34 and 1/365 Years Old

I have been playing with my camera today taking random pictures. None of which is worth uploading to Flickr to show off its awesomeness. I have been finding out little rules of thumb from Tom. Maybe tomorrow when it is not so gloomy outside a picture would find its way to my Flickr account.

Rule that Tom mentioned, 1/30 shutter speed when camera is hand held so that it doesn't blur. I played around and ISO400 changes the shutter speed to about 1/30 of a second in doors.

34th Birthday

Today I have been on this rock for thirty four years. I am happy, content, generally feeling well today. My brother Mark called me and we had a little chat. He is sitting at home because they canceled school due to the imminent arrival of a super typhoon! Nohemi got me a Canon Digital Rebel XTi... a camera that I have been pining over for the past three versions.

... Lindsay got me a Pimp My Cubicle kit to pimp out my cube.
... went to lunch with people at work to Craftsman Chop Co.
... went to D&W and got ice cream. Cake batter and Mackinaw Island fudge.
... gosh-golly-jeepers, I want to go home already so I can open my presents!!!
... my cake at work was good, the cake batter ice cream was yuuumieee.

Hala Madrid!

I am going to Spain this Christmas break. Nohemi also added a side trip to Madrid from the usual stay in Palma. It'll be my first trip to mainland Spain even though I have been to Mallorca several times. I am excited. Did I mention that there might even be a side-side trip to Toledo while we spent a few days in Madrid?

Hmmm... Starbucks... Yuuuuuummy

I decided to get a cup of coffee from Starbucks this morning. As per my previous post, I have been cutting down on my caffeine intake. Well, after the "tall traditional" that I ordered my body switched to Cornholio-mode. Boy, do I feel sorry for the people that had to interact with me this morning. That poor customer service rep from Cingular that had to request for me to slow down twice. Poor Katrin that needed to upload a file to the FTP server. It was all worth it in the end. The yummy, yummy cup of delicious happiness... hmmmm.

I Ache

We've painted the master bedroom yesterday, two coats, and my back aches like a mofo. I shouldn't be crying about it but I have to help paint the bathroom today too. The whole thing looks awesome.

Black Friday

Nohemi and I did some preping of the master bedroom and bathroom for painting today. We had to go to Lowes, Bed, Bath & Beyond, Meijers and KMart and there weren't as many shoppers as I was expecting. I wonder where the shoppers went?

Thanksgiving.... burp!

My head hurts from my caffeine cessation thing. My tummy is full from eating turkey and cranberry. Now just waiting for Grey's Anatomy.

The Slowdown

I noticed that sentences in my previous posts were phrased weirdly. I don't know why they made complete sense to me at the time but are awkward looking now.

I haven't had my coffee this morning yet and I seem to be in one piece. I am drinking tea instead. I will try to drink juice or water for lunch instead of (2) 12oz cans of Coca Cola Classic.

Tangent: I am fundamentally opposed to any form of deprivation because of religious reasons. I don't mind an occasional fast but I disagree with the absolutes. The you cannot eat pig or you cannot eat cow are archaic rules that have no valid reason to exist in the modern world.

Now back to my caffeine abstinence.

Tanget:My absolutely no smoking exists because I am a nicotine addict. The rule has a physical, chemical reason to exist. No eating of shrimp does not.

Now really back to my abstinence. I know, I said that I need to gradually decrease my consumption of caffeinated products but I do not think that it will be effective because as with nicotine, I am also a caffeine addict. The process needs to also be cold-turkey or it'll fail. Let's start with a monitored gradual caffeine intake cessation program. Cold-turkey's finality is scaring me. So here are my current values:

1 cup of coffee in the morning
2 12oz cans of Coke for lunch
1 12 oz can of Coke after work
3 12 oz cans of Coke for dinner & prime-time TV

Man! No wonder I have a baby beer gut... that's a six-pack of Coke a day. The program is minus a can a week from my daily intake. I'll be using the label (caffeine-intake-cessation) feature of Blogger beta to check my progress.

Picky

I posted on craigslist an ad for a couple of free 17" CRT monitors available for pick up. No one responded! No one wants free stuff in Kalamazoo?

Antsy

I cannot explain why I have been feeling restless recently. I also feel anxious like I am unable to catch my breath. It usually means that my blood pressure is high...
... and it is. I need to cut back on my caffeine intake. I have managed to quit smoking, now my next target is my caffeine consumption. I need to set a date when I get weaned off of my Coke products and morning cup of coffee. I know my dad will definitely be pleased if he heard this but it's time to acknowledge his valid point. A possible new years resolution? I don't think cold turkey is the way to go with this process. I need Google how others do this.

Iron Nick

I just realized something that will give me lots of grief once the 2007 Microsoft products are released, the shuffle. Every time Microsoft releases a newer version of a product, it never fails that they move the location of things in the menu. I spent a couple of minutes looking for the new location of "Add-In" in the 2007 beta version of Outlook. I was looking around in Outlook on my work PC and changed the color scheme to the Vista black from XP blue. After half a day of using Outlook on my work PC, I figured that I should use it on my notebook too so that everything is uniform. I will be able to update my mailbox at home and at work. It was a good plan until I tried to remember where the theme changing thing was on Outlook. I know, I am anal like that. So anyway, it was at Tools - Options - Mail Format - Editor Options - Color Scheme. Not where Help said it was supposed to be located. I am so looking forward to Vista and looking around for things.

Quest

I am looking for an application that I can use that will allow me to have a prioritized task list with dependencies, searchable, and manage projects. Did I mention that it should work with a BlackBerry too?

Update:
I ran into Project Center on Entourage. However, the feature is not available in Outlook. My current system involves using Lookout with To-Do Bar on Microsoft Outlook 2007. I wonder why Project Center is not available in Outlook?

The Movies: The Departed

Nohemi and I did a bit of shopping tonight then headed to Celebration! Cinema Crossroads to watch The Departed. I like it but I overhead some confused youths behind us on the way out. The movie really wasn't the highlight of the night but my blazer from Banana Republic was!

Mine is three button but is the same material. Yum!

More Links

I am playing with my Mac, here are some of the links that I know I will wondering about in the future.

Note to self, that thing is called BugMeNot! BTW, AT&T is charging me $10 for a Universal Connectivity Charge.

Quicksilver
MacUpdate
Menu Shade
Informit
SpiritedAway

Happy Birthday Harryl!

Harryl turned 28 today. I called him this evening but he was on his way to have dinner with people from work, I think. My little brother is 28.

Home Movie Tips

Tips from CNET
Sound tips
Tips from Microsoft
More from CNET

Sad

XP On Your Thumb Drive

Ever since the reassimilation to Blogger, I haven't posted links to places. So here's some:

• Install XP on a 256MB Thumb Drive
• Mimoco USB Thumb Drives

12th Anniversary

Nohemi and I have been together twelve years today.

20" Wide Screen Monitor

My new monitor arrived today, in the mail, from Dell. It's a 20" widescreen monitor that natively works at 1680x1050. OS X is so pretty running at 1680x1050.

Bathroom

My weekend comprised solely of the remodeling of one of the bathrooms at home. The end product looks wonderful, I think, but was hard work. The bathroom was more work than either of the bedrooms. Possibly even more work than both bedrooms combined. But I like how it turned out and it's all that matters.

Update:

Before Picture

Acer AL2016W

Acer_AL2016W, originally uploaded by hywell.

I've been living with a 15" Philips LCD monitor for my Mac mini. I was checking out Walmart, of all places, yesterday and stumbled upon this relatively cheap 20" monitor from Acer. I purchase Acer LCD monitors for work machines and they work great. I wonder if this will be my birthday present for me.

BTW, It's cheaper through Amazon.

Update:
Maybe not. Travis pointed out the 20" widescreen monitor from Dell.

Update²:
I ordered the Dell instead of the Acer. The Dell monitor is better specs-wise.

Customer Satisfaction

The elections have given control back to the Democrats from a once Republican controlled house and senate. The control of senate is still a close race but control of the house has been decided. Could this be projection of the countries' current satisfaction rating or a result of campaign money well spent?

Super Duper!

I heard about this application for the Mac to create drive clones. I can make full system backups of my Mac mini for free. Super Duper! is for free when making full system backups but is for $27 if you need features like scheduling etc.

I Voted, Did You?

I Voted, Did You?, originally uploaded by hywell.

Game On?

I wonder if Blogger is still having database issues?

Ka-nee-fee

Nohemi bought me a 5" Calphalon Katana Series santoku knife from Bed, Bath & Beyond. It's not as well-balanced as the rest of my knives but I love how the blade looks.