• my place

    image1109963126.jpgIt’s the time of year when the weather begs you to come outside. After the kids have gone to bed and Cheryl’s pain meds have kicked in for the night, this is where I hide for a few hours. Sometimes I write. Sometimes I just browse through the news. Sometimes I just stop and listen for a while. You can’t escape the sound of cars here, and they’re always there – the whoosh of passing, the sound of rubber rolling on asphalt at speed. But it’s the white noise of suburbia. I hardly notice unless I’m listening for it. Then there’s the crickets and other critters, and the gentle winter winds playing with our old oaks. My PowerBook casts a gentle glow across my lap, not to be out done by the streetlights on the corner, or the baseball fields down the street.

    It’s all noise, of one kind or another, but it’s not noisy. For a kid who grew up here, it’s downright peaceful.

    If you’re driving by you might see me out there sometime. What you’ll see is bliss.

  • Dad’s in charge

    Beth gets a Starbucks surprise.

    Cheryl’s off getting therapy, Adam’s out with the in-laws (post-dentist by now), leaving me and Beth to get dinner ourselves. Guess what was next door for dessert?

    Coincidence?

  • Software hopping

    Why do I even need to blog from my phone? Isn’t it bad enough I spend a chunk of my PC time writting? Now I’ve got to encourage a repetitive motion injury in my thumbs typing on my phone?

    You should know that I don’t like to use the “PC” acronym here, which implies Windows, and all the evil associated with that label.

    Yes, I do. I did some blogging lite before, when I was wandering around in the wilderness with my Palm. There wasn’t a good input mechanism, and no link to the Internet (away from home), so I didn’t use it for much more than quick notes or thoughts – to be fleshed out later when I had my PowerBook. (Be gone PC label, be gone!)

    Now there’s no need to wait for fleshing, while my thumbs rapidly develop into a preciscion machine.

    Now the problem is software – and the fact that too many of the iPhone’s apps are crap. Many of them show promise, and the platform is in it’s infancy – as far as developing software goes. But that doesn’t change the fact that many apps are really buggy, suffering from numerous crashes. They don’t crash the whole phone, but just quiting unexpectedly, not knowing how much of you work will be saved in between, is enough to pull your hair out.

    Don’t get me wrong, I think the thing is the best thing since my PowerBook. I owe my in-laws big time for getting them for us, making this huge drain on my free time possible. It’s fast becoming indispensible. Someday soon I’ll forget it at home and my coworkers will grow alarmed at the weeping gentleman in the next cubicle over.

    Now I just need a better spell check utility and I’ll be all set.