Bag of Randomness

  • I love my new Palm Pre.  I’m not going to say that it’s better than the iPhone, because it’s just different.  For instance, the iPhone has a virtual keyboard, and the Pre has a real keyboard that slides out.  For me, I prefer having a real keyboard, and from what I’ve seen of my friends’ iPhones, I much prefer the Pre.
  • I felt like such a nerdy-nerd waking up early on Saturday morning standing outside the Sprint store.  But I wasn’t the only one, about 30 or so people were ahead of me in line.  The person in front of me was my favorite neighbor.  Dallas Cowboy Isaiah Stanback was also in line with me.
  • The employees of the Sprint store couldn’t have been nicer.  Everything was well managed, but it would have been better if they provided some snacks or breakfast.
  • It was really cool that they took their time with each customer, helping with setup and the transfer of data from the old phone to the new phone.  I never felt rushed, and that was important to me.
  • They want to make sure customers are so happy with the Pre, that on Sunday after the store closed, it opened a half-hour later for new Pre owners and held a two-hour class to make sure our needs are addressed.
  • But I didn’t like that I had to change my data plan, which is going to require me to pay more per month.  And when it comes to nerdy-but-crazy-cool stuff like this, I just can’t say no.
  • I’m the type that likes to talk and get to know my sales representative, I guess I just like people to feel that they are more than just an employee, and I know what it’s like working that kind of job.  Before becoming a sales person at the Sprint store, my sales person lived in California and was in the funeral business.  He helped bury celebrities such as Ray Charles, Florence Griffith-Joyner, and Eazy-E.  There were a few others, but I can’t recall who they were.
  • Even though the Pre is very intuitive, there are how-to videos included in the phone as a guide.
  • When you slide the keyboard out and turn the phone around, there’s a surprisingly large mirror on the back.  That’s to help you take a picture of yourself, but I found the camera a bit hard to use since the “picture-taking-button” is virtual, and you can’t feel it.
  • The flash on the phone works much better than I anticipated.
  • Here’s the first picture I took with my new phone, OtherDogGeeding was doing that dog-shaking-thing.  Oh, and the wall has those stripes because WifeGeeding and I are trying to figure out what color to paint the bedroom.  It’s been a very hard decision thus far.
  • It’s fun using “thus” in a sentence.
  • One very big plus was the ability to synch the Pre with iTunes, which was crazy easy.
  • It was also crazy easy to set up email and contacts, and that’s one of the biggest pluses of the new operating system.  When something is updated in one area, it’s updated in all areas.
  • Oh, and I were to lose the phone, I can log into my account and erase all the data on the phone even though it’s not with me, so my data isn’t compromised.
  • There’s an application store that’s been fun to use.  Of course it’s not as wide-ranging as Apple’s, but the phone has just been released.
  • The same cord to hook it up via USB is also the power cord.
  • Not only do I love having a real keyboard, but I love the physical appearance.  It’s like a rounded river stone, is light, and easily fits in my pocket.  My old Palm Treo 700P was a bit bulky, and I’m not the type to use a belt-clip . . . that would make me feel like totally square.  But when I use the keyboard, I love how it feels in my hand, the weight is proportioned just right and the buttons have a good feel to them.
  • A big plus about it is that I can run more than one program at a time, and if I’m surfing the web, I can open additional windows.
    browser_2009-07-06_232638
  • It’s so much fun closing an application, you just flick it off the screen.  I do it almost like a b-slap.
  • The headphones that were included are surprising good and solid.
  • I also love the universal search feature.  When I start typing, contacts that fit that criteria appear, as well as apps, as well as an option to search for that term on Google, Google Maps, Wikipedia, or Twitter.
  • One of my friends is house-sitting for a couple weeks, and he invited WifeGeeding and I over after we met for dinner.  The house is really a mansion, it’s worth well over a million dollars.
  • The laundry room in the mansion was bigger than my college dorm room.
  • It was the first time that I saw a wine cellar.
  • The media room was pretty cool.  We watched the movie Taken and it felt like we were really in a movie theater.  Now my brain is going crazy contemplating creating my own man-cave.
  • I made mention that it was the nicest house I have ever been in, and then WifeGeeding reminded me of our visit to the Perot’s mansion.
  • I learned something new at church, there was and probably still is in some cases such a thing called closed communion.  I guess it also depends on how you define closed communion, so there’s probably more of it than what I first thought, but it came up  during a sermon in which back in the day a pastor would provide a communion coin, and you would present the coin at the church to take communion.
  • I always felt that the first signing of aging was the drinking of coffee.
  • I seldomly drink any coffee, maybe just twice a year.
  • Here are some great pictures of the new U2 stage being built.  I hear there will be a total of three stages.  They are so massive, that when the band is performing in one city, the others are being built for the cities next on the tour.  And another.
  • I saw some local news coverage about the opening concert at the new Dallas Cowboys Stadium.  The major complains were traffic (no surprise there, and why the heck doesn’t Arlington have mass transit?) and sound quality (uh oh).  But from the appearance of things, the concert didn’t look well put together, like it was all rushed and rapidly put together, and it didn’t look very full even though it was said to be sold out.  It all looked budget and underwhelming.
  • JimmyJohnson was there, and the news mentioned that the crowd cheer both him and Jerry on.  I have a feeling the cheering was more for Jimmy Johnson.
  • I bet if the same concert was held at the Cotton Bowl or Texas Stadium, it wouldn’t have been a sell out.
  • Here are some pictures of the event.  There’s one picture showing the line to buy souvenirs, that just looks crazy.
  • A while back WifeGeeding bought some new faucets for the bathroom on eBay.  The old faucets were chrome and a golden-brass color, and the new ones are an oil-rubbed bronze kind.  Unfortunately, there wasn’t one for the bathtub to match.  The closest thing to match at Lowe’s or Home Depot ranged  from $200 – $600.  And since installation included soldering, that is, using a blow-torch, that is, something I’m not comfortable using, the plumber quoted us $300 to do the installation.  I decided to use a very back woods solution:
    faucet2screenshotbonv001
  • I wasn’t too worried about the bath faucet matching the sink faucets perfectly, since they will be about eight to ten feet apart, so off hand, I don’t think  anyone would really notice unless they were looking really hard since they will be across the room from each other.  I know the spray-painted faucet turned out a bit lighter, but hey, I’m trying to save $300-$700 here just for some faucets only a hand full of people will ever see.
    faucet1screenshotbonv001
  • And here’s the finished product.
    faucet3screenshotbonv001
  • Cigar-smoking, Tommy-Gun-toting bear surfs an angry shark.
  • On the way home from church, we were traveling down a somewhat always busy road (Denton Tap in Coppell) and I saw a mama duck and her ducklings crossing the street.  My heart automatically went from “ohhhhh, how cute . . .” to “oh no, they are going to get run over!!!!”  As look in my rear-view mirror and saw other cars moving out of their way, but I needed to know if they survived.  I got stuck at a light, but did a u-turn and made my way back.  There was no sign of roadkill or ducks, so I’m just going to assume they all made it.
  • Grace
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4 Responses to Bag of Randomness

  1. MamaToots says:

    I need more info on painting the faucet!! I may do that in my bathroom since replacing it is a MAJOR plumbing effort. NO…………….I do not expect you to do the work!!

  2. Kim says:

    Great work on the faucet!

  3. George says:

    I recently had to sweat a valve at the new house. It was a little uncomfortable having a propane torch that close to a wall. I was really surprised when it didn't leak.

    We could get some scrap copper tubing and you could use my stuff to practice if you wanted. Might be fun.

  4. Doug says:

    I'm really happy that I haven't spent money on any events at the Cowboy stadium now. This blog tells the story.

    http://cowboysblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2009/0

Comments are closed.