Isn't She Cute?!

This may look like a studio shot, but it was actually taken on a playground in Tenino, WA. The blue background is a plastic plate behind the slide that Lily is sitting at the top of. I really like the way this shot turned out. I played a lot with exposure compensation, white balance, and then used the "Glow" and "Soft Focus" effects in Picasa2 after doing a LOT of sharpening in Photoshop. Isn't she cute?! 

Lily at the Park

I took this shot at the same park as yesterday's post. Lily crawled around on a blanket while Mikayla played on the playground. Lily can really move now!

Swing

This is Mikayla at a park in Tenino this weekend. She had a blast! Expect to see several shots from this weekend on my blog this week. But, I am running late this morning, so off to work I go! Happy Monday!

Rambles on a Friday Morning

I took this shot a little over a year ago at Otter Rock. When I first got back, I wasn’t happy with any of the shots. Now that time has passed, I see them a little different and there are a couple that I like. Maybe it’s just me, but I thought I’d share this one.

Sorry for no post yesterday, but I’d rather not post that just posting simply to have a post show up everyday. I mean, why post if there isn’t anything to say? Today I have a lot to say. I’ll probably break it up a little and save some for the weekend.

It’s Friday! This has been a long week. At my office, we have one person on vacation this week and we are training someone new. The trainee takes a lot of time and at this point isn’t help. I’m sure that will change with time, but it makes for a little bit of stress. Hopefully since it is Friday the day will just fly by.

After work, we are heading up to Olympia to visit Krista’s family. It should be a fun weekend. Hopefully I will return with tales of poker and photos.

Okay, here is the weird link of the week. I have no idea if this is real or not, but it is weird. These guys kill a goldfish and then bring it back to life. I don’t know if it doesn’t really die, if it’s trick photography, or what. But you’ll want to watch this video. As of right know it has 1023 diggs, so it must be true, right? ;)

Hopefully I’ll have a chance this weekend to post about the Canon 5D, Google’s talk, etc. But as for now, time to go to work.

Have a good Friday/weekend everyone!

Pocket Rockets Fall to 96os

Last night was Lefty's Poker Night and I managed to go. The night started off well and only 25 minutes in I peaked at my hole cards and they were Pocket Rockets (AA). I kept my poker face on, but inside I was jumping for joy. To make things better, I was the big blind. Everyone folded except the little blind, he took his 50 he had in the pot and made it 100 to call the big blind. I raised it (making it 200, that's the only raise I could make playing limit hold'em) and he called. I didn't put him on great cards. The flop came 995 rainbow. This was very good for me, unless my opponent had a 9. Now, being the small blind (and chip leader at the table), he could play a 9, but I thought it was unlikely. He checked the flop and I bet and he called. The turn was a 2 and the small blind bet, I raised, he re-raised, and I called. I was worried that he may have made a set of two's. Now I was pot commited - I had 900 of my 1475 chips in the pot. The river was useless (but no straight possible, no flush possible) and he checked, I bet, he raised, and I called. I lost 1300 chips to a 96 off suit holding AA. It was sickening. I blame it on the limit poker as opposed to no-limit and my inability to lay down good cards when I should be scared by the cards on the table. I'm barely a no-limit player and I am most certainly not a limit player. On a positive note, I was home by 8pm.

Bill Me Later

I was browsing at RitzCamera.com, looking at flash units, when I noticed something. A "Bill Me Later" option on purchases over $250. You've heard of the no payments for 90 days thing before, but what makes this one different is that they are promoting it as a secure way to buy. Nevermind that each purchase is an 18% credit line at Chase Manhattan Bank, it's secure! All you do is give them some information to verify (address, last 4 of SSN, etc). No credit card numbers or bank account numbers given out, you just get a bill. And better yet, you don't have to make a payment for 90 days! And, ontop of all that, RitzCamera gives you 10% off your purchase of $250 or more if you use this payment option.

I think this is a low blow and an ingenious marketing technique. Companies want people to buy more and put it on credit. People want to feel secure online. Bingo, in steps Bill Me Later. I know this isn't the first time that a company uses the fear of ID theft, fraud, etc. to make money, but it's the first time I've seen it as a shopping cart option on a site I frequent. I think we are going to start seeing these things more and more. Anyone else seen something like this on a well-known website?

Future Plans

I took this shot of Mikayla on Saturday morning. Krista’s parents were staying with us and Mikayla was showing off. Her latest thing is those goggles. She doesn’t use them in the water, just around the house. I had to get a shot of her proudly wearing them.

This was a long weekend. Saturday we all were going to go to a wedding down in Eugene (1 ½ hour trip – one way), but Lily got sick. I ended up staying home with Lily for the afternoon/evening. Then yesterday Mikayla had a birthday party to go to, so I watched Lily again for a few hours. I have a new appreciation for what Krista does. It is a lot of work taking care of one (sick) baby. I can’t imagine being home alone with two kids 5 days a week. That is a lot of work. Makes my job look easy.

This weekend I began doing a little re-structuring. I will eventually be moving my blog as well as making some other changes. As of right now, there is only one new thing, Mikayla has a podcast: http://kaya.billenglish.net. The first episode is up, but it’s only 1 minute long. It’s basically a test of my new iPod mic, Audacity (my audio software), and how I am going to be putting up the podcast. The RSS feed needs some work. According to WordPress (the CMS that I am using for her podcast), if you include an absolute URL to an mp3 in your post, it treats it as a podcast. Well, I did this and it’s not putting the right stuff in my RSS feed. If anyone out there knows anything that would help me, please e-mail me! I’m doing a lot of research, but there is just so much information out there.

Eventually, www.billenglish.net is going to be my webpage. It will link to my business site (www.ouralbumonline.com), my blog (melange.billenglish.net), and much more. It will have my resume online, contact info, etc. I need to make time for all of this though. One step at a time is my approach. The first piece is Kaya’s Podcast. I am looking forward to publishing 3-10 minutes a week of her latest vocabulary/songs/words/etc.

After a bit of online research, I decided to get the Griffin iTalk. It’s an attachment for the iPod that allows for voice recording. It has a built in mic (that I am not at all happy with), but it also has a jack to plug in another mic. I hope that the audio quality of plugging in another mic is good, otherwise I will be looking for another solution for capturing Mikayla’s audio. I also need to learn how to disguise my iPod. It’s all Mikayla wanted to do – “hold daddy’s music?”

Update on Lily (right now!) - she just barfed on my side of the bed...man!

My Dad Has a Blog!

[Link to my Dad’s blog]

My dad now has a blog! He has some great photos of my girls and the rodeo up so far. Be sure to add his RSS to your reader or bookmark his site. I am really looking forward to seeing photos he has taken.

Having said that, he is on vacation and not near a computer until Saturday, so don’t expect an update until next weekend.
Hope you all are enjoying your weekend!

Not enough time in the day for all these podcasts!

[No photo today. Go visit Krista's page and see my cute girls there!]

I just discovered “KFI’s Tech Guy”. It is Leo Laporte’s radio show that he also broadcasts as a podcast. It’s a GREAT show. I love it. The only problem is, it is twice a week at 2 hours each. Add this to the 1.5 hour TWiT podcast once a week, the latest 45 minute sermon from Covenant Life Church, a 40 minute weekly episode of techPhile, a 30 minute Diggnation, and a 40 minute Mike’s Tech Show, and a handful of other random < 15 minute podcasts….and WHOA happens FAST. I’ve easily got 10+ hours of podcasts to listen to a week. I pretty much exclusively listen to them in the car, so that limits me to about 1.75 hours a day, M-F. And to make matters worse, I doubt I am done finding good podcasts. Here are my recommendations:

• TWiT (This Week in Tech)
• TWiT is basically a round table style meeting of some of the top geeks in the US just talking about technology this week. Leo Laporte, Kevin Rose, Patrick Norton, John C. Dvorak, Roger Chang, and more!!

• KFI’s Tech Guy
• This podcast is basically Call For Help on radio. It’s very fun to listen to. I love Leo and there is a lot of good information given out on this show.
  

• Diggnation
• Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht chat about the top digg stories of the week. Very informative and fun to listen to.
  

• techPhile
• Another technology podcast. They talk about all kinds of stuff; Xbox 360, politics, IE 7, Vista, podcasting, etc..
  

• 2 Minute Photoshop Tricks
• A podcast in its infancy, but VERY good. They could use a better host (voice), but the content is great. I learned something new about Photoshop just last night!
  

• Covenant Life Church
• This is the church that Joshua Harris pastors. It’s way over in Maryland, but all the sermons go online and podcast each week. I’ve heard two now and I’m hooked. It’s a great mid-week listen to on a lunch break.

• Mike Tech Show
• The Mike Tech Show is good. It’s not TWiT or KFI’s Tech Guy, but it’s good. If I have to end up cutting a show, it will probably be this one. I have really enjoyed it though, so the thought of cutting it is sad.
  

I don’t have time to listen to all these. I’ll probably keep downloading them and just archiving them for the day to come that I can sit down for 800 hours in a row and catch up because that’s the kind of person I am. I have said it before and I say it again, I have a disease. I just simply can’t throw things away.

Well, I didn’t get home at 6 last night. It was 7pm before I got home. The lady I am training at work was out of balance and it took a LONG time to fix it. I don’t like talking about work on my blog, so I’ll stop there.

And now, for all 2 of you that haven’t given up trying to read this terribly long post…I was finally able to download the World Series of Poker episode that aired Tuesday night. It was put up yesterday. I know I can’t complain, but I’m going to anyway. That is a long time in between airing it and when it went up for download. During the regular TV season, shows would be up within hours of airing. I guess some people are just slacking off during the summer.

And now I say farewell to the laptop. My parents are leaving for vacation today for a week and my brother is meeting up with them. He wants them to bring him his laptop. I have used it a lot the past two weeks and it makes me want a laptop more than ever. It is so nice to be online outside, on the couch, etc.. But, I’d need to spend at least $1000 to get one I’d like and that is a little much right now. Maybe I’ll come up with an idea for a book to sell on Lulu.com and buy a book with the profits…not likely. Me? Write? Ha! I can’t write. This blog is a testimony to that.

Rocks, NES/Excitebike, Norton, and Cookies

I enjoy taking pictures of odd signs. “Rocks next ½ mile” is not a funny saying and is by no means profound, but I love the image that goes with it. I am building a collection of funny/interesting/odd signs.

Well, yesterday I found the Nintendo. It was in a box in the garage. Unfortunately, I realized that I did not own Excitebike. I packed up the NES anyway in hopes that Salem would have Excitebike accessible. Somehow even after the garage search, I had enough time to hit Starbucks yesterday morning. I really needed that triple vente caramel latte.

On my lunch break I headed over to Gayle’s house to download and install Norton SystemWorks 2005. I didn’t end up finishing it on my lunch, so I went back after work (5:45 to 7:15) to finish up. Why did that take so long? Symantec puts you on hold for 20 minutes when they forget to “complete the order” after it’s paid for. For some unknown reason the Symantec downloader only downloads at 30 Kb/s on a 4 megabit internet connection. A 1.2 Ghz processor should have more than 128 MB of RAM when running XP home. But, I got grilled sandwiches and a half a watermelon to take home.

After the Norton nightmare I stopped by Game Crazy in hopes that they would have Excitebike for the NES. Sure enough, they had multiple copies. And, such a great deal too! Only $12.95 for a 1980’s NES game. *dripping with sarcasm* But, they had it and now Eugene has it for his object lesson and I have it to add to my collection of NES games.

It was a long day. I got home at 8:15pm, had dinner, ate cookies, talked a bit, and went to bed. Hopefully this evening I’ll make it home by 6pm.

Bat

I shot this bat at the *gasp* Oregon Zoo last week. It was incredibly dark and I didn't have a flash. I was so glad I had a digital camera and a lens with IS. This was shot at 135mm with my 75-300 IS lens at ISO 400 at 1/30s. I knew I could slightly underexpose the image in Capture One, so I bumped my ISO up to 400 and waited for a moment that he was doing something interesting/fun, but not moving a lot, because 1/30s isn't fast enough to stop most motion. I think it really worked well. I had zero confidence while I was shooting, but I am very happy with the result.

It's Wednesday, so if I make it until lunch, I'll be half way through my work week. My lunch today will be spent installing Norton Internet Security on a computer for a board member of the Credit Union. I'm getting home made grilled ham & cheese sandwiches out of the deal, so I am happy. Now, just to make sure I make it until lunch time.

I have been staying up too late lately (no pun intended). Last night I wasn't trying to fall asleep until midnight. I might need the help of Starbucks this morning. We'll see if I have time. I need to find my NES and Excitebike for a friend to use for an object lesson later this week. I hope it's in the house, otherwise I'll have to kiss Starbucks good-bye and brave the garage. *Shudder*

Wish me luck.

More Zoo, Windows Updates, and Poker

I took this shot of Mikayla and Papa at the Zoo. Mikayla was getting a little fussy, so Papa took her for a walk. When she got down from his shoulders, she wanted to make friends with everyone. “I sit here?” she asked of a boy sitting on a mat waiting for the bird show to start.

Speaking of Windows updates (*wink*), I find them very frustrating. Last night makes twice now that my machine has rebooted itself after installing updates. That isn’t a shocker to any Windows users out there, but what makes it frustrating is that I had my updates set to download and let me install them. I don’t know how it was switched. It is not good though when you have processes started at night that will take several hours to complete and your machine decides it wants to reboot itself.

I need to think of a better way to separate topics. Maybe I should write more on each topic and make them separate posts, or save them as a draft so I will have things to post later in the week.

Topic 3: It’s Poker Night @ Lefty’s and I’m going! Yes! It’s been a month, but if all goes well, I will be there. Come and join me! I am really looking forward to it. I can’t believe I spaced out last week and forgot. That’s what vacation will do to you.

Hard Drives

No, this isn’t a hard drive. This is a tiger at the Oregon Zoo. I really like my Canon 75-300 f/4-5.6 IS lens. I shot this at 1/125s and ISO 200. The image stabilization is simply amazing in Canon lenses. For anyone out there with a Canon SLR, go for the IS!

Mikayla had slightly higher expectations at the Zoo than we could deliver. When she was looking at the tiger, she said, “I go in there?” Try to explain to a 2yr old that going in to pet tigers isn’t a good idea. It was interesting. We got to thinking though, her previous experiences with animals include going to the Alpaca ranch in Tenino where she gets to chase, pet, etc. all the animals. Why not at the Zoo? 2yr old logic is really fun.

Yes, I guess since this post is titled “Hard Drives” I should at least touch the topic. Let me just put this simply, I have hard drive issues. I never have enough. I can’t throw anything away….and I can’t delete anything either ;)

It’s sick when I add up my active HDs in my machines: 160 + 160 + 200 + 250 + 40 + 17 + 20 + 20 = 867 GB. That doesn’t count Krista’s computer. Nearly a terabyte of data storage and I run out? Well, right now I have a good 200 GB free. I just can’t throw anything out. Photos, music, documents, tv, home movies, etc. – it just adds up. Then there is the backup of the important stuff that I want on both my machine and my server.

I just need and endless supply of hard disk space. Gmail is great because they keep increasing my storage limit. I don’t have to ever delete an e-mail. See, I want to never have to delete a file.

For those of you who delete out there, how do you do it? How can you part with data? Data that you may never be able to get again? Is this a problem that just I have or do other people out there suffer from the same disease?

BTW, I only have 500MB left on my 20GB iPod…

I'm running OSX!!!!

No, I didn't go out and buy a mac. I followed these instructions (and these too) to install the OSX x86 version to my machine. Why? Because it's cool! Can I do anything in it? No. Can I install anything to it? No. WAY COOL none the less. It is running natively on MY PC.

This makes me think, why is Apple not planning on licensing their OS to the masses? Steve Jobs needs to realize that millions of people want an alternative to Windows for their PCs... I'd buy it.

I'd post screenshots, but I can't get my network card to work in OSX. At this point it is very much just a novelty to have it.

Doh!! Looks like it just broke :) "You need to restart your computer" comes up now when I try to boot it. Well, that was a fun 30 minutes. Guess I'll have to rebuild the drive :)

digg dugg

Over the last year or so my online life has changed drastically. I ALWAYS have Firefox open. I ALWAYS have 3 tabs open in Firefox; Gmail, Bloglines, and digg. Today, I’ll briefly write about Firefox and Gmail, but my guess is that anyone reading this knows about those.

Firefox is the browser of choice today. There are hundreds of reasons to use it, but the most basic are:

• Leaps and bounds ahead of IE as far as functionality.
• Most viruses/spyware are/is targeted at IE, so if you use something else, it helps you.
• TABS!!!
• TONS of great extensions.

Ok, now Gmail. Google is an amazing company. Google Search, Gmail, Picasa2, Google Earth, news.google, etc.. The list just goes on. Gmail is currently giving away 2.5 GB of e-mail space with your e-mail account. It is free, conversation based, and has the power of Google’s search behind it. I will never go back to an Outlook Express pop3 based e-mail account. Never. If you want a Gmail account, e-mail me and I’ll send you an invitation.

RSS has stormed the Internet. Everyone has an RSS feed now. I have 46 feeds that I read on Bloglines. I like Bloglines because I can access my feeds from any computer. If you use an RSS reader application, you don’t have them with you everywhere you browse. Bloglines makes it nice, because you simply login and from any machine you have access to all your feeds and you know what you have read and what you haven’t. I recommend it to everyone. That is almost exclusively how I “cruise” the internet now. That and digg.

Digg is like Slashdot that the readers control. Anyone can submit a story/webpage/link to digg and then when other users “digg” it, it gets a higher score. Eventually, it may end up on the front page of digg. It makes it very easy to “digg” stories. Then, you can find them again in your personal “dugg stories” area. It even has an RSS feed for each user that you can add to your webpage or add to your live bookmarks in Firefox (another reason to use Firefox). Kind of a social bookmarking site. I love digg.

If you like digg, you might check out diggnation. It is a podcast/videocast by Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht that goes over the top digg stories each week. They bring their own fun personalities and comments to the best digg stories. I have really enjoyed them.

Here are the links to everything I talked about:

Firefox - http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/
Gmail - http://Gmail.google.com
Google Search - http://www.google.com
Picasa2 - http://www.picasa.com
Google Earth - http://earth.google.com/
Google News - http://news.google.com
About RSS - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rss
Bloglines - http://www.Bloglines.com
My Bloglines - http://www.Bloglines.com/blog/englishw
Digg - http://digg.com/
My digg - http://digg.com/users/englishw
Diggnation - http://revision3.com/diggnation
Diggnation - http://diggnation.typepad.com/
Kevin Rose - http://www.kevinrose.com/
Alex Albrecht - http://alexalbrecht.typepad.com/alex/

“The Internet has been really slow…”

Today was a busy day. Today was my cousin Carly’s 14th birthday party and we had a wedding to attend. We made it to everything, had a good time, and didn’t have any major breakdowns with the girls. That is a major accomplishment.

My aunt and uncle have a DSL internet connection with a Linksys wireless router. This is because when it was setup, my cousin CJ lived there too (he has since moved to OSU). There were two computers on their network and they couldn’t have been further apart. One upstairs, one down, etc… Wireless is a perfect solution for them. My dad and Zach set it up, enabled WEP, and made sure there was a good connection.

Well, today they told us that their internet “has been really slow for a LONG time now.” They blamed it on moving the downstairs computer from one room to another. I sat down at the computer to setup Carly’s new 4GB green iPod mini and thought I would inspect the internet slowage while I was there. We got a USB 2.0 card installed and Carly was loading CDs onto her iPod. She was thrilled. Now onto the network.

I inspected and found that the “VanWetten Network” had a very strong signal (5 out of 5 bars). However, that was not the connection they were connected to. They were connected to “home network”, an unsecured wireless network of one of their neighbors. This connection only had two of five bars and was intermittent. I couldn’t help from laughing as I changed the order of preferred networks back how it should be. This was a first for me. I had heard of people mooching off of their neighbor’s internet connection to avoid paying for service, but to be connected (for weeks if not months) without knowing and still paying for a DSL line, that was a first.

We finally pinned it to a power outage that happened a long time ago. The computer must have been turned on before the router was brought back online and it simply searched for a wireless network within range and connected. Somehow that new connection was made the default connection. Anyone else have fun storied like that to share? I am still chuckling about this one and I have a feeling I will be for awhile.

iMAgiNiff…

I don’t know how many of you have played iMAgiNiff, but if you haven’t and you are an analytical (someday I’ll write about the frustrations of a spell checker not knowing what you are trying to spell.) person, steer clear.

The game goes like this, someone picks up a card and inserts a person’s name into the blank, so it reads, “iMAgiNiff Bill was a tool, which would he be.” Then it lists things like, jackhammer, level, toenail clippers, screwdriver, and a couple more. Everyone picks a number and the majority moves on. For instance, if 4 people choose toenail clippers, 1 person chooses level, etc. The toenail clipper choosers move a square.

We played this game last night. It was easily the dumbest thing I have played in years. Its place is in a college group gathering for an ice-breaker or something. But, I won’t say anything bad about the game (yeah, what I’ve said so far isn’t bad) since Zach bought it.

Moving on…. Today is my work week. My Monday, my Friday, all wrapped into one. Vacation is over, but I just have to make it through today and I get a weekend. We have a new hire at work that I will be training for two weeks, so that will make life interesting. I have never done training like this, but I’m kind of excited about it.

Last subject I promise. There is a photo today! I managed to catch this Bald Eagle in flight during the bird show at the Zoo on Tuesday. With almost all photos, they could be better, but for the most part, I’m happy with this one. Especially considering he made one flight and I didn’t think I got the shot at the time. That was the only exposure I took.

I have one or maybe two more from the Zoo that will have to wait until next week. Happy Friday everyone!!!

Podcasting & Poker

[No photo at this time]

No, I am not turning this blog into a podcast. That takes too much time and I don’t think there would be much interest. I am starting to listen to podcasts though. It amazes me how many there are out there. If anyone knows of any good ones, please, e-mail me. I am just starting to build my subscriptions list.

Last night we played some poker. Little did we know that we were playing with 51 cards. The ace of spades was left in the box when the cards were taken out. I won’t say who counted the cards twice and didn’t catch it, but you know who you are ;)

Sorry about the photo, but I want to do a little more post-processing on the ones I want to put up next and I haven’t had the time. I am still installing my software on my desktop. Maybe I’ll post a photo later today.

Pachyderm

Well, yesterday was our big trip to the Oregon Zoo. Mikayla had a BLAST! The elephants were the highlight of the trip and they were almost last, so that was good.

It's hard to take good photos of animals in captivity. For the elephants, I tried zooming in close and capturing their facial features. I think it works. I really like this shot.

I'll be posting more this week from the zoo. I got bats, tigers, eagles, and more. I didn't end up doing night shots in Portland last night, I was just too tired. I was so tired I forgot about Poker Night at Lefty's! How was it (for anyone that went)?

Also, I am posting this entry from my newly installed Windows XP machine. Yes, my iPod/iTunes works now. \\/00T!!

Mak'n iTunes work again!

My iPod has not been sync'ing with my computer for a long time. It simply won't. I have tried re-installing iTunes and a TON of other things. It will sync on another computer though, so I know it is an issue with my PC. I have newly acquired a 200GB HD that I backed up all of my data to yesterday. Today, after a trip to see monkeys, elephants, zebras, and lions, I will be re-installing Windows XP Pro on my desktop machine. If all goes well, I should be listening to tunes on my iPod tonight! Perhaps as I take night shots of Portland...that part is still up in the air. I'd like to get some sunset/night shots of Portland with Mt. Hood in the background. My dad has today off work and I think we might make a trip tonight...we'll have to see.

So, prepare for pictures. There isn't one today to increase the suspense ;)

P.s. I am not re-installing just because of iTunes. I'd say it was 95% iTunes, 5% other reasons ;)

Short (for Eugene)

I have been told by a source that will remain anonymous that my blog entries are too long. Here is a short one for ya.

Boycott Exxon Car Wash

Today’s post is a venting. It is also my 100th post.

Yesterday I went outside to hand-wash my Ford Explorer & Taurus. But, I couldn’t find my car washing stuff. So, I sat outside and watched Mikayla play in the backyard. I had a nice lazy day. I napped, watched the 3rd World Series of Poker circuit event, and just enjoyed a lazy afternoon. Later, we decided to go to Wal-Mart. $0.88 and $1.32 items add up fast – and that’s all I’m saying about Wal-Mart right now. For some reason Mikayla had a breakdown when we left Wal-Mart. So, I thought, “Well, I wanted to get my Explorer washed. I bet going to a car wash would make Mikayla happy.” So we went.

$5 and 3 minutes later, hundreds of dollars of damage was done to my vehicle. My rear windshield wiper was all bent out of shape – completely ruined. More than that, while we were in the car wash and it was being all bent out of shape, it scraped the paint off my back end in a few places (4” scrapes). I’m no auto expert, but I believe that is not cheap to have fixed. I was mad for quite a while.

Fortunately, I think I was calmed down by the time we started playing poker. I think the pizza roll dinner helped that. 10 people started and I finished 8th. For the second time in a row, I went out on the last hand before someone with a lot of chips had to leave and we evenly divided up his chips. That was a little frustrating, but I got over it. I think everyone had a lot of fun. The bean dip was good, the Pepsi was good, the chips were good, and the brownies were best. I dealt most of the time and then sometime after I went out, JD took over for me so I could focus on my food.

I know why I didn’t do well last night. I got almost zero cards. The few times I had a hand, someone else at the table had a slightly better hand. I did a good job at laying hands down. Well, maybe not the last one. I hadn’t seen a face card in well over an hour and then I’m dealt ATs. I raise before the flop and ATM (Eugene) calls me. The flop comes T 6 9 rainbow. I bet and ATM calls. Either the turn or the river is a 7, I don’t remember which, but the turn was checked. I have top pair with an ace kicker. Having called a raise before the flop, I put ATM on a really small pair or over cards that didn’t hit. There was a lot in the pot and I was getting low on chips. I move all in and ATM calls me and shows the 58 to make a straight. I was shocked. How could he call a raise with those cards? He had a nice size stack (11,200 after he took mine – with 40,000 in play), so I guess he could afford to play anything. Especially since he knew it was his last hand – you have to play your last hand. It was just a bad read on my part. There is no way I would have put him on a 58. The ATM just took deposits last night. Only one major withdrawal was made. If this keeps up, he might have to look for a new nickname ;)

I have greatly enjoyed this blog over the last 6 months. Hopefully I’ll continue it. I have a rhythm down now. And I never seem to have a shortage of topics to write about. /me raises a glass of Pepsi, “Here’s to the next 100 days and 100 posts!”

iPod in the car

As many of you know, my car stereo is outfitted for my iPod. For nearly a year now I have enjoyed high quality music in my car with my Alpine stereo and all the music I own just a few buttons away. Well, this technology is getting cheaper. If you have a stereo that has CD changer controls or has the ability to add satalite radio, your iPod could be connected to your stereo for $150. Click here for more information.

Wow, two posts in one day...what is this world coming to?

Wireless Security: A Joke

Wireless internet is great. 802.11 a/b/g has become so affordable, everyone is doing it. Heck, I’m posting this blog entry from an 802.11g connection. But, what about security? Now, I’ll say right up front, I am not a security expert my any means. I’m not even a security amateur. So, having said that, take the rest of this post for what it’s worth.

Joe internet user goes down to Best Buy. He buys a wireless access point and a PCMCIA card for his laptop – all for less than $100. He takes it home and plugs it in. After reading the quick start guide (90 seconds) he is now an expert and seamlessly starts cruising his broadband internet connection from his lazyboy. Joe is nobody. He doesn’t have anything people would want to steal, so he isn’t worried. Besides, who goes around connecting to people’s wireless internet connections anyway?

Joe’s friend comes over with his laptop and instantly connects to his connection. He tells Joe he should setup WEP encryption and MAC address authentication. Joe doesn’t know what that means, but lets his friend set it up. Joe now feels invincible. Little does he know that WEP encryption can be cracked in 10 minutes and MAC address spoofing is a matter of running an application.

For Joe user, WEP and MAC address authentication is enough. Unless he has a geek neighbor that is determined not to pay a monthly internet bill, he should be fine. Now, a business is a different story. Now there is customer data, business secrets, and a lot more that needs to be secure. This is why I think that until things change, businesses should have two networks. There is no reason for desktop machines to be wireless. And laptops in meetings? There should be plugs for them to plug in to. Wireless should be reserved for PDAs and laptops that do not need access to the main network. E-mail, checking news, etc.. WEP encryption and MAC address authentication should still be used, but it should not have access to vital information.

It would be nice if you really could secure a wireless connection though. 802.11i is in the works and it is being developed with security in mind. I haven’t read a lot about it, mostly because standards drastically change from where 802.11i is now and where it will be when it is final. I do have my own idea for a secure network though (at least I think it is an original idea).

A company called RSA Security makes a device called a SecurID token. This token has an 8-digit (I think it’s 8) number that changes every minute or two. This is synchronized with software on a server. In order to login to the server, one must have the 8-digit number than is currently the password, again, that changes every minute or two. This way, the password is constantly changing and unless you hold the SecurID token, there is no way to crack the password. It is a very secure form of authentication. My idea is this; have a similar hardware/software setup that changes the WEP key every minute or two. Unless you have a wireless card built by RSA (or whoever develops it) and configured to your network, you will not be able to connect. And, even if you miraculously cracked the WEP key in 60-120 seconds, it will change momentarily after you connect. It would take special hardware and custom software, but I think a company could make a lot of money by offering a product like that. The wireless access point (WAP) would need to be able to change the WEP key seamlessly and fast.

Maybe it isn’t the WEP key that changes, maybe it is another code that must be present to connect and is then checked every 60 seconds. If the code in the wireless card does not match the server/WAP, the machine is disconnected, even if it has a MAC address that is allowed on the network.

Again, I don’t claim to be a security expert and I don’t know all of the products out there. Maybe this isn’t an original idea and there is already a company out there selling this technology. I doubt it, but it’s possible. I just wish I had the knowledge and the resources to carry out this idea. It’s a great idea (I think), but I have no way of doing anything with it.

If anyone reading this knows of any technology similar to what I’m talking about, please e-mail me or post a comment. If you think I’m off the deep end, please e-mail me or post a comment. If you like my idea or have something to add, please e-mail me or post a comment :) I have a real interest in this topic and any links to wireless security articles are greatly appreciated.

Sorry this is so long, but hey, I’m on vacation! What else am I going to do? I’m sitting out in the backyard watching Mikayla play in the sandbox. I like wireless, laptops, and Saturdays!

TGIF

A peak surrounding Mt. Rainier. I like the contrast of the shot. Both the contrast of light and dark and the contrast of hard/jagged and soft clouds. I think it really works.

It is Friday! And this is a GREAT Friday for me and it is a sad Friday for me. On a sad note, this is my last day working with Jim. He is moving on to another Credit Union. On the great note, this is my last day to work for a week. I have Mon-Thurs off work next week. We are going to go to the beach, the zoo, Enchanted Forest, and who knows what else.

One of two things is going to happen to this blog. Either I will be so busy with all kinds of stuff that is out of my normal routine that I won't post at all or I will have so much time to post thoughtful things that I will be posting a lot of content. I don't know which it will be, but I am hereby on vacation, so no complaining if I don't post.

Also, my brother is leaving for Summit today. He is driving with 3 other guys to Colorado where he will stay for two weeks. My dad is leaving for a two-night backpacking trip today. My mom is going up to stay with my grandma for the weekend. That leaves the house to us. We plan to party all weekend long. Okay, maybe just one party ;)

Well, I smell bacon. There is a 6:30 breakfast being prepared down there for Zach and his buddies that I must get in on. It's 6:25 right now.

/me waves.

TV – My Take

Quick thoughts on this photo before delving into the TV topic: I took this shot on Saturday. I positioned the bench so it was leaning back slightly so Lily would easily be able to sit there. The blanket is one that my grandma Thelma made for me. My dad is off to the right of the shot holding my reflector bouncing light onto Lily and my mom and Krista are also off to the right doing many crazy things trying to get her to smile. It worked :) I took 9 shots of Lily and her expression is identical in each one. I chose to shoot at f/2.8 to minimize background distractions and create the colorful blurred background. Hard to believe it was shot in my parents’ backyard, huh? I am pleased with the finished result. Lily is very easy to photograph right now. She is easy to make smile and as long as she isn’t tired or hungry, she’s in a good mood.

And now, on to the topic of TV:

I just stumbled on this site. It took me a minute to realize what it is. I think it’s KaZaA for a monthly fee. I don’t know how they are doing it without being sued, but they are. Pay $0.99/month for unlimited downloads of current and old TV shows. “The purchase of a membership, however, is not a license to upload or download copyrighted material. We urge you to respect copyright and share responsibly.” What a joke. Are people actually buying this P2P service when there are a TON of free options? This baffles me. If they are and this site doesn’t get sued, why didn’t I think of this first? This is ridiculous. I hope people are smart enough to realize that they are paying for a free illegal service.

Tuesday this week I purchased my first TV series. Season 1 of The Cosby Show on DVD (or, DVDVs as Mikayla calls them). And yes, I plan to buy all 7 seasons as they become available. The Cosby Show is the best TV show that has ever aired on television. Mikayla like the show now too and asks to watch it.

My view of TV may be a little different/skewed/whatever. Let me try to explain it as best I can. I support Hollywood. I have hundreds of DVDs (movies, TV, and kids shows). I am not opposed to cable TV or satellite TV. I have had both in the past and I will have cable TV again in October. But, I prefer to download most of my TV. I prefer to have it archived on DVD so I can watch it again later, I prefer to be able to pause my TV and choose exactly what I want to watch when I want to watch it. My modded Xbox with the Xbox Media Center allows me to organize and play all my downloaded TV with ease from my couch with a remote control. I can go back and watch those 2004 World Series of Poker events. Krista can go back and watch the last few episodes of Lost this fall to brush up on everything before season 2 starts. It’s all about convenience.

The only reason for having regular TV is news (even that I want to be able to pause) and live sports events (that I couldn’t care less about). I know, I know, if you have a Tivo you can pause anything. More than that, you can record anything and then play it back at your convenience. It might sound like just what I’m looking for, but it’s not. You can’t hook up a DVD burner to your Tivo and archive your TV. You can’t transfer video files to your brother’s laptop so he can watch Alias anywhere his laptop goes. By downloading TV you get a lot more flexibility. AND, you don’t have to worry about remembering to record something, how much space is left on your Tivo, etc.. Tivo/DVRs are great and I would love to have one hooked up to my cable or satellite TV, but they must be complemented by torrentTV (my word for downloaded TV).

That’s why I download TV. Wow, this is kind of a long post now. I’ll stop for your sake, Eugene ;) Oh, one more quick comment: I wish I had $636 right now.

Communication

This shot was taken in our living room. I have a dark blue blanket that I use as a background (setup with PVC pipe). I also used a flash bounced off the ceiling for lighting. And that is the budget portrait setup. Then, in Photoshop, I used the clouds filter and some lighting/hue saturation layers to create a more “studio” looking photo. I really like the results and hey, she was smiling and she’s really cute. That helps my job :)

Lily now growls. She has a very deep voiced, “Gggggrrrrrrrrrrrrrr” that she now uses to communicate. Of course we growl back and this thrills her. Her first unique form of communication. She will go back and forth growling for several minutes. We just better warn the nursery on Sunday so they don’t think she is constipated or about ready to bite someone…

On another communication note, I spend about an hour and a half longer on filling an order recently because of a communication error. 15 minutes expanded 10-fold. It’s just a reminder to me of how key communication is. Good communication can save a lot of time.

Splash

I would like to say that this is a splash from a fish jumping, another frog jumping, or something else natural that I happened to capture. But, it's not. This is my dad throwing rocks at the frog trying to get it to jump. It just wouldn't jump. Eventually, it would swim a little, but that does NOT look exciting in a photo. You'll have to trust me on that though because I won't be posting any of those swimming frog shots I have.

I do like this shot though. I like the way the splash frames the frog. I don't know how many other frog shots I like.

Subject 2: Well, it's Tuesday and that means Poker Night at Lefty's. Unfortunately I won't be able to make it tonight. I have photos to crop and order. I'm excited about the order - that means profit, but I am a little bummed I'll miss Lefty's two weeks in a row. But that's good too. Now next week I should definitely be able to go. Not only will I be on vacation, but it will have been 3 weeks since I've been :)

Subject 3: My sister-in-law's laptop broke and I brought it back from Olympia a couple weeks ago to have it fixed. Uptech Computers was able to fix it relatively cheap. I was very impressed with that. Anyway, now there is a working laptop in the house that won't be picked up for a week. I have been enjoying it all weekend long. It makes me realize how old my laptop is (300Mhz - 128MB RAM) and how nice it is to have a laptop around that the screen works on all the time and that doesn't reboot when you plug power into it. It's a very bad thing - I want a new laptop now. I'm afraid I'll have to wait quite a while however. Like, a couple of years.

Subject 1: I think this is my last frog posting. You can look forward to photos of my girls for the next couple days. Maybe a damselfly in there somewhere, depends if I like any shots the 5th time going through them.

About to jump!

Saturday my dad and I took a trip up to Wilsonville and photographed frogs. Our goal was to get a shot of a frog jumping for a damselfly. After watching this frog sit there in the water for 15 minutes and not jumping after these tasty morsals that landed 12 inches away, we moved on. We found a few others, but they were just as inactive.

Realizing our goal was very lofty, we changed it. "It doesn't mater why they are jumping, we just want to see them jump," my dad said. He got some rocks and I positioned myself. I result? Well, if it had worked you would be looking at a jumping frog shot instead of a sitting frog shot. About 1 out of 3 rocks caused the frog to swim a bit. This is less than exciting on film to say the least.

I like this shot because it best captures the frustration of the moment. "Just jump you stupid frog!" should be the title. Maybe I'm not cut out to be a nature photographer. Or, maybe 90+ degree heat had something to do with it. I don't know but, if someone wanted to pay me to get the ideal 'frog jumping after food' shot, I would tell them it would take a week plus about $10,000 in equipment. You could rent the equipment for less than $1000 for a week, so that would help, but still. My camera's burst mode is way too short. To get the shot you would need to anticipate the frogs movement and start bursting. About 1 out of 10 times you anticipate movement he might actually move. And if your burst mode is fast enough and you have a fast long lens, you might just be able to do it. A Canon 1Ds with a 70-200mm F2.8/L IS lens would be ideal. But, again, $10K is a bit much for a frog. I'll be happy with the shots I got.

I was tempted to make this "frog week" and post frog shots all week, but I thought that might drive some people crazy. And I can't wait until next week to post a couple shots of my girls. I got some good ones this weekend.