My kids with Joe

Some people do not understand it, others think I/we are crazy, but losing Joe was hard. He was more than a coach, a public figure, and an educator…he was part of the family.

After watching the Joe Paterno memorial yesterday one thing was made very clear – we the Penn State community are one big family. Sure – we have our problems, but what family – especially such a large family – does not? Seeing everyone together, supporting one and other, and sharing memories about Joe was pretty amazing and finally made me feel a bit more at peace.

A big thanks to the Big Ten Network for airing it!

http://www.butter-krust.com/movies/MilanoItaliannew.htm

For the last three weeks, I have been spending two hours a week on organizing/reorganizing all my data. One of my goals for 2012 is to be 100% sure I am backing up what I need and ONLY what I need. I have two backup drives here in my office that I use with Apple’s Time Machine. I also then backup remotely once a week to Amazon S3 using JungleDisk. I also have data on a remote server for all my web sites (including this one) that gets backed up on/off site. A few weeks ago I decided to centralize all my remote data on Amazon S3. All media/uploads/theme files/etc get served up from Amazon S3 which not only helps with my centralization of data – but it also speeds things up a bit too.

Now that I have everything flowing into one place – I realized I am backing up a lot of stuff. Stuff that does not need to be backed up and will only cause frustration and increased storage cost. So – when thinking (or re-thinking) about backups, make sure you also consider what you are backing up. I found I was backing up backup archives, photos I would never use/look at, etc that were completely a waste of space. By going through all of my content I was able to save significantly in space/cost in my backup solution.

So – if you have a backup plan – make sure you know how to restore from it (and actually test it). If you do not have a backup plan – take a few minutes to look into doing something ASAP. You will lose data at some time – that is a guarantee. You can either take a few minutes now and get something in place or you can spend hours/potentially thousands to restore “that data you really need”. Your choice. This has been your annual reminder.

I had been waiting for the call since November 9th, 2011 when everything started to unravel. I went over the conversation in my head over and over. Sometimes nasty – other times supportive. When I saw “Penn State University” on the caller ID last night as the phone rang I was not sure what I would say or how the conversation would go.

I generally get these calls a few times a year by current students looking to raise money for the school. I have been donating money to Penn State since I graduated and look forward to talking to the students on the phone to hear what they are studying, doing, etc. I at first did not know which way the call was going to go until I, in an instant, realize I had two ways to play this out: 1. act out of response to others (Penn State current leadership) or 2. act out of response to what really matters and be true to the core of our being (Joe). At that point I decided I would spend a few minutes talking to this student about his well being and his thoughts/feeling about all of this and what it means to be a Penn Stater. I told him I would be happy to give to the Paterno library fund.

Lesson learned: as Penn State alumni/students/staff – we need to stick together and show people who we really are. It is and always has been more than football. The media and some of the general public just do not “get it” and that is understandable. I am hopeful that living by example will show eventually show everyone what Joe Paterno taught us and what it truly means to be a Penn Stater.

Jay Paterno did a nice job with this interview. I wish him and his family well.