1. Move to Los Angeles.
2. Enjoy it completely until fire season starts in August.
3. Breathe fumes and smoke and ash for a few days.
4. Wonder aloud at a party what starts some of these fires.
5. Go to bed that night and get a song about not starting a fire stuck in your head somehow, amidst your dreams.
6. Wake up singing said song.
7. Curse whoever wrote those wretched lyrics.
8. Pose the following question to yourself: Why the fuck was fire used as a metaphor for a song about pop culture?
9. Notice that, when applied to an actual fire, We Didn’t Start the Fire is pretty depressing.
10. Damn you for this, Billy Joel, damn you!
There’s a good chance that this post will cause my partner to roll his eyes, cover his face with his hands, and then click close tab. It’s no secret that I’m a huge nerd, and despite being in a field practically devoid of gadgets, I still manage to spend a whole lot of time thinking about them. I’m a blogger, it’s a given.
A few weeks back, I got it into my head that hey, wouldn’t it be fun to add a techie element to this blog. I have learned so much just from blogging and crawling the internet, so what better way to give a little back? It’s stunning how little I know, in the grand scheme of things, but I thought why not share what I do know, and what I have learned? I learn more all the time, so it will be a great place to bring all that together.
So I introduce this, a whenever-I-like-it (I’m hoping weekly but I make no promises) post about something tech-related. It could be software I like to use, gadgets I enjoy, or websites I find useful. Just to offer fair warning, I use Apple computers, so a good deal of this content will be geared toward Mac products and software. That said, whenever possible, I will mention things that are Windows- or other operating-system-based, in the spirit of making information useful to whoever wants to find it useful.
And finally, a huge thanks to Jamie for listening to my ideas and for helping make sure I didn’t blind you with my special little graphic here (see below). Thanks, Jamie! And now, let’s begin…
Since it’s my first week back at school, let’s kick it off with a fantastic little study tool I use. It’s a simple little flashcard program that’s intuitive and makes learning a quick, easy task. The program, appropriately called Genius, is free and runs on any Mac, both PPC and Intel, running any version of OS X as well as Mac OS Classic. You can find Genius here.
I would recommend Genius for anything you need to memorize. It is exclusively designed as flashcard memory, and has a study function that reviews items for you a few at a time, and as you master items, it adds new items accordingly. Your answers are scored and you can even write in keywords during study sessions for Genius to recognize and score as correct even if you don’t repeat items strictly verbatim. If you establish preferences manually, you can select exact, case sensitive, or lexical similarity.
The only drawback to Genius is that its format is fixed. You have to expand the size of the window in order to view lengthier questions and answers in the editing pane, and the study panel style is sometimes difficult to read. But your information is there, the set-up is good, and at $0 cost, these are par for the course. Genius a great ticket for any college student, and will improve your grades without even touching your wallet.
My Afternoon Inner Monologue While Napping on the Couch For Something Like Two Hours.
Or
The Most Unproductive Nap Ever
Or
An Inordinate Amount of Dialogue Considering This Is A Slumbering Monologue
I think I’ll close my eyes. Yes, yes! Excellent idea. Oooh, I’m drifitng to sleep. With my glasses on.
(30 minutes later.)
Hey, I’ve been asleep. With my glasses on. Well take them off dammit!
(Glasses are removed. Sleep recommences. 30 more minutes pass.)
How long have been asleep? I don’t know but I’m so sleepy I can’t open my eyes.What time is it? How should I know? I can’t open my eyes.
(An hour later.)
Wait, have I been asleep? Duh. I can’t seem to open my eyes. Yes I can. Try. I just did again. Nothing. Well maybe I’m just dreaming about all this. Maybe I’m just dreaming that I can’t open my eyes. What a fucking useless dream. Tell me about it. But I still can’t! Yes but even though I’m conscious of this, I can’t bring myself to open my eyes. Right? And then I’ll just fall asleep and then have the same stupid dream again. Arrrrrrrgggghhhhhh.
(And then I woke up.)
Twitter. The social networking site that everyone either loves to hate, hates to love, hates to hate, or loves to love. The site that is frequently lauded for being lame for reasons as uncreative as it’s just boring to I don’t care what you’re doing every minute of every day, both of which are tired reasoning and are only said anymore because someone else said it first.
So where am I going with this? Right here: Twitter has made me a better graduate student. Grad school, no matter what field of study, is an intense process, and chances are you will be doing a lot of writing. I have noted before that writing this website has considerably improved my writing skills, especially in terms of essays, arguments, and even research papers. What, then, has Twitter done for me?
I’m studying Speech-Language Pathology, and one of the challenges of this field is learning to write reports. The field is incredibly dynamic, and can involve working with people of any age in settings from schools to therapy centers to hospitals. Report writing, unlike other forms of exposition, needs to be concise by nature. Narratives are great, but once you get out there and have a hefty caseload, your reading time is limited. This is where Twitter comes in.
Over the summer, I discovered that I had the ability to write a lot of information into very few sentences, thus making my reports clear, direct, and, according to my supervisor, something other hospital employees could definitely appreciate. Granted, it’s taken me about a year to understand what clinical writing is all about, but Twitter has had a huge impact on how I write.
The key, naturally, is to avoid “text speak.” One of my biggest pet peeves, be it when texting or when using Twitter, is when I see people type things like b4 u used 2 b cool but now u r dumb. It’s like nails on a chalkboard for me, and instead of getting information across faster or more effectively, it serves only to make me judge you. The challenge of Twitter is to get across some form of information, story, idea, or what have you, in only 140 characters.
Twitter: useful in more ways than even I ever thought it would be. And just remember, if you’re one of those people who’s going to come up to me and tell me how silly you think Twitter is, I’ll have only one thing to say to you: b4 u used 2 b cool but now u r dumb.
Today is the much-awaited 20-Something Bloggers Video Blog day! The theme is “What does 20SB mean to you?” A fitting theme, indeed, and considering I’ve made some amazing friends through them, I thought the least I could do was participate.
Here’s the part that’s easy to believe: I did this video in one take. I only allowed myself the one take because otherwise I never would have gotten to this part right here. If I had even once reviewed it before uploading it to my computer, there’s a strong possibility that I would be huddled in a corner, crying, eating ice cream right out of the container. Luckily, I don’t have any ice cream.
In all seriousness, the 20SB network has brought much joy to my life. I’ve met amazing people, read the stories of amazing writers, made wonderful new friends across the globe (even going so far as to drive to Las Vegas to meet 25 of them all at the same time!), and just generally found a wonderful place on the internet to hang out.
I owe more to other people for this video than myself. Specifically, the folks providing the soundtrack. The intro track is courtesy of Tek Support, who I got to see perform over the weekend and he totally blew my mind. The track is called “Robot Apocalypse.” The closing track is by pop electronic duo Air, and is called “Napalm Love.”
Now sit back, relax, and enjoy the next one minute and forty-five seconds of crazy. Hopefully this shows up in your reader, but if not, click here to view it on the web page.
20sb Vlog Day August 2009: Rocky Time Warp edition from Phil on Vimeo.
Oh, and because this is a Director’s Cut, after all, here’s a special feature: Behold, the amazing towering tri-pod for my camera! Why yes! those are two large books beneath a ream of paper beneath my MacBook beneath a magazine beneath four novels, why?
I will be there. Nico will be there. But more importantly, will YOU be there?
Confrontation has never been one of my strong suits. I’ve long been a good listener first and a good conversationalist second. My landlord, on the other hand, has an affinity for considering himself a blow-hard know-it-all and at 60 years old is never going to feel differently. Our relationship can only be described as ‘cordial’; I pay him a huge chunk of change to live on his property and in return, I get a cool place to live. To stay in his good graces, I usually find I have to give up one hour per month and listen to him rant and rave about politics and money.
As I was having my internet installed Wednesday, I also got to hear him spout on about computers and he started drilling me about why I decided to ditch the internet he pays for in favor of my now super-fast cable. I replied that I needed speedier, more reliable internet, and that the DSL was slowing me down.
Landlord: How much RAM do you have on your computer?
Phil: Why?
Landlord: Well that would explain why your computer isn’t loading the internet well. I have two gigabytes on my computer and it runs fine.
Phil: …
Landlord: I’m telling you, that’s what it is.
Phil: RAM is hardware in your computer that allows all your software to run, and can allow you to run more than one program at once. It has nothing to do with your internet connection.
Landlord: Well. Maybe. I’ll have to look into it.
Phil: Trust me, I could have 500 gigs of RAM and that wouldn’t make this shitty DSL any faster.
Landlord: We’ll see.
The best part of all this? The look on the guy’s face when my nerdiness shined and totally owned his masculinity. That was nice for a change.
Hey, remember how much I complained about having no internet access the other day? How the DSL completely went out and, once it was fixed, it still worked slower than dial-up? Yeah, I decided to change that. On Monday, I got it into my head that since school starts in two weeks, and since one of my classes is completely online, it might be wise to free myself from the free-because-my-landlord-paid-for-it internet and drop some change for my own cable internet. You know, that actually worked.
Cut to today, the day I was told to be waiting at home between the hours of 1 and 5 in the afternoon. Just for the record, Time Warner (and other cable companies who might be listening), a four hour window is a murderous amount of time to demand a person be done. I had so much to do, and every time I started to go about doing it, I’d stop myself and say, “But what if the cable guy shows up?” Past experience has taught me that no one shows until at least the last half hour, but that does nothing to stop such lame behavior.
The cable guy showed up at precisely 4:40 pm, a mere five minutes before I was about to call the company and scream obscenities into the phone at the recorded voice on the other end of the line. Because my humble abode already had cable, I had assumed that the guy would show up, test it out, flip a switch, give me a modem, and be on his way. I had no idea that I was in store for a four-hour ordeal that involved pulling everything out and then putting in completely new wires. Only to find, naturally, that the length of wire we had did not even reach all the way back to my house. So, three more technicians and a full spool of cable wire later, and I was in business.
After nearly four hours of waiting, then another four hours of watching the cable guys and making sure that Dylan, the ever-curious dog who loses his shit whenever new people show up on the scene, didn’t terrorize any of the poor cable guys.
Seriously, by the time it was all over, I had to jump into the car and leave the house because I just couldn’t take it anymore. The most I could do on my computer was to turn it on, click a few pages, then pee my pants because the pages! They were loading so fast!
And now I’m back home and typing this and I literally cannot believe that this is happening to me. Videos are loading in mere seconds’ time instead of a couple of hours, I’m not constantly getting disconnected from my email, and in the space of the thirty or so minutes I’ve been using my computer, I’ve been so productive! Who knew that when your internet works, and it works super fast, you can actually get done everything you need to do in a timely fashion. It’s like that chunk of change to pay for it every month really pays for itself.
(Also, I typed this post in less than ten minutes. In TextEdit. Which isn’t even connected to the internet. But that doesn’t matter because my internet is moving so quickly that apparently so also must my typing fingers. Holyshitmyheadexplodedit’stimetogotobed.)
That is all.
It might be wise to preface this post by saying that it’s a doozy. It’s long, it’s a huge rant, and it’s nerdy. For that I blame a considerable amount of frustration, as well as an affinity to reading a lot of tech-related blogs lately. You’ve been warned.
Technology doesn’t seem to be working in my favor at the moment. In addition to my aforementioned shitty internet connection, I’ve pretty much declared war on my cell phone. I remember when I got my LG Voyager last July that Jenn asked if I would do a review of the thing. I said sure, but never ended up writing it, in part because I didn’t know how to do a review at the time, and also in part because I suspected that a better review would be done after a solid amount of time spent with said phone. I made that second reason up, but who could blame me since I’ve now had the thing for over a year?
A year ago, my review would have gone something like this: The LG Voyager is a lot like my previous phone, the original LG “The V”, but with cheaper quality plastic, a touch screen, and a higher-resolution camera. It’s otherwise unremarkable.
And today, my review goes something like this: The Voyager is an okay phone whose MSRP is inflated well beyond its actual worth. It is mediocre in every possible way, and the only reason to really use it is for its qwerty keyboard, which is actually quite comfortable for typing. It has a number of known bugs that never seem to be remedied, including–but not limited to–powering off when clicking ‘send’ on a text message, powering off for no apparent reason, an unresponsive touch screen, a responsive touch screen that clicks in places a centimeter or four away from where your finger actually touches the screen, and for repeatedly pocket dialing and not logging the calls in the phone’s memory. For all the hype initially surrounding this phone, it’s a profound disappointment.
What has become an even more profound disappointment for me is Verizon. Up to now, I’ve been content with their service because my phone gets reception just about everywhere. My initial reason for using Verizon was that my whole family used them as well, so it only made sense to use the same network.
I’ve never been terribly impressed by their customer service, however, and I’m not a huge fan of their phone software, which only ever ends up making the interface look uglier with each subsequent change. However, I’m still under contract with them and also, unfortunately at this point, like that I get such strong service everywhere I go.
I’ve made no secret about my desire to get an iPhone, and despite all the current drama surrounding them, I still want one. Of course, if there’s anyone I like less than Verizon right now, it’s AT&T. The feelings I harbor against AT&T are a combination of both their current lousy reputation for having actually fewer bars in more places as well as their history of being a giant blood-sucking monopoly. Then again, considering currently do business with the largest cell phone company in the country, perhaps that last point is moot.
I went to the Verizon store today to voice my complaints regarding my phone, and while the guy behind the counter was checking everything out, I was informed that if I shelled out $50.00, I could get the exact same phone I have as a replacement (thanks to it being more than a year old now and despite my point that the problems I’ve had with my phone are not unheard of), which I quickly shot down by noting that paying money only to eventually end up having the same problems a few months down the line wasn’t exactly an ideal solution. I also learned that I could extend my contract for another two years and “upgrade” to a new phone for $20.00, a notion I also shot down because I’ve become really suspicious of contracts at this point and hate being forced to do business with only one company.
During this exchange, I decided I’d inform the representative that what I really want is an iPhone, and had the man heard if Verizon would be carrying it come 2010. He proceeded to talk about the much-rumored Apple Tablet, and also expounded on why Verizon hadn’t initially snagged the iPhone for its own line. He gave me the following reasons:
- Apple refused to let Verizon put their own label on the phone
- Apple uses its own iTunes, so Verizon’s own music download center would see a loss in profits
- Verizon wasn’t keen on the data plan proposed by Apple
- Verizon didn’t like that troubleshooting could only be done at the Apple store, and not at any Verizon store locations
The only thing I could think was, WOW, what a huge, huge, mistake for Verizon. The fact that the iPhone does not have AT&T’s symbol on it has done nothing to lessen the sheer volume of sales on the device. Also, I’ve been a Verizon customer for more than three years now (amazingly, I’ve only been a cell phone user for that long) and I have never once, and never will, download any music from Verizon. Why? Because I download songs to my computer (via iTUnes and Amazon) and I don’t need separate copies for my phone. And frankly, I don’t even use my phone for an mp3 player in part because it really isn’t that great a phone to do so and also in part because it doesn’t have a standard headphone jack. Also, I believe that all data plans should be a flat rate for unlimited usage, an aspect I’m sure Verizon completely disagrees with me on.
In sum, I’m currently of the opinion that all cell phones should be open to any carrier of choice. Second, all cell phones should be free of contracts, which would serve to increase competition, demand consistently better service, and reduce the outrageous cost of the devices. I wouldn’t mind paying full price for a device if it meant I got to use it how I saw fit instead of being forced to use it the way a carrier wants me to. Here’s hoping!
As the notorious Nico often says so succinctly, we live in the future! And every time he says it, be it while we’re instant messaging, emailing, blogging/commenting, or chatting it up at a party, I always nod my head in solemn agreement. He knows about these things much better than I. Or rather, he’s got a much better grasp on this point, as it’s his spiel, not my own.
The last 48 hours have really brought to life how right Nico is about us living in the future, however. His point has long been that regardless of how we perceived the future to be in the past, the reality of our lives is very much the future of our pasts, and in ways we likely haven’t even thought much about.
As I’ve so eloquently noted already, my home internet connection has been out for the better part of two days. It’s been spotty for the last several weeks, but these last two days it’s been a nightmare, allowing me actual access for maybe ten minutes out of every hour or so. This is a problem for me, as much of what I do requires the use of an internet connection.
So what have I been unable to accomplish as a result of virtually no internet connection? Let’s see.
- Sending important documents over email for my clinic.
- Reading the news.
- Writing on any one of my plethora of websites.
- Paying bills.
- Checking email.
- Working on setting up my new Etsy shop. (coming soon…)
It’s funny to think about it. I’ve gone paperless on virtually all my bills, and was proud that it was a means of going green. But just as paper bills are only possible if there are trees to make the paper, so too is paperless billing only possible with a reliable internet connection. The point is, who knew that what we so long considered to be paperwork might one day not be actual paperwork at all? There’s no other response to that than… we live in the future.
This blog post is being typed at a local Coffee Bean, where a nice, sturdy, reliable, fast, and free wireless internet connection has allowed me to get all my work done and more. Who knew that it would be possible to go order a drink, plop down at a table, and work on your laptop to your heart’s content? That settles it, I think; we really do live in the future.