I've done all sorts of things - used to print photographs for a living, analyse sewage, sell cameras, been a chemistry and maths teacher, was a missionary in southern Africa in the mid-80's, been a pastor in a psychiatric hospital for the last 22 years. I've done IT work for the last 18 years to make up the difference between what the NHS pays me and what I spend. Dental networks a specialty - most of the last ten visits to the dentist have ended up with him giving me money. The visit today is going to cost me though - managed to lose 6 (plastic) teeth in London 2 weeks ago. Chillies and whisky were involved. Don't ask.
I test networks at home by experimenting with weird and wonderful (woeful?) setups before deploying them on customers. Currently messing with a Cisco ASA device though I'm trying to persuade the owner of that network that it shouldn't be connected to the internet at all. It contains a lot of clinical information. Messing with networks usually involves following cables through roof and floor cavities where nobody ever thinks to provide lighting. Or with my print industry customers, hearing protection. I remember building a network where I couldn't hear the guy at the other end of the cable. 10 feet away. Lights are essential when pulling cable unless you take my approach to getting an Ethernet cable through a wall. Smash a 2 metre square hole in the wall and pass a 5mm diameter cable through the hole. Gives you lots of flexibility. And ventilation. Tends to be unpopular with the customers though. Dust masks are a good idea too. And don't take fancy lights underfloor. There is a good chance you'll never see them again. Remember to bring batteries - you are going to need spares. Lots of them.
Used to have the usual plastic garbage lights for the (very rare) occasions the power went out here - less than 30 minutes in 20 years - the last outage was in 1996 when someone got silly with a backhoe and blacked out most of the city. One other outage I only noticed because the generators fired up at work. My first LED light was a Golston and it sort of grew from there. Not counting the Photon clones I own something over 60 lights. I think. Most of them cheap.
To get the sort of brightness you can now get for under $20 would have cost you almost unlimited money even five years ago. Take a look at what Mr. Bulk's lights sell for. 5 year on you get more light and often better usability for $15 than you got for hundreds of dollars then.
For all that we get snow to a greater or lesser extent every year, you wouldn't believe it because of the chaos it causes. In the last month we've already had more than usual. The coldest and snowiest weather is usually in February/March. though I have seen roads blocked by snow in June (7th june 2001). That was high up (By UK standards - the highest point in the country is just over 4000') I have been unable to move my car for snow in early October - that was 10th October 2001. It is unusual for there to be snow before January. The fact that I can remember the dates will tell you how rare that is.
The only bits of the USA that are north of here are in Alaska - I am way north of most of Canada. However the oceans all around us mean that the weather isn't what you'd think. VA will be hotter in summer and colder in winter. I've only on a couple of occasions (In 50 years) experienced temperatures below -30C (3F) here and have never (here) experienced close to, let alone above 30C (86F) outdoors. A really hot summer here will be in the high seventies. People die from the heat when it stays above 75F. I have taught in a classroom that was 46C (115F) and 100% humidity. It was a lot hotter outside. Needless to say, that was in Africa, not Scotland. 120F with 100% humidity is rather unpleasant.
It is 2C (36F) at the moment but there is a very lazy wind - it can't be bothered blowing round you so it goes straight through you instead. It is also pretty damp. Not good weather at all. It has been raining/snowing all day. According to Accuweather.com the wind is about 60mph in gusts just now. It felt a lot warmer when it was -9C (16F) but there was no wind. Usually here when it is below freezing, the air is pretty still - there are 60 days a year when we get no wind at all.
Most of our winters are cold and wet. Horribly cold and horribly wet. But I'd rather have that than huge heat and humidity.
Complicated by the fact that most of the buildings I work in are over 29C (84F) which I find unpleasantly hot. One ward today was at 32C (87F) but outside was at -2 (28F) with a lot of wind, rain and general weather nastiness. I spend a lot of time outdoors - the contrast is no fun at all....
Which is why we Scots drink so much. On average 46 (700ml @ 40% alcohol) bottles of whisky (13 litres of pure alcohol, 4 US gallons) per person per year.
Damn......you would not like Va in the summer then....it gets hot and humid here. That is a lot of alcohol, good thing i have been sober for 10 years now....lmao.
Don is pretty much THE original BLFer. He’s username #7. Many thanks to his friendly help and expertise that really helped this site get off the ground. Never too late to say “thanks”!
He’s username 