Tag Archives: Gizmo

LIVE

w600i


I still miss my old green-screen clunker at times… and I swear I’m not a phone whore…

I’m just an old fart that gets repeatedly freaked out by miniaturization.

*Realize that my first experience with cell phones was during high school while working for Radio Shack when I’d run around feeling futuristic with the store’s demo hand-held. A marvel for it’s time which retailed for $1400 and resembled a brick both in dimension and weight.

My S710a started shooting craps… Most likely because of a fall it took when Chad and I were down in Georgetown.

It was still under warranty and I have the in insurance so they sent me another one.

That one shot craps too… (I think it was a half-ass reconditioned one.)

Soooo.. when I called Cingular back for a replacement they told me they were out of replacement s710a units and would have to send me a (newer) W600i instead.

It’s basically my previous phone with more features…. The biggest deal of them I won’t use: “walkman capabilities”… *big deal.. I own an ipod.

But an FM radio too? and Panorama photo function? And the whole “phone operating system” is like 4 times faster… and there’s a flashlight built-in with emergency S.O.S. signaling, and it’s BURNT ORANGE!!!… and… and… And oh look a chicken.

OBSESS

finger

this pic and others *here*

*beep*

Funny… That discovery of the multi-touch-screen stimulated a lot of conversations around our place. (previously journalized).

I started preachy-poo-blow-harding about how we’re overdue to completely re-examine how we (people) interact with machines and information.

I’d like my ipod to do everything my cell phone does – but with a click wheel… no….
maybe just a “click wheel etching” on a smooth glass-like surface that is completely gesture driven…. (FingerOSâ„¢?)

Spin your finger around the etched circle and it acts like a jog wheel for songs…

Tap the surface four times and the screen clears to white… I draw a heart with my finger on the surface and the device calls home.

Anyway… Somewhere in the convo I think it was Chad who asked if I saw the new phone from Nokia… which sounded similar in spirit to what I was talking about.

Google be damned… We found this little Kubrickian minimal delicious piece of telecom.

I don’t think they’re out here yet… I don’t want to know.

No room in the budget for toys after horkin up the cash for the Nikon….

We need new windows on the house… not a new cell phone for Jim.

oh but *SQUEEEE*… shhhhh..

*click*

*dial tone*

LIVE

ear bud


Well… it was inevitable… My beloved old ratty pair Radio Shack of headphones finally died.

I slipped them onto my head at work and the left earphone snapped off in my hand…

no fixing that…

well.. I suppose I could have fixed it with some epoxy – but there does come a point when it’s alright to retire things and get something new….. ….. ….. …. ….. I guess….. *pout*.

Their replacements were waiting for me when I got home in a UPS box from a company called Shure.

They’re allegedly the makers of some of the best headphones in the biz…. Shure they’re expensive…. Which is why I never got a pair… (their best model runs around three hundred bucks I think)…

Bah-ha! But they recently released a budget pair… still a little steep… But considering the last time I bought a set of headphones was 15 years ago, I said shure! Why not!?

They’re probably the best sounding earbuds I’ve ever stuck in my ears… comfortable… and they’re way more portable than the old shedding foam monsters…

They just don’t have the base boom-boom of big headphones – but they’re very “accurate” sounding. (*is that a correct audio guy description?).

The only drawback I can tell about them so far is also a benefit: Sound Isolation.

Once you get them dug into your ear – you can’t hear squat other than the music you’re listening too.

GREAT for sitting in the Grand Central Station / Communal Space / as quiet and conetmplative an environment as a market square in Calcutta / referred to as my “office”. (I’m saving my rant about the drawbacks to the whole “Open Office Environment” concept later).

BAD if you were doing something like riding a bicycle in traffic.

I shure could use a new gimmick to close journal entries.

WORK

cam


My employer inhabits portions of the first and basement floors of their “flagship” project: A turn of the (last) century hotel designed by Preston J. Bradshaw.

Until room is made with the next remodel, I’m stuck in the basement with the construction division.

Sure – I want to be upstairs with the architects and other creative folk… But I’ve found the insulation of being in “the hole” good for productivity…

Besides, the constant parade past my desk of woofy sub-contractors provide that perfect excuse to heed the optometrist recommendation to “divert and exercise your eyes every 20 minutes when working on a computer”.

/digress

ANYWAY – in an open environment like this you tend to pick up knowledge like second-hand smoke. At any given moment I’m now able to hack up tid-bits of information about plumbing, which nail guns are better to use and how to get a building permit.

The other day a vendor came in to demonstrate these new cameras which are getting installed on our properties…

Security cameras aren’t a new concept – but these are cool / and,… well.. quite creepy… These are digital “IP” cameras… Meaning, using a personal computer with an internet connection, (and providing you have the software and pass-codes to log in) – you can pull up ANY camera,…. ANYWHERE…

Wanna know who’s sitting by the pool at our Cayman’s project? – Just ask the security manager to punch it up on his laptop.

The cameras have already proven themselves as useful for the company by nabbing vandals and / or wrong doers… But I just can’t shake this nagging creeped out feeling about what this technology “represents”.

Since I’ve become sensitized to these things – I’ve noticed that they’ve installed IP Cameras at EVERY intersection out in the county where we live. *Why?

I guess I’m just being paranoid.

I’m definitely paranoid that I’m blogging.