The first one is a moderately funny bit involving Pee Wee Herman using an iPad. I can’t tell if it’s a real one or a prop though.
The other is an interesting, thought-provoking piece from The Economist which I’m confident will be onboard to have its publication ready for the new device. The Babbage blog on their site seems to imply they will.
When will I get mine? Probably sometime after we get our vacation to Las Vegas completed. I know what my first application for it will be.
It’s under the wire but he lives in California so this is valid for an additional two hours!
Today is his day despite having to work yet I’m confident his wife (Kelly) and daughter (Evie) will have a surprise for him tonight or this weekend. I don’t have any insight on this, I’m guessing.
Should you know him, wish him well through here, Facebook or whatever means you may have.
I hope to catch Ethan during his next visit to Austin, buy him a drink and finally get him to sing for my virtual band in Rock Band, Shampoo Planet.
Mark M sent me the link last night/this morning. I’m not sure if it was the economy that knocked the company down for the count. I would say it was more the one-two combo of iCal being free and Nighthawk becoming vaporware; the promised version 5 (or whatever) had been promised for at least two years. Then not being CalDAV compliant was the KO for me.
I’m going to keep using in conjunction with iCal until it stops working. My guess would be when Rosetta is removed from Mac OS X.
So many great memories, around 15 years of it and probably two previous versions. Yes, I had strayed temporarily with After Dark’s Espresso because I was seduced by their licensed Star Trek: NG look and animation but the novelty wore off when it proved to be limited.
Still, it was a good run for one piece of software which became mandatory on every portable I’ve owned.
Given a choice between the two “major” US music magazines, I would go with Spin over Rolling Stone any day. Both are probably dying since neither are as (physically and subscription-wise) large as they used to be.
Recently I wasted five minutes perusing RS at Waterloo Records to see how their political reporting was over the enemies of stopping Climate Change (meaning, people who want to maintain the status quo). I was more surprised to see the ol’ hippie rag reduced to the same form factor as Time or Newsweek.
My guess is that this move by Spin to have its archives online could be a pre-emptive move in light of the upcoming iPad hitting the streets in early April.
When I saw the announcement via The Onion‘s AV Club, I quickly rushed to see if they started from the beginning (as the link does) because I had so many great memories of Spin‘s beginnings. I managed to score the first issue during our long weekend in Montana of all places. Then I was a big collecting nerd trying to be a completist. I quickly fell short in several months due to my lack of income more than being in a remote location (North Dakota). Either way, Spin was an eye-opening experience for me at 16. The upstart magazine covered “obscure” acts RS didn’t have any interest in; it would’ve taken up valuable pages on their worship of has-beens Eric Clapton and Bob Dylan. In its early years, Spin let Henry Rollins have a column, there was a knock-off of Siskel & Ebert watching MTV when music videos still got played and they reviewed some records which are now a part of my collection RS skipped or really hated; how often I laugh at their prediction on Huey Lewis & the News’ Sports and Tear For Fears’ Songs from the Big Chair.
That first issue featured Madonna, who remains boring, but I sat in the car on the ride back from Montana, pouring over the other pages about U2’s love of Roxy Music, Bryan Ferry (of Roxy Music), Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Fela Kuti, what CDs were like and this weird trio called Bronski Beat. Looking over it now online, I’m laughing on how I probably overlooked the pieces about the Replacements, Joe Bob Briggs’ piece on the worst 10 movies of 1984 and snippets over other up-and-comers, yet I think the BoDeans couldn’t get arrested after 1989.
The ads are pretty funny too. The hair, the clothes and who used to be on top of the heap (Hall & Oates!). My personal favorite was the plug for cleaning solution to use on vinyl and record players.
Based upon today’s Austin weather, Spring decided to call in sick. There was a huge thunderstorm with a deluge of rain followed by the temperature dropping; today’s high will be a disappointing 48 F!
I shouldn’t complain too much. We’ll be back to normal by Monday and the following week appears to be smooth sailing.
I just remember how lame this day was in the Midwest and Great Plains because there could always be another snow storm or freezing rain. The weather for today brought all those chilling memories back.
Meanwhile, today is officially the first day as of 17:35 UT (which I think is Greenwich MT) which would make it around noon here. My little friend RC said it’s tomorrow due to her calendar. I’m going by what my Buddhist wall calendar says.
Oh yeah, contrary to the rumors. You can stand an egg on the small end any day of the year. The trick isn’t exclusive to the Equinoxes.
In light of the recent suspension of Washington’s Ovechkin (a hit I never saw, I only heard about it through my ESPN widget), my ex-roommate Paul sent me a copy of the NHL’s Top Secret document on how the Governors and Bettman punish the various offenders. Many Bothans died to bring us the information I’ve been told.
Being a Flyers fan, there was a little dig to make me laugh. Click on the graphic to see the full thing in a larger size.
This is mainly Somara’s new car too, I plan to tough it out with my 1996 VW Golf until we get this puppy paid off. How soon? I give it around three years really but we financed it over five to be safe.
So I think it was worth the wait to get it shipped over from Japan. The visor part turned out better than I anticipated. I thought they would jut out like gutters on a house, instead they resemble tinted pieces of plastic on the glass. Explains why they’re not legal in all states; they can obstruct visibility.
Somara gave it a quick test drive around the lot to make sure it worked and handled well enough. Then we did all the final paperwork which I still need to finish the online parts with Honda tonight. The one thing I will have to get adjusted to should I ever drive it (I’m scheduling this weekend, let her enjoy it for a while) is the gear shifting. Oddly this car gets to fifth pretty quickly, around 40-45 mph; my VW would still be in fourth until 50.
Our sales guy Sam was great. He made buying a car a nice experience. I take some of the blame for 1996, I was in a hurry to get wheels so I didn’t shop around or let the VW people spoil me a bit. The funniest part was Sam showing us the car’s secret compartment or as he joked after getting our permission, the place to store our weed. Somehow I have a feeling the lawyers we know are aware of its location from their conversations with the police. Besides, we’re such dorks, it would get used for hiding junk food, money or gifts for friends.
Most importantly, the USB connection kit works very well! The old Nano (circa 2006) locked up when I plugged it in but my Touch and iPhone knew what to do. This didn’t count, it was a test drive. After resetting the Nano during the paperwork session, we tried again on our way to get dinner. Success!
The inaugural song from the mix of 20 car/driving songs? “Drive My Car” by the Beatles. May it be a good omen for this vehicle. I’m confident the novelty of it will be worn out by the first payment due in April.
Yesterday we rode to work in Somara’s 1995 S-10 pickup for the last time. I felt we owed it to the ol’ vehicle before we took it to the Honda dealership which is probably its final resting place. My guess is that the truck is worth more as spare parts for all the people in Mexico driving them. Seriously. Somara used to get offers left on the windshield constantly because it’s a common practice in Texas and I know a guy at work who received a couple grand on his used VW the same way. Some days you’ll see a bunch of used cars going south on I-35 headed to Mexico for parts.
It was a relatively sad final day. This truck had many great memories. Somara made numerous trips across the US in it; primarily between Austin and Phoenix. We used it to get my crap in North Carolina in 1999 when we were still cementing our relationship. Obviously I shanghai’d it a couple times to move from one apartment to another also. (Her assistance was voluntary, I only wanted to borrow the vehicle for the record.) As for trading it in over my VW which is more well known as a problematic car, the truck ended up being the more logical choice: the heater stopped working, same for the AC, its fuel efficiency is much worse and it became formidable to drive without a tachometer (for me, Bryant witnessed it during our lunch hour).
I think I will miss it more because when I first saw it in 1999, it told me that Somara was really from Texas since where I’m from, most women drive something more practical and inconspicuous.
The (more or less) final mileage for Somara's main vehicle since 1995
Last week, the Huffington Post had this link up on its Science section, nice to see something other than the anti-vax idiocy. I quickly recognized it was only the old ion-engine design. This was used recently with a probe or two but it has never been thought of as practical with passengers. The story does mention the biggest factor holding this back is a power source.
I think propulsion is a lower priority with going to Mars. Keeping the crew alive from all of the Sun’s dangerous byproducts (radioactive flares) our atmosphere normally shields us from is the biggest unsolvable problem, something recently brought up by NASA’s current boss Charles Bolden. Personally, I think the first mission to Mars will be a small town full of people going and the plan will involve them staying there for at least a year.
It seems the medication the nurse (not a PA or doctor) prescribed for Somara wasn’t enough. There was some slight, brief progress after Tuesday evening but a huge regression happened yesterday. I don’t know how severe it is until I get her to a specialist or at least a full-fledged doctor tomorrow morning. I’m not blaming the nurse from last week. She did the best she possibly could based upon the data available, etc. Medicine doesn’t always get it right on the first attempt unlike Star Trek and medical dramas. However, I thought the free-market was supposed to solve the issues of expertise/availability as per the Right-Wing Noise Machine. Obviously, it’s not true since most doctors in America are Nine-to-Fivers like everybody else. No wait, I’m using anecdotal experience as evidence as the many critics of Canada’s system like to use, never mind the statistics and facts contrary to those claims.
Personally, I prefer the Bismarck model so I don’t know why my opponents always point to our northern neighbor.
Either way, we’re hoping for a better, more hopeful diagnosis because the steroids didn’t work (or they’re perceived as failing) and if it doesn’t clear up soon, I will be the exclusive driver of our new car (and probably the old one too), which our friend Juliana will be overseeing the final details on!
Mar. 16, 2010 Update: The doctor had nothing useful to report. Immediate results from the blood test reported everything as normal. Somara received some stronger motion-sickness medication (dramamine on steroids?) and we’re off to a specialist in two weeks. Meanwhile, I had the honor and thrill to drive her pickup truck on its final commute today. I did alright, I gradually got the hang of taking it out into first gear without grinding it too much by the time we arrived at Apple. I hope her medication kicks in by the time we go to the Honda dealership tonight. I feel Somara should give the ol’ S-10 its final drive.
This was achieved back on Tuesday but I didn’t get around to ripping, cataloging and inventorying the material until today. Of course, you’re probably thinking, “CDs? Does anybody buy those anymore?” Guilty. I’m not quite the musical Luddite as those caught up in the vinyl resurgence as much as I loved my 45s in Seventies and LPs in the Eighties, I will never miss their downsides regardless of the 180-gram stuff being manufactured now. I prefer to have a hard copy of what I buy and the CD (a format which is now over 30 years old) works best since I’m a music nerd who actually skims over the booklet looking over the details about the record’s production: location, guests and producer. Trust me, sometimes the right producer can help you make a decision on buying material from a band you’ve never heard of: the most famous case in 20 years would be Ric Ocasek producing Weezer’s 1994 debut.
So which album received the honor of being number 2500 in my collection?
The new Peter Gabriel release Scratch my Back. I fudged the data entry to give it to him, most people wouldn’t recognize the majority of my recent purchases. Besides, he turned 60 this year. It’s the least I can do.
This definitely puts more urgency into getting Alexandria going because I really want to show off what I’ve been collecting and enjoying for 28 years (23 of it on CD).
My friend joins the Prime Number Club today!
What a great way to kick off Spring Break. Well, it’s Spring Break in Austin which means the UT students leave so all the jackasses with ponytails and cell phones can enjoy SXSW at our expense.
As for Nelson, he should celebrate with a birthday pie because it’s also Pi Day, 3.14 but he should kick off with breakfast at Einstein Brothers’ Bagel Co. since it’s also Albert Einstein’s birthday. Lucky him. He got a genius who made some of the biggest contributions to Physics since Newton, I have the last dictator of Italy before Berloscummy.
If you know my friend, wish him well via e-mail or a phone call.
Yesterday wasn’t very pleasant. I’ve been fighting off the beginning of a cold with a sore throat and I managed to get the afternoon off; take an opportunity to sleep it off since I felt the worst of it was over.
Right before lunch, my iPhone went off and it was Sam (our Honda salesman) telling me the car arrived. I was under the assumption he would call when it was being unloaded from the boat in Long Beach, CA. This was then an automatic punt to Somara because it will be mainly her car and the hold up is getting the title to her truck.
The short story and conclusion to this all: the title should be in my hands today, the car isn’t completely ready (the dealership has to install a couple of the features we requested), I have to get our insurance amended to prove its covered and we go seal the deal Tuesday night.
The next step is getting the playlist together for the iPod when we take the Fit out on its inaugural cruise. This is what we have in mind, suggestions are very welcome:
We’re open to others as long as it doesn’t involve a particular model (hence “92 Subaru” by Fountains of Wayne or “Car Trouble” by Adam & the Ants are out).
My brother turns the big 4-0 today.
I hope he and his family have a nice, big three-day weekend planned to celebrate. Meanwhile, I did find a funny card, it will just be late due to Somara’s dizziness and my pre-occupation of other things getting in the way.
May the Chicago-area weather be pleasant too.
Past birthdays of his I remembered when we were kids:
Maybe we’ll even have a conversation over the phone.
If you know him, drop him a line.
Somara even having such a problem was news to me when she told everybody at breakfast on Sunday. Namely her ongoing issue of it for 4-6 weeks. I’m not going to discuss the why at this point because it’s irrelevant now.
Somehow it hit critical mass yesterday, enough to make her want to go to the doctor before her follow-up on the Mayo Clinic program we’re in (I’m winning on the weight-loss/exercise part). So she scored an afterwork appointment with Austin Regional Clinic and we rushed down MoPac to get there.
The good news is that the nurse found the probable cause; some kind of weird crystalizing in the ear canals which are involved with balance. Then through some yoga-esque turning of Somara’s head and torso, we learned about how the dizziness tended to manifest more often when she turns left. Thankfully it’s an infection, not the genetic thing her dad and siblings have with deafness; this also affects their balance, ask Jose about my father-in-law’s driving in the Aladdin (now Planet Hollywood) parking lot. I blame our cat Nemo since we had been battling something in his ears for several months and he tends to sleep in my region of the bed while I’m away.
Currently the plan is some powerful antibiotics, saline solution to rinse out and the yoga lite. Somara read other details of this via the Internet about vibrations near the troubled area helping. On the drive home I joked about renting the paint shaker at Home Depot to help her out. I don’t think anybody uses nor builds those silly weight loss machines from old-timey movies. You know, the devices resembling an outboard motor with a belt on it.
We should see results (or not) in a week. I’m confident the drugs should do it. I’ve had nasty blockage behind the ears in the past. Thankfully, it was only painful but I could still drive.
