April 08, 2006
Who-hoo! VPN working
Telecommuting - Well, it looks as though all that finagling (that's a technical term) with the new Linksys modem/router is paying off. Before dinner I got a VPN (Virtual Private Network) secure connection to work running. When we got back, I even got the graphical applications to run and display on my humble iBook. It helps that all Macs come with X servers. X servers are the graphical software frameworks that engineering workstations use for display and they've always been "network transparent" -- meaning that can display locally or anywhere a network connection can be made. Thus, I ran a graphical application simulating a dual processor design running code. It displayed here in Milford on my lil' iBook even though it was actually running all the way back in Marlborough. I'm used to the idea of remote login, but when you see graphical applications run remotely like that, it still seems cool to me, even after all these years.
Dinner - Michelle and I went out to eat in downtown Milford tonight. It was the first time we let Claire and Abby watch the house. They are pretty responsible and the boys were in bed. We figured we'd stay close by this first time. It was just sooo nice. No major arrangements, no sitter to drive home afterwards, etc. For the near term whenever we do this, we'll stay very close by with both cell phones handy.
Boys - The boys all had their developmental screening this morning. I guess that we can say it went as expected. Timothy will need speech therapy and the twins will need more screening and all around help. The twins were behind a bit for their age on a number of conceptual skills. I have to admit sometimes though that I think part of it could be attributable to being boys and being twins. They got rather anxious when they were separated and a perfect stranger suddenly starts asking each of them twenty questions. Then we move onto another screening area and lather, rinse, repeat. They were more interested in just getting back together and playing outside on the school's playground.