threading.Timer usage

[codeLoad]

Hey everyone. I am writing a threaded server and want to check if the the handler thread is being told to exit. I have code like so:

def __init__(self,...,..):
  self.timer = threading.Event()

def stop(self):
  self.event.set()

def statusCheck(self):
  if self.event.isSet():
    self.exit()
  self.timer = threading.Timer(10, self.statusCheck)
  self.timer.start()

def recvMsgs(self):
  self.timer = threading.Timer(10, self.statusCheck)
  self.timer.start()
  do stuff....

So my main thread will call thread.stop() when it wants to exit. I just want statusCheck() to run every few seconds to check if the thread should exit and if the connection with the client is still good. Is this code ok?

On another note, how can you determine if a client has closed their end of the socket?

[codeLoad]

Ok I just realized that I can use select() for this particular application but I am still curious if there is another way. Basically I have a thread running and making a blocking call within a loop that I need to interrupt occasionally so it doesn't just sit there and block all day.