I've never seen Tom Waits live. I've heard plenty of bootlegs, but never in person.
When the chance came to see him in Jacksonville, I jumped at it. I got good seats and just needed to figure out the logistics between WPB and Jax. Jax is the closest he's ever been to me.
The show was great. I heard a bunch of the stuff I was hoping for.
If he comes near you, go see him. It is worth it.
Thursday, July 10, 2008
Monday, March 10, 2008
Lions and Tigers and Bears! Oh My!
Silverlight 2, WCF, WPF, Expression Blend, Silverlight 1, Entity Frameworks, Anonymous Types, Generics, LINQ to just about everything, SQLServer 2008, WorkFlow Foundation, BizTalk
In the MS space (forget the iPhone SDK and other things happening out there), there is an over abundance of new technology out there. How can anyone keep up? Where to start?
In the MS space (forget the iPhone SDK and other things happening out there), there is an over abundance of new technology out there. How can anyone keep up? Where to start?
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Apple Store Experience
My son, Jason, is pursuing a career in 3-d animation. It was recommended he get a Mac for some of the software work. He decided on a MacBook Pro and we went off to the Apple Store.
Now first off, most of the people in there are too hip (or trying to be too hip) for their own good. A big of smugness when dealing with the general consumer. See this article in Geeks Are Sexy for the general smugness of the Mac User http://www.geeksaresexy.net/2008/01/19/mac-fans-were-stuck-up/.
Maybe it was a bad day, but the Apple store experience wasn’t the best. Now some of the people in the store have been very helpful in the past, but not today. First it was the aging hippie that waited on us. He really didn’t know (or shared his knowledge if he did know) much about the laptop, he just read from the little poster board and said, which one do you want? Then he wandered back, got the stuff, plopped in on the counternd said she’ll help you.
After about 5 minutes, the woman asked if we were being helped, we said he said you’d help, she said I’m in a training session. Let’s see now, a store with 3 spots for registers, all 3 being used by training sessions. How the hell do you buy something in the Apple #Store#? Finally, she starts to check us out and someone else comes and we get out of there.
Wait! It is the wrong screen, Jason goes trudging back to the store. After about 15 minutes I go back to see what’s happening. He is there waiting patiently while the laptop is swapped out. First the guy brought a 17 inch instead of the 15 inch (that would have been a score), then he had to redo all the paperwork for the student discount they did before. Finally we get out.
Jason said some guy made the comment about how are they supposed to sell stuff in the store? Are they victims of their own growth and are trying to get new customers trained and sell stuff? Don’t know, but it was a bit frustrating.
He is getting up to speed on the laptop. A Mac in the house, a sign of things changing.
Now first off, most of the people in there are too hip (or trying to be too hip) for their own good. A big of smugness when dealing with the general consumer. See this article in Geeks Are Sexy for the general smugness of the Mac User http://www.geeksaresexy.net/2008/01/19/mac-fans-were-stuck-up/.
Maybe it was a bad day, but the Apple store experience wasn’t the best. Now some of the people in the store have been very helpful in the past, but not today. First it was the aging hippie that waited on us. He really didn’t know (or shared his knowledge if he did know) much about the laptop, he just read from the little poster board and said, which one do you want? Then he wandered back, got the stuff, plopped in on the counternd said she’ll help you.
After about 5 minutes, the woman asked if we were being helped, we said he said you’d help, she said I’m in a training session. Let’s see now, a store with 3 spots for registers, all 3 being used by training sessions. How the hell do you buy something in the Apple #Store#? Finally, she starts to check us out and someone else comes and we get out of there.
Wait! It is the wrong screen, Jason goes trudging back to the store. After about 15 minutes I go back to see what’s happening. He is there waiting patiently while the laptop is swapped out. First the guy brought a 17 inch instead of the 15 inch (that would have been a score), then he had to redo all the paperwork for the student discount they did before. Finally we get out.
Jason said some guy made the comment about how are they supposed to sell stuff in the store? Are they victims of their own growth and are trying to get new customers trained and sell stuff? Don’t know, but it was a bit frustrating.
He is getting up to speed on the laptop. A Mac in the house, a sign of things changing.
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Head First SQL gotchas with SQLServer 2005 (1)
I have been working through Head First SQL
and have run into a few differences between SQLServer and MySQL (recommended to use with the book).
instead of desc for describe table, use sp_colums {table name} or sp_help {table_name}
in one example they use date as the data type, datetime must be used
the insert with multiple values will not work as they have it - this website has a solution http://blog.sqlauthority.com/2007/06/08/sql-server-insert-multiple-records-using-one-insert-statement-use-of-union-all/
more as I run across it
and have run into a few differences between SQLServer and MySQL (recommended to use with the book).instead of desc for describe table, use sp_colums {table name} or sp_help {table_name}
in one example they use date as the data type, datetime must be used
the insert with multiple values will not work as they have it - this website has a solution http://blog.sqlauthority.com/2007/06/08/sql-server-insert-multiple-records-using-one-insert-statement-use-of-union-all/
more as I run across it
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Customer Service - Amazon
I ordered a Toshiba HD-A30 1080p HD DVD Player
I hooked it up and was very impressed with the picture.
In browsing around Amazon for some other stuff, I noticed the player had gone down in price. Snooping around Amazon, I see that they have a 30 day price guarantee. I shot off an email (on Sunday) to see what they would do. Within 4 hours I had a response from them. They reviewed the order and credited my credit card for the difference. I think that is excellent.
There is a site at www.nukeprice.com that will watch the items you have ordered and notify you if the price goes down.
Day 27 - Post 18
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Various Thoughts
We had a nice Thanksgiving. My parents and sister were over. Jason had his girlfriend over.
I usually do the appetizers. I try to do something different, but this year I just wasn't inspired. I thought about it for quite some time, but never really came up with anything unique. I worked off the appetizer for last year and made mini meatball and sausage pepper and onions subs. They were good, but nothing exceptional.
It is amazing how much work goes into creating the dinner and how quickly it is all over (except the leftovers).
How much is it worth to wake up early to get a deal on Black Friday? I'm not sure. Jason and I ventured to BJ's where we picked up an Olevia 47" 1080p LCD. We were in and out, back home by 8AM.
The TV is installed (partially) and looks great. I also picked up a Toshiba HD-A30 1080p HD DVD Player
It doesn't look like I'm going to make the 30 in 30. I'll get some more up over the next few days, but not 30.
Day 26 - Post 17
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
VS2008 Download
After turning off the pop up blocker on IE7, I was able to get the professional version downloaded. If I had bothered to read the instructions, this would not have been an issue. I need to learn to read instructions more.
Install was not an issue. I only ran the beta in a vm so there was nothing to clean up.
Now, let's see if I can learn something here.
Day 21 - Post 16
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