Well, there is not much to report lately. Most of my time online is being monopolized by Dave's forum. Like I said, its more rewarding to get feedback on what you're putting on here. But I know there are still some people that read this and likely see nothing posted and get a little bummed.

Still havent gotten my Mac. Apple has pushed back the release by another week, but the good news is they bumped up their processors to make them even faster. Meaning if you ordered the 1.67Ghz you will now be getting the 1.83Ghz for no extra charge. I think thats worth waiting another week or so. I did get MacMall to bump my shipping up to 2-day FedEx instead of ground for free though for the hassle.

Both of our cats are sick. snotty and runny eyes. We have to give them this eye gel and put it right in their eyes! As if a cat is going to sit there and wait patiently while you squirt gel in their eyes. Yeah right. I practically have to put Grady in a figure four leg lock just to give him his medicine. Nikki is a little more docile, fortunately. She doesnt like it but she gives up pretty easily. They have been getting along more though which is cool. I even caught them sleeping right next to each other on our bed.

Snowed In

Most of MD got about a foot of snow last night but there was a band of weather that went through our house that dumped 22" of snow. I was beginning to think we mkay not get a significant snow this winter season at all and that maybe Global warming may have something to do with that.

A huge snow used to bring me a lot of joy. It meant no school and heading for the nearest hill for sledding. Micah's family had this toboggin (sp?) that could hold 5 ppl and was fast. We would be out all day, get wet and cold and endure the torturous walk back home with frozen feet. I hated that feeling. I remember once sledding down an hill and ending up in this little creek and being totally soaked. I was nervous and thought I had to get home wuick before I froze or something. Mom always had hot chocolate ready and would dry our clothes in case we were going to head back out later.

As an adult a huge snow means shoveling and digging out cars. It means difficult driving. It means a higher heating bill. For the time being I genuinely dont like the snow and I don't anticipate enjoying my time in the snow until I have kids to enjoy it with.

Font followup...

My prayers have been answered! Well, my WANTS have been answered anyway, and apparently have been somewhat answered longer than I thought. Turns out that there is a typestyle that will work on a mac AND a PC. They are called OpenType fonts. They are more expensive than individual PC or MAC fonts (as they should be) but in theory they should work on my new MacBook Pro! I happen to have a good collection of OpenType Fonts that I didnt know about!

You wouldn't believe how expensive fonts are. For a "family" of classic fonts which would consist of about 2,000 fonts, it is currently selling from Fonts.com or directly from adobe for $8,999.99. Unbelievable.

The new computer has a lot of bells and whistles that I didnt even know about until reading a PDF of a manual for it. Apparently there is a sensor in the laptop that senses when it is being dropped. If it senses this, it locks up the hard drive so it cant be scratched while reading, then when the sensor is stabalized, it activates again for use. Just in case it breaks and you need to restore your data. Thats cool. Plus there is a built in mini camera lense in the laptop, a backlit keyboard with a light sensor so when it gets dark the backlit keyboard illuminates. ITs awesome. I'm looking forward to really getting comfortable again in the mac environment enough so that I can go on some interviews and know what I am talking about.

MacBook Pro

I took the plunge and ordered a MacBook Pro today. Its the latest and greatest that Mac has to offer. Its basically an apple powerbook with intel inside. ITs supposed to be 4 times faster than the current G4 macs (for anyone who knows what the hell I am talking about). I used Macs all the time at school and really grew to appreciate them. The operating system is streamlined and for Graphics they are the leading edge. I've been pondering going on interviews for design jobs but I know all designers work on macs and I would have to be fluent in Mac in order to succeed in this business SO the mac is the way to go. Goodbye crappy old laptop. I wont get it for a couple more weeks so don't expect me to have a macgasm on here anytime soon. I'll let you know what I think when it arrives.

There are always drawbacks, and the drawbacks for the MacBook Pro (other than apples high prices (2K compared to a comperable PC at 1K)) are software compatability. Since this new system runs on intel but is still on a mac operating system a lot of the design software companies (adobe and macromedia) don't have compatable software yet. They have been working on it and it should be available by the summer or somewhere abouts. Apple excelerated the launch of the MacBook Pro so they werent prepared. I don't have that software for a Mac system anyway so I knew going in that I would have to make the purchase. That software aint cheap either, probably 500-700 bucks or so. It will be worth it though.

Mom finally got her high speed internet today! Its been a long time coming. She will be glued to the computer now I bet. Right mom? We'll see.

Cyndi and I adopted another cat this week. Her name is Nikki (Nikki happens to be the name of Cyndi's long time dog that recently had to be put down) so I think that sweetened the deal for her. This cat is already over a year old so she was very calm and approachable when we got her home. She is black and white spots, we call her a cow because of it. She is more like my cat growing up, she sits on my lap and falls asleep on my chest etc. Our other cat (grady, a russian blue) is very independant and likes to go wherever he damn well pleases. Grady is all up this new cats ass too. Excited about a new companion I think (maybe a little horny too, hehe).

LOST is almost on so I gotta go and be entertained for the next hour. Future posts will be courtesy of my new MacBook Pro!! YAY

WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN

Sorry for the delay in posts. Its not that I've been too busy, I guess Its been more rewarding to talk and play on Dave's forum than it is on here. I like getting the responses and the dialogue, it makes it more fun. I realized that people were still checking this thing out and wondering why it wasn't getting used. oops.

So I had to fire another person yesterday at work. Its a wierd experience. I'm sort of in a unique situation I think. I'm in charge of such a large department with so much turnover that I have to fire people pretty regularly. Most managers probably have to terminate someone once or twice a year and probably dread doing it whenever it comes up. I have to terminate employment on a weekly basis. Someones rent, child care, drug money (probably) is in my hands. I've gotten better at it. I know now that when they leave my office they should know that they fired themselves and I was just following the rules and doing my job. Hopefully they still respect me and my position, or at the very lease dont shoot me in the parking lot. The person I fired yesterday was a 17 year old pregnant girl. I KNOW. Its terrible, I hated doing it but it was necessary. I look forward to the day that I am only responsible for my own actions.

Birthday

Yesterday someone mentioned my birthday coming up (Jan. 30th, gifts will be accepted) and asked how old I would be. I told them 28. I was wrong, its 27. I totally didn't know how old I was turning for the first time in my life, certaintly not the last. I need to start taking Ginko again. Every time I try taking it I get a sore throat almost immediately and stop taking it. I can't even tell if it works or not.

Another conversation at work one time was about teachers growing up. Most of my co-workers can name every single teacher they've had from kindergarden on up. I think this is crazy. I can honestly say that I cannot name a single teachers name prior to highschool. I remember 2 highschool teachers names, and a few professors from college.. a FEW. Turns out that is not the norm. My memory is a little low. Even at work with a lot of interviewers that work there or have worked there in the past they try coming back to work after having not worked there in a few months and I don't know who they are. Hopefully its not as bad as it sounds. I'm not walking around looking for my glasses and car keys everyday for an hour.

Scrabble...

Cyndi and I went to a dinner party at one of her co-workers houses. I think we were the youngest people there but it was still cool. Her friend Kelly and her husband Tracey came too and we had a pretty good time. Tracey and I got along pretty well, he's into sports, videogames, games in general. He saw that they had a super scrabble game, same thing as scrabble but with more tiles and more of each letter. He said he killed at scrabble and wanted to play. I never really liked scrabble, didn't think I was that good at it and thought it was boring but it was better than making awkward conversation with someone I didnt know so I was up for it.

Turns out that I am a pretty darn good scabble player. I waxed them all, I was really surprised. My spelling is ok, not great but I think I have a decent vocabulary and more importantly knew how to manipulate the game with the board etc. I scored 551 points, which they all said was rediculous and they'd never heard of. Second place was Tracey with just under 400. Turns out Kelly and Tracey live just a few blocks away from us so we made some new friends and will be hanging out with them more often I'm sure.

Cyndi and I played scrabble again tonight with our new board that swivels (its a normal sized board though, regulation) and I scored 350 points to her 260. I don't really know whats normal, who cares, its pretty fun. We're trying to build up our board game collection. We're not really drinkers or anything so when people come over to hang out we end up playing games.

On a side note, I've noticed how lazy I'm getting and it needs to stop. I need some motivation to get up and be productive during the day. I've been sleeping a lot, probably too much and need to be helping out more around the house and trying to get some design work in the pipeline. I also want to get my butt up and leave early enough to stop at moms and see the kids a little more. I'm not making enough of an effort and not taking advantage of some ofthe free time I have to be with them and with Mom. I've been putting a list on our whiteboard of things to do during teh day which is helping but I need deadlines and an alarm to make it happen.

Tomorrow morning I'm getting up, doing dishes, straightening up the house for my wife, then drop off a package at FedEx before heading into work. Goodnight.