We’re in day 8 of 90o+ heat, with the humidity trailing that by a nose. A break is on the horizon, doubtless in the form of torrential downpours and thunderstorms.
I can’t wait.
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I remembered this punchline while waiting to get a haircut earlier today:
This punchline was of course in response to the question “Bob Cox here?”
It was all I could do to keep from giggling out loud.
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One of my Fedora feeds had an announcement of the Rawhide version of a nifty little utility called rpl. Here’s its help screen:
Usage: rpl [options] old_string new_string target_file(s)
Options:
--version show program's version number and exit
-h, --help show this help message and exit
-L, --license show the software license
-x SUFFIX specify file suffix to match
-i, --ignore-case do a case insensitive match
-w, --whole-words whole words (old_string matches on word boundaries only)
-b, --backup make a backup before overwriting files
-q, --quiet quiet mode
-v, --verbose verbose mode
-s, --dry-run simulation mode
-R, --recursive recurse into subdirectories
-e, --escape expand escapes in old_string and new_string
-p, --prompt prompt before modifying each file
-f, --force ignore errors when trying to preserve permissions
-d, --keep-times keep the modification times on modified files
-t, --use-tmpdir use $TMPDIR for storing temporary files
-a, --all do not ignore files and directories starting with .
So, basically rpl is a sed-like tool that can optionally recurse directories. I quickly did a yum install rpl on my Fedora laptop. rpl is a python script, so it should work anyplace that has python installed.
This is what I like about Linux and Unix; I’ve been using both for years, and there are still neat little discoveries like this to be made. This beats the tar out of doing a find and exec’ing sed for each file of interest.
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One of the hoped for but not expressly articulated events of our trip was being reintroduced to our friends’ eldest son, his lovely wife, and their cute-as-a-bug’s-ear daughter. I had not seen their son since he was in diapers; it was inappropriate to go through my usual my how you’ve grown routine.
On Saturday morning, we were delighted to hear that they were dropping by to join us for brunch. We had a great meal; I forget the name of the place, but you can get red beans and rice with your scrambled eggs if you so choose. And an out of this world good Bloody Mary. I had the bacon omelette with cheese grits and biscuits … Good Eats. After I got totally aced out of picking up the check, eldest son’s lovely wife used her cell phone to snap this photo of the rest of us.
Front row, left to right: me, my little bride, eldest son.
Back row, left to right: Sue (Richard’s wife), my friend Richard, holding their lovely granddaughter. The little one goes by Pippy; her given name is Penelope.
Aren’t they a beautiful bunch?
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We took a cruise down the Chicago River and out onto Lake Michigan on our recent visit. Our host had gone below to avail himself of the plumbing facilities and cash bar. So, my little bride and I did the classic touristy thing; we handed our camera to a fellow tourist, who was kind enough to snap this photo of us with the Chicago skyline in the background. The sky looks more threatening than it actually was; the sun was shining brightly when we boarded the boat; the cloud cover and breeze was welcome. As my hair thins, my head needs protection, and my Kevin Harvick racin’ hat was left behind.
Our friends have an obvious affection, if not outright passion, for the city and living in it. MLB and I are small town folk. But being shown around the city by people who actually live and work there was a treat. Our host and his wife have only one minor nit with the Windy City, and that’s that It’s not New York. In addition to the boat ride, we did a lot of walking around the city, and revelled in the architectural magnificence of it all.
I was glad the NASCAR events were held at night; we would have missed out on a lot of Chicago sightseeing otherwise. And there’s much more that we want to see; if we haven’t worn out our welcome with our friends, we will definitely make a return trip.
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It appears to me that American beer is now to be found in Texas. Not on the side of a race car, not known for equine cartage displays, but just an excellent product:
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Packer out, Kellogg in as CBS lead announcer
I must admit that it took me a while to get used to Billy Packer, but after having done so, I appreciated his observations, and obvious passion for the game of college basketball. And, after 38 Final Fours, I’ve had ample opportunity to hear Billy’s comments.
So long, Billy, best wishes in your future endeavors, and thanks for adding spice to an already great game.
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I did a miserable job of providing daily updates from the recently concluded Search for America Tour. I’d intended to provide at least an every-other-day update, but two consecutive late night NASCAR events, and a desire to catch up with friends we hadn’t seen in too long combined to get in the way.
In the spirit of boring your pants off with photos and reminiscences about the recently concluded adventure, stay tuned.
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It’s great having a day off after the Search For America Tour, if for no other reason than to upgrade one’s blog installation. tbbs is now powered by WordPress 2.6.
Thanks, WordPress!
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