Merry Christmas!

I'm pretty much done with my Christmas shopping:

Shoot!

Well, I guess JC Penny removed the longer version of that commercial so I had to find it on YouTube:

My favorite Christmas commercial

So far this is my favorite Christmas commercial I have seen this season:

I love that song and the girl is so cute. She reminds me of my niece Emily.

Nothing ever goes as planned....

Yes, it's a hell of a notion.  I got my copy of OS X Leopard yesterday and I was anxious to get it installed on my MacBook last night.  So I sat down and popped in the DVD, waited for the machine to reboot, and then started the installation.  My excitement turned to frustration when up popped a screen informing me that the OS could not be installed on my hard drive because the partition table was not GUID.  That would have to be changed with Disk Utility, which would erase the drive.  Even though I had all of my data backed up I was paranoid that I might have forgotten something so I decided to use SuperDuper to clone my drive, which took over three hours, then I booted to the external drive and re-partitioned my main drive and set the GUID partition table.  Then I had to again boot to the DVD and install the OS, which took about another hour.  After that I had to transfer all my files and settings from the external drive to the new OS.  The estimated time was over two hours and it was getting late so I just let it run and went to bed. 

When I got up this morning I didn't have much time to play with it but it appears that everything was transferred flawlessly.  All my music, pictures, files, bookmarks, programs, everything seems to be there and working fine. 

I was hoping for a painless upgrade and, even though it got off to a rough start, in the end I'm pretty impressed.  Apple could certainly teach Microsoft a few things.  Oh, the reason my partition table was not set right was because I upgraded my hard drive a few months ago and I didn't know that I had to set it to GUID.  So it's really my fault.  I didn't do enough research before I installed the new drive

X-Wing Flight: The Real Story

You might have seen the video from the guys who built the scale model rocket of an X-Wing fighter and launched it:

But that's not the whole story. Watch below to see what REALLY happened. Shocking, just shocking!

ZZ Top

So Friday evening Jason & I headed up to Fayetteville to see ZZ Top, who was playing at the Bikes, Blues & BBQ Rally. They played at the Randall Tyson Track Center. I had never been there before but the event description said it would be all general seating with bleachers. I wasn't thrilled about that but figured it wouldn't be that bad. I was wrong. The track center was basically like an elongated gymnasium. It had pull-out bleachers along both sides, however they only had one side pulled out. This made for VERY limited seating. We did not arrive early enough to get a seat so we ended up having to stand on the floor the whole night. It was very full and people kept crowding around us. By the time it was over I could hardly feel my legs. When getting into the car neither of us could make our legs bend!

The band put on quite a good show so I'm glad I went but I wouldn't do it again. Next time we need to make sure there will actually be SEATS.
The opening band was called Blackberry Smoke. I had never heard of them but they were pretty good. They played a song called "Up in Smoke" that is included in the new Nascar 08 video game. I like it but I can't find any way to buy it yet. Hopefully it will be available soon

iPhone Obversations

Ok, so I have been using the iPhone for a few days and I've discovered a few problems with it. Some of these I already knew ahead of time but I didn't think it would be that big a deal.

First is the headphone jack. Apple decided to make the headphone jack slightly recessed so that only very small headphone plugs will fit into it. Since they include a set of headphones, with built-in microphone, I guess they thought nobody would ever want to use anything else. I like to listen to music and podcasts in my car but my existing mini-plug to mini-plug cable would not work. I had to buy a new one from Belkin. It works great but I wish I hadn't had to buy it.

Next is the fact that the iPhone will not send or receive MMS messages even though it has a built-in camera. I know they phone has e-mail capabilities but it is so convenient to be able to snap a picture and just send it to someone else's phone. If anyone tries to send you a picture you get a notification and a website to visit. You are given a message ID and password to retrieve the picture but half of the time there is a problem and you can't get it. You have to keep trying until it works. Then there doesn't seem to be any way to save the picture. As far as I know the iPhone is the only camera phone on the market that doesn't support MMS.

Third is the automatic screen locking. While I love this feature most of the time I find it a hassle to use while driving. There should be an easier way to pause the music or advance to the next track than having to push the home button, swipe to unlock the screen and then make your selection. To be fair if a call comes in while music is playing the iPhone automatically fades and pauses the player while you answer the call. Even so I still would like to have more control with the screen locked.

So these are my main gripes so far. I'm sure I'll discover more as time goes by. Overall I am very impressed with the iPhone. It isn't perfect but it is by far the best mobile phone out there today

iPhone is MINE!

I bought an iPhone last night. I have wanted one since they came out and I just couldn't pass up the $200 price drop! This thing is truly a remarkable device. So far I really love it. I only wish the headphone jack wasn't so recessed. I had to order a Belkin cable so will be able to listen to the iPhone in my car.
I can't wait for the update that will let me purchase songs from the iTunes store over WiFi.

Cracks

Today I noticed a crack in the hinge on my Nintendo DS Lite. I bought it the day it was releasedin the US (June 11, 2006). I called Nintendo to see what my options are and I was less than pleased. Basically, since it's nearly 3 months out of warranty, I only have two options:
1) Buy a refurbished DS for $84.80
2) Send my unit for repair ($75.00 + parts)

I told them I didn't want to use either of those options so I will just live with the crack. The customer service representative said it was really only a cosmetic issue anyway.
I'm kind of bummed because I don't really know when the crack appeared. I just saw it today for the first time. It may have even happened during the warranty period.