I was cleaning up some programs that I am not likely to use on my new MacBook Air (iPhoto, iMovie), and I figured I would also blow away Garage Band.
Before I deleted it, I thought I would open it up and see what it was all about. Then I found the Lessons part.
Damn, that is cool. Really cool. Now I need to buy widget to get my guitar plugged into my Mac.
I bought the Artist Lesson of Alex Lifeson teaching how to play Working Man.
Damn, I am going to waste a lot of time with this.
I took a plunge and went for one of the new MBA’s that were announced this month. (I am claiming that my boys got it for me as a Father’s day gift. Shhhh, don’t tell anyone).
Of course, the design, the fit and the finish are outstanding. I got the 13” version, and I opted for the 8G memory on the system, so I had to wait until it built and was shipped from Foxconn. I gently unboxed it and fired it up.
Since I didn’t want to just migrate my user files from my current MBP, I have been selectively installing software, and copying files over. I am mostly done now, but I am sure there will be a few things that I set up and get tweaked.
Impressions:
I took a big risk in going ultra portable. I have historically favored the 15” MacBook Pro models, as it was a good fit for my lap, convenient to work with, and plenty powerful enough to drive anything I need. I know that I can’t fit all my data (mostly my huge music collection which with videos are ~ 140gig) and have enough room on this thing to be useful.
There are a few things I am worried about. Going from nearly a TB of disc space to about 1/4 of that will take some discipline. I did a good grooming of the essentials on my MBP before this arrived, and I am going to rely on DropBox to keep my “active” files synchronized between my systems. That said, I have nearly 200G free, and I will keep an eye on it, but not worry to obsessively.
I thought I could live with iPhoto for when I want to quickly dump photos off my camera. No can do. I forgot how crappy iPhoto was (or my workflow has evolved to where I need Aperture), so I moved Aperture over to my new MBA, and I am sure I will not look back. Perhaps the limited disc space will give me discipline to clean up and delete bad pictures. Now to delete iPhoto and reclaim 1.5G of disc space.
My goal is to use this as my everyday machine and keep my MBP hooked to the big screen on my desk. I am very optimistic that this will be a successful strategy.
I have long been a photographer. I began back in high school with my grandfather’s old Canon from the ’60’s. I shot a lot of B&W film in high school (it was super cheap, and we learned how to process it ourselves, so it was a no brainer.
I have stayed true to Canon over the years, with several film cameras, and not I am fully in the digital realm.
Last year, on a whim, I bought a Canon Powershot G12. My wife had one of the compact cameras that she loved, but I wanted a little more versatility. I talked to a couple friends who have the predecessor of the G12 (not surprisingly the G10 and G11) and they spoke highly of the platform. So I took the plunge (I used my AmEx points to buy it.)
I wasn’t sure of what I expected, but it is a viewfinder camera with the option of looking at the LCD screen to compose pictures as well. It has a reasonably fast lens (F2.8) and a pretty large optical zoom range. It is snappy and easy to use, and it actually takes gorgeous pictures.
One huge benefit with this camera is that it has one of the HS sensors that greatly improve its performance in low light, so you can get clear, blur free pictures without a flash. I can attest that this really works, and that it does lead to some gorgeous pictures.
Since I often use this camera to grab quick pictures at work of small parts, and our tools for the documentation and manual, it is good to note that it can do a pretty reasonable job of focusing in the macro realm.
Other things to note: You get a fair amount of flexibility with the system. A series of auto programs for portraits, landscapes or action pre-set conditions to make the shot easy to get, but you also have the ability to go to aperture, or time over ride and get your creative on. In these creative modes, you also have the option of saving the pictures as RAW files, that facilitates post processing quite well. The battery is pretty beefy, and I find that I don’t have to charge it too often. I haven’t felt the urge to buy a second battery to swap with. There are some optional mounts that let you add filters to the camera. Not as flexible as a DSLR, but it does give you some options. (note, I haven’t bought these yet)
While it isn’t going to replace my 5D and the L series lenses, it is a convenient knock around camera that nicely fills the void between the point and shoot variety, and the full on prosumer DSLR. I can highly recommend this for your everyday camera.
In my job, I often must write long, boring, detailed technical specifications for products under development. A full set of requirements includes the up front market justification that is needed to “sell” the proposal, an accounting of the types of customers who will buy (buyer personas, user personas) and the actual requirements in excruciating detail.
It is not hard, once I get started, but getting started is like staring at a blank page. When I am running, cycling or hiking I often have inspiration, but I never seem to remember that when it is time to put the proverbial pen to paper.
Today, I have blank page syndrome. Fortunately with the holiday next week, it is remarkably quiet in the office, and will be all next week as well, so I will be able to avoid distractions, but getting in the groove is hard.
I might need to slip into a heavy metal playlist, and just zone out to get the juices flowing.
(Well, re-reading really)
My memory is foggy, but I think this is the book that someone tossed at me in my sophomore year of high school. Written by Robert Heinlein, and originally published in 1961, it is one of the “must reads” in the SciFi genre.
The premise is fairly simple. A manned expedition to Mars meets with tragedy, and the only survivor was an infant born shortly on their arrival. Orphaned, he was raised by the Martians as a (strange) martian. When a follow-on mission arrived, they expected to not find any survivors, but instead found the child, now in his late teens (early 20’s? It is never mentioned how old he was directly), who has never had contact with his race. The story of Valentine Michael Smith, the first interplanetary bastard.
They bring him back, and a wild ride begins. He is early on involved with some intrigue and political interplay, but is soon spirited away to the compound of one of the central figures, a cantankerous old man named Jubal Harshaw.
From there, many formative episodes are lined up in short order to integrate him into humanity, but, like the boy who was raised by wolves, the integration is never quite complete. Indeed, the introduction to the concept of ‘religion’ is through a cult like church called the Fosterites (after their founder, whose name was Foster). Preaching a gospel of be happy, don’t worry, and all will be good. The services include interesting dance, and other traditions that you would not associate with “church”.
Michael takes from this a “badness”, but senses that at a deep level the concept of god is “goodness”. The martian in him leads him to declare that “Thou art God”, that is me, you, the blade of grass, my greyhounds etc. Every entity has some element of god in it, and by learning the Martian language, you can learn to control both your body as well as physical things around you.
Of course, the established religions view this with disdain, and run the “nest” (as the church is called) out on a rail. The ultimate confrontation is where the Fosterite congregations whip up a mob mentality, and Michael takes their abuse, violence and even gunfire in a calm, peaceful manner, uttering as his last breath a “Thou art God” to the grashopper by his head as he expired (discorporated in the parlance)
I thoroughly enjoyed the book when I first read it in high school, and have re-read it a few times over the years. It started me on a quest to read and enjoy SciFi, and I have relished in it. When the book was written originally, it had some 320K words. The editors in 1960 thought that was too long, ans asked for 70K words to be edited out. That was the official version until Heinlein’s widow discovered the original manuscript, and had it re-published. The extra words do much t help the story, and I am glad to have read both versions.
The other thing this story did was cause me to look at religion from the outside. I was not brought up in a family that went to church, and apart from tagging along a few times with neighbors, I had little exposure to organized religion. The theology of Michael and the Fosterites was intriguing, from an intellectual point of view. I got the impression (many years later) that the Fosterites was a swipe against L. Ron Hubbard and Scientology. Perhaps, perhaps not (what I have learned about scientology gives me the creeps.)
If you are a fan of science fiction, and haven’t read this, I highly recommend it. If you aren’t a fan, but are interested in the genre, this is actually a very readable book that will entertain on many levels.
Our family is complete with two furkids. We have adopted retired racing greyhounds, and made them completely spoiled. Greyhounds are some of the sweetest, laziest, dogs you will ever know. Both of ours are couch potatoes, and are often ridiculed for being the slowest walkers. We don’t mind.
However, there are some downsides to the Greyhounds. Their upbringing and time on the track is really hard on them. They often come off the track with worms, bad coats, and teeth that are frightful. However they clean up and adapt very well to home life.
But there are other issues. Many of them are injured at the track, and (if they are lucky) have a long recovery before their retirement. But there are other health problems that arise later in life. The incidence of osteosarcoma is frightfully high. We lost our last greyhound, Oliver, at the far too young age of 8 to bone cancer.
After we lost Oliver, we had a hole in our family that needed to be filed. Enter Tate.
Tate raced 8 times, and broke his right rear hock on his 8th and last race. Fortunately, there was a rescue group on hand, and he was taken in and nursed back to health. After that he leaped into our hearts, and has been here for almost 3 years now.
Alas, all is not perfect. About 2 years ago, he began to have seizures. Grand mal epilepsy. They seemed to be getting worse, and more frequent, so off to the neurologist. When I was commuting from Tucson to Chandler last year, the frequency increased to about 1 a week, an escalation that was frightening (often it is indicative of a brain tumor that is growing). So off for an MRI (at a price that is frightful).
Fortunately there was no sign of a tumor, and he just has epilepsy. We cope with pretty heavy anti seizure medication, and the frequency of seizures is about 75 days. A tolerable state.
Today was one of the seizures. We get less freaked out not, and he recovers remarkably quickly compared to before we began the anti seizure medication.
I posted this AM about our neighbors’ new nasty habit of having loud parties on Tuesday nights. This is most annoying for a variety of reasons, but the main negative is that I get to lose three hours of sleep.
This leads to a domino effect of me being logy and off my game all day. I hate this. Tonight, I will fall asleep early, and hopefully will not be disturbed.
I am fully acclimatized to the Phoenix (and Arizona in general) weather. Yesterday, I thought nothing about pulling on shorts and going for a 4 mile run at lunch time (95F when I left).
Additionally, yesterday, it was 100F at the high. The lowest temperature this June (from my memory), and it felt very comfortable.
Of course today it will be 108, tomorrow 113, and Friday 117 or more.
Yes, I am sick.
(Warning: I am going to use some harsh language below)
We live in a nice subdivision in Chandler, in SE Phoenix. It is a clean, well kept, and in general a very friendly neighborhood. But there always seems to be someone who has to stand out as a twat-waffle.
Our neighbors to the north are one such “family”*. They have a Son who just graduated high school, and he was a baseball player (you can see the batting cage they built in their backyard without even needing to snoop). The father is away a lot. Sales? The mother works nights and long shifts. I think you can see where this is going…
The “son” (Called Sonny-Boy) is unsupervised, and takes advantage. Last year there were some loud parties on the weekends that went until 4:00 or 5:00 AM. Really obnoxious, but I pulled the covers over my head and bore it. But now that he has graduated, Tuesday nights are the designated pool party nights. Stating about 9:00 and running until 1:00AM, they have been at it on Tuesdays for a month.
We have taken to calling the police to complain, and it appears that this group has a lookout, for they get really quiet when the police car comes by. They see and hear nothing, and leave a door hanger. 10 minutes later, the hooting and hollering are back up to amusement park rollercoaster level.
Last night we called the police again, and told them to check around the back. That did seem to bring a lasting peace but they still partied until 1:00AM or so.
There are other downsides. After one of the soirees we have to go picking up cigarette butts that the kids toss over the fence, sometimes having to fish them out of the pool. Often in the front yard, there will be beer bottles (whole or broken, and why do kids drink Bud Light? Sheesh, I had better taste at that age.) And, the inevitable barf pile will be around somewhere that our dogs get super interested in.
So, we live with it until the kid goes to college, or otherwise moves on.
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*Family might be a loose definition. They behave like it is three roommates sharing a flat. Hell, Sonny-boy had his very tramp-y girlfriend spending the night every night. It was a joy to have to dodge her as she peeled out leaving while my dogs and I walk in the AM. Truly makes you wonder..
As I have posted before, I have been grooving on watching TV series from my youth. (well, ok, not really my youth) I have come to a realization. Regardless of what show it is, it seems that in the 5th or 6th season, the shark is invariably jumped.
X-Files, in the 5th season, they kill off all the conspirators, and in the 6th season it gets mega campy. Sigh, because I still groove on Gillian Anderson.
Family Guy – I was a big early fan, but I have been dropping in on episodes, and season 7 is where it falls completely apart.
I propose a new rule. From now on, TV series should only have 5 seasons. All shows should be put out of there misery in a reasonable fashion.