Panoramic Photos of our Farm

I used all of the automatic settings when taking these, so there are some color anomolies, but you can get a good idea of what the farm looks like.

iPod nano

iPod nano
Originally uploaded by Zengame.

This is what Amy wants for her birthday. Apple. iPod. nano. White. 4GB.

Quote of the Day...

Republican Senator Trent Lott, when asked about Harriet Miers's withdrawal, said "I want the President to look across the country and find the best man, woman or minority that he can find."

New Camera (Sort of)...

I'm asking my wife for a Canon SD200 for my birthday (less than a month a way!). For the next week or so, I've borrowed my friend's SD300 which is very similar. It's hard to believe how much smaller it is than my current camera, the Canon A-10. These pictures show the difference in size. Unfortunately, these shots were taken with my lousy camera, the Treo 600. I hope to post some cool pictures over the next 2 weeks. Watch for that!

http://base.google.com

This is what I get when going to http://base.google.com this morning. MercuryNews.Com has a little more information here. Here's a teaser...

Google confirmed on Tuesday the creation of Google Base, a service that potentially expands the company's reach into online classifieds -- and into the territory of Internet auctioneer eBay and craigslist.

Treo 600 vs Audiovox SMT5600

Here's a shot of my PalmOne Treo 600 and BigMac's Audiovox SMT5600. As you can see . the Treo is quite a bit larger, but that gives it a larger screen. The similarities are striking, both of us have installed 1GB cards and use the phone as our MP3 player. Both PDA's are pointed to Mobile Optimized.

It's hard to put a dollar amount on a blog, but...

My blog is worth $5,080.86.
How much is your blog worth?

Go ahead and make me an offer.

Wikimedia Foundation, Inc

I have linked in the past to Wikipedia & Wikibooks. I just found the home page of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc and their other properties: Wikiquote, Wictionary, Wikisource, Wikinews, Wikimedia Commons, Wikispecies and The Wikimedia Meta-Wiki.

The Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. is an international non-profit organization dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free, multilingual content, and to providing the full content of these wiki-based projects to the public free of charge. Wikimedia relies on public donations to meet its goal of providing free knowledge to every person in the world.

OpenOffice.org 2.0 is no longer in Beta...

It's been over seven months since I first told you about the Beta version of OpenOffice 2.0. Now, it has been released and is available for download.

OpenOffice.org 2.0 is the productivity suite that individuals, governments, and corporations around the world have been expecting for the last two years. Easy to use and fluidly interoperable with every major office suite, OpenOffice.org 2.0 realises the potential of open source.

With new features, advanced XML capabilities and native support for the OASIS Standard OpenDocument format, OpenOffice.org 2.0 gives users around the globe the tools to be engaged and productive members of their society.

Download it now. If it is not ready today in your language, it will be shortly. OpenOffice.org 2.0 is yours.

More changes to my blog.

I have deleted TreoVida and migrated those posts to this blog. I posted them with the date and time that they were originally posted. For the comments, I created one comment for each existing comment and quoted the original. This way, it still shows who commented and when.

Spiders are scary...

Changes to my blog

In the past week, I have deleted tons of spam comments. Hopefully, you don't see much of that because I delete it a couple of times per day. Blogger.com has a feature which may significantly reduce (or even eliminate) this crap. It's called word verification and the only apparent downside is that people who leave legitimate comments will be inconvenienced. I am doing this to keep others from making money off of my blog. Let me know if the inconvenience will keep you from leaving comments. If that's the case, I'll try to figure out a custom solution for you.

I have also included Google AdSense advertisements. I don't think that they are too obtrusive. They are context sensitive, so if people find my blog, they may very well find well-targeted ads. If not, they are on the right side of the screen and can be completely ignored. I doubt I will make much money, but if someone is going to monetize this site, I want it to be me.

Also, I have enabled the backlinks function, which will allow me to enable me to keep track of other pages on the web that link to posts on this blog.

Games I'm trying to watch right now...

• LSU Tigers vs Auburn Tigers
• Chicago White Sox vs Houston Astros
• Toby vs Sabrina

The teams I am supporting are bolded.

Zelda Fitzgerald...

Meet my mother's new cat, Zelda Fitzgerald. While getting used to her new surroundings, she prefers to spend the majority of her time under the bed. I'm sure that will change soon and I hope that Zelda provides a great deal of entertainment and companionship. Our cats certainly do.

RIP: Treo & TreoVida

The other day, my Treo stopped working as a phone. The PDA worked (without Internet access of course). I talked to Verizon and they replaced it. The new one works great and sync'd without issue. I will be sending my original Treo back Monday.

In related news, I have ceased updating TreoVida. The only people that seem to read it are spammers. I will be providing Treo updates in this blog in the future and I may migrate those existing posts to this blog. If you're not interested in those posts, please ignore them. Thanks.

Long drive home...

Congratulations Astros!

Last night, the Houstom Astros won the National League Championship Series. For the first time ever, they will compete in the World Series.

At least four of the Astros have played for the Round Rock Express in the past few years, so there's a hometown connection.

My MontBlanc pen...

Several years ago (1991-1992?), I worked for a company which ran a small ad in the back of Byte Magazine. It was my job to create the copy and arrange for the advertising. We were one of Byte's smallest accounts, but they treated us well.

At the end of that year, our account executive sent me a MontBlanc pen as a gift of appreciation. For a while, I bragged about it. Then I tended to forget I had it. I didn't want to carry it, because I was sure that I would lose it. It was kept in the case it came in. For years, I kept it hidden.

I never knew what I would use it for, until about 8 years ago. I was about to buy a house in October of 1997. I decided I would use it to sign my name on the numerous documents at the closing. A week before the closing, I made sure that it worked.

On the day of the closing, I pulled the case out and put it on the conference table. At the time that they put the first document in front of me, I smiled. I reached out and opened the case. I removed the pen and just as I was about to put it to paper to sign my name, the title agent said "That pen doesn't write in black, does it ?". It did and I told her that. She explained that these were legal documents and that they needed to be signed in blue, so that copies would be obvious as copies. She handed me a Bic pen with her company's name on it and I signed everything with that Bic.

I hope that, someday, I will be able to live up to such a fine writing instrument.

Sign seen in local pub...

God created liquor to keep the Irish from conquering the world.

Joke of the day...

Bush and Dick Cheney are enjoying lunch at a fancy Washington restaurant, when the waitress approaches their table to take their order.

She is young and very attractive.

She asks Cheney what he wants, and he replies, "I'll have the heart-healthy salad." "Very good, sir," she replies, and turning to Bush she asks, "And what do you want, Mr. President?" Bush answers, "How about a quickie?"

Taken aback, the waitress slaps him and says, "I'm shocked and disappointed in you. I thought you were bringing in a new administration that was committed to high principles and morality. I'm sorry I voted for you." With that, the waitress departed in a huff.

Cheney leans over to Bush, and says, "Mr. President, I believe that's pronounced 'quiche'."

Source: Joe Stump's Blog at JoeStump.Net

Bimbo Box

I spotted this yesterday at an antique dealer and had no idea what it was. I did see a description of it's function here.

I'm gonna be rich !!!

Check out the email I just received from Bongo Roseveelt. Bongo is looking for a trustworthy person to help him steal some money. He apparently picked my email address from a list of 143 million. Heck, it's an honor just to be nominated.

Dear Sir,

In order to transfer from a Bank some amount of money, I have the courage to look for a reliable and honest person who will be capable for this important business believing that you will never let me down either now or in the future.

I am Bongo Roseveelt,a consulting auditor of prime banks here in South Africa. On June 6,2002,an American Mining consultant/contractor with the South African Mining corporation,Mr. Robert H. Klinsman made a numbered time (fixed)deposit for twelve calendar months,value of United States Dollar(USD $) Fourteen Million Two Hundred thousand in an account. On maturity, The bank sent a routine notification to his forwarding address but got no reply. After a month,The bank sent another reminder and finally his contract employers,the South African Mining corporation wrote to inform the bank that Mr. Robert H. Klinsman died from an automobile accident,that he died without MAKING A WILL, and all attempts by the American Embassy to trace his next of kin was fruitless.

I therefore, made further investigation and discovered that Mr. Robert H. Klinsman in fact was an immigrant from Jamaica and only recently obtained American citizenship.He did not declare any kin or relations in all his official documents, including his Bank deposit paper work. This money total (USD $) Fourteen Million Two Hundred thousand is still sitting in my bank as dormant Account. No one will ever come forward to claim it, and according to South African banking policy,after 5years, the money will revert to the ownership of the South African Government if the account owner is certified dead.

This is the situation, and my proposal is that I am looking for a foreigner who will stand in as the next of kin to MR.Robert H. Klinsman,and a Bank Account abroad will then facilitate the transfer of this money to the beneficiary/ next of kin. This is simple, all you have to do is to immediately send me a bank account anywhere in the world for me to arrange the proper money transfer paperwork. This money total USD ($14.2M) will then be paid into this Account for us to share in the ratio of 70% for me, 25 % for you and 5% for expenses that might come up during transfer process. There is no risk at all, and all the paper work for this transaction will be done
by me using my position and connection in the banks in South Africa. This business transaction is guaranteed.

If you are interested, please reply immediately through my personal email sending the following details:

(1) Your Full Name/Address
(2) Your Private Telephone/fax Number.
(3) Your Account Particulars.

Please observe the utmost confidentiality, and be rest assured that this transaction would be most profitable to both of us because I shall require your assistance to invest my share in your country.  I look forward to your earliest reply.

Yours,
Bongo Roseveelt.

Coolest way to wash your hands

I had lunch with some buddies today at Rudy's BBQ. Near the entrance, they have sinks to wash your hands. This automated hand washing device is new and you put your hands in the holes in the top. For 12 seconds, it sprays your hands and massages them. When you remove your hands they are clean and wet. Then, you just dry them with a paper towel (a relatively low-tech process). The roll of stickers are blue circles with white letters that boldly state "I have clean hands!".

Useless dialog of the Week...

Uh, this would be a good time to click Cancel.

NETGEAR - Storage Central SC101

Personally, I'm using NASLite and have been for about a year. The Netgear Storage Central looks like a much more elegant solution.

"Storage Central is easy to setup and install. Just slide in one or two 3.5” IDE disk drives of any capacity; connect Storage Central to any wired or wireless router or switch from any vendor, then configure with Smart Wizard install assistant. Now you’re ready to access files from any PC on your network, as a simple letter drive."

Additional Resources:

• Support forum on Netgear's website- There do seem to be quite a few issues with the device. Here's the support forum on Netgear's website. It appears to only accept specific IDE drives.
• Reviews @ Cnet
• Reviews @ Amazon

Red River Shootout....

Today is the big game and Texas has lost the last five Red River Shootouts. Hopefully, we can win this one, the 100th game between OU and UT. The actual name has been changed to the Red River Rivalry, but we we're still gonna call it a shootout. OK ?

These boots are made for walkin'...

Amy bought her first pair of cowboy boots yesterday at Cavender's Boot City. I will let her tell you about them.

I'm not sure if it was my 30th birthday or my 8th anniversary of living in Texas or just the cosmic alignment... but earlier this year, I decided I needed a pair of cowboy boots. I have never really considered myself a cowboy boot-wearing kind of girl, although I probably officially earned them the summer I worked on the HF Bar Dude Ranch in Saddlestring, Wyoming!

The first boot store we went to had an okay selection, but the boots were sorted by size as opposed to brand or style, so it was kind of like shopping at Payless for 10 times the price.

The experience at Cavender's was far better. John from East Texas was my friendly and knowledgeable sales person. I appreciated his honesty about what brands are better for first-time boot wearers, what brands are known more for their name rather than their quality, and how the construction of the boots varies. I actually ended up buying the first pair I tried on at Cavender's. They are Ariat stockman boots, and I got them for $150. I'm wearing them as I type this, even though I'm already in bed. (Just kidding!) And despite the fact that Eric probably thinks I should have stuck with any one of my many pair of Birkenstocks, he has been completely supportive of this little whim. Thanks, baby!

Latinitas Magazine

Thursday, Amy attended the 2005 Greater Austin Hispanic Chamber of Commerce Community Service Awards Luncheon. A friend of ours recieved the Luz de la Communidad (Community Visionary) Award for Latinitas, an online magazine which she created for Hispanic girls.

At the early age of twenty-five, Alicia Rascon, who was born in Mexico, is co-founder of “Latinitas” an online magazine. Latinitas is a non-profit organization whose main mission is to empower Hispanic girls to succeed through media and technology applications. Ms. Rascon has dedicated herself to providing new avenues and opening the doors to a new future for Latina youths by creating a forum where Latina girls can feel good about themselves. In 2005, the Austin Chronicle’s Best of List named Alicia Rascon, “Best Aspiring Journalist 2005.”

Above quote provided by the September 28, 2005 issue of the Greater Austin Hispanic Chamber of Commerce newsletter.

Fourth Anniversary Weekend

Amy and I celebrated our fourth wedding anniversary a little early this year. We were able to take advantage of some great deals.

Friday night, we went to a going away Happy Hour at Nuevo Leon for two of Amy's co-workers who are leaving. We left the festivities early to go out to dinner with our friends, Chad and Amanda (she is one of the people leaving Amy's company). We enjoyed visiting with them on the rooftop of Whole Foods.

Instead of going home, we checked into the Hampton Inn Round Rock, approximately 1 mile from our house. You might be wondering why we would choose to stay so close to home... it was free! Several members of Amy's family had stayed in the same hotel back in February, so we had earned two nights' lodging.

Saturday, we slept in until 7:00 and enjoyed a free continental breakfast. Then we did some shopping around town before having lunch at Central Market and going back to the hotel for a nap.

That evening, we got all gussied up and went to dinner at Hill Country Pasta House. A friend had given us a coupon for a free entree, so even with a bottle of wine, two entrees, and a dessert (free because our waiter found out what we were celebrating), we only spent $50 !(and that included a ten dollar tip). The food was delicious, and we had great service from Hank - the same guy who waited on us the only other time we went to that restaurant. He even remembered us!

Following dinner, we drove downtown, parked for free at St. David's Episcopal Church, and enjoyed an amazing concert by Will Taylor & Strings Attached featuring several talented artists - Abra Moore, Suzi Stern, Libby Kirkpatrick, Tucker Livingston, Kacy Crowley, Barbara K, and Patrice Pike. It was a CD release concert benefitting CASA of Travis County. Oh, and did I mention it was free? We were on the guest list!

Sunday morning, we slept REALLY late (8:00) and had our free breakfast again. Then we just lounged around watching a movie until check-out time. After we got home, we watched the Auburn game, which we had recorded from Saturday. Auburn stomped all over Steve Spurrier's South Carolina team. The Gamecocks played embarassingly bad football, but we'll take the win just the same. War Eagle! Sitting around watching TV was exhausting, so we took a long nap...had to drum up enough energy to work on this blog post.