All posts by Brian

It is that time of year again, leaves leaves leaves

Personal

This weekend I started the yearly ritual of dealing with leaves. It had rained a little last week which knocked a few off and I thought I’d get a head start. Funny how this afternoon, only two days later, when taking the dogs for a walk you couldn’t tell I’d done anything. I’m hopeful it doesn’t rain to much and i can mulch most of them with the mower, else it will be a tough go.

A change from the norm was Cooper getting into the middle of me loading the tarp. Normally he just lays in the garage and Roscoe is the one in the way. It was a rare occasion so I snapped a pic. Just as rare was Roscoe having a seat and sitting still long enough for me to get the phone out and take one of him. Hard to believe Cooper is 5, and content with just hanging out, and Roscoe is 12 and just wants to go go go. They are always good to put a smile on your face.

Dual Monitors

Personal,

I was back in the office last week and picked up a machine they had for me. First time in more than 10 years I won’t be using my own equipment but that’s ok. With the machine came a monitor and a video card supports dual monitors via a 1 to 2 DVI cable. That gives me to LCD’s the 20′ wide screen with the machine and my 19′. I’ve never had dual monitors but always wondered if the extra screen real estate would be worth it. At this point I’d say maybe.

Back in my support days I’d have 3 to 5 terminal windows open at once and 10 plus applications. Today the number of applications I might have running at once is 6 to 10 and a few of those are always minimized. One thing that is nice is if you have an app that opens multiple windows inside it’s program window moving that app to it’s own monitor can be a plus.

Time will tell if they both stay.

Dove hunting 2010

Personal,

This weekend it was off to Crowell, TX for a little dove hunting. It’s the third time in the last four years I’ve been and the hunting was the best it has been. There was 10 to 11 of us. My dad and I were the only ones from out of state, the others were from around the Dallas area. We got into town late morning on Friday and met up with the others for lunch. About 2:00pm we made it out to the grounds, it was about 95 degrees not much shade and a little breeze. We where there till 6:30pm and then headed in. Tally for the day was only two. Dinner was boiled shrimp with potatoes, onions, corn on the cob, and other vegetables…. excellent.

Saturday we started early, about 6:45am just before daybreak. The birds were flying better and when we went in for breakfast I had two more. Not stellar numbers by any means, as the limit is 15, but I did shoot more so maybe the practice will pay in the afternoon. Weather this morning was great 65 when we got there and maybe 75 by the time we went in at 9:45. Breakfast was eggs made to order, hot cakes, corn bread, sausage, bacon, and home made rolls. We had some time to kill before going back out in the afternoon some of us just hung around and chatted and others went fishing.

Lots of shotgun shells
Saturday afternoon would be the best of the two days. One of the other guys let us borrow his MoJo which really helped bring in the birds. Four was all I got for the afternoon but i did take a lot of shots, 50. I wish I could say it was the wind that contributed to the large number of misses but more than likely it was the operator. I may need to take some lessons <grin>. Dinner was steak, potatoes, and a few veggies… again excellent

Sunday was an early day as we headed out at six, my drive would be 14 hours and just over 12 for my dad. It was a good trip we saw a lot of dove and had plenty to shoot at. Now if I can just get better to bring up my average.

Brakes squeeking at low speeds

Personal, ,

A few weeks ago I replaced the front rotors on the truck and the pads I chose where ceramic. My thought process at the time was not to go with metalic pads and thus avoid any squealing. The rotors I got were steel, nothing special, so it was the metal to metal I wanted to stay away from. Needless to say ceramic was not the route to go. After the rotors warmed up any low speed stop would cause squeaking. I lived with it for a while but Friday I needed to do something. I picked up some cheaper semi-metalic pads for about a third less and put them on this morning and wouldn’t you know it, no squeal. Lesson learned high quality is always the best choice.

I’m sure ceramic is good for the right application just not for what I was doing. So for me and regular old steel rotors don’t use ceramic pads go with semi-metalic. I’ll try to remember that next time.

The HTC G1 still rocks

Technology, , ,

Phones have almost become disposable as technology advances at a speed where what you have is replaced in a month or two by “the new thing”. I like new gadgets but these days at $300 to $600 dollars a pop it’s just not economical. So when I opted for a G1 Dev Phone last year I was hoping for something that might be upgradeable and still have that new feel as the software evolves.

I have not been disappointed.

After the upgrade to 1.6 I was satisfied for a while but then came the next version of Android and that changed things. Better navigation and snappier user interface with screen auto rotation and more. When it didn’t look like there’d be any official version after 1.6 I went looking for a custom ROM, enter cyanogen. I loaded 1.6 just after the first of the year and 2.1 (Eclair) about a month ago, it has been excellent. Checking the site today they have 2.2 (Froyo) available for both the Dream (G1) and the Magic (G2).

It’s been two years since the G1 was released and thanks to folks at cyanogen and other communities like xda developers it has the same software as a Nexus One, HTC Incredible or EVO. Open Source, you gotta love it !!!