Perfect.

“…you’ll feel like and asshole, that’s normal–it means you’re doing it right”

Via Lifehacker

• Always BCC added to email settings so you can carbon copy yourself
• Battery diplay updates to provide more accurate display of charge
• Passcode lock can have a longer timeout– prevents you having to enter your passcode EVERY time the phone goes into standby mode– instead allows you to picke a time frame to allow the phone to wait before it requires a passcode
• Audio out now works on many popular stereo docks and adaptors

So, back to the regret part…I really only listen to music in my car. Until this update my iPhone just couldn’t take the place of my iPod– it had iPod features, but no audio out to my car’s iPod setup.No matter how many ogled over the iPhone, or how many times I used Google maps–no amount of ‘cool!’ helped me shake the feeling that I’d potentially made a $600 (plus tax) mistake. The pitch had been ‘one device to do everything‘, and here I was still carrying around my 5th Gen iPod Video, AND an iPhone.

Along comes this supposed security update, and BAM, audio out through the dock connector– meaning, I can use it in the car!

I can’t explain how happy I was when this thing worked like I knew it could. It was like getting an iPod all over again (which by the way, can’t be explained, if you have one, you get it– shuffles don’t count…).

In the last 2 days, I’ve had time to really judge this thing as an iPod, and take a look at some of the new features of this ‘best iPod ever.

My favorite example of the iPhone’s improved iPod? Shuffle.

Now before you laugh at me, and call me names, try out this situation: you’re listening to your iPod, on shuffle, and a GREAT song from an even GREATER album comes on. All of a sudden, you need to hear that album. With iPods of yesteryear, you have to Menu Menu Menu your way out, then select Artist, or Album and scroll to the Artist or Album in question.

Now, I would never do this while driving…but, I bet some have and do. It’s a potentially dangerous pesky interface, and a total buzz kill.But with the iPhone? Screw that son, you just shuffle away, and when one of those DEEP TRACKS comes on, you can just hit the track listing for the album, and BAM, you have the entire listing of that album to choose from.

I can’t tell you how great this is. Is it worth 600$? Well, having something work the way you hoped it would, and having a pet peeve eliminated goes a small way toward making me a bit less impetuous– but $600 less? I think that’ll take another few ’security’ updates…

Over the last weeks and months, many of you have met my girlfriend Kellie. In the last few months the two of us have been running as a way to get in shape, and recently decided to enter a road race– the Falmouth road race on August 12th in Falmouth, MA.

We’re doing it for a reason– we’ll be running as part of the CCFA’s (Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation of America) ‘Got Guts’ team. Each year the race provides guaranteed entries, exempt from the lottery, to selected groups which offer the entries out to runners who then gather donations for the charity.

Support of CCFA is something that’s important to both Kellie and myself, as she was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease 2 years ago.

Half a million people in North America are affected by Crohn’s disease. It is a lifetime disorder that involves the small intestine and colon– causing abdominal pain, upset stomach, and fatigue. The cause of Crohn’s disease is not known, and currently there is no cure. Researchers believe that the immune system mistakes good bacteria found normally in the intestines for foreign substances and launches an attack. In defense, the body sends white blood cells into the lining of the intestines where they cause inflammation. A number of medical treatments are utilized with the goal of keeping the disease in remission.

There is no currently no cure for Crohn’s disease. Instead, a number of medical treatments are utilized with the goal of keeping the disease in remission. These include steroids, immunomodulators, and biological medications. Crohn’s disease affects approximately half a million people in North America, and there is a genetic component to susceptibility.

It would mean a lot to me to have your emotional (and if possible) financial support as we run on the “Got Guts” team. You can pledge online by going to the Got Guts website,  or you can contact me directly.

All of the funds we raise will go directly to CCFA to support their mission, which is “to cure and prevent Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis through research, and to improve the quality of life of children and adults affected by these digestive diseases through education and support.”

With the deadline coming close, I’m almost there, with just over 700$ raised so far!

Thanks for your help everyone!

Have to raise 1k for it– so you might be hearing from me soon!

Then this happened:

For the uninitaed, that’s a Kernel Panic, in short a total system crash. What’s impressive is that it came up during a system install.

Kernal Panics can indicate any number of software or hardware issues, that eventually cause you computer to crash. In the bygone days before protected memory, and multithreaded operating systems, total system crashes were common. This is not the case any more–Apple suport tends to regard Kernel Panics as a strong indicator of a hardware issue.

Aside: In case this happens to you and you call support, Applecare support will normally ask the following common troubleshooting questions:

• Have you installed any 3rd party ram?

No matter what, if you answer “yes” to this question, all other troubleshooting will usually cease until the 3rd party ram is removed.

• Have you run disk utility to repair permissions, and check your disk?
• Is your drive reporting any type of errors (what’s the status of the S.M.A.R.T. reporting)
• Does this happen in any specific apps / 3rd party apps?
• Have you tested this in another profile?
• Is you firmware up to date?
• Have you cleared you PRam, and reset your PMU?
• Have you run the Apple Hardware Test (AHT), have you run it in extended mode, have you run it in looped extended mode?

Back to the story. I bought 3rd party Ram. It was fine, or so I thought. Then I had the following issues:

1. Kernel Panic when using Aperture
2. Kernel Panic when installing OS
3. Video corruption when using OS (and by using, I mean watching a trailer in Quicktime, and running NO other programs Safari and Software update)

And by video corruption, I mean:

and:

So I put back in the Apple ram (512 megs–ughh!) and thought everything would be fine.

Then my machine wouldn’t login to my user account. The AHT said everything was fine–which was not true.

Disk Utility–while booted from the MacBook install disk–reported errors. “Hmm, that’s not normal.” Letting Disk Utility attempt to repair them resulted in failure, and–as is often the case–the drive no longer showed up on the desktop.

Shit.

DiskWarrior is great with stuff like this, and it was able to repair the drive and get it to show up on the desktop. But now, (even though S.M.A.R.T. reporting was showing that my drive was OK) I was having a hard time believing it.

Various files on my desktop weren’t copying to an external drive, Superduper couldn’t sucessfully clone the drive.

To recap:

1. Kernel Panic
2. Video Corruption
3. Data storage issues

So yeah, a few RMA’s later, my MacBook is back up and running. Complete with new ram, a new hard drive and most (if not all) of my data back in place.

Moral of the story? I have no idea. It’s not like I ran right out to buy Apple ram, or that I’m never going to replace my stock hard drive with a newer, larger model.

In fact, it’s because I got new ram, and a new hard drive, that I was able to revert back to the stock ones when the new stuff failed–or maybe it’s because of the new stuff that I had to.

Either way,I don’t really care–after all, mechanical shit breaks. Plan for it.

• Bought a tree
• Got christmas lights
• Bought ornaments
• Bought candy canes
• Made a home cooked dinner
• Decorated the tree while listening to ‘A Charlie Brown Christmas’ music

• And…ate some of the gingerbread house

After:

Today’s Collision– I would recommend them to anyone.

• Late payments = credit company raises your card’s APR.
• Autopay – For Christ’s sake, wake up, jump into the 21st century and use auto bill pay– avoid the late fees and the ever raising APR that comes along with them.
• Replacment card for no reason = new terms. Sign that card, and call that number to activate the card, and you’ve likely agreed to new terms. Highlight the important parts of your ‘card-member agreement’. For example:
  1. APR, base and maximum
  2. Fees
  3. Billing Period
  4. Due Dates

  – then check out that crap in the new agreement. You can refuse the new terms if you want (Of course they don’t tell you that). End result, you might have to get a new card with decent terms…but it’s better than getting blind-sided with shitty terms.

• Worried to switch cards because of your late payments and your credit rating? How late was your payment? Less than 30 days? Fuck it then…they didn’t report you.
  Payments that are only a few days late aren’t reported (only when over 30, 60, 90, 120 days). Don’t forget tho, late payment = they’re gonna raise your APR. In the meantime grab a free copy of your credit report online and make sure the info is correct.

• Carry a balance–what APR are you paying on each of your credit cards? If you don’t know…you’re screwing yourself. Put another way, why buy gasoline at the expensive station when the cheap one is right across the road? If one card gives you a better rate, use it instead. Don’t pay high fees simply because you were too lazy to look at your latest statment…that’s where your APR is listed by the way…
• Save your statements, in case they screw up…and they probably will- plus you can get it even if their website is down.

Two drops, from 4 feet, onto a corner, and the worst thing that happened is that it got dented.

My

God.

1. RAID is only as good as your drives
2. VPN is a pain in the butt
3. Give people what they want, not what they ask for
4. More gear doesn’t equal better pictures
5. Technical difficulty usually produces better images
6. Present options, not opinions
7. Love your family and friends
8. Physical activity is good for you
9. Physical pain is the subsititute for emotionial pain
10. The inmates are running the asylum.

The tub, the shower walls, the window, the sink, the mirror, the floor, the bathmat, the handtowel, and the toilet. Even behind the toilet!

Take that bachelor bathroom!

:Updated!: Images

   

So without further delay, and in the interest of burning thru some bandwidth…here’s my TV commercial