New Mac Daddy

My dad just celebrated his 73rd Birthday on the 25th, and treated himself to a new computer. After hearing me rave about Macs for so long, he finally broke down and got one of his own. Needless to say, he's a happy camper. We had to drive to the Apple Store in Cincinnati to find the Mac mini, everyone in the Dayton area was sold out of them. It looks great on the 20" monitor we got him for Christmas. So much nicer than Windows!!!

I Love Photo Booth

My Mac makes me so much more productive that I've had time to try and clone myself.

I know I haven't posted...

...but between work and doing things around the house, I have been too tired to do much of anything. My idea of a good night is to be in bed by 10:00.

I have been pressure washing the deck the past few days (with Kyle's help) and it's taking more time than I thought. But, it's worth the effort if you can see how good it looks.

If you are a frequent reader of Guy Kawasaki's BLOG, you know he just hosted a get together at his home for BlogHer which looks like it was a lot of fun. Hey Guy, come on, when am I going to get an invite to your home? Seriously, click on the link and check out the photos. Looks like it was a lot of fun.

New Toy

OK, it wasn't the most prudent financial decision, but you have to enjoy life for yourself once in a while. Dana and I were shopping Saturday, and Guitar Center was having their huge pre-4th of July sale from 9:00 pm until midnight. After talking to the sales rep, he agreed to get me the price I wanted without having to wait until later that night, so here it is:

1961 Epiphone Custom Shop SG re-issue in Alpine White. I lowered the action a little when I got it home, and it plays like a dream. No fret rattle, very responsive, and the pickups are scorching hot! I can't get over how light it is compared to my Les Paul Standard. Now I know why Angus Young loves these guitars. (click photo to enlarge)

Some Happy News

For those of you who don't have contact with me each day, I must apologize for not letting you know that I have a new job. I'm an Account Executive with The Berry Company. For those of you unfamiliar with The Berry Company, it's the company that started the Yellow Pages, and was founded in 1910 by LM Berry right here in Dayton, OH. I think some people forget that Dayton was the Silicon Valley of the country almost 100 years ago. How many of you knew that Thomas Watson Sr. started his career at NCR as a salesman and lived in Dayton for many years before moving to IBM in 1914 and turning it into a punch card powerhouse before handing it over to his son, Tom Jr, who turned it into the mainframe computer giant? It's true.

I'm working with print and digital media sales, and so far I love it. My class is in training for approx. 16 weeks, and I look forward to going to work each day (I know, tell you how I feel a year or two from now). My background in technology and the printing industry is serving me well. It's directional media at it's best, and talk about the ultimate Permissions based marketing solution.

I haven't given up on real estate, but things are just dead all over. The housing crisis has caused a lot of problems all over the country, and slowed home sales to a death march. I was tired of working and not getting paid, on top of all the fees that are involved with being a Realtor. It's insane, and yes, I know many Realtors contributed to this situation.

I've included some photos of my new digs, and the view we have from the training room. We will get our office assignments once we are out of training and added to the existing sales teams.

Sad Anniversary

A year ago today I lost my Mom to liver cancer and it's been a tough week for all of us. It seems like yesterday, and it also seems like 10 years ago.

This was the last photo I took of her shortly before she passed.

I miss you Mom, and I love you!

Fishing Trip - June 21st, 2008

Google Search Tips

This might help you improve your Google searches.

June 11th - Kings Island Fun!

Newton Message Pad 120

A while back, Kyle and I were talking about all the computer systems and gadgets I've used over the years trying to make my life easier. I went and dug out my old Apple Newton Message Pad 120 to show him, put in new batteries, and it came to life like the old friend I remember. I couldn't believe it still worked after sitting in it's box for so many years.

This thing was a BRICK compared to the Palm Pilots I've used, and now the Apple iPod Touch. It didn't fit in your pocket, it was bulky, and the battery life left a lot to be desired, but I loved it and was the envy of every one of my co-workers. The only bad thing about getting this back out was that I have lost the cable to connect it to a PC. I'd be curious to see if it would work with XP or not. Oh the memories this thing brings back of taking notes in the many endless and pointless meetings I had to attend.

Our New Fence

Take The Muppet Test...

I'm Fozzie Bear

"Wocka! Wocka!" You're the life of the party, and you love making people crack up. If only your routine didn't always bomb! You may find more groans than laughs, but always keep the jokes coming.

The Muppet Personality Test

Sunday Again

Is it just me, or does it seem like the only chance I get to post on this site is on Sunday afternoon?

We celebrated Dana's 43rd birthday this week, and our Saturday excursion for lunch at The Greene was fun and free from rain. We ate at BD's Mongolian Grill for the first time and it was really good. A place we will definitely try again.

Not much new to post other than the fact the have started putting our dog fence up last week. It will be nice to just open a door and let the dogs out to run and play without having to have them on a leash.

Have a great week!

Another Week Gone By Too Fast

Sunday morning, and trying to play catch-up. Just got some of the pictures I took at our last trip to Cox Arboretum ready on FLICKR if you want to click here and check them out. Click on the photo here to enlarge it, it's one of my favorites.

First, I would like to express my condolences to Jim Kloss at Whole Wheat Radio on the recent loss of his mother. We are here for you Jim, and hope you are doing well during this difficult time.

We met with my dad, Lori & Rick and Patty & Charles at Marion's Pizza in Englewood Friday night for dinner. If you have never had a Marion's Pizza, you don't know what you're missing. Makes me hungry for one right now just thinking of it.

Saturday was spent running errands and getting things done that can only be accomplished on the week-end. I'm going to spend part of the day today getting the yard mowed and helping Dana get some plants in the ground that we bought last week-end and haven't been able to plant due to all the rain we have had.

I'm sitting here looking at a stack of books that I have to read and just haven't had the time. I need a 30 hour day!

Pretty Much Says It All...

OpenOffice 3 Beta New

Got this today from the good people at OpenOffice.org. If you haven't switched to OpenOffice, you need to try this totally free Offfice Suite. Stop paying the Bill! I switched to OpenOffice several years ago and love it. Mac users, this version promises to work with Aqua, so I'm not sure if this is the NeoOffice version or not. Also, if you can afford to send a few bucks to support this organization, please do. It's a rock solid package.

The OpenOffice.org Community is pleased to announce that the public beta
release of OpenOffice.org 3.0 is now available. This beta release is
made available to allow a broad user base to test and evaluate the next
major version of OpenOffice.org, but is not recommended for production
use at this stage.

If you are a regular user of OpenOffice.org, here's a great opportunity
to help us make the next release the best ever.


What's new in OpenOffice.org 3.0?

The most immediately visible change to OpenOffice.org 3.0 is the new
"Start Centre", new fresh-looking icons, and a new zoom control in the
status bar. A closer look shows that 3.0 has a myriad of new features.
Notable Calc improvements include a new solver component; support for
spreadsheet collaboration through workbook sharing; and an increase to
1024 columns per sheet. Writer has an improved notes feature and
displays of multiple pages while editing. There are numerous Chart
enhancements, and an improved crop feature in Draw and Impress.

Behind the scenes, OpenOffice.org 3.0 will support the upcoming
OpenDocument Format (ODF) 1.2 standard, and is capable of opening files
created with MS-Office 2007 or MS-Office 2008 for Mac OS X (.docx,
.xlsx, .pptx, etc.). This is in addition to read and write support for
the MS-Office binary file formats (.doc, .xls, .ppt, etc.).

OpenOffice.org 3.0 will be the first version to run on Mac OS X without
X11, with the look and feel of any other Aqua application. It introduces
partial VBA support to this platform. In addition, OpenOffice.org 3.0
integrates well with the Mac OS X accessibility APIs, and thus offers
better accessibility support than many other Mac OS X applications.

A more detailed guide to the features can be found at
http://marketing.openoffice.org/3.0/featurelistbeta.html

Beta Availability

OpenOffice.org 3 beta is immediately available in US English for
MS-Windows, GNU/Linux, Mac OS X and OpenSolaris platforms from
http://download.openoffice.org/3.0beta. This page also contains details
of where to find localized builds and language packs as they become
available. For more details, please consult the appropriate native
language project - see http://projects.openoffice.org/native-lang.html


Help us gathering bugs in May!

In order to help us release OpenOffice.org 3.0 on schedule in September,
users of the beta release are encouraged to report any bugs, issues or
errors at http://qa.openoffice.org.

If you would like to test just the new features, there is a list of test
cases by component at
http://qa.openoffice.org/ooQAReloaded/TestcaseSpecifications/OpenOffice.org_3.0

If you are nervous about reporting bugs through the formal bug reporting
system, you can simply email details to the user support mailing lists
http://www.openoffice.org/mail_list.html

The developers look forward to receiving your feedback on this beta
release of OpenOffice.org!

"2008 - the year of 3"

Judas Priest Shreds

Man, these guys ROCK! I think they were playing in Guitar Center the last time we were in there.

Eric Clapton - An Off Night

Just goes to show you that even Eric Clapton can have an off night. Oh well, maybe there's hope for my career as a guitarist after all.

I Thought It Was More Than This

68%How Addicted to Apple Are You?
I took this online quiz and thought I was seriously more addicted to Apple Computer products than I thought. I guess I would have tested higher if I owned the iPhone instead of the iPod touch.

Here's a photo with one of Kyles latest Lego creations. I used to build cars and trucks, he builds inter-stellar cruising ships (click to enlarge).

Spring Is Finally Here

Dana and I went to Cox Arboretum Saturday to see what was growing and to check on the tree they had planted in memory of her mother (it's getting ready to bloom, we will check next week and add some photos) and I couldn't believe how much fun I had just wandering around there. It was overcast and raining on and off, so not a lot of people there. I have added photos to my FLICKR site if you want to see the rest of them (click the photo to enlarge).

Not a lot going on. We did get our income tax refunds today, which is amazing since we just filed not even two weeks ago. Electronic filing is the way to go people, let me tell you.

In a very short time, I will turn 42 years old and I'm feeling it. I tell Dana every night that I'm going to get on the tread mill. Well, tonight is the night. Going to get this sorry excuse for a body back into shape while I still can.

Oh, and to Aunt Patty & Uncle Charles in PA who always check my BLOG, Hello, and I hope you are doing well!