August 2006 Archives

Recently, I've been spending a lot of my relaxation time watching 24 DVD's and I'm definitely hooked. Katie and I are almost through Season 4 and it seems to get better and better by the minute...

This show is like crack for people that love one liners like, "I don't have any time!" or "My name is Jack Bauer and I work for CTU..." -- all good stuff, all the time...

And up until very recently, I've been thinking that I wanted to upgrade my cell phone and service plan to make me a little more mobile tech savvy. That was until I noticed the cell phone that Jack Bauer is using in Season 4 is the exact same model cell phone I currently own.

It's now officially a no-brainer; who the hell would want a Q when you have Jack Bauer's cell phone?

I had a good run first thing this morning -- still on my main route and still hitting the same distance I'm trying to -- and man was it early when I got up. When the sun hasn't even started to shine when you're done working out, you know you've gotten up early enough...

More tomorrow hopefully; I'm going to try and rest a little less this week and really push my muscles to start actually working correctly.

I should note that I'm still weeks away from feeling comfortable with any sort of *distance* -- my muscles just don't have any ooomph back yet. That's not stopping me from planning on a 5K in the near future; I'm looking at you, end of October...

I should also note that my energy level is insanely high today. Like, wow, really high. I think my endorphins are trying to tell me that they're happy.

If you're checking my site in a feedreader, make sure you stop by to see the *new* design. I say *new* because technically it's been done before -- consistency is a good thing -- but I really like the way it looks so I'm running with it...

Enjoy.

In today's hustle and bustle, you need to keep all of your bookmarks and feeds synced up while transferring from computer to computer -- work to home, home to work -- it hasn't been an easy, hands-off task to perform in our recent history.

Firefox simplified this by allowing people to build extensions. I used the Bookmarks Syncronizer add-on -- requiring your own web hosting account and a little more know-how than the average web browser -- and it worked okay for what I needed it for.

Much to my surprise a few months later, Google jumped in and decided to release their own version of that extension (a much more powerful one at that) -- Google Browser Sync.

The kicker is...somehow in one of my recent syncs...I lost a lot of my bookmarks. Not sure how. Not sure why some stayed and some went. But I lost a ton. Bummer.

I may have an offline backup somewhere but I've started to realize that this is probably a good thing. I had subscribed to WAY too many feeds -- RSS just excites me a little too much -- so this will give me a chance to whittle away at the extraneous distractions haunting my brain at the moment.

There's an interesting article floating 'round the blog world today about how blogs and ad-supported content can mean really big bucks if you happen to have the right niche...

Arrington, a 36-year-old entrepreneur behind a long list of unrecognizable startups, has suddenly become one of the rising stars of Silicon Valley. Why? The answer lies in TechCrunch, Arrington's blog about new technologies and companies. -- He's pulling in $60,000 in ad revenue every month.

Impressive and something I'm hugely envious of. But not really.

Blogging for big bucks [Business 2.0]

September's Wired features the musician/artist/Web 2.0 enthusiast Beck on the cover with an apropos quote, "Radio sucks. The labels are lame. Now bands are taking over--and fans are getting what they want." Warning: If you repeat these words enough times, you will become a disciple of L. Ron Hubbard's teachings. [Valleywag]

There's a large write-up on Pitchfork Media in the issue, too. I keep getting the "last chance to renew Wired warnings..." in the mail so I'm wondering if I've already exhausted my full subscription. Bummer, if so.

I am pretty psyched to see that Google has completed plans and rolled out their first WiFI network -- GoogleWiFi -- for the city of Mountain View, CA.

Not that I need Google to manage everything for me [unlike John - ;) ], it would be interesting if a company could successfully get me to rely on them for my internet connection all the way through how I find things on the internet, how people find things on my blog, etc. Google's the first to get me on board on most of their products straight out of the gate. We'll see how it looks once plans for Chicago's citywide wifi start coming to fruition...

Free citywide WiFi in Mountain View [Google Blog]

Back a few years ago when I was still in school, I had my brother-in-law help me put together my first computer. I was so excited. We purchased most of the parts OEM from Newegg.com -- a site I still frequent to keep up with dramatically decreasing hardware costs -- got together, drank some beers, and put together my own personal Frankenstein.

That PC gave me nothing but problems for the two years to follow. I swore to myself that I'd never *DIY* ever again -- at least in terms of computer hardware elements -- and I was coming up on a good time to purchase a new one. I went the easy route -- purchase a computer from Best Buy and get a performance plan -- and I brought home my new PC (with a crappy, free printer) that very day.

That was about two years ago.

Very recently, I booted up my PC and got the message "Primary Master Hard Disk S.M.A.R.T. Status Bad" (see inset to the left). A quick Google search yields the following link and a disheartening message; "The problem cannot be fixed. The drive's self-diagnosis and WD's diagnostics confirm that the drive is going south. Back up any valuable data and replace the drive." Time to give the performance plan's legs a little stretching...

'I see handcuffs': Osment charged in DUI - Yahoo! News

I give them 9.2/10 for the headline...

Teen actor Haley Joel Osment, who suffered a broken rib last month when his car struck a mailbox, faces up to six months in jail on charges that he was driving drunk and possessing marijuana, authorities said.

Yet another example of what NOT to do if/when you ever land yourself in celebrity status. "Hmm, why I do believe that it could be fun to drive around drunk in my 1995 Saturn while carrying pot!" I'm pretty sure that's what he was thinking.

While I seem to think that I've got tons and tons of stuff to work on at the moment (putting some improvements into Ward-o-blog being one of them), I can't seem to find one intelligent word to write on this blog. Other than that which was just written, I guess.

Lately, I've been thinking that I'd like to become an email-on-the-go sorta person. My wife vehemently opposes.

What do you think, though? Can I wield this productivity tool in a way that allows me to surpass most expectations people have of a normal person's productivity level in a normal 24 hour period? Does that matter? Would I think the same way if I was in Europe? Should I buy a Q?

iRepair.ca // Story of a shop in Canada that will fix your iPod for you while you wait. I'm thinking about sending both of our broken iPods up there just to see if he can get them juicing again. It'd be about $200 to fix both but that's definitely better than buying two brand-new ones. [via Treehugger]

I've just upgraded to Movable Type 3.3...

Let me know if anything on the site looks weird or anything and expect some more *upgrades* soon...

"Who the fuck brought this motherfucking beverage on this motherfucking plane?!"

Words to live by.

[via Boing Boing]

There's been a lot of talk around the office lately about the CC: field in emails and what it really means...

Accordingly to Wikipedia, the CC: field in an email header stands for "Courtesy copy," meaning that anyone that was cc'd was sent this note as a courtesy that doesn't require any action or response. I only use it as an FYI. At least, I try to use it as such but I know I've used it wrong a million times in the recent past...

Coming up next -- an in-depth analysis on the BCC email field and how many problems it can cause if used incorrectly. In fact, I'd almost say that it should never be used for what's it's intended...

Because I once signed up for a Google Video account to test the uploading and sharing capabilities, I just got an email describing some new features that they're rolling out. One jumped out as *interesting* to me...

"...we're continuing to experiment with using ads to extend content distribution. To do this, we've made some minor modifications to our Terms of Service (TOS) so you can participate in ad programs we may roll out in the future. Please take a moment to review the changes by logging into your account at https://upload.video.google.com and accepting the new terms and conditions. If you don't agree to the new TOS, we will assume you acknowledge and accept these changes, and will include your content in Google Video, as it is today."

In all the recent news of Digg vs. Calacanis and how YouTube going to make money and whatnot, I find Google's positioning rather relevant...

Every time I go running I follow a path and I tell myself, "I have to make it slightly farther today...two blocks is all that is necessary...do it, pussy!"

That worked nicely for me today. By the Gmaps Pedometer's count, I made it 1.2 miles without stopping. This is a significant step up from my normal, slothy lifestyle.

I want to get up to multiple miles before I commit to any sort of organized race. I'm getting closer...

Over the next few weeks, I'm going to start really pimping out this space to be feature-rich website -- Justin Ward-rich if you will -- so bear with me on any changes and stylesheet borking...