NaBloPoMo

Goodbye, good boy

August 27, 2009 by kathi

My brother’s dog went to the Rainbow Bridge on Monday at age 13. Starbuck was a Brittany, Jon’s first dog, constant bird hunting companion, make that constant companion, period. And clearly his “heart” dog. Starbuck’s second favorite person was Jon’s ex-wife Steph. Steph was never an ex-anything to him. They were both with Starbuck to help him to the Bridge.

For a number of reasons, some good and some not quite so good, Dan and I hadn’t seen much of our canine nephew in recent years. We’ll miss his wild ways and enthusiastic love of life.

Hug your dogs now. They are here for such a short time.

(NaBloPoMo | August ’09: 27 of 31 | 75% Challenge: 215 of 274)

Driving while distracted

August 26, 2009 by kathi

There has been a lot of talk on the ‘net and in the news recently about a graphic car crash re-enactment video produced as a UK PSA against texting while driving. Odds are you’ve already seen the video, but here it is, just in case you haven’t. It is a re-enactment, and yes, it is quite graphic, and I hope the message is heard.

Many municipalities have proposed or enacted laws prohibiting and punishing texting and other cell phone use while driving. I don’t think this is a bad thing.

I would still like to take a moment to remind everyone that singling out specific technologies is still not the whole answer. The distracted driving incident that I still find most horrific was not caused by texting or any other high-tech distraction. It was caused by a thoughtless person’s decision that it was okay to paint her nails while driving.

I wrote about the death of motorcyclist Anita Zaffke when it happened, with tragic irony at the start of Motorcycle Awareness Month (May).

Please take a moment to read about the organization her son, Greg Zaffke, founded to raise awareness about the dangers of distracted driving, and then visit the Black Nail Brigade‘s site.

(NaBloPoMo | August ’09: 26 of 31 | 75% Challenge: 214 of 274)

It’s all blurring together

August 25, 2009 by kathi

I’m working on a couple of personal projects right now and not enjoying myself at all. The particular tasks I’m working on are way too similar to what I do for a living: image creation and modification, proofreading, and page layout. I guess it shouldn’t be surprising that my enthusiasm isn’t at a fever pitch if I’ve been doing the same things all day and then more of the same all night.

It’s self-inflicted, so I suppose I should not complain. The reason I do this type of project is that I feel it’s the only real way I can contribute to most of the organizations I’ve belonged to. There aren’t very many clubs and organizations that don’t need flyers, programs, advertisements and various other printed pieces to keep things (whatever those things may be) in motion, and for the sake of effective communication and a polished image, the job really shouldn’t be left to someone with good intent but no communication or computer skills.

On the one hand, I’m happy I can help “my” groups by producing printed pieces with all of the words spelled correctly, and at least somewhat professional-looking (and by that I mean at least they are totally devoid of Comic Sans and cheap-ass clip art). On the other hand, I am so freaking sick of InDesign and Photoshop and especially stupid Microsoft Word which everyone insists on using and whose most recent version simply served to lower my productivity to levels that cannot be detected by the unaided human eye, that I just want to walk away from volunteering for anything even remotely related to document production ever again.

I’m sure I’ll get over it in a day or two, but for now, thank you for listening to my rant.

(NaBloPoMo | August ’09: 25 of 31 | 75% Challenge: 213 of 274)

No Snow Leopard for me

August 24, 2009 by kathi

Apple’s latest and greatest incarnation of OS X, Snow Leopard, will be out this coming Friday. I usually let others cut themselves on the bleeding edge of new OS, and most application, releases. But this time, I can’t be an early adopter even if I wanted to. My G4 iBook is a PowerPC, and with Snow Leopard, Apple is dropping support for the PowerPC Macs. Snow Leopard will run only on Intel Macs.

I’m usually even more cautious about upgrades for the computers at the business. But again, since many of our computers are PowerPC Macs, we’re going to be faced with a pretty unpleasant upgrade situation once the applications no longer support the older OS X versions.

As a small business in a Mac-centric niche that has not exactly shown explosive growth in the past few years, we pretty much run our Macs till the wheels fall off. A PowerPC G4 or G5 that’s maxed out on RAM is hardly a useless relic, and in the case of the G5s, they are only three or four years old.

I know that computer years are like dog years, and I’m not one of those people that thinks a company should support old operating systems and applications forever. I just hope we have enough time to switch over gradually enough to prevent a financial crisis.

(NaBloPoMo | August ’09: 24 of 31 | 75% Challenge: 212 of 274)

Axel embraces the joy of the self-pedicure

August 23, 2009 by kathi

Last month I wrote about our experiences with Shirley Chong’s doggie nail file. Freya still doesn’t see any reason to do her own nails, but Axel is still enjoying it way more than you’d think a dog, especially a boy dog, ever could.

For anyone who came here hoping to get some tips on how to teach a dog to use the nail file, sorry. I haven’t pursued the issue with the uninterested Freya, and Axel almost didn’t need instruction or encouragement. The best suggestion I can give you is to read the original article on Shirley Chong’s site. Basically, you are shaping the behavior by rewarding the dog for pawing or scratching at the board.

Here’s the video proof of Axel’s joy of pedicure:

(NaBloPoMo | August ’09: 23 of 31 | 75% Challenge: 211 of 274)