Twitter for Week of 16 November 2008
These are my annotated tweets for the week of 16 November 2008. Follow my microblog on Twitter at http://twitter.com/conrad_halling, then come here for the expanded version.
Dictionary Evangelist
2008-11-16: I just watched a TED presentation on the dictionary by Erin McKean — http://dictionaryevangelist.com/ — I love reading the dictionary.
I have the American Heritage Dictionary With Thesaurus, Fourth Edition, installed on my laptop, along with the New Oxford American Dictionary, which comes with Mac OS X. I spend a lot of time browing these dictionaries.
Resuscitating a PowerBook G4 (2)
2008-11-16: I removed Debian 4.0r5 from my PowerBook G4 and installed Mac OS X 10.5. I’m very pleased with how fast the computer still is.
Yesterday, I installed Debian 4.0r5 for PowerPC on my 1.5-GHz PowerBook G4. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t connect to my Airport Extreme base station, and I didn’t have the patience to twiddle with the configuration files. I read the documentation for Mac OS X 10.5 and discovered I could install it on the PowerBook, so that’s what I did, and it runs great.
Working on the Weekend
2008-11-17: @pyyhkala My observation is that working four hours on the weekend is equivalent to eight hours on a weekday. There’s a problem here.
I usually work several hours every weekend in order to keep up with the demands of my job. I often put off until the weekend those tasks where I need several hours to concentrate.
Pandemonium Bookstore
2008-11-17: I went to Pandemonium in Central Square (Cambridge) tonight to buy a book for vacation. I bought A Fire Upon the Deep, by Vernor Vinge.
Pandemonium is a book store in Cambridge that specializes in gaming, science fiction, and fantasy. Their selection of science fiction is very good because they have a lot of used books.
Not a Smartphone
2008-11-18: My new cell phone will be delivered today. It’s so not a smartphone that it doesn’t even have a camera. It’s just a phone, nothing more.
I thought about buying a smartphone, and I looked into it carefully. But I’m on the Internet all day long at work, and then I’m on the Internet when I’m at home, so I don’t really need a smartphone. So I ordered a Samsung Knack (see the CNET review), which is a no-frills cell phone and nothing more.
If Verizon had the iPhone, I would buy one. But after billing problems I had with AT&T several years ago, I vowed never to do business with them again.
Charles Stross and Vernor Vinge
2008-11-18: @agbiotec Stross is on my list of authors to read. Vinge’s A Deepness in the Sky is the best science fiction book I’ve read this year.
@agbiotec is the second person to recommend books by Charles Stross. I’ll get to Stross soon.
Testing PowerBook Batteries
2008-11-18: I’m testing three old batteries in my PowerBook G4 to see how long they last after charging. One battery has a cycle count of 753!
These batteries have seen hard use. None of the batteries lasts longer than one hour forty minutes. I need to buy a new battery.
Missouri No Longer a Bellwether State
2008-11-19: McCain is finally declared the winner in Missouri. We lived in Missouri for seven years; we’re much happier in Massachusetts.
Missouri is blue in St. Louis and Kansas City, red otherwise. My wife and I are very liberal, and we sometimes felt uncomfortable in the conservative Missouri culture. Obama did a great job challenging McCain in Missouri, and he almost pulled it off. This breaks Missouri’s string of casting its electoral votes for the winner of the presidential election.
Vacation Reading
2008-11-19: I’m on vacation, so I’ve been reading today: Hallelujah Junction, by John Adams; Mac OS X Leopard: The Missing Manual, by David Pogue.
I’m reading David Pogue’s book using my Safari Books subscription, which has saved me a lot of money so far. I bought John Adams’s autobiography at Porter Square Books, one of my favorite local bookstores.
Trading in an iPod mini for an iPod touch
2008-11-20: I erased my three-and-a-half year old iPod mini this morning. I’m going to trade it in today for the 10% discount on a new iPod nano.
2008-11-20: I went to the Apple store on Boylston today to buy an iPod nano, but I came home with an iPod touch. I got 10% off for my old iPod mini.
Oh, did I mention that you can trade in an old iPod at the Apple store and get 10% off on a new iPod? I wasn’t sure I believed it, but it’s true. I had to fill in a form with my name, address, email address, and the serial number of the old iPod.
My initial plan was to buy an iPod nano, but the 8-GB iPod touch is only $80 more, and I wanted the larger screen to watch TED videos on, so I splurged.
The Long Now and Anathem
2008-11-21: The Long Now, a project to build a clock that will last 10,000 years, provided inspiration for Stephenson’s Anathem.
I learned about the Long Now project from a TED presentation by Steward Brand. Neal Stephenson’s connection to the Long Now project is described in this post. Anathem is a book that has remained in my head after I finished it; I will probably reread it in December.
iPod Touch 2.2
2008-11-21: iPod touch 2.2 update is 277.7 MB in size. I updated iTunes to 8.0.2 first, but I don’t know if that is a requirement. Downloading now….
2008-11-21: iPod touch 2.2 update was problem-free. I’m still in novelty mode in the App Store. Complete works of Shakespeare for free is awesome.
The 2.2 update for the iPhone provided Street View for Google Maps, but not on the iPod touch; no one really knows why.
I’ve been spending a lot of time on the App Store seeing what’s available. My choices so far:
- Google Earth
- Shakespeare
- Stanza
Unfortunately, there’s a real paucity of scientific applications.
Boston Drum Center
2008-11-22: I took my brother, who is visiting from Oregon, out to the Boston Drum Center in Acton, where he tried all the cymbals. Great store!
Harvard Square Book Shopping
2008-11-22: @02138now My brother and I bought presents for his kids at Curious George and the Coop. Both stores were packed with people who love books.
@02138now retweets Harvard Square activities; 02138 is the zip code that contains Harvard Square.
Touch Screens
2008-11-22: This afternoon, the touch screen of my cell phone wouldn’t respond. Then I remembered, it doesn’t have a touch screen.
This is iPod touch disease. I use my iPod touch so much more than my cell phone that I forget that I have to use the buttons on my cell phone.
November 23 2008 07:33 pm | Microblog
