jeffpollard.net

Are you sure? Cause I'm not.

Are you sure this comic isn't created JUST for me? It's just too funny.

Silver Gadgets Galore

I took a cool photo of all of my silver gadgets tonight. It hit me that all of my geek toys are silver now. And the best part is that my website matches it all!

For those of you playing along at home, that's Olivia's Titanium 550, my new Visor Edge, my Titanium 667 and my Kyocera mobile phone in front. It's like a happy little family!

Bring your dead!

Tonight was pretty productive. Olivia went out with the girls to see some Ya Ya movie (whatever the hell "Ya Ya" means!) so I stayed around here and began my quest to get rid of a bunch of old junk before we move. Most of my junk is in or around my computer area, so that's where I have started. Since I got a new Visor, my old one will be hitting the road. We'll also be parting ways with Olivia's old PowerBook soon as well as some old computer junk that Martin was throwing away some months ago and I took mercy on it and brought it home (much to the lady's disliking). It'll make her happy when I get rid of it all and get more mooh-lah to buy cool stuff for the house. (Yes, you want to check out that link. Go ahead. Click it. It won't hurt you. See? It's just a harmless little link.) Now, if I could just save up enough for that Toyota Matrix....Hmm..I wonder how much that old, used tissue would go for...

What a crock

Did I really do what I said I'd do?

Work continues to seem really slow. And, wouldn't ya know it, it's that time of year again. Yup, time for employee reviews. As much as I didn't enjoy spending lots of time tediously writing my self-review last year, I kinda enjoyed it. But, it's different this year. It's not that I'm dreading getting reviewed- I think it will be a favorable one again this year- but I guess I just feel sortof useless lately. It could be that work has been slow lately and so I've been spending time working on personal things..like blogging at 10:00 in the morning. But it's crazy because there's really not a whole lot else I should be working on. Sure, I can think of a lingering project or two that I could work on, but the motivation seems lost. Those projects have gotten strung along this long, why can't they wait another day to be completed. "Why do today what you can put off until tomorrow?"

I know my total performance over the past 12 months has been good and I've gotten a great deal accomplished, but the past two weeks of worthlessness seems to be overshadowing it. I guess I just need to take a few steps backward and look at the year as a whole.

I've discovered that the backlighting on my new Visor Edge isn't working. Before I purchased the handheld, I opened the box and checked to make sure everything was there. However, I couldn't turn the Visor on to make sure that everything works. I've made the assumption that since it was a clearance item at Wal-Mart that exchanging it isn't an option. Plus, I think the two (one blue, and my silver one) the guy brought out from the back were the last two they had. So, I called Handspring tech support last night and they're sending me another unit. Not a bad deal, except it'll be a refurbished model. I guess it doesn't really matter, as it will still have the factory 1 year warranty. It had better not smell like somebody else's sweaty hand.

House call work is still booming lately. I did some work for someone Saturday afternoon, someone else last night, and tonight I've got a couple of iMacs to network down the street from the Agency, right accross the street from my parking deck. How convenient! I may also have a larger job coming up in a few weeks doing some consulting and setting up a network for a new small business here in downtown Richmond. Luckily, all of the Cat 5 cables are already run, we'll just need to install some network equipment. Ya know, the fun stuff.

I broke down..

It's been a pretty lazy and uneventful weekend.

We went to a "office party" that Lauren won from a local radio station at Club Razzles Friday after work, followed by Waffle House and then hanging out at their new apartment (which is very nice, by the way).

We woke up late on Saturday, sat around all day and then went to Dinner with Jennifer and then a late night Wal-Mart spree. I think we walked every isle of the store and ended up buying a bunch of stuff. Olivia finally purchased her Dirt Devil mini vacuum.

Today we woke up even later, watched the race, and then I changed the oil in my truck. After getting cleaned up, we went to Pizza Hut.

After dinner we checked in at our Rt. 1 Wal-Mart to see if they had any good deals on Handspring Visors. When we were at the Mechanicsville Wal-Mart Saturday night, they had taken down their Visor display and they had some Visor accessories on clearance (aparrently Handpsring had some sort of deal with Sam Walton or something, cause every store used to have a special Visor display case). I made the assumption that Wal-Mart is not going to be carrying Visors anymore. What a good time to get a good deal on a new Visor, right?

When we got to the electronics dept., their Handspring display was gone, too. So, I asked one of the workers if they had any leftover Visors to sell. He said he thought they did and went back to the back room to see. He came back out a few minutes later with two Visor Edge boxes. One was the silver model and the other a blue model. I asked him to see how much they were currently priced. $149. NOT BAD. I had been pseudo-shopping online for the past few days for a new handheld since my Visor is acting up. The best price I had seen online was $139, which is good, but then I'd have to pay shipping and wait a few days for it to arrive.

So, I opened the box for the silver one to inspect it. It appeared as though it had already been opened, but it was still pristine, no scratches. Everything was in the box including the springboard module adaptor and all. I didn't even think the Edge could take springboard modules..I guess I was wrong. So, I bought it. Yep. I can't believe it even now. It's a beautiful little device, all wrapped in a metal casing to protect it from the monsters (and lint) in my pocket every day. It's slim and sleek and I hope it works better than my last one has been recently. We'll see.

That's about it for this weekend. Olivia's getting set up with her new computer so I gotta go give some technical assistance.

Oh joy of joys!

It looks like Olivia's Titanium PowerBook G4 should be arriving tomorrow. MMMMMmmmm 550mhz....256MB RAM..CD-RW/DVD drive...mmmmm..OS X. I hope it's everything she had hoped it would be. After waiting a month and a half for the damned thing to ship, it had better come with some little candies in the box.

Hopefully *nudge* *nudge* she'll post on Monday and talk about her first experiences with OS X. I'm going to predict that she's not going to fall in love with it immediately. In fact, she'll probably wonder why this is the next generation of the MacOS and why it's such a revolutionary thing. She'll also hate the trackpad, but (and don't tell her 'cause she'll figure it out) she'll get used to it. In a month from now, she'll be singing the praises of widescreen Aqua bliss.

Caught between a handheld and a portable

I've spent the past two years making myself so reliable on my Visor that now that it's not working properly, it's frusterating the hell out of me. I called Handspring to find out why my power button isn't working. They tell me that my Visor is beyond their 90-day free support time and that I need to call their 1-888 number and pay $19.95 per incident support. I don't think so.

So now I've got to decide whether I buy another handheld or find other ways to organize myself. I mean, I still use my Visor for lots of things including keeping appointments and entering data into Pocket Quicken. The novelty of it has definitely worn off (It wore off a long time ago), but I still use it a lot..when it's working. And that's the thing: it hasn't worked correctly for a long time.

I've been eyeing the Handspring Visor Edge, which is only running around $150 if you can find a good deal on them. It's so tempting..but do I need it enough to replace my current handheld? Also, do I buy another Handspring handheld or should I try a Palm, Inc. product?

Caption Game

You know what to do. (For those that have never played this game, this photo needs a good caption....or three.)

Almost ready!

Looks like the first unit is nearing completion. The doors are now locked on this building, making it more difficult to get inside and see things. We did, however, find out that the windows slide up and down very easily. Not quite sure what else they'll be doing to finish up the outside of this one other than possibly painting the doors and shutters dark green. Building C is about to have the first floor concrete poured, so we're not too far off!

A few good links (cause I'm tired)

If you like car show coverage, then you might enjoy my coverage from this weekend's event.

The Summer Slam meet and extra Tacoma photos from the show are posted, too.

If you like to see a bunch of Tacomas from California then you might enjoy this.

And..if you dig really good techno music, then make sure you check this out. The guy who traveled all the way up from Florida for Summer Slam mixes/makes his own techno music and his group (SunRise Society) has an area setup on MP3.com. It's pretty good stuff, especially the song in the link above.

I also just wanted to make yet another mental note of why I love being a minitrucker so much. On the way to work this morning, a lowered red Nissan truck passed me about halfway to downtown. He (of course) threw up his hand and waved. I (of course) already had my hand in the air to wave at him at the same time. He passed me, got in front of me, and then seemed to slow down to match the speed that I was traveling at. We traveled through downtown front-and-back of each other and when it came time for me to head off on my exit, he once again threw his hand out the window to wave. This is what it's all about, folks. I have no idea who the guy was, but it's a neat thing to be a part of something that has such a widespread (read: national...international?) mutual respect for each other. It just goes to show that it doesn't matter whether you drive a Tacoma or an S-10 or a Nissan or whatever..it's just a mutual respect thing. I wouldn't trade being a minitrucker for anything in the world.

Relief...

I'm finally able (mentally and physically) to get on with my life. Circumstances over the past couple weeks have kept me from the following:

1.) Blogging like I should

2.) Sleeping like I should

3.) Enjoying life..like I should

You see, I had this little project that I knew I would be spending lots of time on in the last few weeks. However, I didn't factor in all of the other things that are going on in my life to figure out that the whole thing was going to cause me to get sick. I know, I know: Whah. Don't worry, I'll cry you a river some other time.

So, I'm feeling a bit better now. Still not 100%, but almost. I need to get myself back up to full health by this weekend for Summer Slam. It looks like a bunch of guys from CustomTacos are going to meet at the show, including one guy from FLORIDA! He's crazy for driving all the way up here just for that.

I also want to give a big ole' shout out (whatever the heck a "shout out" is) to my Dad. He's nearing the end of his last year as an elementary school principal. Yep, he'll be retiring very soon to relax and probably take on some less-stressful work. Olivia and I attended a dinner party that his school threw for him last Friday and we had a blast. I'm so absolutely proud of you, Dad. You sure have made a huge difference in Harrisonburg City Schools and it was really neat to see how much your staff adores you. Now, go find something stress-free to do with yourself..like, maybe, go to Alaska in two weeks! :)