Bring Back the Slide Rule!!!

In real life, I'm a Luddite. Although computers are great for watching Red Sox games, listening to radio stations from the West Coast, and managing my financial investments (read: losing money), I think they're kind of over-rated. Sure, they do lots of good things, but really, they're just an expensive way to kill time. Give me a quill and some ink, and I'll make do.

Because of my status, it's kind of funny that this blog even exists. Actually, it probably doesn't exist, it's just a bunch of 1's and 0's in some server farm in a Googleplex somewhere in eastern Oregon. And it's even funnier that I have a Flickr page, and a Facebook account. These things are great because they allow me to look like I'm feverishly doing actual work on my computer, when in fact, I'm killing time.

This is my way of announcing that I'm sinking further into the world of computers. We have a Twitter feed. Its right there ---------> on the sidebarof the blog, as well as on the Twitter page, and its synched up with my Facebook account. The feed is intended to keep everyone updated on the baby, and its easier because I can update it with text messages (oh yeah, I'm addicted to texting too - see how luddite-ish I am).

I'm sure there's some way to receive tweets (what a nerd I am) on your mobile device, if you can't wait to be in front of a computer to keep track of our mundane lives. My goal is to update it every couple of days up til the birth, then "live tweet" the labor and delivery. Kimberly is excited for that. If only I could instantaneously upload video, too (actually, I'm working on that, but don't tell Kimberly).

I keep telling myself I'll get rid of it once the baby pops out, but I probably won't. It will just get incorporated into all the other technology crap I update half-heartedly.

Anyways, please follow us. The only thing worse than having no friends in real life is having no followers in cyber-life. And really, you can't wait for exciting updates like: "baby kicked" and "Kimberly is the size of one of Jupiter's moons" or "baby x just pooped through her diaper" and other exciting 140 character-or-less/poorly punctuated and spelled non-sequitors. Just do it.

[And an internet shout-out to whoever gets the tag below]

Blue Screen of Death

Well, old Sunshine may have bit the bullet. She's had three blue screens of death (you know the one- you're in the midst of something - always something important- and the screen goes blue with the terrible words describing some indecipherable fatal error) in a row. Given that she's 5 years old, it's probably not too unusual for her time to be up, but this is a terrible way to go.

I'll take her in to the resident geeks and see if there's any saving her...

Thanks Dad, for teaching me to back up.

Reading is FUNdamental!

I'm fairly ambivalent about technology. Only a few years back, I referred to myself as a Luddite. However, over the past few years, coinciding with my move to the NW, I decided I needed to more fully embrace technology. I've made strides, but I'm still certainly no first-adopter.

But this new product from Amazon is really cool. Books without killing trees! Reading on a computer, but without the eye strain! Free Wikipedia!

From the video and some of the reviews on that page, it seems like it still needs some fine tuning and some of the bugs to get worked out. And hopefully the price tag will come down. But honestly, I hope that they can work things out and that we have one of those within the next couple of years. Maybe we can get Kimberly to be a tester, since she reads a million words a minute.