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--- user:grahamperrin [2023/11/26 13:38] – grahamperrin
+++ user:grahamperrin [2025/01/05 09:51] (current) – De-italicise names. grahamperrin
@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
 ====== Graham Perrin (grahamperrin) ======
-I have [[https://wiki.freebsd.org/Community/Cats#grahamperrin|two cats]] – Bill and Pickle.
+Until recently, I had [[https://wiki.freebsd.org/Community/Cats#grahamperrin|two cats]] – Bill and Pickle. Bill was maybe nineteen years old when I said goodbye to him on 31st December 2024. My first two cats were named Cat, one of them lived happily until the age of twenty-one.
 Crushingly dull obligatory tech history follows. Former Mac user (1992–2014; AppleSeed programme member 2009–2014). The GUI of OS X 10.10 //Yosemite// drove me away from Apple. I gradually switched from OS X 10.9.5 //Mavericks// to PC-BSD. Then TrueOS, then FreeBSD-CURRENT. In the midst of all that, something with FreeBSD in September 2012 … probably toying with [[https://web.archive.org/web/20120923043805/http://www.freebsd.org/platforms/ppc.html|9.0 on a PowerPC iMac]] with failing graphics hardware. Not because I was a glutton for punishment (like, the horror of a command-line loader, and the certainty that hardware was failing) – because there was nothing good to be done with the Mac, and I was curious about non-Apple alternatives to Microsoft Windows.
@@ Line 11: / Line 11: @@
 Bill and Pickle were largely responsible for discovery of a security issue that involved a comedy of errors, and eventual discovery of an old "fixed" bug that's not //truly// fixed for many users of FreeBSD. Whilst I can't draw attention to the public comedy (it's not entirely amusing), here's a two-point overview:
-   - https://mastodon.bsd.cafe/@grahamperrin/111377465852217006
+   - [[https://mastodon.bsd.cafe/@grahamperrin/111377465852217006|https://mastodon.bsd.cafe/@grahamperrin/111377465852217006]]
-  - https://mastodon.bsd.cafe/@grahamperrin/111421799789564704 explaining the cats' role in discovery.
+  - [[https://mastodon.bsd.cafe/@grahamperrin/111421799789564704|https://mastodon.bsd.cafe/@grahamperrin/111421799789564704]] explaining the cats' role in discovery.
 Sidestep away from the cats. To me, and where I hang out:
@@ Line 20: / Line 20: @@
   * [[https://mastodon.bsd.cafe/@grahamperrin|https://mastodon.bsd.cafe/@grahamperrin ]]
   * [[https://hear-me.social/@grahamperrin|https://hear-me.social/@grahamperrin ]]
-  * [[https://forums.freebsd.org/members/grahamperrin.35084/#about|my profile at The FreeBSD Forums ]] – access restricted (not by me), it's not significantly different from what's above.
 I'm dyslexic, reportedly. It probably doesn't show in my writing. Long story.
@@ Line 28: / Line 27: @@
 ----
-Avatar in [[https://codeberg.org/grahamperrin/|Codeberg]] and some other places: from the cover of [[https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2014/07/19/book-review-the-worlds-of-frank-herbert-frank-herbert-1970/|the 1970 edition of]]// The Worlds of Frank Herbert//  (credit: Jan Parker).
+Avatar in places such as [[https://codeberg.org/grahamperrin/|Codeberg]]: from the cover of [[https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2014/07/19/book-review-the-worlds-of-frank-herbert-frank-herbert-1970/|the 1970 edition of]]// The Worlds of Frank Herbert//  (credit: Jan Parker). If you're vaguely disconcerted by detached heads and shoulders in a serene alien landscape, you should tremble in fear at [[https://social.jvns.ca/@b0rk/111460966674032287|the detached head]] sometimes encountered by people like me on planet Earth.
-Mugshot in [[https://gitlab.com/grahamperrin|GitLab]]: from a 2018 holiday in Greece.
+Mugshot in places such as [[https://gitlab.com/grahamperrin|GitLab]]: from a 2018 holiday in Greece.
+Avatar in places such as [[https://github.com/grahamperrin|GitHub]] and BSD Cafe: [[https://www.flickr.com/photos/forestservicenw/23273672529/|a bunny rabbit]]. Partly because it's less confusing than a 1970 vision of a faraway planet, but more because:
+  * **bunny rabbits**.
+Think about them. Think: bunny rabbits. Feel better? //I do//.
+----
+**Footnote**: bunny rabbits tried valiantly, ultimately failed, to spread happiness at the Forums.
+I joined in 2012, quit in June 2022, rejoined in October 2023. All profiles, including [[https://forums.freebsd.org/members/grahamperrin.35084/#about|mine]], are hidden from the public. The May 2024 transformation – from //Graham Perrin//  to **//Cath O'Deray//**  – was:
+  * largely for giggles ([[https://media.bsd.cafe/bsdmmedia01/media_attachments/files/113/467/713/668/554/284/original/587211c0e8d9773a.png|avatar: a cathode ray tube]]) whilst continuing to provide technical support – with screenshots, as one might expect from a CRT TV screen
+  * harmonious with whims of the intolerant, narrow-minded [[https://www.thesaurus.com/browse/ignoramus|ignoramus]] clique that insists upon "The Power To Serve" __without__  the modernity of serving links to a twenty-first century Internet that exists beyond The FreeBSD Forums.
+Readers with a sense of humour might note that Cath's primary occupation was //Tube//. Her secondary occupation, not divulged during her time there: //Statistical Analyst//  – a five-month contract, which involved removal of a few hundred links to the Internet. (She didn't pay attention to all 8,000+ comments, only the subset that was found through normal web browsing.) Conclusion:
+  * links to the FreeBSD subreddit – one of the clique's irrational obsessions – formed less than 0.005% of what's now gone.
+Analyses complete, I quit, for the second time, [[http://archive.today/2024.11.11-072117/https://old.reddit.com/r/freebsd/comments/1ekvrxv/best_place_for_technical_discussions/lunpa0w/#15%|in October 2024]] – [[https://forums.freebsd.org/tags/absence/|https://forums.freebsd.org/tags/absence/]]. I suppose that mean-minded bloodsuckers will continue to infect the place – I'm thankful that those emotionally ugly suckers are so miniscule a part of the community, but more thankful that I quit before they bled me dry.