Since the storm lots of people are bringing in their laptops complaining that they can’t send e-mail through their mail client. Nine times out of ten the reason for this is because they’re logged into a coffeeshop’s ISP which is different then their home/office ISP. If your outgoing (SMTP) mail server is set to use smtp.east.cox.net and the coffeeshop uses bellsouth as an ISP, cox is not going to authorise the outgoing mail. With Autoroute SMPT you can specify a list of SMTP servers and point your mail client to localhost. Autoroute will detect your connected ISP and use the proper server. You must have entered the server’s address into Autoroute for it to know where to try.

Link: Autoroute SMTP

Lately I’ve been having trouble sleeping at night. It could be a bit of depression, it could be a bit of confusion. It’s probably a bit of both. Too many thoughts swirling around my head.

Anyway, at least two or three times a week this last month I’ve been getting up and going riding at like, 2 in the morning.

Yeah, I go to the Pub but it really isn’t about drinking – since I just get a diet coke or two. It’s not about meeting someone, I already have someone I’m interested in. I’ll stay out for an hour or so, watch some videos and then come home. I might get a lucky dog. What it is about is the ride there and back. What happens in between is just an excuse; a means for the ends.

It dawned on me tonight on the way home at 3:30 am why I like riding a fixed gear so much and why I don’t run a brake. Riding a track bike forces me to drop all of my thoughts, to clear my head of everything that’s bothering me. All that exists is the road, the traffic and the fusion of bike and self. When riding brakeless I can’t worry about my fucked up semi-satisfying dating situation, my slowly emptying checking account, the third-world city I now live in or my dillema filled job that I love – working for a boss that I believe in who hasn’t been able to pay me in over a month and who could very well die at any given moment.

Nope. I’m too busy simultaneously paying attention to the two intersections ahead of me, the flow of traffic around me, the pedestrians on both sides of me and the pavement below and directly ahead of me to think about those things.

I can deal with those things tomorrow.

4:45 and I’m just getting to bed. Good night.

This morning I was on my way to work when I was almost killed by a car that was turning into me without his blinker on. (Mental note: Try to pass on the opoosite sides of the direction of cross traffic!)

Anyway, that’s not my story… After almost being sideswiped I say outloud, but to myself, “Damn, what happened to turning on your blinkers?”

To which, this handsome man in shirt & tie in the car next to me says “They don’t care about people on bikes, man. By the way, nice track bike. I have a Viner that I race sometimes.”

Now, keep in in mind that Viner is pronounced “VEE-ner.”

We carry on…

Me: Wow, I love Viner. I bet it’s nice, your Viner.
Him: Oh, it’s nice… I was just riding it the other night, I don’t race that much anymore.
Me: Awesome, I’d love to ride your Viner. You look like a big guy though, it’s probably too big for me. *chuckle*
Him: I don’t know, it’s not that big.

Then a car honked behind hiim. I tried to say one more comment about his Viner, but I couldn’t think of anything that wasn’t just plain rude..