Computers and Technology

Giving (1 of 31/36 of 274)

March 1, 2009 by kathi

I think I’ve been doing more taking than giving for the last few days, and it will continue for at least another day.

A couple of weeks ago, I decided to redeem points from the various credit card company rewards programs that I participate in. You never know when they might arbitrarily end the programs, or almost as bad, discontinue the good rewards. Instead of being in a gift-y mood and passing out several Amazon gift certificates, I gave only one Amazon certificate to my husband, and spent all other available points on a Flip Mino mini digital camcorder for myself. Mine, all mine.

I would normally choose an expensive, whiz-bang “real” camcorder. But there is something to be said for something small, fun and simple that fits in a pocket and will definitely get used, even if only for dog and cat movies. Oh, and that didn’t cost any “real” dollars. It arrived just in time for my upcoming road trip, in which I finally get to see my Axel in the show ring. I just hope I can find a spot where I can film him without him spotting me and ruining what I am told is some great ring presence in my absence.

Also, my wonderful husband bought me a new laptop to replace the almost-six-year-old one I sort of complained about back in January. It is a pretty dark red Sony VAIO VGN-CS290JER. To make it even better to my shallow self, it not only color matches to my digital camera, BlackBerry case, and Bluetooth headset (and probably other electronic stuff I am forgetting), it came with a color matched wireless mouse. Life is good. Mostly good, anyway. I’d forgotten what a task it can be to get a new computer set up just perfect. It’s going pretty well so far as this computer wasn’t loaded with as much junk and trial software as the last two that came my way.

And tomorrow I pick up the much-needed replacement to my 11-year-old minivan. Because I had a pretty small budget and apparently not much imagination, it’s another Dodge Caravan. Grand Caravan this time, as they no longer make the short wheelbase Caravan, and blue, because when you buy out of dealer stock on the second-to-last day of the special offers period, there is no chance of getting a dark red anything. At least that has been my experience.

So if giving to myself counts, I’ve got our March NaBloPoMo theme well covered. Stay tuned for some less self-indulgent posts as the month goes on, I hope.

Oh! Can’t sign off without an Axel update. There wasn’t much Axel love at the Deep South shows, although he did bring back a few reserves and placements. He got back in the groove this weekend though with two more wins and two more points. Total points now: 5 of 15, no majors yet. He is basically 1/3 of the way there! I hope I am making the right decision to give him a break after next weekend. More about that during the week to come.

Saturation point (22 of 31/22 of 247)

January 22, 2009 by kathi

That’s it. I’ve reached the saturation point. There’s only so long I can sit in front of a computer screen for any reason. Over the last couple of days, work (and work brought home) has used up almost all of that “so long.”

So this will be very short.

I enjoyed this Washington Post article about the supposed “technological dark ages” at the White House. zOMG, no Macs!!1!! Of course, still keeping up on the updates regarding the First BlackBerry. After reading conflicting reports as to whether it is in fact a real BlackBerry or some overpriced “other” smartphone, I think it is in fact an actual BlackBerry.

I’m sure I’ll be back to my normally digital self tomorrow, and I’ll be a day closer to vacation as well. That will do wonders for my outlook, I am sure!

CrackBerry! (21 of 31/21 of 274)

January 21, 2009 by kathi

I’ve had my BlackBerry for only a couple of months, and I am already finding it even more vital to staying on top of things than I did my Palm. And that’s going some. I hesitate to use the word “addiction” yet, but I can see where the nickname “CrackBerry” comes from very easily.

So of course I’ve been following the story of whether or not Barack Obama would get to keep his BlackBerry. By now, we all know that it was approved for personal use. I got a kick out of the article the New York Daily News did a few weeks ago, where they asked a number of ad agencies to put together ads in support of Obama keeping his BlackBerry.

My favorite one was #9, showing a convo between BideN09 and POTUS4EVR.

Technology kicked my butt again (19 of 31/19 of 274)

January 19, 2009 by kathi

EDIT: Apparently technology is kicking my butt in more ways than I posted about, since this post, too, was stuck in digital limbo for a bit. Look Twice, or more specifically, remote posting to Look Twice, really is fixed now!

There’s enough to do at work this week without technology glitches and failures stepping up to make life more ermmm… interesting. So, what happens? One of the routers goes belly up.

I think I might actually be lucky it didn’t catch on fire or something. When I disconnected it, it was hot. Really hot. Nothing else plugged into that power conditioner or that outlet seemed to be having any problems, and nothing else seemed to be running a temperature. So off to Office Depot I went to buy a cheap router to get us through a few more weeks. Some upgrades are planned, and since the old router would have only had to make it a few more weeks… it didn’t.

I guess I should also be glad it didn’t wait until I was on vacation to go belly-up. It would have created much greater panic if that had happened.

Office Depot had misinformation and a cheap router on sale for me. The misinformation didn’t mislead me, and the cheap router is happily taking care of things and not overheating and not almost catching on fire. And not going belly up!

Is it time yet? (17 of 31/17 of 274)

January 17, 2009 by kathi

You might remember that back in November, I lamented the fact that I didn’t plan a day to relax before leaving on vacation. I have exactly one thing planned for the day before we leave this time: drop Freya off at the boarding kennel. So I have high hopes of a relaxing evening, at least.

Unfortunately, the coming week is going to be anything but relaxing at work. We have a few large projects starting on Monday (did no one get the message that Monday is a federal holiday?) and the entire week promises to be somewhat hellish. One of the projects requires contact with one of the biggest jagoffs on the planet and said jagoff’s clueless minions. That alone would make the week unpleasant. Add that to long hours and the rather tedious nature of the projects themselves, and it will make for a very long and horrible work week.

Posting from vacation didn’t work out that well for me in November, but I still managed to post every day, so I think I’ll be fine with completing this month’s NaBloPoMo. I have more interesting topics and photos to post when I’m on vacation, but I just don’t want to spend a lot of vacation time sitting at a computer.

One thing I didn’t have on the last vacation is my BlackBerry, which was purchased shortly after we returned from that trip. I really wish there was such a thing as a WordPress client for BlackBerry, and I was very surprised to see that no such thing exists. Go ahead, iPhone users, gloat a little about your selection of apps.

Even without a WordPress client, I think having the BlackBerry will help with blogging from vacation. But I don’t think I ever finished setting up email posting to this blog, so I’ll have to make sure to do that sometime before this weekend is over.

Back to proofreading! I’m trying to make sure I’m caught up on all the proofreading for Total Rottweiler Magazine, and all the updates for the various websites I maintain, before this weekend is over.