Now with Android!

July 16th, 2010

Well, I’m a Blackberry to Android convert.  Yesterday morning, I picked up two new Samsung Vibrants for myself and Candy.  I must say, I really like these phones.  They are really nice.  I don’t know if I will ever use my laptop again.  Coming from my old BB 8320, I can say that this is major improvement!  This phone adds GPS, Expanded memory (2GB compared to 64 meg for apps), and a  HUUUGE screen to the features that were on my Blackberry.  So I already would have been impressed, but when you talk about the Android OS, that’s where this phone really shines!

I must say, that I love the Android OS!  I had a chance to play with a co-worker’s HTC Incredible over a month ago, and I really liked it.  I realized that I wanted an Android phone, and I needed to find one on T-mobile.  Candy and I love T-mobile.  They simply have the best customer service, and reasonable prices.  I immediately began looking for something similar that was available on T-mobile.  I was sad to find out that there was not, but there was a phone in the works that would be launching sometime in 2010 on T-mobile (The Galaxy S aka the Vibrant).

You might ask what’s so great about the Android Operating System, and I will tell you, that it’s just like having a laptop on your phone.  It’s based on Linux, it has tons of free and paid for apps out there just a click away, and best of all (for those of you who know me you know how important this is), it’s NOT APPLE!!  The touch screen interface is nice and smooth.  The presses feel responsive, the keyboard is nice, and customizable.  I prefer the default Swype keyboard that lets you drag your finger over the virtual buttons to type, and Candy likes the more tactile Android keyboard, but that’s the great part, if you don’t like something on this phone, change it!  Android is the have-it-your-way operating system!

All in all, I think Samsung has a really great product on the market, and it’s available to all carriers in one flavor or another.  The T-mobile version (Vibrant) is a welcome addition to the T-mobile family, and is definitely the best smartphone you can get that is supported by the carrier.  I would say that this phone compares very closely to an iPhone 4, and if you believe the hype about Froyo (Android’s new OS version), it may even be better!  I also should point out, that my Coworker decided to compare his Incredible to my Vibrant in a head to head processor/data speed test, and his won in both categories.  So, I guess that’s good, because he needs to feel important, but I really don’t care.  I love this phone, and I think you couldn’t go wrong picking one up for yourself!

Samsung Vibrant Unboxing Courtesy Of Wirefly | TmoNews – Unofficial T-Mobile Blog – News, Videos, Articles and more

July 9th, 2010

TMONEWS has a video of the phone that I plan to get next week being unboxed!  Yes, I am a nerd!  I can’t help it, but you have to admit, it looks pretty cool!

Samsung Vibrant Unboxing Courtesy Of Wirefly | TmoNews – Unofficial T-Mobile Blog – News, Videos, Articles and more.

No Time to Kill

June 11th, 2010

Okay, so the bedroom remodel project is in full swing.  Last weekend, Candy and I moved all of the furniture out of the bedroom.  As of last Saturday night, we are officially sleeping on our memory foam mattress on the kitchen floor, and Isaac is currently sleeping in the play pal next to us.  It’s crazy. 

Over the weekend, we managed to scrape the ceiling and texture the walls using trowels and joint compound.  Candy has been working to help during this week by finishing the bit of texturing that we had left and sanding down the window sills.  We have also managed to make THREE trips to Home Depot, and on the last trip, finally picked out our paint after having brought home 3 samples.  We ended up liking one of the colors so much that we decided to use it on a small part of the room, even though it would be too dark for the entire bedroom. 

Today, after enjoying the afternoon at the ESC picnic out at Will Rodgers Park.  I came home, and helped Candy sand the window seat and cabinet doors, and then I made a few wood repairs, and stained them.  While the stain dried we ate dinner, I mowed the yard, and now the stain is just about ready for primetime.  Next up, is painting primer over the new texture, a task that I plan to accomplish tomorrow afternoon, and maybe, with any luck, we can be done with the thing by Monday.  

So, as you can all see, it’s been a busy week, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.   I really like for us to keep busy by doing projects here an there.  I think it’s really good for us to keep focused on stuff that improves our lives, and makes us feel good about our home.  I can’t wait so get the new trim up, and I’ve been itching to pull that old, painted-over trim with the phone cord tacked to it off the walls since the day we moved in, I just didn’t have the money, the time, or the know-how to replace it before now!  I will post pictures when we are finished.

Progress on Projects

May 26th, 2010

 

Over last weekend Candy and I actually got a chance to work on the bedroom remodeling project of ours.  On Saturday, we got to staining.  We stained 3 interior doors and the trim, and we also stained over 140 feet of trim.  I hate to brag, but we did a good job.  As if that wasn’t enough, on Sunday, we got out there in the backyard and polyed all of that stained wood.  Thank goodness we have a big shed, or we’d be in trouble.  I am excited about remodeling the room.  I think the trim is going to look great once we get it all placed on some freshly painted walls.  I just need to take my time and do a GOOD job measuring so that when I actually make the miter cuts, I won’t have pieces that don’t match the walls.  I’ve done that before, and adding in pieces here and there just doesn’t look good.

I have started working on Candy’s photography site.  I have created a logo, I’ve made a layout, and I’ve scouted some nice WordPress plug-ins to make things as simple as possible for me to build, and her to maintain.  I have a hard time finding opportunities to code on on-the-side projects at home.  Things like that take time.  I suppose if I was charging for the site, I might be more motivated to get it done quickly.  Maybe I will have a few rainy weekends, and then I won’t mind staying indoors to work on the website.  Maybe I’m just used to having a  desk and dual monitors.  Whatever the case, I’m gonna’ get it done pretty soon because I want to see Candy’s photos online.  She does a great job on her photography, but I took the pictures of our boy Isaac in his Beastie Boys outfit!

Isaac Beastie

Updated, Finally

May 18th, 2010

Okay, people, I am still here!  I know it’s been a while but we’ve had a bunch of crazy stuff going on.  Between hail damaged roofs and cars, and lightning catching people’s houses on fire, we just haven’t know which way was up.  The best part is, none of that crap really matters because when it comes down to the nitty gritty, God is in control.

So I’ve managed to stick to my healthy eating lifestyle, and as of now, I’ve dropped somewhere between 15 and 20 lbs.  I recently gave blood at work for the OBI blood drive, and got my free blood checkup thingy.  The results were good.  Really good!  I was thinking that they looked better than anything over the passed 3 year, but when I looked over my entire history of blood donation, these stats are actually the best that I have ever had, and I have been giving blood since 1998!  I really owe it all to the support that I have gotten from my wife, and my recent decision to start taking control of things in my life, and being a victim of circumstances.

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I am super excited about this summer.  Lots of good stuff coming up.  I went to Home Depot with Candy the weekend before last and bought up a bunch of stuff to use for remodeling our bedroom.  We plan to repaint, stain and replace trim, stain and replace doors, and scrape and retexture all of the walls and the ceiling.  Should be a real big project, but I know our bedroom will really look nice when we are done.  Then, of course, it’s on to the remaining rooms that need refinishing.

Overwhelmed

May 4th, 2010

So, I guess you can just call it part of the territory in IT.  Maybe it’s just a part of any career field, but I’m wondering it anyone else gets overwhelmed.  I seem to have this problem every time I start a new job.  I start working somewhere and I don’t do much of anything for a while, and maybe I just get rusty or something, but I just don’t feel like I’m ready to tackle anything difficult, and then it happens.

What happens is, I start getting assignments.  Assignments that seem easy to accomplish at first, and then I start working on them and get into the whole can’t-see-the-forest-for-the-trees dilemma.  Such a dilemma has come upon me recently in my new position.  This happens when I expect things to be set up the way that I think they should be done, or the way that I have seen them done in the past.  The problem arises when I find that a system doesn’t meet my expectation, and I keep trying to make it meet my expectation rather than just see it for what it is.  As a result of this, I can spend hours looking for something that just isn’t there, and then the light will suddenly come on.  As it did today.  Today I finally realized that what I was working on was not as difficult as it seemed, and now I feel like I am going to make it.  The doubt has started to fade from my mind and I feel as if I will be successful at my new job. 

So, why am I sharing this?  Is this just Andrew rambling?  Well, maybe I am rambling a bit, but I think it is important for me to express how I am feeling in my new position because maybe it can help others to see that this is normal, well, for me at least.  I want to spare everyone the technical details of my situation.  Very few people who read this would probably understand what I was talking about, and those who did probably would be bored with it.  Let’s just say, it always takes me a while to figure out what the lay of the land is, and what is expected of me, but when I do, everything just works.  If you get in a tough spot with a new position just remember to be confident in you skills, and don’t give up, break big problems up into manageable chunks, and don’t let your assumptions get in the way of the facts.  And KISS (Keep it simple, stupid).

GAME 5

April 27th, 2010

The Thunder managed to put a Country-A$$-Whoopin’ (CAW) on the Lakers on Saturday night, but they have a big one tonight in L.A.  The game starts late for us at 9:30 P.M.  Lets hope we can pull off a big “W”, and let me hope that I can stay awake.  I am so excited!  It would be great if we could steal a win out there this game, and finish the Lakers off here in OKC on friday!  Lets do it, guys!  Thunder up!

Pau Gasol's ugly face, oh wait, his ONLY Face...

You watchin’?

Crazy Weekend

April 27th, 2010

If you hadn’t heard already.  Simon came down with the flu mid last week.  He probably had the worst night on Friday night.  We probably used every single towel and rag in the house trying to clean up after the poor kid.  Candy and I may have had a total of six or seven hours of actual sleep on Friday night.  So Saturday was nutzo around our house.  We had a sick boy all day who kept Candy and I both on our toes.  We were giving Simon medicine, trying to get him to eat, hoping he didn’t cough up what he had eaten, and taking care of the little baby.  I had also discovered on Wednesday that I have allergies because although I felt like crap all weekend, I in fact, did not have the flu.  And on top of all of that, we were getting some stuff ready for a garage sale that we plan to have next weekend. 

Somehow, I managed to keep in mind that my beloved Thunder were going to be playing the Lakers that evening, and made sure to tune in when the game started.  The game stated off awesome, and the Thunder jumped out to a huge lead that they were able to maintain for the rest of the night, which was a good thing because there was no way that I could maintain focus on anything but the chaos that was surrounding me.

About 9:30 Candy started to notice that our easy-going 6-month-old, Isaac, was starting to act a bit cranky, and seemed to be running a temperature, and since Simon had the flu, we figured that it was time to call the pediatrician and get a tamaflu prescription for little bubba as well, so we did.  An hour later, Simon and I are hanging out at the 24-hour Walgreens (Simon loves to go our, he behaves well, and his feelings get hurt if I go without him.  He also seemed to be feeling a lot better).  I somehow managed to rack up $60 worth of crap and a few treats from the McDonalds before we made it home.  Simon enjoyed some French fries on the ride home which was good because he wouldn’t hardly eat anything all day.

After arriving home, we managed to get the big boy in bed by 11, and we were down to dealing with the little one who had already received his dose of medicine, and was most likely ready to go to sleep as well, right?  WRONG!  Lo and behold he managed to quickly develop a 101.6 fever that we had a heck of a time breaking.  Candy and I spent the next 3 hours cleaning up vomit and trying to cool the kid off.  We stripped him down to his diaper and gave him sponge baths hoping to cool him off.  Both of us were half asleep.  Well, long story short we managed to finally get the boy cooled off enough and properly dosed with infant’s Tylenol and he went to sleep.  The two of us were so wound up from all the excitement that we had a hard time going to sleep, and once again, spent the next day running on fumes.  Lets hope next weekend is less eventful. 

How was your weekend?

It’s Earth Day, Who Cares?

April 22nd, 2010

So, it’s Earth Day.  Okay.  So, um it’s not like democrats, environmentalists, and Hollywood stars don’t try to push the conservation/recycling bit on my every other day of the year.   Are my kids not subject to politically correct environmental reprogramming on all of their favorite shows on a daily basis?  It’s almost like some sort of crazy environmental cult has established itself as the new hip religion.  I personally think it’s more difficult to have faith in the doomsday claims brought about by scientists who study climate change than it is to have faith in Christ. But the fact still remains, being “green” is the one thing you can believe in and not get ridiculed by the mainstream media.  As a matter of fact, it seems almost as if you are ridiculed for not being “green”.  Yuck there’s that word.  The word that makes me think of not the environment, but money wasted.

Don’t get me wrong.  I think the Earth is great and all, and I want it to be a good place to live when my grandkids’ grandkids are around, but I don’t really see the point in being a martyr for the environment.  I can see that it is important to reduce waste.  I think that is something I can really believe in.  I, for one, think it would be great if we invested more energy into reducing the amounts of plastics used, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to go buy one of those $1 re-usable grocery bags!  Every time I see somebody with one of those, I automatically assume that their elevator doesn’t quite reach the top floor.  If I was to use those for our groceries when I went shopping for my family of 4, I would have to carry with me about $20 worth of those crappy little bags.  Bags with handles that you can’t tie, bags that you have to wash, bags that you have to keep up with.  I’m sorry, but it’s just not worth it to me.  I recycle.  I use those little plastic bags to put trash in sometimes.  So in a way, I’m reusing them, right? 

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Moving on, I don’t understand why somebody would pay a premium for an electric car for any reason but to save money on gas.  And from what I’ve seen, you’d have to save a hefty chunk on gas to really make it worth your while.  I don’t like people who think they can tell me that I should walk or ride  bike to work.  If they want to walk or ride a bike to work, be my guest, but I live in Oklahoma, I am 12 miles away form work, and there isn’t  a bus that stops anywhere near my place of business.  Not to mention, if one did, it would probably take me a couple of hours to commute compared to my nice 20 minute drive.  I personally like owning and driving my full-size pickup, and my classic Chevy.  Both are V8’s and both are a heck of a lot of fun to drive.  I’m not looking forward to the day when some politician decides he wants to tell people like me that we can’t operate our vehicles that we choose because it’s not good for the environment.  This is America, and we have rights! 

I for one do not plan to sacrifice my own happiness for the sake of the environment, especially when the whole Global Warming crisis is nothing more than a ploy to get more of our hard earned tax dollars for research.  If you haven’t noticed, it seems that the temperatures world wide seem to be reaching record lows a lot of the time.  This phenomena has occurred so many time that you will no longer hear Global Warming mentioned.  No, the smoke-and-mirrors scientist are now calling it “Climatage”.  This stuff is all a bunch of bull.  I will recycle and conserve, when it makes fiscal sense for me to do so.  Make it easier for me, and I might just cooperate, but until then you can forget it.  I am sick and tired of seeing my favorite color green being mistreated.   Most of the time when I get a magazine, or an advertisement with the word “green” on it, I will promptly file it in the circular file, and maybe even in the one with the recycle symbol on it, if it happens to be the closest one. 

Big Day for OKC Sports!

April 22nd, 2010

So, just in case you weren’t paying attention, today has been a big day for Oklahoma Sports.  The NFL draft round one took place today, and there were 3 Sooners taken in the first 4 picks.  That has not happened in the draft since Nortre Dame in 1946!  Sam Bradford went #1 overall (can you say big, big, big, big paycheck?) to the Saint Louis Rams who were in desperate need of a quarterback.  Ndamukong Suh from Nebraska was taken #2 overall by the Detroit Lions.  As a Sooner fan, I must say, I am really glad to see this guy go on to the NFL.  He pretty much played the entire Defensive Line for Nebraska.  At #3, Gerald McCoy was taken by the Buccaneers, and Trent Williams was drafted by Washington.  Jermain Gresham from OU was taken by Cincinnati at #21.  Former Oklahoma State wide receiver Dez Bryant was drafter 24th overall by the Dallas Cowboys.  So, needless to say Oklahoma will be well represented in the NFL next season.

Secondly, The Thunder hosted the Lakers tonight in a history making event.  The First ever home NBA playoffs game in Oklahoma City.  The thunder have lost 2 games to the defending champs from L.A., but you can see that they’ve got a lot of heart, and they are young so that spells lots of future goodness for our local NBA franchise.  Currently the Lakers lead 66 to 62 in the 3rd.  GO THUNDER, and congratulations Oklahoma the country is finally seeing just how great this state really is!!!

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