Xbox Live!

Now that Slippy and Wooderson have joined the online world of the XbOX360, I thought I would post a view of our gamertags...

New Addition to the House

Yeah, not that kind of addition...

Friday night, my foray into HDTV began. I am now the proud owner of 37" of LCD goodness. It was T-I-G-H-T fitting it in that cabinet, but I did it. 1/8" clearance on each side! That's also an XBOX360 on the right... I must say, my eyes are happy. The room is almost finished reno mode - just carpeting and tiling to go!

Now I just have to deal with Brotha Bell to upgrade to HD. Not looking forward to dealing with those knobs.

Troops

I laugh my ass off every time I watch this!

Kid Beyond

Ok. If this guy ever comes to Toronto, I want to see that show. Find a video of this guy - its pretty amazing.

Check it.

Amos Lee

I am going to throw out a reco for singer/songwriter Amos Lee. I grabbed his debut, self-titled album from the library on a lark, because I liked his name. Solid album.

Weeds

After seeing such a glowing endorsement a few weeks ago by Wooderson, the Mrs. and I rented season 1 for a viewing.  What a great show!  The characters are deep, and the stories are not a glorification of ganga distribution, but rather paint a picture of the trials and tribulations of trying to maintain a lifestyle in an upscale suburbia.

While we don't have Showcase (yet), I look forward to season 2.  

Little Superstar

Had to throw this bad boy up here. I wish I had those moves...

Shout-out

Well, I upgraded the Mac with another 1GB of RAM as per many suggestions, and the damn thing got even faster. I also threw on a trial version of Parallels, and can now run XP in 1440x900 rez. Lovely.

I have also been pretty impressed by the apps available for Mac, and often the free nature of these programs. While not free, I found this pretty sweet blogging tool called, ecto.

Anyways, hope all is well out there. Check you later.
________________________
Listening to Rhythm & Blues Alibi (acoustic) from the album "Liquid Skin" by Gomez

Technorati Tags: Apple, MacBook Pro

361

It's funny the relevance and memory that a simple number can bring...

Tigga & Togga now on TV!

Fathers of the world rejoice! Tigga & Togga is now airing on TV! For all the details click here: Tigga & Togga

A long time ago...in a Galaxy far far away...

...do you guys remember....in the NOT too distant past...certain Fall-weekend gatherings that involved only the male gender of the spieces gathering for hours of debauchasizing and such ???

If you dont...TRY HARDER !!!!

I got an MSN last night from one Mr. Anthony Whalen...deep in the midst of sleepless nights and potty training lessons for his young daughter...REACHING out to me in an attempt to initiate a "GUYZ-WEEKEND" this fall. "GREAT IDEA !!!" I said...and here I am...pushing the proverbial ball in an attempt to get 'er started.

Understanding we've all grown older...wiser...and FATTER, with committments ever increasing and for some the constant draw of the family....what do you think ??? Can it be done ??? You KNOW you dont have to ask me twice ! Id be glad to champion this fine cause, because given the time that has lapsed since our last "real" guyz-weekend this would almost serve as a reunion of sorts ???

I put the idea out there to you fine gentlemen. I refuse to let this die. No discussions as far as timing and locale have taken place at this point. I know those will most likely big the biggest sticking points, but I would add we've done it before - read whirlwind trip to Montreal for a 2-day weekend...and we can do it again...sure we are all older...wiser...fatter and more committed, but I think we need to have a kick at the can !!!


Join me...and together...we can....we can do it !!!

Wooderson.

Banner Week For Failing Technology!

Last night she went gentley to sleep, battery completely depleted and never woke up. The officials said that the logic board failed and that it would be too costly to repair an obsolete machine. I bid a fond farewell to my G3 iBook (dual USB). You served me well over the last 5 years. iBook is survived by 5GB iPod (with moving scroll wheel).

On the other side, I just picked up my 250GB replacement LaCie F.A. Porche Firewire drive and then promptly went to the computer ghetto at Spadina & College and scored a 250GB Iomega USB 2.0 drive for all my back-up needs. I have learned my lesson. I plan to keep the USB drive off-site. I currently have 580GB of external drive space!

Not sure what the deceased iBook means in terms on future computer aquistions, but I will keep you posted. For now, long live the G4 14" iBook!

Well, that didn't take long

Well, it didn't take more than 3 days for my MacBook Pro to require repairs. Yes, its true. Apparently, you can't stick 2 DVDs in the SuperDrive at a time, and I guess my 3-year-old son didn't read that part of the MANUAL before he jammed 2 DVDs in there when it was in sleep mode. The eject button makes some great sounds, but nothing comes out.

So... tomorrow I have to take it to my authorized Apple store in town. Hopefully they can fix it. At least I'll know which one is mine - its the one with the PEN MARKS on the top that don't seem to want to come off. They match the PEN MARKS scribbled on the screen of our 19" LCD monitor.

Needless to say, the little guy's office accessibility has been suspended. And to be totally honest, that wasn't even the worst thing that happened today. It was truly a banner day. Some days life just shits all over the place and forgets to clean up.

Newz

Woah...You guys are posting machines ! I have a couple of excuses for my lack of Moontower activity...

1) XBox360. Need I say more? Its awesome, and I am not even playing it in HD yet ! Despite my best efforts Pam wants to keep the HD tv upstairs! Oh well, even with the setup downstairs, its awesome. I bought NHL2k7 on Friday, and it blows me away ! I will embark on my first dynasty tonight !!!

2) I am not sure if both of you know this...as a done deal. This is my last week at Anixter. Just wasnt for me. I know I didnt put a lot of time in here, but I could tell. It wasnt the right job for me. Hard to explain, but I couldnt see myself here a year..3 years...5 years down the road ?!? That said...Protek who had kept a close eye on me in my 3 month absence, is taking me back with MORE than open arms. I am thrilled to be going back...of course for more $$$ and an increase in responsibility, something that was sorely missing there before. I am at Anixter until Thursday...taking Friday off, and then Im back at Protek on Monday morning, in the capacity of Service Co-Ordinator.


Thats all I got for now....chat soon.

MacBook Pro First Impressions

Well, its 7:30am on Saturday morning and my son refused to sleep in, so while he's enjoying his morning apple juice, I thought I would post my first impressions of my new acquisition.

First of all, I ordered this thing on Wednesday night around 9pm, and it showed up Friday at 3pm. Admittedly, I paid an extra $23 for expedited shipping, but I did not expect to receive it within 2 business days. It came in a slick black box, all wrapped up nicely in styrofoam for protection.

I got the machine out of the box, and plugged it in for a charge, but the battery was already full. I started it up, and the Mac began asking me some simple questions (e.g. region, language), and promptly found my wireless network and connected. I was beginning to get impressed, but I felt like it was saying to me, "dude, don't worry - this is the easy stuff". After registering my account with Mac and denying a few things like setting up a .Mac account, I was at the desktop. Immediately, a window popped up with software updates, 12 in total, so I let it do its thing while I started making dinner.



Everything updated just fine, so after the little monkey was put to bed, I got down to really checking it out. First of all, the finish is amazing. Brushed aluminum, translucent apple logo inset in lid, gently backlit keys. Then you look at the screen. This thing is breathtaking. Its HUGE compared to the screens I've been using in the past, its bright, crisp, and just a pleasure to gaze at. The laptop is light - less than 6 pounds - but it feels big. Fold it up, though, and it seems fairly compact. Probably because it is very thin, even though the footprint isn't so small. When this thing is plugged in, it runs hot. I don't mean warm, I mean HOT. Those online reviews were not lying. I do find that when just on batteries, it is considerably cooler, though.

I feel like I might be rambling a bit, but I am just throwing down things as they come to me. The backgrounds that come with the machine are a nice touch, and convey the quality of the screen nicely. I started checking out system preferences and some applications. Browser worked nicely, and did many of the applications. They all seem pretty basic, but I'll have to spend some more time with them to understand if I will use them. I found that most things were self-explanatory, but at times, I was left wondering how to do certain functions I would previously had done by clicking on the right mouse button.

One of the first things I did was to connect to the network, and grab an MP3 off of our desktop (Windows) computer. Found the machine just fine, got to my music, and selected, "By My Side". iTunes launched, and sweet music began to play. The sound was crisp, albeit a little tinny, but that might mean it needs a bit of adjustment. I checked out the trial versions of a few programs (MS Office for Mac, Keynote, Pages), then thought I would get down to business and try out WinXP. I decided to try Parallels, and downloaded the trial version.

I started a virtual machine and threw in my XP disk, but after considerable time, I realized it just wasn't installing. It "hung" while trying to "detect and install devices", so that didn't work. It may be because I used my OEM disk from my Dell, so I am going to have to try another version.

So, all round, my first impressions are about 90% positive. Can't wait to get more into this machine - still getting use to some of the OSX stuff!

Fun (not really) with Camera-phone

Here's what I am doing right now. Siebel Analytics demo. But I am still checking the Moon Tower!

Interesting Weekend - UPDATED

See post below.

A Stern Warning - BACK UP YER FILES!

I just got news from LaCie that my 160GB drive decided to kick the bucket today. It had been making some odd noises yesterday, but I didn't think too much of it and now I have lost almost my entire digital music collection, some of my digital photos, and some of my key work files.

I was lucky to have backed up my current project last night before setting an animation render which was the last thing that poor drive would ever do.

Back up yer files!

On a posting tear

I've picked up the bug for posting again. Figured I'd play with my camera-phone as well and start adding images to my posts. This is a picture of my workspace right now, and yes, those are MegaBlocks. Why? While I would like to say that I am "building a robot out of a garbage can", the blocks are for a training exercise. My client likes the warm and fuzzy approach. That laptop there will be joined next week by a new MacBook Pro. Did I mention that I went Apple last night?

Notice I got a shot of the MoonTower in there? So... what's your desk looking like today?

Slippy switches teams!

I know what you are thinking: "How could he do it? He has such a nice wife and child!", but it is true - I have gone to the Mac side. Yes, that's right. No more PC for Slippy. He will now be the proud owner and user of a MacBook Pro 15" marvel of technology.

But he won't stray too far from Microsoft, or even Windows, yet. He'll still dual boot, and even use Parallels and XP to get at the MS Office. And he'll give Bill Gates even more money in the months ahead when he drops $500 CAD on an XBox360. But he will show off his shiny new silver surfer. Oh yes.