Django error: [Errno 60] Operation timed out - django

Question

I know the title is a little ambiguous and I'd only ever ask here if it wasn't a last resort - but I am stuck. I've pulled down a Django project from my work repo that is rather ancient (we're talking 1.13), and I've been tasked with bringing it into 1.9. Okay, fair enough.
I've loaded the database from a MySQL dump and faked the migrations just fine. However, when I run the server, I get hit with this:
File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/smtplib.py", line 256, in __init__
(code, msg) = self.connect(host, port)
File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/smtplib.py", line 316, in connect
self.sock = self._get_socket(host, port, self.timeout)
File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/smtplib.py", line 291, in _get_socket
return socket.create_connection((host, port), timeout)
File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/socket.py", line 575, in create_connection
raise err
error: [Errno 60] Operation timed out
At first, I had no idea what was going on here, but from the look of it, SMTP is throwing this exception - probably due to the mailing server not being accessible. Any how, I can't even get print statements to show up in settings.py, and so have no idea where to even start to trace this problem through.
Any guidance would be lovely.
EDIT: Here is the new error:
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/wsgiref/handlers.py", line 85, in run
self.result = application(self.environ, self.start_response)
File "/Users/krisvukasinovic/.virtualenvs/give2gether/lib/python2.7/site-packages/django/contrib/staticfiles/handlers.py", line 63, in __call__
return self.application(environ, start_response)
File "/Users/krisvukasinovic/.virtualenvs/give2gether/lib/python2.7/site-packages/django/core/handlers/wsgi.py", line 177, in __call__
response = self.get_response(request)
File "/Users/krisvukasinovic/.virtualenvs/give2gether/lib/python2.7/site-packages/django/core/handlers/base.py", line 230, in get_response
response = self.handle_uncaught_exception(request, resolver, sys.exc_info())
File "/Users/krisvukasinovic/.virtualenvs/give2gether/lib/python2.7/site-packages/django/core/handlers/base.py", line 284, in handle_uncaught_exception
'request': request
File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/logging/__init__.py", line 1191, in error
self._log(ERROR, msg, args, **kwargs)
File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/logging/__init__.py", line 1284, in _log
self.handle(record)
File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/logging/__init__.py", line 1294, in handle
self.callHandlers(record)
File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/logging/__init__.py", line 1334, in callHandlers
hdlr.handle(record)
File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/logging/__init__.py", line 757, in handle
self.emit(record)
File "/Users/krisvukasinovic/.virtualenvs/give2gether/lib/python2.7/site-packages/django/utils/log.py", line 117, in emit
self.send_mail(subject, message, fail_silently=True, html_message=html_message)
File "/Users/krisvukasinovic/.virtualenvs/give2gether/lib/python2.7/site-packages/django/utils/log.py", line 120, in send_mail
mail.mail_admins(subject, message, *args, connection=self.connection(), **kwargs)
File "/Users/krisvukasinovic/.virtualenvs/give2gether/lib/python2.7/site-packages/django/core/mail/__init__.py", line 97, in mail_admins
mail.send(fail_silently=fail_silently)
File "/Users/krisvukasinovic/.virtualenvs/give2gether/lib/python2.7/site-packages/django/core/mail/message.py", line 292, in send
return self.get_connection(fail_silently).send_messages([self])
File "/Users/krisvukasinovic/.virtualenvs/give2gether/lib/python2.7/site-packages/django/core/mail/backends/smtp.py", line 100, in send_messages
new_conn_created = self.open()
File "/Users/krisvukasinovic/.virtualenvs/give2gether/lib/python2.7/site-packages/django/core/mail/backends/smtp.py", line 58, in open
self.connection = connection_class(self.host, self.port, **connection_params)
File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/smtplib.py", line 256, in __init__
(code, msg) = self.connect(host, port)
File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/smtplib.py", line 316, in connect
self.sock = self._get_socket(host, port, self.timeout)
File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/smtplib.py", line 291, in _get_socket
return socket.create_connection((host, port), timeout)
File "/System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/socket.py", line 575, in create_connection
raise err
error: [Errno 61] Connection refused

Answer 1

As you know, the error you were getting is because your logger was set up to send emails whenever you received an error. The problem being that your development environment doesn't have access to the mail server that this logger relies on.
What happens is django then raises this new error and the actual error gets hidden away.
The actual solution to this is to create a separate settings.py file for development, that way you don't need to worry about the mail server not being there, nor (I expect) would you really care.
When running runserver you can then specify this settings file with
runserver --settings=mysettings
For completeness, heres a very simple development settings.py file
from myapp.settings import *
print 'DEV'
DEBUG = True
# INSTALLED_APPS += ['debug_toolbar']
# MIDDLEWARE_CLASSES += ['debug_toolbar.middleware.DebugToolbarMiddleware']