09.06.08
Arizona trip
I’m out in Tucson, Arizona traveling with the Toledo football team so I’ll pop a few iPhone photos up here.
07.31.08
iPhone camera problems
Yes, I’m a dork and I love my iPhone but I’m definitely not blind to it’s issues. One of the worst hardware failings is how succeptable the outer camera lens, and more to the point the anti-reflective coating, is to scratch damage.
After using my phone without a protective case for a few months, the camera became almost unusable because the scratched coating created blurry halos around any light sources.
Enter the savior of the iPhone camera: Meguiar’s PlastX plastic polish. (or any optical quality plastic polish for that matter) After five minutes of work with a Q-Tip, it’s as good as or possibly better than new. Pictures below:
07.28.08
Thirsty?
Today while showing a relative what my iPhone can do, I was asked how long it took me to learn it all and I was surprised that I couldn’t come up with a decent answer.
Do you just count the time playing with the device or add all the time it took to learn how to use things like Web browsers and email clients too?
Living a digital lifestyle is such a cumulative thing and new concepts and services pop up every day. If you aren’t familiar with blogging, what do you make of something like Twitter?
How do you keep up?
Some describe it as drinking from a firehose but that’s not quite right.
It’s more like drinking from a fire hose connected to a moving fire truck. If you stop to take a breath, you have a lot of catching up to do.
I actually spend quite a bit of time per day reading magazines like Wired or visiting tech oriented Web sites (lifehacker.com, engadget.com, gizmodo.com, etc…) just to keep up. That doesn’t even count actually playing with and evaluating the technology to see if it’s something useful.
What do you do to keep up? What are your favorite sources for tech info?
New blogging tool
I’ve downloaded a new application for my iPhone that enables me to make posts from just about anywhere. I’ll be testing it for a bit but I sure wish the camera in this didn’t suck so badly.
[edit] Ok then. I have no idea what the slashes are about. So much for using contractions, eh?
[edit 2] After upgrading my blog engine, it seems to be working.
04.06.08
Great show at Frankie’s last night
Disclaimer: I’m sitting here writing this with the dull ache that comes from the bar running out of Jameson and having to substitute Jack Daniels mid-stream, while finishing off the drunk special (ham-n-cheese omlette and homefries) from the greasiest of the greasy, Central Hot Dog. (aka Greasy George’s) I’m clearly under the influence of unclean things.
Some people say the music scene in Toledo sucks but damn was there a great show at Frankie’s Inner City last night. The only band on the lineup that I knew of was The Matt Truman Ego Trip, a really solid local band that’s always fun to see, so I knew the night wouldn’t be a waste. Their up front tongue-in-cheek narcissism is always good for a laugh and they rock, so yeah; game on. I figured the other bands would just be gravy, lumpy, out of town mystery gravy. Wow, was I wrong.
The other two bands were The Hard Lessons, from just up I-75 in Detroit (Go Wings!) and Bryan Scary & the Shedding Tears, from Brooklyn, NY. I have no idea who was considered to be headlining because Bryan Scary came on first but was BY FAR the most entertaining of the bunch, and that shouldn’t be interpreted as a slam on the other bands. I’ll get to them in a minute.
The Hard Lessons is a hard rocking pseudo power trio, with keyboard bass instead of an actual bass player. The first thing I noticed about the band was the vocals coming from singer, Ko Ko Louise. She has a soulful and sultry sound that’s an almost dead-on match for Toledo’s own Michelle McGrath, formerly of The Rivermen and The Capital Sun Rays. I’m not convinced that her vocals mesh well with their music though. Her voice is almost too good for rock and roll. Add in the raw-style guitar and vocals from Dave Grohl lookalike Augie, and you have a band that I won’t hesitate to go see again and again.
I’ve saved the best and strangest act for last; Bryan Scary & the Shedding Tears. I’ve been trying to come up with an accurate description and the only way that works is a comparison with other bands and performers. They can best be described as unequal parts of ELO, the White Stripes, Ringo Starr, Alice Cooper, Tiny Tim and Carrot Top. (I have to qualify that last one. I’ve never seen a lead singer with so many props.) They present a sort of pop symphonic revival movement that is endlessly entertaining. I had to research the exact genre of their sound but at the time I thought, I don’t know what they’re trying to be but whatever it is, they nailed it. They eagerly launch into long musical storytelling that even included props like model airplanes, lab coats and the odd space helmet on Bryan Scary, the lead singer. The band’s music was articulate and complex enough that it must have been written in sheet form first. There’s simply no way songs like theirs were thrown together with a couple repetitive chords and a catchy chorus.
Scary’s on stage performance was riveting. From his huge swaths of blue eyeliner to the donning of a 60s style space helmet, I just couldn’t wait to see what he’d do next. He was just as likely to frantically run in place with his back to the audience as single out one of the Elvis impersonators in the audience. (Yes, you read that right, no I don’t understand it either.)
If you’re bored with the normal rock bands or whiny emo groups, I can’t possibly recommend this group more strongly. GO SEE THIS BAND.
02.09.08
Crazy Cat Lady
My family went out to get (adopt?) a cat from Planned Pethood for my mom. Dad’s been gone for a while and it’s a good time to have pet around again. We all think it’ll be good for her.
So we get there and find the little brown tiger kitten that mom has already fallen in love with. Almost immediately, a nervous-looking spinster (representative) from PP swooped [Yes, she swooped.] on us and cautiously allowed us hold the kitten and had my mom fill out an adoption form. [Ok, I love cats but they're pets, not children. Using the word "adoption" is just the beginning of the crazy.]
While we were holding the cat, she was pretending to make smalltalk, telling us how her sad lonely life also involved being a social worker, [this should have been the first danger sign] and asking about our previous pets. We made the mistake of mentioning a previous ornery cat who always made a break for the door. [Seeing her face when we said this, you'd have thought we just revealed complicity in Mike Vick's dogfighting ring]
So after my mother chose and became attached to this cute little kitten, the crazy-ass cat lady says “no, you can’t have her!” She was so worried about the cat escaping the house in the future, she’d rather keep it in a cage. She did show her kind heart though. As my mom was walking away in tears, she did offer to let the cat MAKE A VISIT to our home to see if we could prove ourselves worthy. [of owning a damn cat!]
What a frickin’ nutball. Screw Planned Pethood, go to your local animal shelter where they know the difference between pets and their own children.