It's time for the Elf...or Elves
I
don't know about your family, but in mine we have an "Elf on a Shelf"
named Randy.
We got him some years ago when my oldest son was losing his
interest in Santa.
His classmates were telling him that Santa was
really the parents and all of that jazz.
Of course we all know that
Santa is actually REAL and that he has magic helpers that craft toys and
electronics for all good boys and girls. The modern Santa also
sometimes has to use cheap
Chinese labor to produce things one could
also see on Amazon. His sleigh defies all laws of
time and space and
that any thoughts to the contrary are silly. Just ask NORAD.
Anyways,
the rules are simple. The elf shows up on December 1 (today) and is
found somewhere in the house.
He is there to watch and report back to
Santa if you are being naughty or nice.
Every night, he flies to the
North Pole and reports whereby returning the next morning in a
different
spot in your house. Children cannot touch the elf but parents can if
he falls or needs to be moved.
You can imagine how this impacts the
home as the elf gets more clever every year. It is also an interesting
tradition as a parent (and yet another responsibility).
I
will say that it is fun to have Santa believers in the house. It makes
the Season so much more hectic
and delivers so much joy. I am still
thrilled to see the pure excitement in my son Chase's eyes every
morning
looking for the elf and turning the Advent calendar. These simple
traditions truly add to the
anticipation of Christmas... and the relief
when it is over.
To
this day if you ask my kids what their favorite day is, they will tell
you Christmas Eve. We get dressed up
and go to church for mass, then to
my parents house (which is above the funeral home) for a grand time.
The evening starts off with cocktails and pierogi and moves to a
beautiful beef roast and salad.
My mother complains that there's too
much food and how much she hates Christmas. Then the kids
(who have
been rehearsing all night) call us down into the funeral home where they
put on a talent /
Christmas pageant that contains skits, musical
performances, dancing, jokes, poems and generally great fun.
The adults
all enjoy the show and then we venture back upstairs to do a truly
wonderful gift exchange.
The family ends with coffee and cake to rush
home to sugar plum fairies when it's all done.
We may not have many
traditions but Christmas Eve is sure one of them.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
And now for a new
keyhole picture above- Can you guess where it is?
"This
place is man made and shows that having too much money makes you do
crazy things.
The people have dredged the sea and created this place out
of sand. Not only is it an amazing
feat but it is also quite
impressive that you can have people live there with modern amenities."
Last month, Kurt Swanson made the guess of the city from Back to the Future...close enough.
Correct answers will be given recognition but half the fun is trying to figure
it out. The correct answer will
be revealed in the subsequent
issue. Good luck and have fun.
If you like this newsletter, forward it to someone else or sign them up HERE.
As always, send any items you think are newsworthy, interesting or just plain
odd to news@turnkey.pro
"The name of this city is an oxymoron in and
of itself. It has been seen in many movies
throughout history and if
you can generate enough power you just might travel through time.
Name
the city."
Do you remember how much power the flux capacitor needs to travel through time? I do.
This
City actually is a set at Universal Studios and was originally built in
1948 for a film called
"An Act of Murder". I remember going there some
20 years ago and was immediately transported to the
City where Marty
McFly once was bullied by Biff. However, not only Back to the Future I,
II and III
were set to use this masterful city square. Some of these
films may surprise you. They did me...
And
it has been 30 years since Back to the Future was released. You can
see most of the cast here.
At this point the sad thing is that all of
Back to the Future will take place entirely in the past.
Now that makes
me feel old.
Hill
Valley has made several appearances throughout the years in many
movies. Below are just a few.
Sadly in 2008 the backlot suffered a
massive fire which destroyed a portion of the square.
Luckily the clock
tower was spared. It has since been restored and has had some big
screen outings.
Enjoy this montage of the use of Hill Valley...
Back to the Future I, II, III
To Kill a Mockingbird
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Bruce Almighty
CryptoLocker Spawns Endless, Awful Variants
CryptoLocker is the granddaddy of ransomware, and thieves are developing
new and more dangerous variants of it.
Developers
who create ransomware are nothing if not ingenious.
They are constantly
developing new techniques for distributing their malware,
making it
harder to detect and strengthening the encryption they use to take files
"hostage." Their ingenuity is a huge challenge for enterprise security
teams,
given how prevalent ransomware is.
The latest Threats
Report from Intel Security McAfee Labs, which looked at the
threat
landscape for the second quarter of 2015, saw a 58 percent increase in
ransomware samples detected by McAfee.
Ransomware locks down a
victim’s files and encrypts them, then gives the victim a
short amount
of time to pay a ransom to obtain a password to retrieve their files.
Ransomware
can possibly encrypt shared files from servers, networks and
connected
devices as well as encrypting local files, noted Aamir Lakhani,
a senior
cyber security researcher and practitioner at Fortinet.
"Organizations
that have been affected by ransomware have been forced
to pay the ransom
because they had their central files on servers and storage
systems
encrypted and did not have appropriate backups," he said.
The
key to ensuring you won't be devastated is to BACK UP YOUR DATA and
have a reliable recovery process. MOST of our customers have adequate
backups but some still don't want to based on the cost. In this case it
is pay
now or pay later. I'd prefer you back your stuff up!
