I
walked into Wal-Mart today and right there by the door was a 4-foot high,
motioned activated Santa Claus. He started ringing his bell, singing and
dancing at me. I love Christmas. I used to go around saying that it could
not start too soon or last too long for me, but I also love Halloween and
this is just TOO SOON unless you are trying to sell
"Nightmare Before Christmas" videos.
I told Wal-mart employees that I would prefer
to be greeted by Frankenstein or Dracula. They jokingly told me that
Frankenstein was at the "other" entrance. I can understand Christmas
getting ahead of Thanksgiving, but NOT HALLOWEEN! I realize that stores
would like us to be in the Christmas-shopping spirit all year round
throwing money in every direction. They are making it only too obvious.
I hope Halloween is not disappearing. I love
the ghosts, spooks, costumes, children and candy. I love my Mannheim
Steamroller Halloween CD, too.
Comcast, my Internet
provider, offers two different speeds of Internet access, I just
discovered. (I've seen the
phone company ads about getting different speeds of service. I never
imagined the cable companies would do the same - duh on me.)
I decided to try it. The service speeds up
from 3 MBps to 4 MBps. The service rep was new and said this was the first
time she had upped the speed for anyone and wanted to know if it made a
difference for me. She asked if she could call back in a few days. I would be glad to give a report,
I said. (All of this was done
over the phone -- they only had to "flip a switch" on their end to turn on
the speed.)
She told me to unplug my cable modem for 30
seconds and ta-da, I should be at the new speed. We hung up, then I hunted
through the massive tangle of cords beneath my desk to find the right one.
I followed the procedure and got back online.
The verdict? WOW! It was amazingly faster. I
was in awe as sites that normally took a longer time to load, just popped
up. It was almost like going from dial-up to broadband. I realize that I
am here when the Internet is not as busy -- so it was not a true test,
merely a great first impression. As soon as Paris Hilton comes out with her
next video, everything will likely slow down.
Xara has a 15-day free trial. I could not
resist. I can make a bunch of these banners before the trial is over. The
only problem is what to do with them ... and who looks at banners, anyway?
People see them so much that they automatically dismiss them as mild
annoyances.
They are fun to make, though. It's a like
getting a new hobby with no practical value. Oh well, I can always throw
one or two on this blog (to slow down the page loading even more :: sigh
::) or sign an e-mail with one, not that anybody would
actually look at it.
EyeQ
found this treasure. Isn't it an adorable calendar? I was thinking of
putting it on my photo blog, but I have so much stuff that it already
loads a little slower than it should, I guess. I love this calendar,
though, and will find a permanent place for it -- on my Weather
Page, if nothing else.
I finally bought a USB card
reader for my computer. I saw on
The Screen Savers where they only cost
about $12. True enough - so I bought one. It was well worth the price. I got
rid of two other USB camera cables and replaced it with this one card
reader. And now I can read memory sticks from 9 different kinds of cameras
or devices.
Not only that, but I can more easily put
pictures on the memory card for my Palm (Sony Clie) and make slideshows to
carry around with me. Watch out, if I have not already sent you e-mail
with a link to my wedding photos or if you don't have web access and I run
into you in person, then I
may sit you down with my Clie. I'm an armed and dangerous mother-of-the-bride.
I don't have many kind things to say about
our local BellSouth. First, I noticed that we had a "long-distance
provider" fee on our phone bill. We did NOT sign up with any long-distance
provider so I could not understand why we were getting a monthly fee for
long-distance service.
I called the phone company and had this
service cancelled. The next month, I still had a monthly fee on my bill. I
called again and was again reassured that it would be cancelled.
The next month, I had a new fee being charged
by a different provider. When I called BellSouth, I was told that fee was
for "local" or in-state long distance. Apparently, this is different from
"out-of-state" long distance. I was pretty angry by now and clearly stated
that I wanted this monthly fee cancelled, too.
The phone company then told me that
long-distance calls would cost more. That's fine with me since I rarely
make a long-distance call through them. The monthly fees were costing more
than any benefits.
Okay, the day comes when I need to make one
of those rare long-distance calls with my land line (I was sending a FAX
through the computer). Surprise! I discover that I have NO LONG DISTANCE
AT ALL!
Yet another call to the phone company reveals
that they had cut off ALL my long-distance abilities. Argh! By now I am
pulling out my hair.
Finally, I have to explain to the operator
that I still want long-distance ability, but I do NOT want to be on any
monthly plans. That means NO plan for out-of-state long distance service
and NO plan for long-distance service in-state. Sure, my long distance
calls will cost a little more this way. That's fine.
The representative told me that I would have
to talk to a "verifier" and explain what I wanted. I felt like I was
dealing with 3-year-olds. I repeated everything as slowly as I could,
trying to make sure they understood.
Check your bill. You might find the greedy
phone companies are after you, too.
My friend,
EyeQ,
found a very cute doll site. These are the cutest dolls I have ever seen
online. Here's the one I like best. I love her wings, beautiful red hair
and subtle animation. Thanks for telling me about this, EyeQ. I am going
to put her on my photo blog. The author
of these adorable dolls is located at
The Doll House.
This fits me.
I enjoy fantasy and science fiction. Here's the main picture
hanging in the bedroom over our bed. The theme matches -->
Midsummer Eve.
I found a Java script that almost does what I
want. I hoped to find a quick way to go to any date on my photoblog by
simply typing in the date required. This was the closest script I could
dig up. I'd rather have the first part of the link hidden so users could
just type in the date and that would be all they see, making a smaller box
practical. I am sure there's some kind
of script to do this or some way I could hide the date. This kind of
request is hard to google.
Go to any Date on the
Photoblog
Click at the end of the line of text above
to place the cursor and type in any date from
present back to 7/5/2003 (month/day/year - no leading zero).
I
love this program. It was worth every penny (had it a long time so this
last version was just an upgrade). There's much to learn, but it does
much, too. One of the best books for Photoshop beginners is
Classroom in a Book. It covers all the tools and how to use
them in practical ways.
Adobe makes excellent transparent gifs -- and
so easily, too. This
garden spider was sitting by my doorbell on the front
door. She stayed there all day. I liked her -- nobody came to my door when
she was there. H-m-m-m, this might deter solicitors better than a barking
dog.
I liked her so much that I put her in the
bottom left column of my photo blog, too. As of today I have posted over
3,600 photos. I usually post several pictures every day and have been
doing this over a year. The wedding covered a lot and when the happy
couple left on their honeymoon, my daughter asked me to post lots of
pictures of their cat, which we are babysitting for the week, so she could
go online and check up on him. I was more than happy to do so. It gives me
practice with learning my camera and Photoshop. Almost every digital
picture needs a little sharpening, at least.
I've gotten into the habit of carrying a
small pocket camera everywhere I go. It's a small treasure, a Minolta
DiMAGE Xt (now in Xg version, I believe). It is 3.2 megapixels with 3x
optical zoom and does nice little MOV movies. I prefer the MOV format over
MPG because I can convert, edit and do more with MOV files.
But the real pleasure of this camera is the
low-light capabilities. Even my better Sony F-717 can not capture images
in as low a natural light. Of course, both have a good flash. The Sony is better
overall, though. This spider was a macro shot with the Sony. Currently, I
lust after the upcoming Canon EOS 20D with the optional anti-shake lens.
It's the first 8-megapixel camera to get such good preliminary reviews.
The ones currently out in the market have flaws -- like the
Sony F-828.
It adds an obvious purple tint to the photos. I went to Best Buy
and saw the resulting photos myself. It is true. How awful is that?
Leo Laporte
(a TV and radio computer commentator), says that Sony digital
cameras are known for poor software even though other camera parts might
be excellent. I think he's right.
I also have a cell cam for on-the-go shots
such as when we travel. Cell cams still stink for photo quality, though.
Even the cheapest pocket camera is usually better.
Got this from
Webgrits. I don't know why I take these personality tests
since I don't believe them and I don't believe in astrology, but this one
was fun and came from a professional-looking site. Maybe its human nature
to want to label ourselves somehow.
Besides, I like being green. According to the fashion critics, green is
the "in" color this year and my husband's favorite color -- good enough
reason to go out and buy green clothes -- I wonder if anyone carries
"smoke green."
Birthdate color profiles are available at Colorstrology.com.
After selecting the month, don't forget to select the exact day of birth
to get the exact shade profile and not just the month profile.
If you liked their other
presidential flash video (This Land), check Jib Jab's new one out. Their first
site received more hits than the Kerry and Bush sites combined. Both videos
jab at Kerry and Bush equally. It is hilarious. I nearly
died laughing.
I saw an interview with the two creators on
the Today Show. They said it took 6 weeks to make this new humorous
political flash video. This is well worth the trouble it might take
getting into the site.