Archive for the ‘Personal’ Category

Happy 25th Birthday, Epcot

Monday, October 1st, 2007

Epcot’s Spaceship Earth from Family Fun Run in January 2003 (cropped, scaled)Epcot, part of Walt Disney World in Florida, celebrates it’s 25th anniversary today. Here is a picture of Spaceship Earth (with the wand. 🙁 I’m not a big fan of the wand, which has now been taken down. Yeah!) from the 2003 Walt Disney World Family Fun Run.

So in October 1982, when it opened, I would have been 11 and in sixth grade. Being that I was already a computer geek by then, I was fascinated by Epcot. There have been a lot of changes in the 25 years of the park, but I still like it. One of my favorite things is the food available in the World Showcase. I am partial to Les Chefs de France. (I like French cuisine. 🙂 ) I haven’t yet been to the Epcot resort area, which includes Disney’s BoardWalk Inn. (This resort has shops and restaurants in the boardwalk section and is in walking distance to Epcot. You can enter through the World Showcase entrance. But it is a deluxe resort, so I probably won’t be staying there any time too soon.) I haven’t been to the new and improved “The Seas with Nemo & Friends“. (It used to be called “The Living Seas”.) And Spaceship Earth is currently being updated (which is why the wand was taken down) and should be open by my next visit. So, even though it is 25 years old, there is still something new to do in the park.

Sydney’s First Overnight Slumber Party

Sunday, September 30th, 2007

Sydney had her first overnight slumber party last night. She stayed overnight with two other four year olds. She did very well. They had a good time making tie dyed t-shirts and going to see the movie “The Game Plan“. (She liked the bull dog.) I definitely give kudos to the parents where she stayed. They had a gaggle of girls sleep over. (They have three girls, and it was the oldest girl’s birthday. She had some friends over for her birthday, but the middle and youngest girl both invited a couple friends to stay overnight too! I think that this is foreshadowing of my future. But I only have two girls. Whew!) The “sleep over” door is open. Sydney is growing up so fast.

[Updated 10/01/07]: I forgot to post this. When talking to the mom in charge of the sleep over when I picked Sydney up, she relayed this funny little story. I guess she got a full dose of Syd. That night, the mom was in with the three four year olds, getting ready to sleep. Sydney was in a giggling mood and kept giggling. The mom said to the effect of “Okay, girls. It’s time to go to sleep and stop the giggling.” Sydney said, without missing a beat, “But giggling is what little girls do.” This is classic Syd.

To the moon, Cringely, to the moon!

Sunday, September 30th, 2007

Robert Cringely announced in his latest column that he plans to participate in the Google Lunar X Prize. The competition challenge is: “soft-landing a robotic craft on the Moon and roving on the surface”. I have been reading Cringely’s column for a long time. I watched him in his PBS show “Plane Crazy“. I wish him well. It would be so cool to work on his team for the challenge. I am sure that he will provide progress reports in his column. I expect them to be entertaining, to say the least. 🙂

Magazine Salesman

Saturday, September 1st, 2007

I bought magazines from a door-to-door salesman yesterday. I hope it is for a good cause. (I hope that I didn’t get taken.) He was a nice young man and presented himself well. He said that he was from Chicago and was trying to learn skills to help him have a better life. I am supposed to get 36 issues of Condé Nast Traveler for $60.00 plus a $10.00 processing and handling fee for a total of $70.00. I know that I could have gotten it cheaper by subscribing from Condé Nast directly, so hopefully the extra money goes towards the salesman and not just to Midwest Clearing, Inc., the company fulfilling the subscription.

Running headphones: Nike Flight

Saturday, September 1st, 2007

Nike Flight Sport headphonesYep, the stock earbuds that came with the Sansa Express didn’t work out well while running. They popped out of my ears after a few strides. I found these at my local Target store: Nike Flight Sport headphones. They are designed to fit around the back of your neck, with the cord coming out the back. So I decided to give them a try.

They worked out quite well. The ear piece doesn’t actually fit in your ear like earbuds; the band keeps the speakers pressed against, but not in, your ear. The band itself is plastic that is fexible; it keeps it’s shape, but can flex to shape to your head. The cord runs through a channel in the band. The connector worked fine with the Sansa Express. I used them for the first time on Friday, August 31, 2007. I plan to use them on my next run.

St. Pius X Sunday School calendar

Friday, August 31st, 2007

I have made available a Google calendar for St. Pius X Sunday School for the 2007-2008 year. Click on the button below to access it.

Flac to MP3

Sunday, August 26th, 2007

I have been ripping my CD’s to FLAC format for some time now. I use FLAC because it is a lossless compression format. But the Sansa Express doesn’t support FLAC. What to do?

I use foobar2000 as a player of FLAC media. Well, come to find out, it can be used to convert FLAC to MP3. Using lame with foobar2000, it is very easy. I first load the FLAC files into foobar2000. It is convenient to load up a directory of files. I use a format of “[artist]/[album]/[track] [song].flac“. This makes it easy to load an album at a time into foobar2000. I select all of the files in foobar2000, right click, select “Convert >”, “Convert to Same Directory”. A status dialog opens up showing the conversion process. When done, it has created “[artist]/[album]/[track] [song].mp3“.

Now I have files to download. This was one of the selling points of the Sansa Express. You just plug it into a USB port. The computer recognizes it as an external drive. I then drag the MP3 files from my hard drive to the Sansa Express. That’s it!

SanDisk Sansa Express

Saturday, August 25th, 2007

SanDisk Sansa ExpressI just purchased a SanDisk Sansa Express.

I purchased it because it was small, charged via USB, and had a radio. I was looking for a player that I could listen to while I run. (I also bought a Digital Lifestyle Outfitters Action Jacket, which is an arm band and neoprene case for the Sansa Express.)

I have to get it loaded with music for my morning run on Monday. I will have to provide an update afterwards. I suspect that I may have to invest in some sports earphones instead of the ear buds provided.

Our Chicago “Get-away”

Monday, July 2nd, 2007

Nancy and I took a long week-end, during the week, to Chicago. We drove over on Tuesday, June 5, 2007 and returned home on Friday, June 8, 2007. I have put a write-up on TripWiser.

Morning run

Tuesday, May 29th, 2007

I have started a morning run. Since I have completed a 4 runs, I figure that I can write about it now. (I was afraid that I would do it once and then quit.) I have run the Disney Half-Marathon for 4 years now; 2008 will be my fifth year. I really didn’t do a whole lot of running in preparation for the half-marathons (13.1 US miles). (This really made Nancy upset-more from the fact that I was able to do it. She wasn’t afraid that I would get hurt.) I have put together my typical route so far using http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/.

We’ll see how long I keep this up. I started in late spring so that I could get used to running in milder weather. I am not too worried about the hotter summer weather. What I am worried about is winter. We get snow and ice in Iowa winters; I anticipate this to be my challenge.