Haven't posted in awhile, sorry. Thing have been great, a lot's happened. Amanda got an amazing job at TripAdvisor.com in the PR department as the lead of their social media department. So make sure you like them on facebook and follow them on twitter! She also got into Boston College's MBA program!! She's supper excited and starts in January.
I've been busy with work, all of our Benihana systems now sell products. We also have custom software running marketing campaigns for Toyota at the Meadowlands Stadium, Duracell in NY, and Charmin in NY. They were all fun to work on and I'm looking forward to more big projects. Also you can't really beat working from home!
Other then that...I shaved courtesy of the straight razor Chan got me as a wedding gift... (Not sure why the beginning screwed up, something wrong with the uploader)
It's with much regret and sadness I need to talk about this on my blog, but a rider of the exact same ride I was on has passed away during the trip. Paige Hicks.
After all these years, I'm am surprised at how much the new's has had an effect on me. I think it's because it brought back so many fond memories and thoughts of all the riders and friends on my trip. After ridding cross country and everything you go through, you become closer then you can really imagine. I can't think of losing one of those people, even after all this time. I certainly can't imagine losing one of them during a trip. It's going to be a hard thing to deal with for everyone in the Bike & Build community and my thoughts and prayers are with everyone including Paige's family and the other riders on P2S 2010. I also wanted to thank Bike & Build and the leadership for being so quick, transparent, open and thoughtful with their responses.
I know I haven't posted in a long time, and for those few loyal readers who actually check my blog, thanks Dad, I apologize.
I've been swamped with wedding planning, but so far so good. Every thing's gone relatively smoothly so far, knock on wood.
Some of you might not know but Amanda and I are leaving this earthquake infested state and moving back east before the wedding. We have thought about it a lot and we decided it would be too hard and too expensive to move back after we are married. We both grew up on the east coast and to my sister's horror we miss the weather in New England. We will also be much closer to both our families and a lot of old friends.For now we are going to stay with our friend Stephanie in Needham, MA until she can't stand us and we can find a place of our own. Amanda's leaving her job in PR tomorrow and will be spending the next 30 days finishing up any details for the wedding and the move. I am lucky enough to have a company that is going to continue to let me work for them from Boston. It's going to be great for me as I can keep a steady income and healthcare during a huge transition. Hopefully it will also be good for the company to have someone representing and drumming up business for them on the East coast. I'll try to keep you posted and maybe even do a daily blog for the short cross country road trip home.
Until then here is something that will completely blow your minds:
FYI: Fake Steve Jobs blog is having server issues so if you get an error just refresh and it should load...
If you haven't read the comments on my last post please do, you can click HERE to read them. Chan and I have been having a friendly discussion about the topic.
Fake Steve Jobs is at it again. And in my rebuttal to Chan, one point I made was, they HAVE to buff up their network if they want to compete in the next 10 years. The data network problems they are having now are really just starting. Here is a great quote from Fake "Steve Job's" post HERE.
"But AT&T has a much bigger problem on its hands. The problem is that the wireless data explosion is just beginning. This 3% of AT&T users who are supposedly accounting for 40% of bandwidth use? Pretty soon that 3% is going to become 30%."
And I love how he even begins to criticizes how they are spending their money, because they do have more money to spend on their network with out increasing fees.
"Go look at their financial statements (pdf) and open up the Financial Operations and Statistics Summary and look at capital expenditures over the past eight quarters. I’m no math whiz, but it looks like capex [Capital expenditures are expenditures creating future benefits.] has gone down by about 30% over the time period. Scroll down a bit to the Wireless section and check out data revenues — they’re up 80% over the same period." (Capex definition via Wikipedia)
I also would be up for something like what my friend Mark said. Where I pay $30 for unlimited but if Chan doesn't want unlimited he can pay $10 for a certain amount. But in any situation the network has to work reliably for EVERYONE.
UPDATE: Another funny fake conversation with "Steve Jobs" and "Randall Stephenson" read it HERE. Share/Send
I've posted about the issues with the iPhone and AT&T before, and if you've been following it at all. An AT&T executive (Ralph de la Vega) recently said this:
“We’re going to try to focus on making sure we give incentives to those small percentages to either reduce or modify their usage so they don’t crowd out the other customers in those same cell sites,” said de la Vega according to a transcript of the conference. “And you’ll see us address that more in detail.” “What’s driving usage on the network and driving these high usage situations are things like video, or audio that keeps playing around the clock,” he said, according to the transcript provided by AT&T. “And so we’ve got to get to those customers and have them recognize that they need to change their pattern, or there will be other things that they are going to have to do to reduce their usage.”
He's also said this: "3 percent of AT&T users generate 40 percent of the traffic on the network"
This pissed off me and almost every other iPhone user. I'm paying (my work is now, yay!) AT&T $100 a month for service that sucks. Part of that is $30 for UNLIMITED data usage. I have the right to stream video all day everyday 24/7 365 as long as I'm paying $30. So NO I'm not going to go along with any "incentives" and I'm definitely not going to "curb my data usage." AT&T needs to keep expanding their network until it can handle all the traffic. Once they clear up THEIR problems, MORE people will get iPhones and pay $100 a month for them. Considering the #1 reason people aren't getting iPhones is because of the network, AT&T should see this a a priority.
Anyway, there is this blogger who pretends he's Steve Jobs. He blogs as if he IS Steve himself. He has a great sense of humor and really captures Steve's image or at least the image I imagine him to be. He recently wrote a long (but worth reading) post about a "conversation" he had with an AT&T's Randall Stephenson about the recent quote by Ralph de la Vega. It's very, very funny and even though it's meant to be humorous "Steve Jobs" makes some really good points.
Click HERE to read it, and leave me comments as to what you think.
I hope this has nothing to do with the LHC! I've E-mailed my contacts there, I'll let you know if they respond with a statement.... Click HERE to see a summary of the crazy lights over Norway. I hope it's a giant hoax, cause if it isn't then it's super nutty!
UPDATE: Few! Looks like it was just a rouge Russian rocket that went out of control. They are of course denying it. Click HERE to read an article on what happened.
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He does make a good point, and if he hadn't already, I would have written the same post, hahaha. In all my posts I was also joking...mostly....but now I'm also not sure.... Again, sorry Chan, haha Click HERE to read the Gizmodo article.
Who want's to make bets that it breaks again before they do some real tests? Anyone? I'll take that bet, 2012 is closer and closer.... Take a look HERE at all the Big Pictures of the collider.
I used to LOVE Choose Your Own Adventure or CYOA novels as a kid! I would read them over and over again, always making different choices to keep things interesting. I saw this article about CYOA books and it brought wonderful memories flooding back. Click HERE to read it. It reminded me of how much I loved those books, I wonder if they are popular with kids today? Any mom's out there have kids that still read these?
As the article mentions, it seems during their time they were looked down upon as not acceptable literature. I disagreed then and disagree now. They did everything a parent would want. The kid was kept busy for hours, it activated their imaginations, and lastly they were reading! Good literature or not, I think I might go pick one up and read it for old time's sake.
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PC World's Mark Sullivan wrote an article HERE and it's a little scary. Basically, it seem's like he is saying because iPhone users use most of the networks data, that AT&T might consider placing data caps on iPhone users. I quote AT&T Wireless CEO Ralph de la Vega, "We have to manage the network to make sure that the few cannot crowd out the many." Sounds like that means we'll have to manage the iPhone users so our other customers have bandwidth left.
AT&T I assume you realized that when YOU decided to sell the iPhone exclusively, read I have no other option, you also knew iPhones would use a lot of data. Hence the MANDATORY $30 a month UNLIMITED data plan that you force upon every iPhone user. The only phone on your network, until recently, that has such a mandatory requirement. And I suspect the recent change is to get everyone to help pay for your problem.
So NO don't even think about limiting my $30 a month UNLIMITED data. I'd love to see the outrage if they even try it. Hopefully the PR department steps in before that can happen...
UPDATE: A great follow up article HERE from Gizmodo.com about the FCC and wireless carriers.
During my trip back east, I noticed what everyone has been complaining about with AT&T. My iPhone was basically useless during the Boston game in Fenway. Also once I was in NY, my data service went to crap. I could barely use google maps on my phone while walking around little Italy at 10 pm. I ended up meeting some friends and they were also complaining about the iPhones. They didn't even own one but they knew their service now sucks because OF all the iPhones. So of course I documented the whole thing and when I got home to CA I called up AT&T told them they didn't hold up their end of the contract and got $7 back for lack of data during my trip. I was amazed at how quickly they refunded the money. Seems like a lot of people are asking for money back. This is one situation where I hope the FFC or Attorney Generals from a few states get involved with a class action suit.
So look how nuts this recent AT&T fix is for their junk network. You pay AT&T an EXTRA $20 a month to have a box in the house that boosts your cell reception and sends it through your internet connection that you're all ready paying for! WHAT!? Someone please sue them!
THIS is the kind of stuff that really annoys me, especially when I'm paying $80 a month for a iPhone. I understand that creating a cell network that blankets the entire US is expensive, but I don't like that there is an extra $16 million a year left over to lobby my government so I keep paying more!
"Later this month, the Federal Communications Commission plans to begin a broad inquiry into competition in the wireless industry. It will also review rules designed to prevent carriers from tacking junk fees onto phone bills."-WSJ
Yes, good, great! I also don't like the fact that even when paying $60 a month for a voice plan you can get charged $0.20 per text message unless you get a $15 a month text plan. When in fact, a text message costs the carriers next to nothing to transmit. It goes over the same system that the higher bandwidth voice data travels!
"As part of its review, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski reordered the agency to launch an inquiry into whether Apple Inc. nixed Google Inc.'s voice software from its iPhone App Store because it might compete with AT&T's services."-WSJ
And really good to this! I love Apple, but they shouldn't be allowing AT&T to dictate what apps go on the phone. An iPhone owner HAS to pay the high iPhone rate, so who cares how they use up THEIR minutes. Cell phones should follow in the footsteps of computers. You can get service (read internet) from whom ever you want. You're allowed to run ANY program or application you want on your computer. ie. You buy your phone from any manufacturer and can use it with any service provider.
And don't get me started on the crappy service AT&T members are getting for what they pay. If AT&T can't handle all the iPhones and all the data they in turn use, then they should be giving refunds/discounts until they can! That's the number one reason Apple needs to get out of the AT&T iPhone deal. I love the iPhone but AT&T sucks, so I should be able to take my iPhone to Verizon or Sprint, peace AT&T! Here is another blogger who RANTS about similar issues.
Hopefully the FCC is going to get a little more involved with open access in regards to the internet and cell phones. I don't feel like they have been very on top of everything in the last 8 years. I guess we'll have to wait and see what unfolds...
So I wanna do a poll, how much is this umbrella really helping?
Rescuers try to pull a stranded car out of floodwater in Wenzhou, Zhejiang province, China on August 9, 2009. (REUTERS/China Daily)
For the full story in pictures, check out this great photo blog called The Big Picture. The author takes some amazing images from events around the world and posts them in high-res glory for all to see. Make sure you click on the titles to see all of the pictures in a category.
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A few weeks ago I was reading an article in Wired Magazine, which by the way is great journalism if your looking for a well written tech magazine, and I came across an article (Click HERE to read it) on the Nike+. If you aren't up for a good read or don't have time, HERE is Apple's page on it.
Basically it's a little accelerometer that goes in your Nike shoe and it communicates with your iPod or in my case my iPhone. I don't have Nike shoes so I just bought a little pouch that holds it on your shoe laces. After you calibrate it, it tracks how far and fast you're running. Once back to your computer, you sync it with Nike's running website. HERE is my Nike+ Site. You can see all the runs and run/walks I've done and even see the speed/distance graph by clicking any of the distances in the list. On the right side I've also added a widget on my blog that will show my last run.
As the article states, Nike really hit the nail on the head with this because it works with Apple's music players, which has already basically saturated the market, and it shows and shares your running data. You upload it, see it, track it and you can even challenge your self and friends. On top of that you can set personal goals, ie. I want to run 4 times this week.
The challenges and goals are what really help motivate me to run. I set a goal and if know I have 2 weeks to run 6 times, I know I should get on it. And once I get a few more friends on Nike+ it will be really fun trying to beat them.
Here is a screen shot of todays run, and yes I did get motivated to run on a Friday (Click HERE for the interactive one):
You can see circles on the graph and if you put your mouse over them on THIS page you can see the stats. Those are when I pushed a button on my phone. Then in my headphones I hear my current distance, time, and speed per mile. It also marks it on the graph. I use this before I go up hills or change terrain so I can track why my speed changed. As you can see at the end I sprinted and it's reflected in the graph.
It even track all your runs over time:
It would be great if they also did this for biking, and maybe even incorporated GPS into it because the iPhone now has GPS. But as the article says, simple seems to be working well. They have had users log over 151,772,660 miles when I wrote this.
This is the exact reason why everyone hates, dislikes, and doesn't trust companies anymore. It's nickel and dime time folks. They think it's great that they can force us to listen to 15 seconds of information on how to leave a voicemail! Answering Machines were invented in 1935, we get it by now. Wait for the beep, then talk. When done hang up.
I'm one of the lucky ones with an iPhone. As you see in the article, Apple FORCED AT&T to take all that junk out for iPhones. You call me, hear my message and then a beep. Simple as that! But it's pretty nuts that it had to take a company like Apple to force AT&T to do that.
Anyway, help out by leaving comments and E-mails to the companies. The bottom of the New York Times article has links for each contact.
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So I got the new iPhone 3Gs and I love it. It's faster, has faster internet, and has GPS. As you probably haven't noticed, the map at the top of my blog is now much more accurate, within hundreds of feet. As well it now has my altitude. Just though I would mention that. I'll post some good pictures after 4th of July to show off the new camera too.
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My roommates and I recently started fishing. I'm talking all out, bought all the gear, and we paddle around and try to catch bass with fake bait. Here is a picture of our usual nerdy getup, it also happens to be the first Bass I caught.
It ends up that it IS pretty hard to catch fish. There is a massive amount of skill involved, despite what many think. Eventually, Eli, after massive amounts of online research and scanning Google Earth found a great lake up in the hills. He test fished it and caught tons of bass.
One weekend we packed up our stuff and off we went off to the lake. It was perfect fishing weather, cloudy. I actually really enjoyed it because it was a beautiful site seeing the clouds over the lake and hills.
That's how the day started, we all caught a fish pretty early on and were excited to work our way around the lake fishing the entire shore. About half way around the lake I cast off a large rock out into the deeper water. I'm reeling in my bait like a pro, then BAM something hits it hard. I wait a sliiiiggght second then... SET THE HOOK! I've got a fighter on the line. I reel it in, and as I'm about to grab it's lower lip to take the hook off, it struggles and falls to the ground. I'm mostly worried about getting it back into the water so I reach down to grab it, and it struggles again, stabbing my finger with it's spiny dorsal fin. Eventually, I get it back in and it swims off.
Derrick with the largest fish of the day, and a close up of the part of the fish that stabbed me.
Because I am always a jokester, I joke with Eli and Derrick about being stung by the Bass quill. And like clock work they start making fun of me for complaining about a little cut on my finger. We fish on though the day, catching lots of fish and having fun.
Here is what happened in the aftermath of that day, which by the way was April 29th. My finger kinda slowly healed, but continued to bother me to some extent. It also was forming a sort of blister/bump. So today I decided I better get to the bottom of this. I busted out my trusty pocket knife and started digging around in my finger. Guess what eventually shot right out? A bass "quill"!! And yes I took pictures, and I'm saving it to show my roommates after all the crap they gave me. Here is the pictures showing you the events:
The wound site after almost a month of healing, I knew something was up!
If anyone is looking for a new or used car, I recommend the Honda Fit. I know I've already talked about this here, but I wanted to go over it again because of the recent events with the auto industry.
Ever since I purchased my iPhone I've been using a great free app called Gas Chubby It keeps detailed track of many different stats, but most importantly my gas millage. I love stats, especially when they are from something I do everyday, like drive my car.
Since Nov 26, 2008 I've been keeping very close track of my gas and service costs with this application. The coolest feature I found was the graphs. Most of you may or may not know that the way you drive can drastically effect your gas millage. And you can clearly see by the MPG graph that it's true. The dip in the MPG was from a tank of gas in which I drove on the highway going 80 not 70 and thats the only change I made in my driving. I am pretty sure that if I drive conservatively enough I can get my MPG up to 40! I'll let you know if I hit it.
It's interesting to see how the price of gas in San Diego has crept up slowly but steadily after the recent decline. But we are still better off then drivers in Europe who pay around $8.50 a gallon!
I feel like all of this reinforces what has happened recently to the US auto industry. They missed the bandwagon on small fuel efficient cars like the Honda Fit. When such a model was available from a US manufacturer the public usually considered them low quality. And I must admit, when I was researching cars I test drove all the subcompact models, including US companies. So why did I go with the Honda? The number one reason was I knew it would last. I also felt like it was the only one solidly built, had the most features and power, on top of having great gas millage.
Note: Above you can see a dip in the graph which is from a partial tank fill up which was only $7
So I found this very funny, and very true list about things East Coasters observe when coming to San Diego. Click HERE to read it. They almost ALL fit my roomies and I to a T, and I fully agree with #9 even though I'm a Red Sox fan. Because I became a fan when I was a little kid and went to a game with my Uncle and Father at Fenway, not in 2004.
It got me thinking of writing a list of things I miss about the East Coast living here (in no particular order):
1. Weather Sorry, I know you East Coasters are going to want to kill me for saying that. Rain mostly, big huge summer thunderstorms. I miss the smell, before and after, of a summer storm. I've been here 3 years and can count on one hand how many times it's rained. Which reminds me, the definition of rain hear is VERY different. They call fog rain out here. I also miss the other seasons, Spring, Fall, and Winter. No waking up to the beautiful quiet of a fresh snowfall, no jumping in leaves.
2. Driving Skills I miss being around people who know how to drive. I'm talking simple normal things, like how to use a turn signal. And when someone is getting on the highway you move over for them. Just normal things. I actually miss Jersey and Masshole drivers. At least they know HOW to drive, they are just very aggressive. It's like everyone out here is so laid back about driving.
3. Food Now, obviously Dunkin Donuts is the first to come to mind. I just really, really miss the coffee, not to mention doughnuts. There is good news though, I think they are coming in the CA market soon! Also good pizza, Chinese Food, and Grinders. When I first got here, some friends said they were going to Subway, and asked if I wanted anything. I replied with "Sure, a Turkey Grinder" They looked at me like I was nuts and told me "Sorry, they don't have grinders at Subway out here." Hahah
4. Hard Core People (Please see #4 and #2 on the above LIST.) This is a tough one to explain, and I'm not trying to offend anyone. Lets just say you take a guy and girl from NY or Boston and put them up against a guy and girl from San Diego, San Diego wouldn't win. When you grow up in the East Coast you just have an edge to you that can't be explained. Everything is right up front and out there. Thats one reason I would never raise kids out here.
Thats all I have for now, and again I'm not trying to offend anyone. I love living here, and I'm obviously biased because I grew up in CT.
I can tell you one thing, I've never had so many friends come visit me, and that says a lot!
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I know I haven't updated, but I was inspired by my cousin Abby who was able to post even amidst her own epidemic.
The wedding planning is going great, we are are actually ahead of schedule already having the Church and reception hall booked. We are very excited and set the date to JUNE 12, 2010. The biggest problem we are having is trying to cut down the guest list. It's a horrible predicament because you want to invite EVERYONE, all friends and family, but it's just not financially possible. So we continue to widdle down the list. It might end up being a family only event, haha, sorry friends. We DID finish our wedding website, it's a great way for guests to keep up on information for the wedding. We looked at a few sites that offer "free" wedding website hosting. We settled on WeddingWire.com and if you uncheck a lot of those "Send me E-mails" boxes it's pretty vendor junk mail free. Anyway here is the site:
Also two things in the funny news department, I was on TV this morning on the local news channel that did a story about WD-40, they basically just used me for shots spraying WD-40 on stuff, haha. I'll try to get the video and embed it in this post.
Lastly, just because it's a theme on my blog here is a video John Stewart did about the LHC, haha:
I haven't updated in awhile but I will soon. Until then please read Amanda's update on what we have been up to recently. Click HERE to read her post.
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So as some of you may have heard I proposed to Amanda on Friday. And she said YES! Phew!
First, I'll tell you the background info. There is this spot on Coronado, which is basically a peninsula that is across from the city of San Diego, the other side of the bay. One day, awhile back, Amanda and I found this tiny private beach the faces the city. It has an amazing view day and night. We started going there a lot, just to relax and hang out. It came to be called "Our Spot."
Second piece of background info is a bottle of almond champagne. We went wine tasting a little over a year ago and had purchased this "really good" ($10) bottle of it. We were planning on saving it for a special occasion. Occasions came and went and we never though it was worthy enough. Since I had bought it I told Amanda, despite her many requests to drink it, I'd let her know when we could drink it.
Lastly, is the way I "asked Amanda out." One day we were cuddling at a park. Not saying a word I switched her Claddagh Ring around on her finger which symbolizes that she is seeing someone. She was amazed and impressed that I knew what that meant and thats how the whole thing started.
Now the proposal story: So it was Friday and I snuck into her apartment to switch the bottle of champagne out with a new one so she or her roommate wouldn't notice it was gone. I went off to work. Talk about a long day. I left work early and went to her office to pick her up and head to Coronado to hang out at our spot and go to a dinner reservation we had.
One thing I've already learned about Amanda is that when she is hungry, she is hungry, and needs to eat. So when I told her we're going to our spot before dinner she begged me that we eat first. I told her no it will be too dark to go after dinner. Then when I grabbed the beach blankets out of the trunk she protested "How long are we going to be there!?" I told her not long, lets just go relax for a little.
As we walked there she also wondered what the heck was in my very full backpack. I answered with a quick quiet reply "My sweatshirt." For some reason this satisfied her curiosity. We got to the beach spread out and relaxed. About 1 min later (I got impatient) I got the ring out of my backpack, opened it and asked if she would marry me. To which she replied "Seriously? Are you kidding? Really Toddy?..." After a few moments of this I asked her, just to make sure, "So yes or no?" luckily she finally said "Yes, or course!" I busted out the long awaited almond champagne and the celebration began!
Click HERE to see a photo album of our whole engagement weekend!
First, I'll get the nerdiness out of the way. Apple finally released it's plans for the iPhones new features for software version 3.0. You can read about all the new changes HERE. It's not coming out till this summer, so it's pretty annoying to know about all the new cools stuff but have to wait to use it. Oh well!
Second, I'm 27 now and was slowly but surely gaining a little extra weight. Getting older sucks! So Amanda and I both decided to make it a goal to lose weight and change our lifestyles to be healthier. We are going to FL next month for Easter and we figured that's a great target date for weight reduction. Obviously weight is a huge issue in this country when it's such a simple solution. Eat less calories then you burn in a day and you lose weight. But when it comes down to it, it's very hard to keep track of all those calories. Since both of us have iPhones we decided to take a modern day approch to weight loss. We both dowloaded an amazing app called Lose it!. It' has a great interface to track excercise and food thoughout your day. You put in a target weight and date and it determines how many calories you should be eatting a day. With the decreased calories and the running I try to do, I lost weight. I weighed about 220 during the new year and I'm already down to 199.6 lbs as of last night. So it works! And the great thing is I eat anything I want, chocolate, fries, burgers, even ice cream. I just eat less of it.
Another thing that's helped is that we found an anti diet book called The 9-Inch "Diet". It's a great book about how diets don't ever work, and you just need to adjust the amount of food you eat. It really brings to light some of the horrific portion size changes that have happened in this country. If you don't have 9-inch plates at home for dinner, go out and get some! If you are thinking about dieting or losing weight, it's the first book I would read. It's easy to read and even written with a great sense of humor.
Lastly, I'm really excited about all the trips we have coming up. This weekend I'm going to Disneyland with Amanda. We are still using benefits of the time share presentation that we suffered through. So we are using our 2 free passes to Disney and 1 night in a local hotel on Sunday. Then in April it's off to FL with the family and then in May we have our Big Bear trip!
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As you may have noticed I've made a few more changes to my blog. And hopefully soon, when I have the time and motivation I might re build it from the ground up using a free open source process like WordPress. Until then, you get whats here. The best addition I think I've made is the small share button on the bottom of each post. I'm sure you've seen this or something similar before. It's now on almost every site. It's just an easy way to share a posts you like in many different ways. I use it all the time on other sites to post stuff to Facebook. So feel free to try it and share my amazing posts with your friends, haha.
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So I'm sure some of you may have heard the legend that a watch maker inscribed something on Lincoln's watch when the civil war started. I guess the watch broke, and Lincoln sent it out to be fixed. The watch maker upon hearing news of an attack decided to write something about it INSIDE Lincoln's watch for posterity. Anyway, it's been a rumor for a long time now. A distant relative of the watch maker recently claimed the story was true and that it had been passed down in his family. To prove it, they finally opened the watch and there WAS something inscribed.
The engraving, by watchmaker Jonathan Dillon, is dated April 13, 1861, and reads in part: "Fort Sumpter was attacked by the rebels" and "thank God we have a government." Source (Quote and Photo): Reuters
Pretty amazing huh!? I listened to the story on the radio and it was pretty cool to hear them open it and read what was written. What a sneaky little watch maker! You can read the whole article HERE. Share/Send
Rather then beat a dead horse for any overlap readers Amanda and I have. I'll just use this post to give Amanda's blog a shot out. Plus maybe the added pressure will make her update it more ;-)
So click HERE to see and bookmark her blog and HERE for a direct link to the post about this weekends desert trip, which was fun and amazing!
If you want to see pictures of the trip they are posted HERE on facebook and I think anyone can see them from that link. Join facebook if you want to comment on them ;-)
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You might have noticed, or more likely you haven't but I've changed a few things on my blog:
• I've added a search bar on the top right so if your looking for a certain post or key words feel free to use it, it works surprisingly well. Probably cause Google owns blogger, haha
• Right below that I've added a badge that shows you what trips I'm planning on taking and when.
• I've made my location map as small as possible because I thought it was just too intrusive on the page. I think it still is but thats as small as I can make it.
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So two days ago we, the earth, had a pretty close call. A comet (2009 DD45) came within 37,282 miles of the earth. Seems pretty far right? Well the moon is 2,388,550 miles from the earth, so it's quite a bit closer then our own moon. In some parts of the world it could be seen through clouds it was so bright. Being only about 150 feet across it wouldn't have destroyed the earth but it would have caused quite a bit of trouble for the area it hit. And we would only have about 24 hours to evacuate. Here is a video of it, it's best if you just wait till it loads then click and drag through it to see it in fast motion:
It would have looked something like this 1972 comet which burned up in the atmosphere: Anyway, I bring this up because as you know. The scientists of the world decided to test theLHC based on the chances of an astroid hitting and destroying us. HERE is the convo I had with my friend Chan about it. As I read about this near miss, I found the original article and it talks about how we really only know and have mapped about 5% of what could technically destroy us in the near future. Please read the article HERE.
My point? Well maybe the scientists are right, we should test the LHC. Looks like our chances aren't good either way, haha.
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I'm sure my friend Chan is getting annoyed at my posts playing on unlikelihoods and peoples emotions, but here is another discovery I'm not liking.
Awhile back I posted a conversation between Chan and I about how they decided if it's safe to turn on and test the LHC. You can read the conversation and post HERE. Basically, scientists of the world decided to turn on the LHC if the chances of the LHC destroying us was LESS then the chances of a comet hitting us and destroying us.
Read HERE. Did they take these 3,000 puppies into account when they made that decision? So I guess there are about 3,000 "invisible" comets zinging around and we, humans, can only, or have only seen 25 of them. So my question is when they figured out the probability of one hitting us were they 25 "invisible" ones included in the equation or 3,000?
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See HERE the LHC turn on is postponed AGAIN. I'm just wondering are we going to keep seeing these articles until 2012? Hmmmmmm.....
Okay, so I've been hearing a lot about Chickenpox. Now let me pre notify you that I didn't do any research on the subject, just writing based on what I've learned in life and school. So if I'm way off base, feel free to comment. Two things I know, having them as a kid wasn't so bad (for me), having them as an adult is horrible (I don't really know).
I don't think we should be vaccinating people for Chickenpox. Here is why. As a kid you get chickenpox and it's kind of a rite of passage. Once you have it, you have somehow, in your own head become super human, you now can never get it again! If your around someone who has it you confidently would say, "I can't get it, I'm immune!" knowing all the power but not knowing why this happens. You do get some very itchy bumps and for some people it's pretty painful, but you also get to stay home from school! Once I was old enough I would learn the reason you don't get it again is because you are again and again exposed to it just enough to re ignite your immune systems natural defense. That makes sense, even as an adult your usually exposed to it from all the kids, or friends with kids.
Now we vaccinate the children. They don't ever get to feel that awesome immunity power, having fought through the virus and come out the other side immune. Not to mention they won't ever get those extra days off school. But the problem I have, again I didn't do any research, is that won't this cause a huge problem up the chickenpox chain? If the kids don't ever get it, but a few still do, then the adults won't be exposed to it over and over. Not being exposed won't cause an immune system re ignition. Then if they ever are exposed to it as adults they will get chickenpox then shingles. There will be huge losses of work, and the older the person the more likely it could cause death.
So I say stop the vaccinations and save some lives.
Also feel free to tear apart this argument...
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I love when it rains, cause it's acutall weather. And we only get it a few times a year. And yeah I know everyone else is cold but you really do miss weather.
I hate when it rains because no one can drive in it here, so I can't get anywhere cause of all the accidents.
Not sure how credible this is, it's from FOX news but READ THIS ARTICLE.
Basically, a few scientists think that if the LHC does produce mini black holes, they might last longer then expected. Maybe up to a second, which is pretty long when your talking about these kinds of things. Don't worry, if they lasted long enough to suck in mass and grow only this would happen:
Lets just hope the LHC doesn't run into anymore delays and we find out that it won't be fully operational until 2012! Share/Send
First check out this photograph panorama that a photographer made with a canon camera during the inauguration speech. It's 2 GB worth of data and comprised of 220 high res photos. Check out Yo-Yo Ma using his iPhone. It's also cool to check out who's in the VIP section behind Obama. Not to mention the sweet sniper looking dudes on top of the Capital Building. Click the picture below to see the Full Res Version.
Second, why doesn't Obama have a computer? According to this article the white house's internet isn't even that great. I understand we don't want Obama E-mailing people willy nilly and wasting time on Facebook like the rest of us. But he should at least have an internet to check out news and media from around the world. And I would think E-mail, even if filtered and secure would be an efficient way to get things done.
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I'm really sorry for posting this, but I really had to. So I went to weather.com and put in my zip code. Up comes a Severe Weather Warning, here is what I saw:
I click on the warning to read about it for my own safety, here is some snippets from what I saw:
Issued by The National Weather Service San Diego, CA 10:26 am PST, Thu., Jan. 22, 2009
... BENEFICIAL RAIN EXPECTED TODAY...
...RAINFALL AMOUNTS FROM A HALF TO THREE FOURTHS OF AN INCH ARE POSSIBLE OVER THE COASTS AND VALLEYS...
Why bother even measuring those amounts?
Sorry guys. If this doesn't convince pepole to come visit me, I don't know what will.
It's amazing how with all the technology we have these days how quickly news spreads. As most of you may know by now a plane crash landed into the Hudson river after hitting a flock of birds.
Almost immediately I saw someone's status on Facebook sending their prayers to the people on the plane.
After, I was on a tech blog I read and they already had a story up about how it's nice to know the rafts we hear about and read in our safety cards actually work.
How did they get this amazing image? From Twitter.com which is a site that really does nothing but update your "status." Similar to on Facebook it just says what your up to at that moment. You can update it tons of ways including your phone. So someone that was on a ferry in the Hudson posted this photo to their twitter which notified all the people they were friends with. You can see HERE how quickly the picture was spread around by how many views it had. And it's amazing at the quality and size of the photo coming from a phone, click it to see it HighRes.
It's just amazing how quickly all of these things happened. News and media were on the scene but no where close to as fast as real people were able to post stories and upload pictures. Now I'm blogging about it, news spreads fast.
Anyway everyone is okay and there are no deaths reported. Mad props, pun intended, to the pilot and crew who managed to safely land the plane in the river saving many lives.
UPDATE: The photo, which was taken by an iPhone, I was talking about from Twitter took down the twitter picture site because of the amount of hits it got, and how quickly it went viral.
"...TwitPic, an application that allows users to take pictures from their mobile phones and append them to Twitter posts, went down after at least 7,000 people attempted to view the photo of the airplane taken from a commuter ferry by Sarasota, Fla., resident Janis Krums...."
Which just goes to show how true my post is. HERE is an article about what happened to the site, haha.
So the President Elect, Barak Obama, got his photo taken yesterday by Pete Souza, the White House photographer. It's his official Presidential portrait photo. And the amazing thing for me is that it is the first EVER official Presidential portrait taken with a digital camera. The cool thing is that they posted the JPEG with all the EXIF data intact. For those of you who don't know EXIF data is hidden data the camera writes to the file (ie date, time, camera settings, software used) I'm a Canon guy and it was shot with the new amazing Canon 5D Mark II. Here is some of the data I saw on my computer.
To really appreciate the power of these new digital cameras you have to click HERE to see the HiRes file, zoom in to see how amazing the quality of the Canon 5D Mark II is!! It really is the end of film, slowly but surely it will become extinct not only for photography but cinema also.
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So Amanda and I had a great holiday break. We are both very lucky to have off from work between Christmas and New Years! I flew into Newark and then took the Amtrak to New London where my sister picked me up. Of course I used my iPhone to nerd it up and track the take off and landing again. Here are the results...
Take off: When you look at it, it really makes sense. They want to take off as fast as they can but have the passengers feel pretty comfortable the whole time. So they try to keep the G forces steady while picking up as much speed as they can.
Landing: This one makes sense too. They stop as quickly as they can but not quick enough to make the passengers smash their heads into the seat in front of them. Anyway.
So while I was in Hampton I spent most of my time with my family and catching up with old friends. Which I did with the help of Facebook.com. If you don't know what it is, you should check it out. It's a great modern way to stay in touch with people without too much work. Although be forewarned it will take up more time then you like, haha. Either way it was great because as I was going though my old yearbooks I found a lot of old friends that had moved away after elementary school and middle school. It was fun finding out where people went and what they were up to.
I was also able to catch up with an old professor from High School that I had always been close with. So Mark DeMaio and I went over to visit with him and spent a good 4 hours catching up. Although unfortunately we had a little incident with a deer on the way home.
New Years was celebrated in Boston with as many friends as Amanda and I could wrangle together. It was good times, despite the snow storms, and sub zero temperatures. Then back to CT and back to New Jersey to fly back to San Diego.
Which is unseasonably hot because of the Santa Anas. So it's 81º today, not to rub it in ;-) Luckily no fires yet! (knock on wood).
Here is another nerdy map with my iPhone GPS spots from the trip:
Even though I don't think I have anyone from other countries reading my blog, I like to flatter myself so I put an google translation gadget on the right side. So go ahead and translate away all you foreigners.
I'll be posting a entry about our Christmas break trip early next week.
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I'm flying into NJ tonight/tomorrow AM, it's the red eye. Wish me luck with the storm they have going on. At least I know I can safely take off from here, after that is when I'll need the luck.
I'll be in CT until New Years when I head up to Boston to see friends and party at the Bell and Hand.
Then back to CT for a night, off to NJ to see Amanda's family and friends, then home again to sunny San Diego.
Keep an eye on my google map tracker, I'm sure it will be updated often.
Happy Holidays everyone, and have a great New Year! I'll try to post some pictures and maybe a few quick blogs from my phone.
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So I'm not sure if it's because people in San Diego WANT it to be cold or if they actually feel like it's cold out. I know everyone pictures the Christmas holiday as snowy and beautiful, sitting inside with a cup of coco, but this is nuts. A few weeks ago, Amanda and I went downtown for the Christmas tree lighting and everyone was dressed like we lived in Siberia. I'm talking full gloves, hats, scarves and jackets. Kids bundled up like the temperature was life threatening. Anyway, there I was in shorts and a T-Shirt watching the ice skaters and waiting for them to light the tree. I looked online and the temperature at that exact time was a brisk 61.2ºF.
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