I'm so very tired.
Which is why there will be no alternative content for those who hate Apple Macintosh... or just don't care about Apple Macintosh... or are tired of reading about Apple Macintosh. Today at Blogography is all about Apple Macintosh and Steve Job's keynote speech at Macworld. Sorry about that.
Unless you love Apple Macintosh like I do, in which case today is your lucky day! Here's my thoughts on some of the announcements from this morning...
MacBook Air
So sexy it hurts to look at, the slender form-factor, astounding 5-hour battery life, and miniscule weight of the MacBook Air are almost too good to be true for the frequent traveler. The minute Steve Jobs took it out of that envelope, I wanted it... and wanted it bad. But then, just as I was about to click the "PRE-ORDER NOW" button, a few things started bouncing around my in my head...
So, despite my lust for this terrific new laptop, I'm not ordering one until I've seen it in person. Of course, being the Certified Mac Whore that I am, it's inevitable that the MacBook Air will eventually be mine. It's just too perfect for travel and, given the amount of traveling I do, it's easy to justify the purchase.
iPhone 3 Update...
My biggest complaint about iPhone since day one was the lack of a GPS unit to pinpoint my position on Google Maps. I thought this was a truly stupid oversight, and I hated having to figure out where I'm at so I can type it in for directions and such. Well, thanks to Google Maps's new ability to use cellular towers to triangulate position, iPhone now has a kind of "pseudo-GPS" which is accurate enough for me. The other new features are cool, but now I'm most excited about the 3rd-party developer kit Apple is releasing in February. Given the massive success of the iPhone, I'm betting that we're going to see some great new iPhone apps in the coming months. I can't wait.
Time Capsule...
This brilliant device allows wireless backup via Apple's ass-saving "Time Machine" technology, PLUS has a wireless base station built-in, PLUS allows a network volume share... all with an industrial server-level hard drive. The best feature though? The price. Just $499 for a Time Capsule unit with a full terabyte of storage space. I ordered one immediately.
AppleTV, Take 2...
I held off buying the original AppleTV when it first came out... it sounded great, but was lacking in several areas. Well, many of those holes have been filled with the new version two, and now I find myself wanting one. The deciding factor will be how many movies Apple puts up for rental. Something tells me that the studios are just going to LOVE that most of the rental fee paid will be going directly to them instead of some third party (like Blockbuster or NetFlix). If this is the case, and movie studios start putting their entire catalog up for rental (not just new releases and popular favorites) then I'll be giving AppleTV a serious look. This could be the ultimate "movies on demand" appliance, and I am in love with the idea of having immediate access to a massive repository of movies.
Or whatever.
Theoretically, this was a very expensive Macworld for me. It is likely that I'll end up buying every new product that was released, and that is not okay. I wish that Apple would release some total crap every once in a while so I could hang on to my hard-earned money.
What an incredibly crappy day. I wish I could forget most of it ever happened.
As anybody who reads Blogography might guess from previous entries, I'm a major fan of Betty White. She totally kicks ass, and I maintain that every show on television could be improved by having Betty White guest star on it (as she's done many, many times before). The woman is fearless, talented, generous, kind and not above poking fun at herself... I hope I'm as relevant as she is when I get to be her age.
And today is Betty White's 86th birthday...
While sending your best wishes Betty's way, you might also want to give a shout-out to Miss Britt and Kentucky Girl, who share a birthday with her. It's an auspicious day to be born, that's for sure.
In other news, those of you with iPhones who have installed the latest update and make a WebClip Bookmark to Blogography will now get a nifty custom icon. Just be sure to pause when the screen comes up to name your shortcut so it has a chance to load...
For other iPhone goodness, you can also find Blogography wallpaper here (in an extended entry). Eventually, I'll get around to creating a custom version of my blog for easier reading and access by iPhone users. It works pretty well now, but I think there's some things I can do with the navigation and layout to make it even better.
Sigh. I ♥ my iPhone, but I sure wish they would let you adjust the exposure of photos taken with its camera.
Earlier today I was reviewing my DaveStalker iPhone Flickr Feed and got a little depressed. From time to time, when the lighting is perfect, you get a really great shot, but the majority of the images are all dark and murky. Sure it's better than nothing, but it seems stupid that Apple can't give you a slider to brighten things up a bit when needed. Perhaps they'll put that in the next upgrade?
Hmmm... I think I need me some Oreo cookies and milk before bedtime. That will make everything all better.
Today was a wacky day of catching up on work and trying to arrange travel plans for another three trips I've got coming up.
And looking over Apple's FREE iPhone Software Development Kit (or SDK) which was released this morning. If you're not a programmer, it can be somewhat technical and boring, but you can watch His Holiness Steve Jobs describe what's going on via QuickTime here (the demo hotness starts just over half-way through). Suffice to say... I am completely blown away. I simply did not anticipate that the SDK would be so refined, polished, and powerful. Developers are going to be FLOCKING to the iPhone, which means iPhone users are in for some incredibly cool stuff come June when the 2.0 software upgrade drops. I have some concerns about required distribution through the iTunes Music Store (though if you give your stuff away for free, there's no charge once you've paid the $99 developer fee), but overall I am very, very excited. iPhone is going to OWN the mobile market... sweet!
Anyway, somewhere along the day, I was asked to make a fake "tabloid magazine" prop for a play that's being put on at the High School. It's fun doing wacky stuff like this from time to time...
I would so totally buy this!
And now for another installment of Response to Hate-Mail...
Dear Dumbass,
Thank you for your wonderful email chastising me for "showing disrespect to The Queen of England" (from this entry, I'm guessing). A few points... #1: Her Majesty is not the "Queen of England," but instead constitutional monarch (The Queen) of the United Kingdom of Great Britain & Northern Ireland, and Head of the Commonwealth. There hasn't been a "Queen of England" since 1603. Since your IP address is actually located in England, I can only express my sadness that your educational system is apparently as bad as ours here in the USA. #2: I have nothing but the upmost respect for Her Majesty, and wouldn't dream of showing her any disrespect. If wanting to be her friend is disrespectful, then this world is in deeper trouble than I thought. #3: I've read a couple biographies of The Queen, and actually admire Her Majesty for taking on a job she never asked for and performing it to the best of her abilities. Her Majesty has led an exemplary life in service, has done so with dignity and devotion to her people, and deserves nothing but respect for it. I know I'll demand nothing less when I'm king of the world, so fuck you for implying I feel otherwise...
Good night... I love you my Apple iPhone!
This morning I climbed out of the shower after entirely not-enough sleep and thought I was hearing things. But oh no... running to the window I confirmed my worst fears... THE KILLER GEESE HAVE RETURNED!
After getting dressed and arming myself with a squirt bottle, I cautiously made my way downstairs and into the parking lot. But they had gone. Probably off attacking some elderly neighbor or eating a cat or something. If all of a sudden you stop seeing blog entries from me, that probably means the evil geese finally got me. The bastards.
I always dread looking through the new Comic Previews Catalog when it arrives, because there's usually something geeky and super-cool I want that I don't need. And more often than not, it's stupidly expensive too. This time it's stupider than usual, but I can't help myself! I want it so bad!
OMG!
CUTEST...
TOY...
EVER!
They blew up a little Kubrick Alien 400% and are releasing him as an 11-inch action figure. He's beautiful... and he'd better be for $60.00 WITH DISCOUNT! It should cost like $40.00 tops, but with the US Dollar practically worthless on the international market, anything imported is insanely expensive.
Oh well.
Speaking of cool toys I can't afford, my Apple Time Capsule finally arrived! Luckily the box wasn't empty this time, because I don't think I could handle the crushing disappointment twice. It's an amazing device. Within 30 seconds of plugging it in, I was creating my first backup. 30 seconds after that I was messing around with my wirelessly shared volume, creating a media depository. It's brilliant in every way...
But before I go... Amy Sherman-Palladino (of Gilmore Girls fame) has a new show called The Return of Jezebel James which I have really been looking forward to. Until I actually watched it. For anybody who doesn't follow me on Twitter, here was my reaction...
The clever rapid-fire dialogue and quirky characters are there... but A F#@%ING LAUGH TRACK?!? Totally ruins the show. Horribly distracting. FAIL!!
FAIL!
As far as Mondays go, this one wasn't too bad. Though that's not to say there wasn't excitement. As anybody who follows my Twitter feed already knows, not only did I survive my Evil Driver trying to kill me... but I also fell in love with a girl on the train, found out that TinyURL can be used for diabolical purposes, and went broke because Howard compelled me to spend the last remainder of my bank account on music by The Weepies.
Being able to have access to the real internet at all times with iPhone has opened up entirely new opportunities for avoiding boredom while traveling or attending meetings. Not only can I update Twitter all day long, but I can also keep up with blogs quite easily (though, unfortunately, leaving comments with iPhone is a bit problematic... sorry about that).
I only wish that iPhone had a REAL GPS, because that would make my life of travel so much easier than their borderline-useless "faux-GPS" that's there now...
Okay, it's not that bad, but still... I've lost track of the number of times I've screamed "NO F#@%ING SHIT" at iPhone for providing me with a generic non-location that covers 50 city blocks. How is that useful? Sure it's better than nothing, because you can narrow it down from there, but it's a far cry from being able to see exactly where you are on a map at a moment's notice.
Oh well.
Remember the good old days when you had to actually carry a paper map around for stuff like this?
Sigh.
I love to hate you my iPhone.
I desperately want to celebrate Bullet Sunday with a Chalupa Supreme (no beef, add rice) and a side of Cheesy Fiesta Potatoes, but am entirely too lazy to drive the 20 minutes to Taco Bell. Waaah!
• Pizza! I'm officially done. I've tried every frozen cheese pizza on the market and hate them all. It doesn't matter whether it's from a famous chef like Wolfgang Puck, a famous restaurant like California Pizza Kitchen, a hot new brand like Freschetta, a critical favorite like DiGiorno, or a pizza staple like Red Baron. They're all terrible. So I've finally decided that I'm not going to pay
• Christmas! The funny thing about being in the graphic design business is that you are always ahead of the season. Right now, for example, I'm working on Christmas projects. When Christmas rolls around I'll be working on Easter projects, and so on. Because I don't really celebrate any of these holidays, it's no big deal to me, but it's a challenging mindset to be thinking of snowy holidays in the middle of summer. But that's nothing compared to the challenge of finding a live Christmas Tree for a photo shoot next week.
• Jobs! Tomorrow is the opening keynote for Apple's Worldwide Developer's Conference. At that time my personal hero and god among men, Steve Jobs, is expected to release the iPhone 2.0 software update which will allow 3rd party applications to run on my iPhone. This is, to put it mildly, super-exciting. Jobs is also expected to announce the new and improved iPhone hardware which is rumored to have a real GPS (thank you!) and faster 3G internet access. The latter bit means that we can all surf for porn several times faster, which is probably a more important function for a phone than making actual phone calls.
• Legion! One of my all-time favorite comic books is The Legion of Super-Heroes. It's a comic about super-powered teens in the far future of the DC Comics Universe. Back in the 1960's the book was looking for a new writer and ended up hiring 14-year-old Jim Shooter for the job. He submitted stories, the editor liked them, and a legend was born. His Legion books were highly successful and memorable, and ended up being a stepping stone to greater things... like when he was editor in chief at Marvel Comics for nearly a decade. Now, 30 years after he left The Legion of Super-Heroes, Shooter is back writing the book. He's five issues into the title now, and I have to say I'm enjoying the heck out of his stories. But I'm nostalgic that way.
Annnnnnnd... I'm spent.
I'm trying to be optimistic, but something tells me this is not going to be a good week.
Happy Father's Day to all the fathers out there... especially mine... on this fine Bullet Sunday!
• Snackiepoo! This afternoon at 3:00pm (Pacific Time) I will be a VERY SPECIAL GUEST STAR on Snackie Radio. Today's topic? How much is too much? Hilly and I have radically different blogging styles... I avoid anything personal and draw monkey cartoons in lieu of actual substance... Hilly wears her heart on her blog and bares her soul for all to see... what are the consequences to these very different approaches to blogging? How much information on your blog is too much? Is there such a thing as too little information when it comes to the internet? Will Dave ever get his tiara back? Tune in today and find out! (show contains language and situations which may be unsuitable for childre or small animals).
• Radio! And for other BlogTalk Radio goodness, I'd be remiss not to mention the entire BTR's Rocking Sunday Schedule... first up, Karl from Secondhand Radio will have his daughter and the Alive Campaign as his guest at 2:00pm Pacific, 5:00pm Eastern. Next up is the afore-mentioned Snackie Radio show with VERY SPECIAL GUEST STAR me! at 3:00pm Pacific, 6:00pm Eastern. And, lastly, Turnbaby is back on Turnbaby Talks with her special guest Mr. Shiny at 5:00pm Pacific, 8:00pm Eastern. It should be a very interesting night.
• iPhone! As expected, Apple released their new iPhone at the World Wide Developer's Conference this past Monday. It has the faster 3G internet access everybody has been clamoring for, but all I cared about is that it FINALLY has a frickin' GPS unit. I still feel it was profoundly stupid that the original model didn't have a hardware GPS, but better late than never, I suppose. Of course I simply must own one... even though the data plan is a total ripoff that now costs $10 more per month with NO TXT messages and still has NO MMS capabilities. The more things change...
• Shopper! What happens when you find out that a business you really like is owned by a complete and total asshole? How do you shop there anymore knowing what you now know? Does it matter that you've patronized the place for decades and love their stuff? Or is it just over once you discover it's run by a horribly wretched excuse of a human being? I've been wrestling with this dilemma for a week, and have come to the realization that my ethical beliefs simply won't allow me to step foot in this establishment ever again... much as I would like to shop there. Wouldn't the world be a much better place if we could just stay ignorant to the nastiness that plagues it?
• Televised! I had this idea of picking my favorite 100 television shows of all time and then listing ten of them each day with an explanation of why I liked them so much. For a television whore like me, it seemed a perfect fit for Blogography. Then common sense settled in, and I realized how much work it would be to actually do it. But I already had the list made up, so I decided to go ahead and post it in an extended entry.
→ Click here to continue reading this entry...
Argh.
Working out of the office is killer for me because the work back home doesn't stop. This means I am essentially working two jobs, both of which are exhausting... mentally and physically.
After two hours of driving over the mountains plus an additional hour of sitting in traffic hell once I reached Issaquah on I-90, I realized that I had left my MacBook Pro power adapter at home. Lovely. Ordinarily, this wouldn't be a big deal, because I could go to the local Apple Store and get a new one. But Seattle doesn't have an Apple Store. You either have to go to Tukwila, Lynwood, Bellevue, or the University of Washington. Since University Village is closest, I lured a co-worker with the promise of dinner and headed north.
Buying a new power adapter was as quick and painless as you'd expect from an Apple Store. No surprise there, because the shopping experience at all Apple Stores is flawless. I was in and out in five minutes.
We then decided to eat dinner across the parking lot at Johnny Rockets. I love their veggie burger, so it was an easy choice.
Unfortunately, they had run out of veggie burger patties.
ATTENTION JOHNNY ROCKETS MANAGERS!!! THERE IS NO FUCKING EXCUSE FOR RUNNING OUT OF VEGGIE BURGERS AT YOUR RESTAURANTS. NONE! THE VEGGIE PATTIES ARE FROZEN!!! THIS MEANS THEY DON'T LOSE FRESHNESS OR SPOIL, SO YOU CAN ORDER A COUPLE EXTRA CASES AND PUT THEM IN YOUR FREEZER. THAT WAY YOU WON'T PISS OFF VEGETARIANS BECAUSE THE ONLY BURGER THEY CAN EAT IS OUT OF STOCK. OH, AND ONE MORE THING... WHY NOT TRY KEEPING TRACK OF YOUR INVENTORY SO STUPID-ASS SHIT LIKE THIS DOESN'T HAPPEN? THAT MIGHT WORK TOO. —KTHXBAI
I mean, come on... does maintaining stock of a frozen item really equate to rocket science here?
Hmmm... I suppose that I should put away my computer so I can get a few hours sleep before I have to do this all over again tomorrow.
This would be a lot easier if my neighbors here at the hotel would put their squealing kids to bed. Since it's after 11:00pm now, I don't think that's asking too much.
This morning I saw that the "unofficial-official" update for iPhone 2.0 had been released. Not being the patient type, I went ahead and installed it.
It's pretty much everything I had hoped for... and more. Not so much for the basic functionality, which is largely unchanged, but for the stunning applications that are now available. Much like a drug habit, the ability to purchase games and other apps right on your iPhone is highly addictive. I've spent nearly $100 on loads of crap without even realizing it. And I can only imagine that even more amazing stuff is on the way, which is very bad news for my finances.
Here is just a sampling of some of the interesting stuff I got...
By far the best game I bought was Motion-X Poker Dice. It's so beautifully crafted that everybody I've shown it to wants an iPhone just to have it! You roll the dice by shaking your iPhone, at which point the dice click and clatter until you stop shaking. You have three rolls to get a better hand than the dealer. This would get boring kind of quickly, so there are unlock-able playing boards, dice sets, and prize gems for reaching certain goals. You can also just roll five dice to play games like Yatzee and Zilch on the go, which is a nice bonus. An instant classic I can't stop playing!
Another very, VERY interesting game is Trism, which uses all the amazing iPhone features at the same time to ensnare you in a puzzler that boggles the mind. I could post a screenshot, but to truly appreciate how cool it is, you need to actually SEE it in action...
On of the most beautiful games is Apple's Texas Hold'em, which utilizes video capture to create an immersive card-playing experience. Turn your iPhone 90-degrees, and you switch to an overview mode. Overall, the game is pretty darn sweet, but I sure wish it had more options (in single-player you always play against 8 computer opponents, which makes each hand a little longer than I'd like, and I wish I could change to less players). The most impressive aspect is that you can also play against REAL PEOPLE via wireless if they also have the game!
In addition to games, there are also some helpful utilities. The one I was most excited about was something called "Jade" which allows you to automatically enhance the murky, crappy photos that the built-in iPhone camera takes. It doesn't always work, but most of the time the app does improve your images by making them brighter. It seems to be a very handy thing to have, as you can see by the samples here...
Cool huh? Well I thought so too... until I realized that every photo which Jade processes is reduced from 1600x1200 pixels to 640x480 pixels, which sucks ass! NOWHERE on the iTunes sales page does it tell you that Jade shrinks your photos, and that pisses me off. Why can't I keep the original size so I get the best image quality? Who knows. STUPID!
Anyway, I got a lot of other cool stuff, but you kind of get the idea here.
In summary, iPhone is a killer development platform for software. Sure not all the apps are as good as they could be, but I'm sure as time goes on and programmers get accustomed to the tools and what they can do, we'll see better and better stuff. It makes me love my iPhone even more than I already did, which is a LOT.
And then...
Tomorrow Apple released the new generation Apple iPhone 3G.
To be honest, I am not sure I want one. The only feature I covet on the latest model is built-in GPS. This was a horrible, glaring oversight from the first model that still gets my blood boiling. If my current iPhone had GPS... AS IT SHOULD HAVE IN THE FIRST PLACE!... there would be no reason for me to upgrade. Sure the 3G speeds of the internet access would be nice... but they are charging too much for it. I would be perfectly happy sticking with my 2.5G speed at the current rate plan if I could.
So will I buy one?
I don't know. Sure I'd like to have it, but the monthly increase on my wireless bill doesn't make me at all happy.
But it DOES have GPS, which I want pretty bad.
Decisions, decisions...
I am totally exhausted this Bullet Sunday. Let's see how far I get...
• Ordered. I have finally... FINALLY... managed to get most all of the Artificial Duck Co. Store orders filled. The exception is orders that have "Ladies T Monkey Button" shirts in them, which were misplaced at the printer and are arriving on Tuesday or Wednesday. Of course, now I have to process a couple hundred orders for postage and make six or seven trips to the Post Office, but I will work hard over the next couple of days to get everything shipped out before I leave. Nobody will be happier than me to finally see everybody get their stuff! Given the long and difficult road I've been down, I am so very, very grateful for everybody's patience and understanding.
• Pounded. Just when you think that the US Dollar couldn't possibly be worth any less than it already is... you start planning a trip to London. The city has always been expensive... but now, thanks to the heinous exchange rate, even going on the cheap is unrealistic. I was planning on a six day, five-night trip to Blighty so I could meet with an artist there and hang out with friends (Davedon!), but once I got up to an estimated $3600 for all the expenses, I shat myself and decided to see if getting a new president will improve the dollar for a trip next year. I certainly hope so.
• Cents. Since traveling to Europe right now is insanely expensive, I thought I'd look into filling in those missing six states I've got going on...
Fly into Bismarck, North Dakota... drive down through Mount Rushmore... swing through Nebraska, Kansas, and the Oklahoma panhandle... then whip into Albuquerque, New Mexico... simple, right? The one-way rental would run me about $1100 (amazing how you don't get unlimited miles on a one-way rental!). Assuming that I get about 32 miles per gallon, fuel will run me about 42 gallons of gas @ $4.20 a gallon means an additional $180-$200 in gas. Adding in hotels and one-way airfare... and we're up to $2800?? Yikes. For that kind of money, I'd save up an additional $800 and take my London trip.
• MobileMaybe. Ever since resetting my iPhone so I could get the camera working again, syncing through Apple's pile-of-shit "MobileMe" service has failed. After trying absolutely everything, I reset my iPhone AGAIN and finally got it working. Of course, I ended up losing all the information that I had added to my iPhone, since there's no way of transferring notes, and syncing contacts was broken. Don't get me wrong... I love my iPhone and can't imagine life without it... but this is bullshit. To make matters worse, now we've got Windows users freaking out because iPhone syncing through MobileMe can erase all your Outlook Calendar data. Apple has already given everybody an extra month of MobileMe to compensate for how utterly shitty the service is... what happens now that it's still total crap? Another free month? Disaster. And I'm still not convinced it's working as it's supposed to, which is fine if the service was free... but $100 a year for this?
• Darker. I went to see The Dark Knight for the third time because I just can't help myself... and froze my ass off. Why do theaters feel the need to set the temperature to sub-zero? Cool would be fine... I like to keep cool when it's hot outside... but cold? It's miserable to try watching a movie while shivering the whole time. If it were that cold during winter time, they'd have the heaters on!.
And that's all for Bullet Sunday, because it's nearing midnight and I'm falling asleep...
AND OMG, I NEARLY FELL ASLEEP IN THESE EYE-RAPING CONTACT LENSES AGAIN!! Wouldn't that make for a great Monday. I will be so glad when my "real" lenses come in so I can be rid of these elements of torture.
I managed to ship out 103 orders before the issuing bank of my credit card decided that something fishy might be going on and decided to refuse authorization of any further charges. This happened once before, but I thought that it had been resolved. Apparently not. One more thing to fix tomorrow.
When you're working your ass off all day long, a lot of stuff outside of work piles up that you don't find out about until you get home. I used to have a news feed going on my desktop, but once I got addicted to Twitter, something had to give. Otherwise I'd never get anything done at all.
First of all, one of my favorite actors ever, Morgan Freeman, has been involved in a serious car accident. While discussing The Dark Night with a co-worker this morning, I had mentioned that I would have watched the film even if I hated Batman (as if!) because I love Morgan Freeman so much. He's been in some not-so-great films... but his performance is always exceptional, and I'll see anything he's involved in. My most heart-felt wishes for a speedy recovery, Mr. Freeman...
Next up? They've released an update to the v2 iPhone OS that fixes "bugs." After installing it, I will admit that my iPhone feels a bit snappier... BUT THEY STILL DON'T ALLOW YOU TO SYNC EXTERNAL SUBSCRIBED CALENDARS!! This is horse shit. All of my travel plans are stored on the most excellent TripIt site, so I need to subscribe to its calendar so I can keep up with my schedule. FAIL! FUCKING FAIL!! ULTIMATE APPLE FAIL!!!
In better news, one of my first super-hero favorites... Green Lantern... has entered production as a movie. Ordinarily I'd be dreading this because B-list super-heroes always get shitty movie treatments by assholes who think that the characters "need fixing." But there are several things going on here in Green Lantern's favor: 1) Recent box office smashes by The Dark Knight and Iron Man prove that these movies are most successful WHEN YOU RESPECT THE FUCKING SOURCE MATERIAL! Hopefully production will take note. 2) They are using the real Green Lantern here... Hal Jordan. 3) The writer on the project is Greg Berlanti, the guy responsible for quality stuff like Everwood, Brothers & Sisters, and Eli Stone! Please, please, please let them get this right... because a good Green Lantern movie could seriously kick ass!
Last up, I am getting ready to leave soon, so if you're in the Chicago area this Saturday (or in the St. Louis area next Saturday) and want to meet up with a great group of bloggers, please send a message to me at dave@blogography.com and I'll get you hooked up with all the details!
And now... time to wash underwear.
Why is it that no matter how many pairs of boxers I buy, I'm forever running out?
Live from Chicago, it's another edition of Bullet Sunday!
• iPhone. When I got back from Davecago 3 last night and went to charge my iPhone, I found out that my power adaptor was dead. This was frustrating, but not a big problem, because I was going into the city and could just stop by the Apple Store and get a new one. But when I got there, something strange was happening. The line to get a new iPhone 3G had only one person in it. Not knowing quite what to do with myself, I made the snap decision to just get a new iPhone so I could finally have the GPS I need so badly in my travels (and go completely broke from having to shell out $299). I'll undoubtedly blather on about it later, but my initial reaction? Feels better in the hand, but design is not as nice as my first iPhone. Face feels more like plastic than glass (oh shit!). GPS is slow to acquire. 3G network is faster only sometimes and not widely available. None of my old complaints were addressed (clipboard, subscribed calendars, etc.). Conclusion? If Apple had put a fucking GPS in the original iPhone like they should have in the first place, I would never have "upgraded." Still a nice product, however.
• Doggity. Since earliest childhood, the only way I ever ate hotdogs was plain with ketchup. Now that I've started eating Chicago Style Hotdogs, I can't imagine eating them any other way (well, maybe one other way). Damn they're addicting. Fortunately, there's a vegetarian version here in Chicago at America's Dog, which is where I had lunch (again) today...
• Chef. Isaac Hayes, who I will forever associate with the phrase "Hello there, children!" from his character "Chef" on South Park has just died. I know that Hayes had a major falling out with Trey Parker and Matt Stone (creators of the show) a while back, which resulted in the death of "Chef"... but I sure hope that they do something on South Park to remember him and the years he worked on the show. It hasn't been the same since he left...
• Davecago 3. I hate to admit it, but RW over at 1 Step Beyond gave up a much better recap of the festivities than I could ever hope to write. Suffice to say that I had a great time, and was so very happy to meet some terrific new people...
UPDATE: Tori has relented and published the recipe for her amazing, highly addictive brownies! Click and rejoice!
And also to reunite with some old friends from Davecagos past...
I swear that every time I meet up with other bloggers I feel so amazingly lucky to have people like this in my life. It's not easy spending so much time traveling far away from home, but knowing I have a blogging family no matter where I go is a blessing in life that I just can't put into words. I have received criticism from those who think that I'm an egotistical bastard for "renaming cities in my image" and "inviting people to come worship me"... but the truth is exactly the opposite. I don't do this so people can meet me... I do it so that I can meet them...
The fact that I am lucky enough that people even care enough about me to show up and say "hello" is just a bonus. If I am very lucky, I'll get to keep meeting up with fellow bloggers and blog readers for years to come.
Past and upcoming meet-ups can always be found on Blogography's Dave Events Page.
Oog... I really need to update my "Bloggers I've Met" list in my sidebar, but it's time for bed. I have a very long day ahead of me tomorrow...
Catching up with all the television I missed while on vacation has been tough because I've got loads of work piled up as well. So far, the only "must-see" series for me is Jay Mohr & Paula Marshall in Gary Unmarried. I had -zero- expectations for the show, but watched it anyway because I loved Paula Marshall on Cupid and think Jay Mohr is seriously underrated (I can't think of a single thing he's done that I haven't liked). Imagine my shock in finding out that the show is great... really funny stuff. I also kind of enjoyed Worst Week, but don't know how they are going to keep the premise going week after week. The biggest disappointment so far was Knight Rider which sucked so much ass that I expected my television to implode.
Which would be okay by me because after installing iTunes version 8, I've been spending most of my time being mesmerized by the beautiful new Visualizer they've included. It was formerly an iTunes plugin called "Magnetosphere," but it was so sweet that Apple bought it and made it their new default look. Here's just a small sampling of the jaw-dropping images that spring to life...
Of course, static images do nothing to show how incredible the visualizer looks when in motion, but you can at least get an idea of what's going on. Check it out for yourself by downloading iTunes 8 for free!
UPDATE: Here's a video of the old Magnetosphere plug-in in action, which I found in a nifty LifeHacker article with undocumented keyboard shortcuts for the new iTunes Visualizer...
Super sweet.
Blargh. There's not enough time left in the day to blog properly.
Whenever I get a new version of Adobe Creative Suite, I completely start over from scratch on my computers. This is a day-long, tedious endeavor that involves making two redundant backups, reformatting my drive, reinstalling the MacOS X, then re-downloading and installing all the software I know and love.
It may sound like overkill for an upgrade, but I learned the hard way when moving from CS to CS2 that Adobe puts a lot of stuff on your machine that you may not ever get rid of. To make sure that everything runs at its best and conflicts are avoided, a fresh approach seems to work best.
As an added bonus, I clear out a lot of garbage that I've accumulated over the years, and have the opportunity to reclaim hard disk space previously occupied by crap.
In this case, 18 gigs of crap.
And no, it wasn't porn.
Not knowing what in the heck had been taking up all that space, I went back through my backup archive.
For two hours.
Turns out at some point I duplicated my entire Applications folder without realizing it, chewing up 16 gigs of hard disk space I never even knew I should have had available.
Yay! More room for porn!
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