Meet Junior…

He’s there on the right next to his brothers of various ages – isn’t
he cute?

I had wanted a smaller device to use while traveling and while
watching TV (it’s fab to lookup stuff/stars/stats while watching!)

I had high hopes for the Apple iPad but the first version that came
out a few weeks ago just didn’t meet my needs or expectations (no
flash player Apple? Come on now…that’s just dumb no matter what)

So I finally got a "netbook" – and it’s pretty neat. One inch thick
and about 2.5 pounds. 10 inch screen running Windows 7. Intel Atom
N450 processor (the very newest Atom processor) and 2 gigs memory.
Keyboard is more useable than it looks. It’s a sweet little dealie
and performs great.

Oh, and here’s the fun part… It’s a Gateway. Yep, remember them
cows? I was going for the highest rated and reviewed HP netbook but
found this little gem that just came out while researching for the
others. The specs beat the others and price was right so I got it.
Hopefully this little guy will continue to perform.

YAY – new toys!

garrettw On the go..., Technology, geek

This just cries out to be ridiculed and made fun of as wide as possible.  Seriously, this is a professional news organization in an area where aerospace is one of the top 2 industries.

Seriously, KOMO, you deserve all the raspberry you can get for this.  It’s just sloppy and lazy.  No excuses — you are NOT the average person who may not see the difference — you are in the business of ACCURACY and by god in the Seattle area you need to know your airplanes. Would a TV station in Detroit make a story with a caption about a Mustang yet have the picture be a F150 truck?  Must I even explain this to you?!

Next you’ll show a screen shot of Apple Macintosh OS X in relation to a Microsoft Windows 7 story.  Seriously, guys, this is that bad…and if you can’t see that — wow, I’m astonished and kind of embarrassed you are in my town.  You guys are being THAT stupid.  And you haven’t even corrected it after hours of people leaving comments on your own website!

Shame on you.

Here’s the link to the story, which hopefully they will correct.  But I took a screen shot to proove KOMO’s stupidity:

garrettw Aviation, Fun!, Rants, geek

What do you get when you cross a young, pre-Miami Vice Don Johnson and the Brady Bunch’s dog Tiger who can now read minds and talk in a post-nuclear-WW4-apocalyptic world and marry it to a misogynistic film script made on a budget of about a buck fifty?  Oh, and throw-in Jason Robards in mime makeup leading the extraction of, well, let’s call it viscous liquids, just to throw you for a loop…

Why, you get “A Boy and His Dog,” one of those movies that is so amazingly bad it’s completely awesome.  Entrancing, even.  You know the kind — so bad that after the first few minutes you simply must finish the entire thing.  It’s the the biggest train wreak of a sci-fi movie ever!  And I had the privilege of spending 90 minutes this Thanksgiving weekend watching it.

It’s now my favorite awesome worst movie to date.  Highly recommended. Must see.

garrettw Fun!, WOW!, geek

I’ve been blogging for a decade. 10 years already… huh!

While this is certainly an interesting point in a time line, it’s really only an electronic analogue to a diary. I’m sure many people have been keeping diaries for longer. Nonetheless I’m kinda tickled to meet this milestone. I started “blogging” before “blog” was even a noun or a verb; indeed before it was even a popular catchphrase. Indeed I had my first web page back in 1995 (See my “Deep Archive” link above)

That’s a lot of time and bandwidth (timewidth?) dedicated to my own banter. What have I accomplished in that time?

As it turns out quite a bit. I became a true adult (still out for some debate). I had a successful consulting company (official corporation even!) and then transferred clients/closed it after my clients became successful and got gobbled-up by other, bigger corps in what became the dot com bomb. I moved to California and back. I bought a house. Got cats. Sold a house. Bought a condo. Used five different types of blogging software. Stumbled into a great relationship. And generally observed what made me laugh and ranted upon the stuff that irritated.

As I look back at some of my entries it makes me smile and laugh a lot. Also I cringe a lot…was I THAT shrill, really? Or was I THAT stupid, really? But that’s the deliciousness of time and becoming older — the cumulative benefit of your experiences always makes you wiser and wiser.

So what will the next decade have in store? Who knows….That is what is fun, and worth living!

-Garrett

1998:
http://www.gmwnet.com/archive/1998/

1999:
http://www.gmwnet.com/archive/1999/2/
http://www.gmwnet.com/archive/1999/3/
http://www.gmwnet.com/archive/1999/

2000:

http://www.gmwnet.com/archive/2000/1/
http://www.gmwnet.com/archive/2000/2/
http://www.gmwnet.com/archive/2000/3/

2002
http://www.gmwnet.com/archive/2003/1/

2003:
http://www.gmwnet.com/archive/2003/2/

2004:
http://www.gmwnet.com/archive/2004/1/

2005:
http://www.gmwnet.com/archive/2005/1/
http://www.gmwnet.com/archive/2005/2/

2006:
http://www.gmwnet.com/archive/2006/1/

P.S.: I’m going to attempt to add these old entries to my database. So if you subscribe to the RSS feed you may see a slew of new entries. I’ll be careful to set the date in the posts properly, but I’m unsure if they will appear in the RSS feed because they are “new” entries as far as the database is concerned…

Aviation, Capitol Hill Living, Cats, ColdFusion, Downtown Living, Evert, Food, Fun!, Holiday, Holidays, Politics, Rants, Technology, The Condo, The House, Travel, Virtual Aviation, WOW!, geek

A mean lookin pax gang has accepted me temporarily…I feel so chic geek

geek

This is so true…

My God, I think that’s me there…

Aviation, Fun!, geek

Waiting for a more modern day server project of mine to do it’s thing, I decided to play around with Virtual PC and see how old I could go back in PC time. Of course there is always DOS, but that installs fairly easily — although it took me a minute to figure out how to make MSCDEX to work in autoexec.bat & config.sys again!

I’ve previously run a Commodore 64 emulator, and that was nice, but without the software it wasn’t particularly interesting (Anyone remember GEOS?!)

No, the real fun was re-visiting those tried-and-true Windows versions I remember from College. So I whipped out my old CD drawer and what did I find

Fun!, Technology, geek

So my online hobby (virtual air traffic controlling — see www.seaartcc.net) just today had major kerfluffle…basically the entire staff of my center quit and accusations are flying everywhere. It’s quite fun drama to be an observer after being on the staff previously. It’s one of the most beaurocratic orgs I’ve worked with. Well, I guess our goal is to emulate air traffic control as in the FAA. In this regard I think we have it nailed

Virtual Aviation, geek

I like TV. Quite a bit. I’ve been a cable or satellite user since nearly birth. It’s always given the clearest picture and tons of channels

But damn, cable and sat service is getting pricey! As I get older I’m finding I view TV less and watch movies and Internet videos more. Actual “TV” is only for live events and local news. And with KOMO and Dish Network feuding over some asinine reason (So KOMO got dropped from my sat feed) there is even less of a reason for me to partake in the whole package. The only reason I pay for cable/sat is because I thought that was the only way to get a clear signal….until know.

…Enter the digital TV switch into the proverbial picture….

So with the recent brew-ha-ha of the digital TV switch/delay/etc. I decided to just see what I could get and see what the fuss was about. Being at the top of Capitol Hill, I practically stare at the Seattle TV station broadcast antennas from my deck only 2 miles away. My plasma TV has both the old analog and new digital tuners built-in, as mandated several years ago. So having not used an antenna in decades I attached a simple 6 foot length of coax cable to my TV antenna input and had the TV search for channels…

Holy smokes!

It found them. Not only the new digital channels for all the main stations (ABC, NBC, CBS, WB, CW and some others), but it also found some of the old analog channels still broadcasting. This enabled me to do a complete side-by-side comparison.

Rarely am I impressed, but what I’m seeing on my HDTV on the digital channels (with a complete ghetto “cable” antenna nonetheless) is nothing short of amazing. I’m floored. Full HDTV and stereo surround sound on all major networks. The analog channel equivalents still come-in, but are that lovely snow-storm of interference we’ve all come to know and love, but now are glad to get rid of. It really is that spectacular. I’ve never seen reception and picture quality like this from OVER-THE-AIR broadcast in my life. The comparison is really that striking.

So now I mull some thoughts….If a 6-foot length of coax dangling from the back of my TV can get excellent DTV (and, might I add, *FREE*) reception, what could a modern little antenna pick-up? My mind is full of thoughts.

Could this be the end of a $100/month bill and the beginning of a post-modern rabbit ears revolution for me? It makes me giggle with glee.

So for all the hype it’s been given, if you live close to town, or have a good antenna, The DTV switch is totally worth it. Proven by a small, 10-minute experiment I never thought I’d do.

Capitol Hill Living, Fun!, Rants, Technology, geek

No need to bicker about “off shoring” in IT, we’ve been over looking a PRIME resource right here at home that will work for naps and food!

Solution to IT Helpdesk

Cats, Fun!, Technology, geek

RIP

geek