I spent the rest of my day in  a heat induced mental haze..   My one triumph happened early in the day.. before work

I’ve been messing around with computer security  lately and it’s got my old hacker genes excited again.. I did my first WEP crack on a wireless network today just for fun (Don’t worry it was my network).. I used an off brand wifi adapter that allows monitor mode hooked to my linux machine to do a packet injection attack on our wireless router. I collected about 50,000 I/V responses then used another program to decrypt those responses to decode the 128 bit WEP key

Here’s the key

Here I am doing the injection attack and capturing responses..

Et voila !.. Hre’s the decrypted key..

And proof it works !

Tomorrow I’m going to attempt a crack of a WPA protected router using a dictionary attack.. wish me luck.. or not..

This morning was a bittersweet moment (man .. I use the word ‘bittersweet’ more than anyone should have to).. Our dear friend Kevin left today for basic training for the Air Guard. He’s heading down to Texas to reform the military around his own peculiar view of the world. Lots of our friends are going on to their post high school lives.. somehow Kevin leaving feels…. different. Kevin was was one of Sam’s closest friends.. and he’s been one of our closest friends since Sam’s passing.   He’s one of the most unique individuals I’v eever had the pleaseure to know.. He thinks in a completely differnt plane than any other carbon-based life form I’v eever encountered.. His choice of military training is both a mystery and proof of his crazy individuality…
Anyway.. he was leaving this morning.. and we didn’t want that to go unmarked.. 

If you know us.. you know that most of our family and most of our friends .. save diane.. are not ‘morning people’ .. The fact that so many showed up  on the jonesville bridge at the crack of dawn.. (ok .. 7:30) to give him a loving sendoff.. speaks volumes as to how much we love this guy..

In typical Mariano/Cohn fashion.. no prank goes unobserved by the law.. seconds before Kevin’s motorcade came through, so did one of Richmond’s finest.. he sensed unlicensed fun occurring whihc he could not ignore.

Ahh.. here comes Kevin and his mom !

Here’s the man of the hour.. our Hero.. Kevin C !  < I din’t think he was expecting this..

Neither were the other commuters…

We all kissed an hugged kevin and sent him on his way… 

… while Diane tried to straighten it out with the Law…

Mission accomplished we all headed home to sleep, work. drivers ed, etc.

Ahh.. one more leaving.. Ryan is headed to Oregon for a month.. we had hugs for him too..

The resdt of the day was ‘normal’.. except for the overwhelming heat and humdity.. He’re’s my weather journal for the day..

This is really bad news for me.. I tell folks that my IQ drops a point for every degree above 70..     I’m feeling pretty slow and still.. Give me -30.. but you can take this heat !

I came home at 7PM to find it neary 86 degrees inside and out…   ughhhhhh

OK folks.. all for now.. more tomorrow if I don’t melt

noite folks.. stay cool. nite sam
-me

worked all day to shake the leaden mood I’ve been in. Did some puttering around the shop… finished my flame thrower (nice.. bit pics will wait till tomorrow). got in a run with diane and fixed things and cleaned around the house. I was feeling better around evening when it was time to drive to burlington for the firewoorks. We lucked out as a  echo center board member, we’d been invited to watch the fireworks at the museum. It was great milling around there and seeing fiends.

Diane and I took a shott break fro there and walked the pathway down by the lake. there were 10’s of thousands of folks there.. we saw so many people we know..

Including Sam r. and Kevin…

Around 820 a single biplane came out and did an amazing aral show.. the guy climbed, stalled, rolled, looped .. it was amazing !.

By about 9 the sun was starting to set.. it was beautiful over the lake..

We drifted back to echo and settled for the fireworks to begin..

It was a truly amazing display.. many cool new shapes.. (eg.. a smiley face).. and many high. loud clusters,. 

The finale was spectacular !…. As is my tradition.. I called out all three of my boys name during the finalle.. THen .. it was just smoke.. We wandered back to our car and spent an hour or so waiting for the traffic to clear.

I’d inteedned to come home and photograph the flame thrower (actually a propoane accumulator).. but it was too late.. and I was too tired.. I’ll doi it tomorrow night.

For now … I gotta sleep.. .

Nite all, nite Sam…

-me