones.

Sister Marilyn and her sister Linda relaxing on the back deck and pretending to ignore the camera (and the photographer)..

Linda and Marilyn stopped at Meijer’s on the way back to the house and got home around 12:30 PM. We had lunch and then they worked in the kitchen using the new range to make a batch of granola and some apple crisp while I used that time to finish reassembling and testing the outlets in the garage. When I tested them the duplex outlet between the garage doors it did not have power. I thought it did when I checked earlier so perhaps the feed came loose from the upstream outlet. I think I know which outlet that is and recall having to attach one of the hot wires to the side terminal because the push-in connection wasn’t holding. Perhaps the other push-in slipped out. I will check that tomorrow.

When I was done with the outlets I took the cover off the sub-panel, removed the 240V/30A breaker I had previously installed for the radial arm saw, and replaced it with a 240V/15A breaker which is the correct size for that tool. I have the parts I need to install the outlet but I still need to pull the wire which was not on my project list for today. I put the birch plywood cover panel around the box and put the cover back on the box to hold it in place. My last electrical task for the day was to change the two fuses in the disconnect box for the new a-c compressor.

My next project was sanding drywall compound in several places and applying another coat, after which I cleaned up my tools and took a break. I started up my computer and had 1173 e-mails. 1100 of them were from 550 e-mail notifications to two different e-mail accounts resulting from failed login attempts against two of our websites. The brute force login attack has not succeeded, but this is starting to get annoying. I also had an e-mail from Bill confirming that he and Karen and two others would be coming to our house on Sunday for a visit and dinner. I suspected that the other two would be Mike and Kathy (Bill’s sister), which he confirmed later in the day.

Since I was in my work clothes I thought I would cut the grass but couldn’t get the lawnmower started. It’s been a year-and-a-half since we last used it so I was not surprised. I always use Sta-bil in my gasoline, but 18+ months is a long time. I added fuel to the tank but that didn’t help. It’s possible that the fuel I added had oil mixed in with it for small 2-cycle gas engine powered yard tools. If so, that only made matters worse. I put the mower away and will deal with it tomorrow, if I feel like it.

I turned my attention to the bus and removed the cover from the end of the Aqua-Hot to see if I could determine why the burner won’t ignite. I ran it through three start cycles but it would not fire. There appeared to be fuel flowing through the final filter but I had no way to know if it was an adequate flow and I could not see any other obvious reason why it would not start. I jiggled the spark ignition wires and made sure they were fully attached to the ignition coil, but that didn’t help. I also confirmed that there was no white smoke or diesel smell at the exhaust pipe, which really suggests that fuel is not getting sprayed through the nozzle. Stupid machine.

After the apple crisp was done baking Linda started working on dinner. She made a warm Farro pilaf with dried cranberries and roasted some Brussels sprouts. While the main meal cooked we had a kale-chard-spinach salad with sesame seeds, cranberries, and tomatoes and a raspberry vinaigrette dressing. I really like the way we eat, and Marilyn also enjoyed the meal. She has been trying to make healthier food choices after seeing the results we have gotten.

After dinner I made a run to Lowe’s for a spark plug (for the lawnmower), electrical extender box, and a single gang Decora-style outlet cover plate. I stopped at the Shell station for some fresh gasoline and then at Meijer’s for a small towel rack. I had a quick chat with Steve (N8AR) on the South Lyon 2m ham radio repeater while driving home. Linda and Marilyn were just finishing a game of Quadominoes when I arrived, after which we had the apple crisp they made earlier. Linda had warmed it up using the “warm” feature of the new oven. New tools are fun.

The sisters were both tired enough to turn in by 8:30 PM but decided to stay up a while longer. To stay awake they played Scrabble online with their brother in Pennsylvania. They called Ron to make sure he was online and then ganged up on him. Never underestimate the power of a nun and her sister.

2014/09/23 (T) Cooking With Gas

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The autumnal equinox was last night at 10:29 PM EDT. It’s a magical moment marking one of the two times during the year that there are equal hours of day and night at every place on the planet. Today is the first full day of celestial fall. From now until the winter solstice the hours of daylight will steadily decrease and be less than the hours of darkness as winter eventually settles over the northern hemisphere. Meteorologist and climatologists consider September 1 as the first day of fall, but either way colder weather is coming north of the equator. Of course, winter in the northern hemisphere varies widely from mind-numbingly cold in the far north to very pleasant the closer one gets to the equator. The southern U.S., in particular Florida, the Gulf Coast, southern Texas, and the desert southwest, have a winter climate that is particularly attractive to RVers from more northern states and the Canadian provinces. Along with all of the migratory birds the “snowbirds” will be very much on the move by mid-October and generally have relocated to the Sunbelt by mid-December. We will be among the last to go, but go we will.

Linda was up early again and off to the bakery ahead of the morning rush hour traffic. I had finished breakfast and was finishing up yesterday’s blog post when Curt called from D. R. Electric Appliance to let me know that our new range was being delivered to them this morning. He said they could bring it out and install it right after lunch so I gave him our address.

I called Bratcher Electric and talked to Karen. I asked if it might be easier on them in terms of scheduling to have someone come out and convert the generator and do the annual maintenance and take care of the electrical project on a separate visit. She agreed and said she we would call me back tomorrow morning to schedule it as she was not in the shop and did not have the schedule for this week in front of her.

I had gotten dressed this morning with the intent of doing some drywall work in the library, some electrical work in the garage, and possibly pulling the cover off the Aqua-Hot in the bus. I turned up the thermostats in the garage and the library and set the temperature up so they would come on. It was 64 in the library and 59 in the garage. I set both of them to 65 and let them run. The library got up to 69 and the garage got up to 70, so it looks like I may have to adjust the anticipators in those thermostats. That wide of a temperature swing means the furnace(s) will not run as often but will run longer when they do. More to the point, however, is that they should regulate the temperature (at the thermostat) to less than +/- 1 degree F. If the thermostat is set to 70 the thermometer should read 69 or 71, it should show 70. The Honeywell thermostats in the house work that way.

I decided to defer most of my tasks until after the new natural gas range was delivered and installed. I did go online and find a manual for the White-Rodgers 1F78 (70 Series) non-programmable thermostat (we have 1F78-144s installed for the library and garage). The manual I found online contained more information than the installation sheet that came with them, including diagnostic tables. It turned out that this thermostat does not have an adjustable anticipator function other than a wire that can be clipped to produce a longer heating cycle when controlling a hydronic heating system. If the cycle is too long (not shutting off when the set point temperature is reached) the really isn’t anything you can do. The displayed temperature is adjustable, however, within a +or- 3 degree range, but the thermometers were supposedly set (calibrated) at the factory, so I’m not sure I want to fix the problem by changing them. I put one of our refrigerator thermometers on top of the library thermostat to check whether it agreed with the built-in thermometer. I then placed a call to Darryll ask about this and let him know that we had received his invoice yesterday.

I pulled the old range out of its space between the kitchen cabinets/counters and moved it to one side to so I had access to the alcove where it normally sits. I unplugged the unit and closed the gas shutoff valve but I did not disconnect the flexible gas line. I swept up the small amount of debris that had accumulated there, trimmed some wood shims that had been used to level the cabinets and were left sticking out into the range space, and then cleaned the floor.

Although we would have liked to have the range installed last Friday or Saturday, today was good enough if just-in-time. Linda’s sister is arriving sometime tomorrow and we will probably have grand-daughter Madeline here starting tomorrow night or Thursday morning. Marilyn leaves Friday evening and Madeline returns home either Friday evening or Saturday. The arrangements are not yet finalized. Her Jewish-run day care center is closed Thursday and Friday for Rosh Hashanah and we agreed to babysit her at our house, including overnight stays. How fun is that? Lots! We are also trying to arrange to have RV friends from Canada come visit and dine with us at the house on Sunday. The point is, we are getting our new range just-in-time for Linda to be able to cook properly for all of these people (and us; I consumed the last of her amazing home-made granola for breakfast this morning).

D. R. Electric Appliance arrived at 3:15 PM. They determined the easiest way into and out of the kitchen was through the front doorwall of the library and then through the kitchen door. I had measured the old kitchen range and the inside of our Honda Element and knew that the old range would not fit in the car (the width and depth are fine but the height is a problem) so I had the installers move it to the garage. We will call the Salvation Army number and arrange for one of their trucks to pick it up.

Our new GE natural gas kitchen range.

It took the 2-man installation crew about 45 minutes, start-to-finish, to remove the old range, move it to the garage, unpack the new range, move it to the kitchen, remove all the packing tape, plug it in, hook up the gas, assemble the burners and slide it into its space between the base cabinets/counters. They said we did not need a new flexible gas line and reused the old one. I had opened the branch shutoff valve in the basement while they were working and they opened the shutoff valve at the unit as soon as they had the gas connected. None of us smelled any gas so they started it up and made sure the five burners on top were working. They handed me the invoice and I asked if they accepted credit cards. They said I would have to call or go into the office for that, gathered up their tools and packing materials, and took off.

I tested the two ovens after they left as they indicated that if they didn’t work there wasn’t anything they could do about it anyway as they were not service technicians. The oven controls are more complicated than the range burners, but I figured out how to set a temperature and turn them on. I did not test the convection feature of the lower oven, the broiler in the upper oven, the timers (start and cook), or other features but I did set the clock. Linda and I will have to spend a little time with the manual to fully understand how to use the ovens.

Another view of the new range.

The only installation issue we have is the iron gas pipe that comes up from the basement behind the unit with the gas shutoff valve is installed on top of it. The pipe is too long and prevents the unit from being pushed back as close to the wall as we would like. It can’t go flush to the wall in any event as there are vents on the back for the convection oven (I think), but it has open space at the bottom that would allow it to go back farther than it is now if the shutoff valve were closer to the floor. The iron pipe is undoubtedly screwed into a 90 degree elbow just below the floor in the ceiling of the basement. Fixing this will simply involve disconnecting the flex gas line, unscrewing the shutoff valve, removing the vertical pipe by unscrewing it, replacing it with a shorter one, reattaching the shutoff valve (or a new one), and reattaching the flex line (or a new one). That’s all stuff I can do, but yeah, it will take me half a day (at least) once I have all the parts.

I drove to downtown Howell and found a parking spot right in front of D. R. Electric Appliance. There wasn’t anyone in the store but I found Curt out back unpacking a refrigerator. I paid him with a credit card and it was a good thing I drove to the store. He said that if they take a credit card over the phone there is an additional 3% charge. He wasn’t clear about who ends up paying the extra charge, but an educated guess says it’s the customer.

Linda sent me a text message at 4:37 PM that she was leaving the bakery. She got home at 6 PM (traffic was very heavy) and was very excited to see her new kitchen range in place and ready to use. As I expected, she would like to have it pushed in farther, so I guess I have another project. She used the range to pan grill a couple of tofu hotdogs and microwaved some leftovers for dinner. She read through the manual for the range and then worked on a grocery list for the next four days while I checked in on websites and e-mail. I am still getting too many failed login attempts on the FMCA GLCC website, so I lengthened to lockout time from 1 hour to six hours.

Marilyn called to let us know that she had arrived at her destination in Lake Orion and her meeting was set for 8:30 AM tomorrow. Linda will pick her up at 9:45 AM and bring her to our house. Linda had developed a headache during the day and it was still bothering her during the evening so she took some medication and we turned in without watching any TV programs.

2014/09/21 (N) No Drag, No Drop

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We started our morning with a trip to Panera in Brighton for coffee and bagels. We got a table for two right next to the gas fire logs, which have seating on all four sides. I discovered the other day that we had earned a free daily coffee for the month of September. The month was 2/3rds over so we wanted to use what remained of the benefit. We took our iPads and read for a while. We have always appreciated the free Wi-Fi at Panera cafes. We then spent the morning running errands that included visits to Lowe’s, Walmart, the Howell Library, the Howell Farmers Market, Home Depot, and finally Meijer’s. It was after 1 PM by the time we got back to the house. Pre-retirement we would not have spent that much time running errands together but would have split them up. It’s nice to just be able to “hang out” together now taking care of the simple things.

We had hummus sandwiches and black grapes for lunch and then settled in to work at our desks for the afternoon. Linda put in a couple hours of work on the bakery software conversion project, went for a walk, and then worked on our personal accounting. I created a couple of new pages for our website and then created a photo gallery (several, actually) with images of the natural gas project that Roese Construction has been working on for Consumer’s Energy in this part of Livingston County since early July.

The drag-and-drop feature of the native WordPress gallery function is definitely NOT WORKING on my computer and I have tried it on two different WordPress sites hosted on different web-servers. I can drag-and-drop other things on my computer, such as file names, so I strongly suspect this is a WordPress 4.0 problem. Since WP 4.0 was released over a week ago I am getting a bit worried that there has not been a maintenance update fixing this problem or even a mention that the problem exists. I mentioned this to both Mike (W8XH) and Larry (K8UT) at breakfast yesterday and both agreed that it was almost certainly a WordPress problem, not a Windows 8.1 problem. Neither Mike nor Larry had not tried creating photo galleries since WP 4.0 was released, so that had not personally experienced the problem.

We are still experiencing what appears to be a brute force login attack on the two websites hosted by QTH.com; this one and the one for the Great Lakes Converted Coaches FMCA chapter. The more serious attempt is against the GLCC website, which is still under development and almost totally locked down. I decided to tighten up the security options for both sites in the Wordfence Security plug-in. I also changed the passwords for all of the administrative user accounts. It’s a pain, and although I like to think of myself as a peaceful and non-violent individual, I will not put into print what I think should be done with the people (or governments) that are involved in trying to hack other peoples’ websites and blogs either for fun or for more serious (criminal) purposes. The Internet (World Wide Web) may well be one of the greatest technological achievements in the history of human civilization, and it’s a shame that there are those who would like to spoil it for the rest of us.

I got an e-mail from Bill Gerrie letting me know that he and Karen had arrived at the RV park in Frankenmuth, Michigan where they like to spend three or four weeks each fall. That puts them less than an hour north of where we live so we are now trying to arrange for them to come down to visit and have dinner. I know they would love to visit but I suspect they are not looking forward to a whole-food, plant-based meal. I know Linda will do a great job preparing something really tasty that they will like, but for some folks the mere thought of not having meat plays with their head to the point where they can’t enjoy the meal. For others, like a good friend who will remain anonymous, they just genuinely do not like vegetables. Sad, but true.

I worked at my desk after dinner uploading a few more blog posts while Linda read a novel intermixed with playing Scrabble and Words With Friends online. These are what she likes to do to relax. No TV for us tonight as Linda had to be up early tomorrow to get ahead of the morning traffic inbound to Detroit.

2014/09/09 (T) Squashed

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We got up this morning around 7 AM to temperatures in the upper 50’s and thinly overcast skies. I hooked up the garden hose and watered part of the back yard where we have been spot seeding the grass. Breakfast was our usual yummy homemade granola and a fresh grapefruit but I had to eat the cereal carefully.

I woke up this morning with minor pain in my lower right rear teeth. The upper teeth on that side have been bothering me for a little while and the coffee bothered one of them this morning. Not a good sign, as we learned a few weeks ago when Linda developed severe pain overnight. Sensitivity to heat and lack of sensitivity to cold is one of the tests for a nerve gone bad, and that usually means a root canal procedure. I called our dentist’s office at 9:15 AM and they booked me in at 2 PM. When I was there a couple of weeks ago to have an abfraction redone Dr. Steve did not see anything wrong with the upper tooth and speculated that I might be clenching my teeth while I sleep, which can aggravate the nerves. He may want me to try a mouth guard first. We’ll see.

After catching up on blogs I finished watering the back yard and moved around to the front. Being on a well, we cannot just run the water indefinitely; once the pressure tank runs down we need to let it recharge. The tank is large and we never notice this with normal household water usage, but watering the lawn can take a lot of water.

With the watering done I had planned to work on the drywall in the library, something I have not done for the last week, but I decided instead to re-grade a small area of the yard just east of the east driveway culvert. Roese Construction brought two pieces of plastic gas line above the surface in that area, dug a big hole to connect them straight together, and then back filled the hole and buried them. In the process of filling and grading the disturbed area they blocked the lower half of our culvert. Unfortunately the water flows out of that end of the culvert, so their grading was blocking the natural flow of the water.

While I was digging and raking Bill showed up from AT&T. Linda let me know that about 20 minutes before he arrived we had gotten two calls that just identified as “Incoming.” Bill said that coincided with the time he was dispatched and that an automatic line test is run whenever a technician is dispatched. He was able to pull up a screen on his diagnostic tablet of the recent use of the line pairs by 30 minute intervals and could see that our DSL had dropped out shortly after the diagnostic calls were made. This matched what Linda had seen in the house. He repeated the test sitting in our driveway and the telephone test call caused our DSL to disconnect again. He disconnected the line from the service entrance box and went in search of the problem while I continued working on the drainage issue.

I had the drainage problem fixed by 11:45 AM and got cleaned up and dressed appropriately for my dental appointment. We had hummus sandwiches with onion and olive oil, leftover butternut squash from last night’s dinner, and fresh, perfectly ripe pears; all soft foods so as not aggregate my dental situation. I was just getting ready to leave for my appointment when Bill returned. He said it was not a circuit board but appeared to be a cable problem that they refer to as a “swinging line,” referring to a marginal section of cable that develops problems when it moves, such as with storm winds. We had problems on Friday evening as a storm front approached and the winds kicked up, so this diagnosis did not surprise me.

Bill said he moved us to yet another line pair much farther away from our original ones and then repeated the tests he had done earlier. He had not gotten any failures but was not completely confident that he had solved the problem. The weather forecast for tomorrow is for a 100% chance of storms, some strong to severe, and Bill thought that would be a good test. I let Bill know that while I was digging and raking by the road I found an old underground AT&T line that had been cut in half with ends left above ground. He said it was no longer being used but they ask the other utility crews to leave the ends exposed when they snag them so AT&T can find them.

My teeth hurt on the drive down to the dentist, did not hurt while I was there, and hurt on the drive home. Direct examination, hot/cold sensitivity testing, and X-rays did not provide a definitive diagnosis. Dr. Steve was still of the opinion that it could be nerve irritation from clenching my teeth at night, but thought I should have the situation evaluated by an endodontist. Linda saw an endodontist just down the street from our dental clinic, but she needed same day service and they were able to get her in and do the root canal. They referred me to a clinic in Brighton about five miles from our house and made an appointment for me for Thursday late morning. With any luck my teeth won’t go critical in between now and then.

I did get an interesting recommendation on how to manage any ongoing discomfort. Motrin (Ibuprofen), up to 800 mg every six hours, and Extra Strength Tylenol, every six hours, taken half way between the Motrin. Apparently it works nearly as well as narcotics, at least on dental pain, without any of the unpleasant side effects or habit forming properties.

I did not feel like changing back into work clothes when I got home so I enjoyed some quiet time on the deck with Linda, who was working on her counted cross-stitch project, under partly cloudy skies with pleasant temperatures in the mid-70’s and a light breeze. Ahhhh.

With the phone and DSL currently functioning properly I worked in my office for a while before dinner. The login attack on our two WordPress sites hosted by QTH.com had continued, but not to the same extent as before. I set the country blocking to “all” in Wordfence and then deselected the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. I did not have a reply from Scott at QTH.com which surprised me a bit but was not a big deal.

Linda made a nice salad for dinner and then served the leftover baked squash and squash/pasta dish from the other night; a lot of squash for one meal, but very tasty. We had a glass of the Leelanau Cellars Winter White, a very drinkable semi-sweet white table wine blend that must contain a fair amount of Riesling, although the label does not specify the grapes used to make it.

My bottom tooth was really acting up so I took 800 mg of Motrin (Ibuprofen) around 6 PM. We were out of Extra Strength Tylenol so Linda went to the store and got a bottle. I took some of that around 9 PM and then went to bed. I will be taking a pass on wine and coffee until I get the problems with my teeth resolved.

2014/09/08 (M) No More Leaks

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I was up at 6:30 AM, having fallen asleep before 10:30 PM last night. I rarely sleep more than eight hours. Linda was up shortly thereafter. We had breakfast a little after 7 AM and drank our coffee in the living room while we checked in on the world with our iPads. It was a perfect morning to fire up the gas logs in the fireplace, but we did not. The propane logs require the flue vent to be open and most of the heat they produce goes up the chimney, not into the room. We will definitely replace these with 99.8% efficient vent-free natural gas logs that operate with the flue damper closed once we have natural gas to the house.

Linda went for a long walk, about 5.5 miles. I was catching up on blogs I follow on Feedly when Darryll and Alec arrived around 10 AM. With Alec along Darryll did not need my help fixing the leaks in the black iron pipe fittings. To repair the leak behind the garage he decided to install a union in the 1″ pipe coming out of the T-fitting that will feed gas to the garage. They still had to disassemble all of the fittings from there to end of the run and then reassemble them. Ditto for the leak at the elbow in the 1/2″ line coming out of the utility closet to feed the garage furnace.

I had Darryll look at our old propane fireplace logs to see what would be required to replace them with high efficiency natural gas logs and add a shutoff valve. Based on how the pipes are run the shutoff valve will have to be in the outside pipe just before it enters the side of the chimney. That will place it at a comfortable height and keep it out even deep snow.

While Darryll and Alec worked on the black iron pipe I unloaded more stuff from the storage container. I was dressed to work and with Linda away from the house I did not want to sequester myself in my basement office. Besides, I am not very productive at desk work when contractors are here.

As they were finishing up Darryll turned the new air-conditioner on and let it run to check the air temperature it could produce. It got the temp down to 58 degrees F in the main plenum. He said anything below 60 is considered proper operation so he did not need to adjust the refrigerant charge. They pressurized the pipes and checked every junction twice and did not find any leaks. He said a lot of guys, including the gas company, attach a gauge and if it holds pressure for an hour they call it good. Darryll wants to see it hold pressure a lot longer than that, which I appreciate. They finished up around 1:30 PM. After they left I set the pressure in the pipe as close to 15 PSI as I could. I noted that most of the pipe was in the shade and the air temperature was 76 degrees F.

For lunch we had hummus with pita chips and sourdough pretzel nibblers, fresh apple slices, and leftover kale salad. After lunch we worked in the garage for about 90 minutes and managed to get the storage container emptied out and all of the contents stored somewhere. We still can’t get a car in the garage, but we have time to work on that. What we need now is a dumpster, but I think that will have to wait until next spring.

I was supposed to have a FMCA Education Committee telephone meeting today at 4 PM but it was postponed yet again. I did, however, get two phone calls today from the folks at AT&T who are following up on our MPSC complaint. The phone was actually quiet enough today that I could carry on a normal phone conversation with them.

We had several other calls today that were also OK. One of them was from Norma, a woman from New York City that we met last year on our second Holistic Holiday at Sea cruise. Norma stopped by to visit us at Williston Crossings earlier this year along with her daughter and grandchildren. Norma is the person who told us about the Vegetarian Summerfest that is held each July in Pennsylvania. She is eager for us to go, and we are eager to attend; this summer just did not afford the opportunity. Although we will likely be building a barn next year, we would like to take a week and go to this event.

Chuck called in the afternoon to let me know he had picked up his old tachometer from Matt at Bob’s Speedometer and after replacing a few simple parts (capacitors or diodes) it worked fine on the bench. Chuck brought his “new” tachometer along and Matt tested it as well and it also worked, but not with the adaptor cable provided by Prevost. It turned out that the cable was wired to provide DC power to the tachometer from the wire that supplies power to the dashboard lights. Chuck doesn’t drive much at night, so the dash lights were rarely on. Another factor is that the dash lights are on a dimmer (rheostat) that reduces the voltage in order to dim the lights. The tachometer is not designed to work on that reduced voltage.

Once we were done working in the garage for the day I concentrated on deleting or filing old e-mails. I also discovered that we had become the target of a (so far) unsuccessful brute force login attack. I received about 360 system generated e-mails between 10 PM last night and 11 AM this morning notifying me of failed login attempts. I notified Scott at QTH.com and then decided to upgrade the Wordfence plug-in from free to paid/premium on all four of the websites I support.

After purchasing the upgrades I installed one of the API Keys in each site and then activated several premium features including “country blocking.” Wordfence claims to have access to several databases that allow them to identify the country associated with an IP address with 99.5% accuracy. I chose to block China, Europe, Indonesia, and the Russian Federation. If necessary I can “select all” and then deselect the United States and Canada. If the problem stops I could then unblock other countries, such as Australia and New Zealand. Not that I think anyone from there ever visits any of these websites, but with the web you never really know.