A friend of sent me Mobile PC's list of The Top 100 Gadgets of All Time. It is a pretty interesting list. You can almost see the line of what is and what is not a gadget. The upright vacuum is not on the list, but the dustbuster is. I think this is at least worth a debate.
Just in case you were wondering, TiVo is number 10. I can be happy with that.
I think the web site Ban Comic Sans is pretty funny. I agree with the idea that some fonts should just be retied. They have been used so much they no longer mean anything. I know this comes from a man whose favorite font is Times New Roman. Maybe someone needs to start a list of which fonts are in and which fonts are out.
I am going to run a bunch of 100 list on my blogs soon. I thought I would start with the classic. About 15 years ago Jeremy asked all of his friends to come up with a list of their "100 Favorite Things In the Universe." He did a whole zine about it.
I have been doing one from time to time since then. I have been sitting on this one since March 2004. I think it is still try for me now. Part of the fun is to see how they change over time. Here is an older list.
words, books, my iBook, movies, baseball, MP3s, my bed, dreams, music, blank pages, notebooks, photos, ice cream, movie theaters, comic strips, zines, museums, cartoons, pens, landscapes, beer, city streets, postcards, good shoes, comic books, walking, writing, conversations, coffee houses, blogging, digital photography, travel, sleeping, taking pictures from tall buildings, parties, living alone, naps, driving, touch, hanging out, NaNoWriMo, Prague, Philadelphia, Portland, South Bay Weblogers, Live Journal, Sad Salvation, NPR, apples, pineapples, baseball stadiums, potatoes, public squares, corn on the cob, coffee, water, funny stories, red wine, blogs, my apartment, clean socks, lazy Saturday afternoon, cities, airports, sculptures, Blogger, laughter, automatic doors, history, gadgets, pictograms, short stories, firm handshakes, street signs, conversations about religions, family, friends, story tellers, my parents, memories, cable television, seeing people's tattoos for the first time, well used language, jokes, flirting, conversations with smart people, turntables, e-mail, self portraits, cheap art, cameras, coffee, hotels, novels, Vinyl LPs, wireless internet access, pictograms, going places for the first time, public art, 100 favorite things lists,
Taking a step back it seems like Ward Churchill and Lawrence H. Summers are going through the same thing. They are both being roasted over things they have said. If you are an educator should you be able to say something that is unpopular. Can you take unpopular stance.
The interesting thing to me is how they are each being roasted from a different direction. Since Churchill's comments are about September 11, he is getting it from the right. Since Summer's comments are about women and engineering he is getting it from the educational establishment. Should they have the freedom to state these beliefs without losing their jobs.
You can try to make a case that the statements are really different from each other because who they were said about, but I think that misses the point. The difference between these two that is important to me is that Summer is part of the administration at his school. That might hold him to a different standard then a professor.
I write much of Sad Salvation in coffee shops. Between the times I am meeting with friends and the times I am going on my own, I am usually at coffee shops three or four times a week. Everyone close to me knows how often I hang out at coffee shops.
One of my co-workers asked me why do I do this? What is so special about coffee houses? When he sees people reading or writing in a coffee house he always things there is something snobbish about it. I like coffee houses because I can away from all of the other distractions in my apartment. At the coffee shop there is no pile of dishes needing to be cleaned. I do not think about my stack of unwatched DVDs. At the coffee house I do not get half way through writing something and get pulled away.
The coffee house also has a different set of stimulus. I see things there that I would not see at home. I over hear bits of conversation and that gives me ideas. I cannot control what is going on around me and that is a good thing. At times I am forced to focus so I am not spending all my time looking at someone.
Bad part is now I cannot seem to write at all in my apartment. I have to be someplace else to get anything done. Now I go to the coffee house becuase it is an easy place to get writing done.
I have to agree. MLB is saying he has no credibility. If he truly lied it is the worst of slander and the "victims" should sue. If they don't sue, it is as good as an admission, since truth is the only defense (since he didn't say, "in my opinion", he stated it as fact.)
I totally agree with my sister. This is the situation where not defending yourself it admitting Canseco is telling the truth. Since he is printing it in a book it is hard to just laugh him off. I think if it was just an interview it would be a whole different story.
I watched the Jose Canseco on 60 Minutes on February 13. He really lacks something in the credibility department. He has been broke and has had problems with the law. People can say Canseco will write anything to make money. Canseco is not a guy who has ever been popular in the clubhouse. To me that just means that he has no reason to keep the Code of the Clubhouse. Canseco can say things other guys cannot because he has nothing to protect.
According to Michael Wilbon of ESPN's Pardon the Interruption. He Claimed that players will not sue because they do not want to be deposed. They would have to open their lives up to the court if they did sue. It is easy for them to just deny.
Reading through the lines it means that even if you did not do it with Canseco, you might have done it sometime. My guess is that most sports writers are willing not to investigate these guys on Canseco's word. Lots of sportswriters what to believe that it is not true and that is going to guide how they go after this case. I guess they are all wondering to see if the storm will hit or not.
I am surprised that no one has come up with the Ken Caminiti defense yet. If I was a player like Giambi I would say that there was so much juice in baseball I had to take them. To not take them in a situation where they are not tested for would be to put your career at risk. I would blame the league for not taking care of the players.
No matter what, we are about to go into the second year of the Steroid doubt era in baseball. I think there will be more problems ahead for the national pastime. Maybe someone will get the home run crown this year with 36 home runs.
Once again I stand here and bare witness to my love life, such as it is. My love life does not change all that much, but my understanding of my love life is ever changing. My life moves on even if I have no love to share it with.
In the past year nothing happened. I really mean that nothing happened. Not only did I not have any relationships, I did not have any crushes or any real interest in any women. It was a total lack of action. I did not extend myself to a woman and no woman extended herself to me.
I have not been putting myself in places where I would meet women. I have no confidence in my ability to gauge a woman's interest in me. This makes looking for a relationship in public settings very hard. I often come off as being desperate just because I am showing interest. I end up frustrated by my inability to put my efforts to good use. I feel like I have spent my time chasing the wrong things.
I only did one activity this year with an eye on meeting single women. I met a few single women, but none of them seemed interested in a relationship. I should say that none of them seemed interested in me. Once I got there I felt that I was really pushing when I tried to flirt with these women. I felt if I treated the get-togethers as singles events, I was violating the spirit of the activity.
I currently have a policy for women. If they come to me, Fine. If they don't come to me, Fine. I am not going out of my way to try to meet them. Over the last few years all of my efforts to try to meet women have been fruitless. The only thing that has worked is having a friend try to set me up. It seems like none of my other friends are willing or able to do that for me.
I know that lots of people say that my current policy just guarantees that I will not meet anyone. They will tell me that the only way to meet new people is to try to meet new people. If I really want to meet someone I have to make real effort.
These people might be right. I want to just focus on the rest of my life. If an opportunity presents itself that is great. I just do not want to ruin myself by focusing on something I have so little control over. I know from my last relationship that I am not looking for something to cling to. I am looking for the person to fall in love with. To be honest I think I need to work on myself before I am ready to be in love with someone else.
A friend has offered to do a love spell for me. She told me that everyone she has ever done a love spell for has found someone as a result of a spell. It might not be the first spell she casts, but it happens eventually. She says that some of these people have been very hard to match but the spell still worked.
I am hesitant to take her up on this. She warned me that the spell might work, but it tends to disrupt people's lives. She refers to the spelling ripping people away from their lives to start this relationship. I am not hesitant because I think the spell will not work. I am hesitant because I think it might. I am still Catholic enough to think I should not mess with those forces. How ethical would it be to do these things? Would it have any long term effect on the relationship?
My long term forecast is that next year I will still be on my own. I do not see any relationships on the horizon. I can envision all of 2005 being like 2004. I am fine with that. While I would like to share some of my life with someone, but am not sure I can do it on any terms but my own for right now. I know that does not lead to a healthy relationship. It looks like I can only see more of the same from here.
I tested the battery on my iPod mini today. I have had it about 11 months and started to worry about the battery life. The battery indicator seemed to be getting low quicker then before. I wanted to do a real test to see if I had a real issue or if it was my perception. According to the a
Here were the steps I took:
-Yesterday I ran my iPod until the battery totally ran down. I got the no battery icon on the unit.
-This morning I charged the iPod for a full 4 hours. I waited for the charge indicator to stop.
-Loaded a 12 hour playlist onto my mini.
-Made sure the backlight, shuffle and EQ were set to off.
-Started to play my test play list.
-Set the button lock on the iPod to make sure I was not skipping any songs.
-Played the playlist until my iPod was out of battery again.
-Made a smart playlist to see how many songs were played from the test playlist.
This is the right test to run to figure out your battery life. It is really hard to calculate how much life you are getting out of it when you keep stopping and starting the player. Most of the time people complain about how long it last, they do not take this into account. This is why the average user thinks they are not getting as much battery life as they should.
According to the Apple website the battery life for an iPod mini is 8 hours. In my test I was able to play my iPod mini for 7:45 minutes. I am pleased with the life I am getting out of the battery one year after buying it.
