Robin Williams Plays C.O.D

Forgive me again for posting inconsequential news these last few days. I can't help myself. It may just be a rut. We all have 'em. Unless, fearless reader, you are perfect in every way. But alas, I let my insecurities get the better of me. But that does not diminish in any way the coolness factor here, with just a touch of weird to garnish it. Robbin Williams, the hairy/funny man himself is a video game junkie.

A few days ago when he was on Jimmy Fallon's late night show, Williams discussed how he is a Call of Duty player, and also named his daughter for the classic Nintendo video game Zelda. That's what you call a hardcore gamer if I every saw one. You can check out the story at Joystiq.com.

Private Rocket Reaches Space; Plus an Online Arrest?

Yes. You did read the title correctly. First off, said rocket was built by a private company in New Zealand by the name of Rocket Labs. The company's owner, Mark Rocket(that threw me off just a little, it's not why I thought it was called "Rocket") said that this accomplishment was “... a huge technological leap for New Zealand.” The rocket made it to about 62 miles above the earth, which is a sub-orbital flight, but considered space nonetheless.

Now this next story is kinda "interesting" if you ask me. A man was arrested in England for stealing usernames and passwords from people who play the RuneScape MMORPG. According to Slashdot, this guy was also known to have stolen a bunch of virtual money, called "kredits", which he somehow used to place a down payment on an actual house. How do you turn what amounts to monopoly money into a house? This guy must be a true maestro de fraud.......

One Hilarious, The Other Awsomeness

Two stories for your rapt attention. The first, slightly, no..... mostly hilarious. This is what can go wrong if you put a live Twitter news feed on a billboard for the public's viewing pleasure.

Now for the awsomeness. I myself am an avid startrek fan, but if a war broke out between trekkies and fanboys, I would find myself most assuredly a fanboy. Starwars is just pure awsomeness. Here are some pics to demonstrate the point.

I hope you enjoyed that, because it'll be a while before I can stand some more of the hoky and coincidental.

No Change? No Problem!

At least that's the prospective of the Salvation Army, who are now accepting credit cards as a means of receiving donations. It's a crazy idea, but I think it's only logical for the SA to make this move. I know I might feel more guilty when I pass those bell ringers. The Salvation Army people are making it hard for me to have a good excuse.....

I Really Need To Stop Taking Things Personally

It's bad for my blood pressure.

But seriously, most of you who may read my blog already know that BYU won the annual rivalry game against the Utes. As a Ute fan, all I have to say is that the Y gutted out a tough win, Hall overcame the stigma of five interceptions of last years game, and all in all, a great game to watch. What you also may know is that Max Hall, BYU's quarterback, made some harsh comments after the game. Some of what he said,

 "I don't like Utah. In fact, I hate them. I hate everything about them. I hate their program, their fans. I hate everything," Hall said. "It felt really good to send those guys home." "I think the whole university and their fans and the organization is classless," Hall said. "They threw beer on my family and stuff last year and did a whole bunch of nasty things. I don't respect them and they deserved to lose."

I don't know Hall at all. Only ever seen him on TV. Some of what I said on facebook after the fact:

Max Hall is a retard. He totally made himself look like a jackass in some of his comments after the game.

btw deseret news is obligated to back up Hall because being BYU quarterback somehow qualifies you a free ride to the celestial kingdom.... 

I don't like being associated with beer throwing fans. The other thing that Hall has shown the world is that BYU tends to foster the "I'm holier than you because I'm mormon" attitude. Thats not cool either because just because I'm mormon I get associated with that. Hall just made himself 100,000 + enemies tonight, and the only way he can get past it is to apolagize. I feel symathy that some idiots threw beer at his family, but that's no reason to "hate" a program and a whole fanbase either. Stupid Jackass-like comments he made.

"Do you really want me to go into it? I think the whole university and their fans and organization is classless. They threw beer on my family and stuff last year and did a whole bunch of nasty things. I don't respect them, and they deserve to lose."-Max Hall after the game. So just because I'm a Utes fan I'm a beer throwing lunatic. Well, I guess I need some more practice at it.....

Rain falls on even the good people. God has nothing to do with BYU sports or the Y would be #1 in the nation every year. But if we wanted to bring God into everything, we should pray for the sense to take it all as a rivalry, not make anything personal, and to have a good time playing. Hall didn't do it. Nobody does. This is what our world comes to in most facets of life. I'm sorry for all the rants Josh and Sean, but I just have to vent when I feel a personal attack, even if Halls comments don't look that way. Y fans, don't take my comments personally, either. I'm just callin' 'em like I see 'em. The Y gutted out a tough win, Hall overcame the stigma of some mistakes, all in all a good game. I just wanted to mention some things the way most of my peers don't realize.

Compare what I said to what Hall said. He didn't say much. I made myself out to look like a total dirtbag. I think that this is the tendency that a lot of us have, to make something stupid develop into something undeservedly overblown. All over the internet we see it. It's what make the news entertaining some nights. It's how we identify the idiots of society(like myself).

I realized this while I was trying to come up with a new zinger to throw at Hall and his fans. You can see my last comment in quotes that I was beginning to feel this way. I wanted to make this post to show myself, more than anyone, that we should not see ourselves as better than someone else simply on the basis of a few comments. I'm sure Max Hall is a great guy, and if I end up going to the same ward(I belong to the same church as Hall) as him, I would hope that we became friends.

These are the types of things that I can see driving other sectors of society apart. We need to realize it where it happens and stop it.

For those who have viewed some comments of mine on facebook and took offence, I offer my sincere apology, and hope that this doesn't deter us from a good relationship.

Now that I have said all that, I feel a little bit better. Just put this behind me so that I can blow something else out of proportion. ;-)

A little prospective for ya'll

I found a picture that says a whole rant so that I don't have to. Thanks whoever made this thing.

Twitter Desktop Clients

Before I get into any of this, I first have to say that I am very biased toward TweetDeck. It was the first desktop client that I found, and I fell in love with it. TweetDeck has been very reliable for me in all the time that I have used it.

So now into the reviews and comparisons. Please, if you feel the need to ridicule my disjointed and unstudied prose, use the comment section to it's fullest ability. I can take it.

Like I said before, I have been using TweetDeck for a long time now. The screenshot that you are looking at to the right is one that I took in TweetDeck itself. As you can see, the client, like so many others, will support not just twitter, but Facebook and Myspace as well. What I like about TweetDeck is all of the different tool and window options that  are available. The ones that I use beside the Twitter and Facebook windows right now are the 'tweetdeck recommends' and 'direct comments' windows. You have the option to search on any given subject in twitter, and TweetDeck will put the most relevant tweets into it; or you can search for twitter users themselves. The list of options can go on for TweetDeck. Another new feature that the TD guys have added is the option to get the full news feed from face book, which includes the ability to comment, and view applications and so on. You virtually don't need to go to facebook anymore with TweetDeck. The program is very well put together. I found it completely intuitive to use for the first time, and has been a robust application. I really like this thing. Keep it up TweetDeck Guys!

Next on my list was Twhirl. This client looked very appealing to me at face value, but was a little different from what I thought it would be. Let me explain this. First off, in my own stupidity, I thought that it would be a full window program, but I really neglected to look at the screen shots that the website makes available. The next slight misconception was the way it worked. Twhirl can support almost any micro-blogging website or social network you want..... through a web service called Ping.fm. What the way it all works is that you set up a Ping.fm account, connect all of your social networks to it, and then you access Ping.fm from your desktop with Twhirl. When you update Twhirl for your twitter account, you can opt to update your Ping.fm account at the same time, and thus update your Facebook, linkedin, Myspace, you name it.

Other than all of that, I found on very apealling feature. Twhirl is in my estimation one of the only clients that offers you the option to recieve direct access to friendfeed. This is really why I wanted it. I can run it in the background along with TweetDeck. It's turned out great for me. I fully intend on keeping it around for a while.

The next client is called Sobees.com. What intrigued me here was the touted ability to link me not only to twitter and facebook from the desktop, but also to linkedin. Sorry, no screenshot here. For starters, Sobees failed to run in Ubuntu Linux. On the bright side, however, they are working on making it available to Linux users as soon as they can. I was not overly impressed with Sobees. It has the same old stuff in it like the rest of them, but what really rubbed me the wrong way was that it promises to set you up with linkedin.com access, but I was unable to access it. No matter what I did or where I looked for for support, I coudn't get linkedin to work. But I can say that there is a silver lining for Sobees.com, and that is the visual design that the developers put together was very appealing. I wish that TweetDeck had something similar.

To make mention of some other desktop clients, specifically Linux ones, I wanted to talk just a little bit about Gwibber and Twitux.

Gwibber worked okay for me, but I was not impressed with either the speed and reliability, or the layout and design. I don't run a very powerful system, but for a desktop client, that's no excuse.

I've heard much ado about Twitux. I haven't made myself very familiar with it, but I just wasn't impressed with my first outing in it. Twitux didn't combine my desire to have my Twitter, Facebook, linkedin and FriendFeed all together in the same client. It just did twitter. I might as well go to Twitter instead of use Twitux.

I hope that these short reviews have helped you all, at least the four of you who probably read this. But, seriously, I hope that you have got some good prospective with your Twitter desktop client search from me. My one last piece of advice would be to try a few out for yourselves. But, just so you have been duly warned, my preferences may differ greatly from your's.

Also, let me just make a quick mention about how much I have enjoyed using products(TweetDeck & Twhirl) programmed in Adobe's .air format. It is a very robust platform and has worked just fabulously in Ubuntu. All I had to do was download a plugin, and whammo! it all worked.

Looks like every time I post, this tweet can be seen on five different services that I use. Amazing....

Pay-As-You-Go Wireless Data Plans

Here is something to chat about around the water cooler. AT&T is now going to offer pay as you go data plans for those nifty 3G enabled laptops all the wireless dealers are pushing these days. As stated in the article, AT&T is trying to reach a larger customer base.

This seems to me like the logical thing to do from a Huge Company point of view.

My illustrious and vaunted point of view?

Tons of people have cell phones these days, and they don't come cheap, especially on a month to month basis. Owning a cellphone, however is considered a necessity while having a netbook with 3G wireless network is not. I mean, if I can get free wireless internet with my netbook at most McDonalds' or airports, it doesn't make sense to pay Sprint or AT&T exorbitant amounts of money just for internet. Am I expected to pull my computer out of my pocket and start video conferencing for school while trying to drive on the freeway?(I wish...)

But for those gullible enough to go with the pay as you go rubish, they are going to get less bandwith for near the same price. $60 for a regular two year plan, $50 for the month pay as you go plan. It's a no brainer to me.

You never know though. There is probably some guy out there fantasizing about being able to type up and send that report to Johnson while wrangling with traffic on the 405.

More Basket Ball?

Shouldn't Obama be presidentin? I think so. I figure the harder you work at a job the better you learn it. If you learn it right, then you won't dig us deeper than $12 trillion.

According to this Wall Street Journal article, Obama has played 25 full games of golf. First off, thats more already than Dubya played in two full terms. Second of all, do you people know how long 18 holes of golf takes? Just flip the channel on Sundays and find out.

But the real kicker is there are some "critics" who just want our illustrious president to play more basket ball, the better to worship with. Sickening........

Who Reads The News?

I, for one, am one of those fuddy-duddies that is totally obsessed with the news. In the past, I ended up visiting like 10 to 15 news sites frequently per day. It was monotonous, but I need the news to feel "plugged in" to the world. I ended up finding Google Reader, an RSS feed reader. It's been very useful with consolidating my news and tech updates that I just couldn't live without. It was okay at organizing everything. It was also very robust, and loaded very quickly. I would recommend it to anyone who is just discovering the greatness that is reading the news via RSS.

In my daily travels across the vastness of the WWW, I discovered something that I should have found long ago, being the avid Firefox user that I am. This discovery is the one and only Feedly. What it does is give you all the tools you need; not only consolidate your news reading in one place, but Feedly can organize it into many different formats. Some of these formats include categories(not unusual for some RSS readers), magazine format(very nifty), digest, and latest updates. Feedly also has a unique edge on the competition because it incorpates a Firefox extension. Because it's a browser extension, Feedly took the advantage to ad some useful tools that make it easier to ad new feeds to your account, as well as share anything you come across with your twitter minions or facebook friends, not to mention the ability to share your cool discoveries amongst Feedly users as well.

The sleek design incorporates any picture or screenshot of a video associated with the headlines. When you click a headline you see a flash pop-up with both the head line and the first few lines of your story. Some blogs will show the whole story in the pop up, which I find time saving(if only a few seconds of waiting).

Along with all of these great features, I really like the option of seeing my news in so many different formats. It makes for a quick trip to find exactly what I'm looking for. A great option that you have is that you can set which one of these pages as the one you see first when you log in.

For all of you who are current Google Reader users, you needn't worry about having to re subscribe to everything you already get there. As an extension, Feedly will automatically see your browser history and incorporate all of your Google Reader stuff.

All in all, I was very surprised to find an RSS reader that would exceed my bias towards Google Reader, and Feedly did just that. With the great way to organize all of your feeds, wide range of features and a slim and robust design, I really have come to love using Feedly.

Clicker Is Cool

In the course of my usual perusal of a great many favorite websites, I came across a curious link. And where did it lead me to, you ask? Well, it lead me to the best site in the whole world, at least for today. I found Clicker. What Clicker allows you to do is base your TV watching operations from one site. As we all know, there is tons of TV just waiting to be streamed from online, but its scattered all the way to kingdom-come. So when you create an account with Clicker, you can search for your favorite shows, and it will create a playlist for you. All you do is select the show, and it links you right to the original source for your viewing pleasure.

Another nifty feature is that Clicker also includes in its pool of searchable programs professional, high-quality web-shows that are gaining in popularity by leaps and bounds. So when you go off on a search in any category, you can discover some great new shows that are web-based.

I've been playing around on Clicker all morning, and I've got to tell you all that it's definitely worth getting an account and seeing what it can do. Best of all, the service that Clicker provides is free!

Utah: Life Behind the "Zion Curtain"

In the first few years of my life, I was a California boy. Culture was different in many aspects of life. Most notably, stores were open on Sunday's, stores also stayed open later, there was a heck of alot of traffic to deal with and so on. In some respects, I felt like the people I knew were "real". I don't know really how to describe this, except to say that no one had to put up some sort of facade to fit in.

This is where I can catch a lot of flak, my opinions and so forth. I need to be clear that I'm not bashing every single Utahn there ever was. But I just see those people here and there, on the rodes and in stores who seem to have a sense of entitlement. It feels to me like certain people really feel like they are better than the other guy. You can really feel it, and even see it on the roads. In 2006, late in that year, I was driving down a major road, trying to get to a job. It was late in the day, but as a satellite dish installer, that doesn't tend to matter. Traffic was horrible because of a concert that was to take place just up the road. Some woman in her husband's pickup with an 8 in lift and new Eddlebrock pipes, rode up onto the sidewalk, and drove past the traffic.This is just one extreme example of the common attitude of "I'm the entitled Utahn". I can continually see people forcing their way into another lane on a merge, jerk-like, not even caring that it would cause an accident unless it were for the person who was forced into courtesy. I never see such driving habits on the roads of California. Everyone there seems to know the rules, and while they are extreme drivers(driving there is like racing) people tend to work together on the roads. It's an attitude that carries over to other parts of life.

These aren't the only things happening. There are multiple manifestations of an over reaching problem. The "I'm better than you" thing. I can't really say it's because some are Mormon(I'm Mormon myself), or if it's because people feel like they are rich, or because every Utahn has a chip on their shoulder. I don't know, but I think that it comes out to a combination of the three.

Don't get me wrong, Utah, I love the state and plan on living here for a long time to come, but we all really need to work on this attitude problem.

What really set me off on this topic was the recent news article that appeared in the Deseret News paper. The article presents some of the bills that rep. Carl Wimmer is having drafted for the upcoming session to open in January. The thing with all of this is not necessarily the bills themselves, but the purpose for which they will be presented. The first is the one I really have a problem with. After being involved in a minor fender-bender, Rep. Wimmer decided that the guy who caused the accident should really have to pay double to triple the fine rate just because it was rush hour. And so now he's taking a personal vendetta against all who make the same mistake. Why don't we all get the opportunity to make laws because they are personally motivated. Again, don't misunderstand me, I believe that any representative can and should feel some personal motivation to pass a bill that he sponsors, but I mean, come on! Just because it happened to him means it should be changed? No sense in the reasoning.

So now you all know life behind the Zion Curtain. These certain things that motivate Utah life and politics. We as a whole really need to change.

Google Chrome OS

The thought has intrigued me since I first heard the news that Google is currently developing an OS of their own, based on the Linux kernel. There has been a lot of buzz around the internet, and in particularly within the last few days, surrounding a Google press event held yesterday to show off a preliminary version for reporters, and to answer any questions.

From most of the reports that I've read, the presenter, Sundar Pachai, who is a Google VP, danced around some questions that press in the minds of many who follow Google. For instance, some may ask what the pricing will be for an OEM netbook, or something similar, and the answer invariably is "we can't say". For the most part, according to this Cnet article, Pachai did not reveal anything that hasn't been known already, which to me is a big disappointment.

On the upside, what fascinates me with Chrome OS is that Google is developing the software with netbooks in mind. They are focusing in large part on bringing to bear the power and connectivity of a regular laptop and at the same time making it  mobile, quick and responsive. In the link embedded in the previous paragraph, you can see exactly what Google's hardware specs are for the OEM version.

Other problems that skeptics(and you can include me here) is the OS's branding. I don't see why Google has both a browser and an OS of the same name. True enough that Chrome OS and the Chrome browser will be very similar in style and function, but I'm concerned that there might be some confusion and lead to some branding issues.

All that being said, as an avid(though novice) Linux user, I'm excited to see the launch of Chrome OS sometime next year. No doubt we'll see many blog posts and news articles all over the internet divulging new features or problems, so I'll keep my eye out.

Mearsk Alabama Attacked Again

Yes, you've probably heard the news and know that the guys on board had a security team which scared the pirates off before they could board, but I wanted to weigh in on what some are saying about this latest encounter with Somali pirates. Here is a quote from Foxnews.com to show you exactly why I wanted to say my piece:

"However, Roger Middleton, a piracy expert at the London-based think tank Chatham House, said the international maritime community was still "solidly against" armed guards aboard vessels at sea, but that American ships have taken a different line than the rest of the international community."

 First of all, both from reading past this point in the article and then using common sense, I would tend towards wanting to have at least a few armed guards aboard.

Middleton went on to suggest that to have a security force aboard ship makes it a privateer, out on the high seas to put an end to piracy. I seriously doubt that's what Maersk had in mind when it put a security force aboard Alabama. I just makes sense to have at least some who are armed aboard ship especially when in potentially dangerous waters; this is even part of the industry's "best practices" according to ADM. Gourtney.

Oh yeah, I've got to add something for good measure.

Did those pirates realize that they were attacking the same ship that made the news all over the world, especially here in the U.S.? I mean, they need to understand what we do when you mess with us. I thought the Navy SEALs tought them that. Apparently the Somali pirates needed to be shot at again to figure it out. But I doubt they did. They'll just go after ships from other countries. Hopefully those other ships have adopted industry "best practices".

(photograph courtesy Foxnews.com)

Grooveshark Blows Pandora Away

Grooveshark is the shiznit. Seriously. I just found it, so for those of you who are way ahead of me, sorry for the repetitive nature of this post.

Well, on to the review. This online music streaming service works in a similar way to Pandora. The big, and decisive difference is that it's just like you had the biggest cd collection in the freakin' world, which means that you get to pick and choose which songs play and which ones don't. You search for artists and individual songs, pick 'em, add 'em to a playlist and save it. Just like that. You just have to put up with a huge ad on the side, which isn't too obtrusive at all.

I also liked a few more things that Grooveshark did. Formost among them is to add a "similar artist" search. That way it allows you to branch out without having to wade through a bunch of crap like Pandora makes you do. You also have at a mouse-click the ability to see what others are listening to and to see what is popular that day.

I know that this was kind of a short review, but I gotta play around with this stuff some more. You can check out Grooveshark for yourselves here.

Monday's: The Bane Of My Existence

Everyone has their bane. For some, it's test taking, no matter what the subject is. Doesn't even have to be academic for some. For others it's crappy drivers. No, not those kind of drivers. Now I have you all confused...... Anyway, for me, as I stated above, it's Monday. I've been battling this choice and capable foe since I was in 1st grade and learned how to play hooky. Monday still doesn't relent in it's onslaught of making me go back to work, getting things done, being productive and what not. Judging by this picture you can see how fried I am. Oh, wait just a minute, I gotta put the flash card in....... Here we go. (None of that was for you, I just need a minute for the pic to upload)

So now it's 30 minutes later(don't ask) and the picture is finally up. It's important to note that I don't feel like I look. But this is what Monday's do to me. It sucks.

But enough of me ranting on about my Mondaphobia. Time to bid my guestimated 4 readers adieu.

Ubuntu Linux: Way Better Than Windows

I know what you all are thinking. "Daniel's gone insane(I know you knew that already dad), Windows 7 just came out and he's just jealous that he can't have it, he doesn't really know what he's talking about" and on and on it could go. I admit, many arguments may have a foundation on truth, but that's not at issue here. (or is it)

To tell you the truth, I bought a netbook about 6 months ago because it would serve me as my college note-taking and paper writing platform. I has done very well so far, but there are a few things that would just bug me all the time. Foremost among my hate for some things windows is the insane time it took to boot the operating system. It was way to cumbersome(under my standards) to boot the stupid thing in class. Other reasons to hate the thing is that Windows(I was using XP) would have these crazy seziures all the time. I don't know what was going on there, but it just wouldn't handle a certain number of programs running all at once, have a coronary, and keel over. How did I remedy said problem? Reboot. Microsoft might even say the same thing. I heard a funny joke a few years back.... or was it a true story based on fiction... anyways, the most seen fix for most windows issues is of course, format and reinstall. It's true, if you got something unfixable, you can just try to back up all your files and blow away what you got going on, and start over, and repeat ever 1-2 years. There, your set for life.

But, hearkening back to my swingin' computer nerd days(I'm a geek now, but most don't realize that there is a fundamental difference between them)when my brothers and I would play around with lots of different Linux distros and UNIX or BSD, I looked into Ubuntu linux, found out my dad and another brother were running it, and looked into it. Turns out they have an OS optimized just for netbooks. I looked into some more, here and there, and finally decided to take the plunge. Turns out it was great. As you can see from the screenshot taken from my machine, the desktop layout for netbooks is way different from what you would normally see in most(even linux) OS's, the model for norm being taken from Windows and Mac. The desktop layout has been optimized for the screen size of a normal netbook. It makes it so everything is displayed cleanly, but also adds the practicality we've come to expect from normal GUI interfaces. Everything looks clean, is extremely customizable, and if you dual-boot with windows, will even automatically port all of your documents and desktop settings from windows.

As you remember, I was most concerned with the Windows boot time being tediously slow. Now don't just tell me that "you've got a netbook, Daniel, is just gunna do that to you." Well, I reject you reality, and substitute my own! My very first boot into ubuntu took just under a minute from pushing the on-button to checking my email. Now tell me netbooks are crap. I'm also pleased that I can go to class and start taking notes on this rig just as fast as if I were using a real pen and paper.

For all of you now intrigued, but not willing to give up on windows, you can partition your harddrive so that you can boot both windows and ubuntu. As a matter of fact thats what I did.

You can read a very good review on the latest update of Ubuntu, now at 9.10, here at technewsworld.com.

Something is Always In The Way of A Man's Job

Great blog post for you all. Especially if you like stories that are based on a true story. Some detail may have been changed.

So it was one fine warm middle-of-the-summer day, when all of a sudden the trees started to loose their leaves, just like they would do in fall. This wasn't the start of the freakyness, mind you. So, being the good young men that my brothers and me are, we go and clean the yard up.

So we're raking it all up outside at this point, and I was even using the mower, when we discovered insane amounts of dog poop. Now don't get disgusted by me making mention of that, our dog just has a high metabolism. It's going along fine too, when I decided stop for a small break and lean on the mower for a minute or two. I gazed out to the west at the Oquirr Mountains, but they weren't there. What I saw was a huge freak storm headed our way. Being the brave and slightly stupid, though strapping young men that we were, decided to push on with the job.

Needless to say, this was not the best idea any of us had ever had. We ended up fighting the storm for "yard supremacy", a feat still not attained by any man in the world to date. The battle continued. We had to fight the storm or else we wouldn't ever be able to get the leaves up. But as we persevered, we completed the task in the nick of time. Some of us had what we had dubbed, "Everest Finger Condition", where your fingers get so numb that you can't feel them. It can even get to the point where they might get frostbite. But that didn't happen. Mother Nature was no match for us. In the fashion of a braindead teanager who insults everybody, we too insulted that storm.

We don't know now, looking back on it, whether that storm is holding a grudge against us. It might just be. Mother Nature has been known to be vindictive that way. But I tell you now, so that you all can learn a lesson, don't mess with storms. I have nightmares and flashbacks like it were yesterday, even though all this happened today, and it isn't pleasant. So know this you young people, learn my our mistake, and just take it easy when a storm roles through....

The Joy of Saturday

But not really joy, more like mixed emotion. Joyful at the fact that I don't have to get up at 3 am to be at work on time, grateful that I don't have to worry about heaps of homework because I did it already. But at the same time not excited for the yard work that I have to do, and the chores that need to be done. Alas, the only day for this writer to get the needful things in domestic life done is Saturday. Sunday is church, we try to keep the sabbath, and Monday through Friday, all those other pressing needs like working so that we can keep a roof over our heads and meal on our plates. So Saturday becomes the day of days.

Well, I guess I should stop belly-aching and git'r'done.......

I've Been Waiting For This Day

A man in California(go figure) was arrested for wearing navy medals that he did not earn. They included a Navy Cross, the Navy's highest honor just under the Medal of Honor, a bronze star and others that the article lists.

He was spotted today by an actual Navy Commander, who then called the FBI.

I have been waiting for this day with a certain diabolicalness(the spell-checker let me say diabolicalness). Don't get me the wrong way, but hear me out. My dad is currently a Navy Commander himself, and both of my grandfathers served in the army. To give a little more context to my opinion, I will tell you that I have seen the buying and selling of such medals in gun shows and army/navy stores, which I think is disrespectful. The medals should remain with the family of the person who was awarded them, and if those people want to sell them I think of as despicable. These things should not be bought and sold because you think they are cool and are worth something. They mean something to the man who earned them, part of the sometimes inadequate compensation. Sometimes it is impossible to compensate our brave soldiers for their service.

Respecting the medals that these men and women earn in the right way is only one of the things that we can do to properly honor their service.

Pass The Tuchie To the Left Hand Side......

Los Angeles City Hall is thrashing around as the City Council and mayor belatedly try to control a pot-shop explosion they ignited, which has spawned dozens of freewheeling weed emporiums near public schools. The Los Angeles school board’s response? Nada.

Google Wave Invites

Okay, so I've been thinking about this for a while and I've come to the conclusion that with just a few Wave invites left and no one to give them to, I'd offer them up here. I have 5 left.

To reference back to an earlier post of mine, Google Wave is an innovative real-time collaberation tool that is similar in some respects to email. In fact, google intends for it's Wave protocal to replace email. What happens is you place a message, add whichever contacts that you want to see the message, and the post is there for all to see, and is meant to be edited and added to. Neat apps allow you to have video conference, ad a poll, ad a map with the destination of an even and so on. It's a great tool. Let me know if you want one of the 5 left in my comments section.

Third In A Row

Yet another shooting took place today, this time in Oregon. I really couldn't believe my eyes when I saw this article on Foxnews.com. A third shooting in just a few days! Preposterous. I don't really understand why a person would feel the need to go on a shooting rampage. Nothing, can justify the killings of innocent people. Any act like this or the others like it are just pure and simple acts of terrorism, because they strike Terror into the hearts of the regular citizen.

Change is good

But not too much change.

Alas, A home to call my own!

I finally "bit the bullet" yesterday and bought a domain name. It took me days to figure out what I really wanted to call this place, and to some, it probably doesn't seem to show. But for me, and my limited brainstorm capabilities, it is a triumph of engineering, or science, or literature. One of those, you can choose.

So this blog shall forever after be known as RandomBrainwork.net, in homage to no particular subject that permeates this website. But no need to fear, I do plan on making plans for some future posts so that it's acutally worth it to read and even debate my controversial opinions on a number of subjects. Mostly politics. Maybe some other stuff like technology and StarWars. In any case, it will be entertaining. I am making a promise to all four of you who might have seen my blog before. Check back later today for some killer postage action.

Ridin' The "G"-Wave

Google Wave is unlike anything we’ve all seen out on the internet. I’m by no means an expert on the subject, but because I have been able to get a preview account, I’ve been playing around with it.

First of all, you need to understand what it’s purpose is before you can really be excited for it; at least that’s the way it was for me. Wave was conceaved with the thought that went along the lines of, “what would email look like if were developed today?” And so the Google team took this idea and ran. Find out the whole story from the Google guys themselves. The rest is history, at least for them. For us it’s just beginning. What Wave does for us is to create a real-time collaborative environment, where users can post messages, select who can see the message, and then add to or edit the message in any place. Gone are the days of cut and paste into a reply message to gain maximum clarity. Just place your reply beneath the statement you’re replying to.

Along with these abilities that will virtually eliminate forwarding or replying(and hopefully get rid of “chain email”) many third party and independent developers are working on applications to fit inside a wave. Uses for these are manifold. Some of the currently available extensions include a “yes-no-maybe” poll application that makes it easy to quantify how many will attend an event or who agrees or disagrees with you. Others that can be used are a map/trip planner powered by Google Maps, handy in setting meetings or trips, video conferencing, and a few others. There will most likely be loads more by the time the official release comes around.

As with any product in beta testing, there are bugs to be hashed out, but Google is doing a great job with keeping up with a wealth of reports, as well as keeping a help forum well managed. Additional functionalities seem to be forthcoming,(probably somewhat based upon user suggestion?) like mass-selecting waves in your inbox so that you can trash or move to a different folder. At least I would like to see that feature added.

All in all, I have enjoyed my experience getting to know Google Wave. With the real time communication/collaboration at it’s core, with all of the functionality to edit and reply to specific messages and statements, to the extensions, and last but not least, the users who find great ways to use the product make Wave a real force to be rekoned with.

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