Lewies Blog

Aurorealis was just talking about this subject the other day. A few months ago I went through the performance review period. I had almost forgotten about it. My boss’s, boss’s, boss tapped me on the shoulder and asked if I had a minute. I was startled, and you can imagine why.

So I come into his office and ask him what is going on. He is all smiles and asks me to take a seat. He proceeds to tell me that the request for my raise has been approved. Joy! He showed me the numbers and I was a little excited. He said as long as my boss and her boss were happy, then he was happy.

I didn’t know what to say. The amount was a nice sum. I just said “Thank You”. I can not say how much it was, just that it was a positive number. What I will say is that I feel really small and undeserving. Afterall, I only have a high school diploma. He gave me his approval and said that I deserved every penny of it. I don’t think that my car can handle the weight of all of those pennies.

Tags: Raise, Money, Finances, Performance Review, Performance, Review, Boss, Manager, Office, Work, Approval, Excited, Happy, Thank You, Undeserving, Pennies, Penny

I had a small training course that I attended to today. My manager told me to sign up for a CorasWorks workshop and that she and her manager would also be attending.

I printed out the directions before I left work yesterday and saw that it would take roughly 50 minutes. Due to my comming into work late a few times, I figured I should try and get there early and meet them before the workshop starts. I gave myself 40 extra minutes.

So I left home just before 7AM today and made the long journey. As soon as I got on the highway, I was immediately reminded why I hated leaving for work before 9AM. Most of it was just me not moving. A 4 mile stretch of highway took me over an hour to get to my exit.

My estimate is that I was traveling at an average speed of about 12 miles per hour. I was late. Very late. I was considering just forgetting about it and going into work instead. I decided to press on and go with it anyway. I arrived 1 hour late.

When I arrived, everyone was still introducing themselves with who they were and what they did. I found a seat and was happy when another person arrived late about 10 minutes after me.

As far as the workshop goes, it was ok. I was learning much about Microsoft SharePoint Portal and CorasWorks. The server that everyone was working on continued to give us problems throughout the day when we all hit it at the same time. My main beef with the product is that it is very hard to navigate. The instructor told us that there are navigations parts that can help with this issue.

Towards the end, the server pretty much died and the instructor had to demo the “hands-on” workshop to everyone from his sandbox on his network. Talk about having a bad day. This guy must have been very embarassed, but he kept cool and didn’t miss a beat.

Lesson for today: Always multiply the estimated time by three during rush hour commutes.

Tags: Training, Work, CorasWorks, Manager, Directions, Late, Workshop, Long, Long Journey, Journey, Highway, 9AM, Microsoft, SharePoint Services, SharePoint, Windows SharePoint Services, WSS, SPS, Microsoft SharePoint, Hands-On, Commute

I came home and found that I had a package waiting for me. It was my free test kit from Newsworthy Audio. The contents within consisted of a Rio Forge MP3 Player (256 MB) and a Belkin TuneCast II Mobile FM Transmitter. I looked at the welcome letter but quickly cast it aside with excitement. My wife and I started trying to get the audio player working on our own. It was a snap!

She would listen in on one earphone while I listened on the other. A sample song, (”Raining Down” by Astral,) was already on the player and it was nice. I started looking at all the other features. We found that it also contained a stopwatch and contained an FM receiver that could be setup to record audio onto the audio player. The radio wasn’t getting any good reception indoors.

We then went out to the car to check out the FM Transmitter. It was a little hard to turn it on, but I soon figured it out. Both the Rio MP3 Player and the radio had to be on, or else the FM Transmitter would turn itself off. I set it up on the same station as my XM Radio (88.1). It was very faint. I turned up the radio volume to be very loud and we could hear the music playing from the player.

Angel was talking to me about a dream that she had while I was doing all of this. I then decided to try and save the frequency in one of the presets. It immediately went back up to the default radio station and static sent Angel screaming 20 feet away from the car.

Now that we know that it works, I’ll just leave it as is until testing begings. I started setting up the software on my computer. Rio just loves to keep updating things over and over. Ugh! The software for Newsworthy Audio was pretty simple and installed just fine. Well, now it is time to wait for the test to begin on Monday.

Tags: NewsworthyAudio, Newsworthy Audio, Newsworthy, News, Audio, Beta, Beta Kit, Mail, USPS, Package, Kit, Testing, Belkin, Rio, Rio Forge, MP3 Player, Audio Player, MP3, Player, TuneCast II, FM Transmitter, FM, Excited, Angel, Wife, Scared, Funny, Reception, Indoors, Tune, XM Radio, 88.1, Loud Music, Frequency, Static, Screaming, Car, Test, Tester, Beta Test, Beta Tester, News Service

So my adventures since I have started this blog are beginning to pay off. I recently got my free iPod in the mail last week. I’m having plenty of fun with it learning about audio players and such. Now my eyes are looking to a new goal to achieve.

Enter the XBox 360. The XBox 360 isn’t even on sale yet. Microsoft has set the date to be in three months in October for the United States. Sales are estimated to be $299 US Currency. However, that isn’t stopping many people from preordering the things.

The same people who brought the free iPod to my doorstep are now offering a free Microsoft XBox 360. Call me greedy, but I don’t want to miss out on this opportunity. I don’t even have the first XBox. My brother has one and he says that the quality is far greater then the Sony Playstation 2. There is much heated debate over the XBox 360 and the Sony PS3 in regards to which is better. The Nintendo Revolution doesn’t even compare with these next two gaming consoles. A PC may offer some heavy competiotion, but you need to realize that these new consoles have multiple processors. Also, they aren’t running a bloated operating system.

So what comes with the XBox 360?

• Backwards compatible with previous Xbox games
• Detachable, upgradeable hard drive
• Wireless controller
• HD game displays on HDTVs
• Stream media from portable music devices & Windows XP PCs
• 512 MB of GDDR3 RAM
• 3 symmetrical cores - 3.2GHz each
• 500MHz ATI graphics processor
• 12x dual-layer DVD drive that supports: DVD, DVD+-R/RW, CD-R/RW, WMA & MP3
• Built-in Ethernet port
• 2 memory unit slots
• 3 USB 2.0 ports
• Wi-Fi ready: 802.11a, b & g

This sounds pretty cool. I already have Wi-Fi in my house. I like the fact that I can try out those old XBox games on the new system.

Anyway, if you are interested in getting a free XBox for yourself, then be sure to complete an offer and post your referral link in your blog and email signatures. I’ll need a few more people for the XBox then the iPod. As long as the free XBox 360 comes to my door, I’ll be happy. I haven’t had anyone complain about my advertising methods yet. Hopefully it isn’t too obtrusive.

One more word of advice: Make sure you complete your offer using Microsoft Internet Explorer. There seems to be a cookie problem with Firefox. Good luck.

Tags: XBox, XBox 360, Microsoft, Free XBox, Free XBox 360, Games, Gaming, Gamecube, PS2, Playstation 2, PC, XBox-360, PS3, Playstation 3, XBox Live, Sony, Nintendo, Revolution, Nintendo-Revolution, x360, Free, Referral, Referrals, XBox360, Videogames, Video Games

I’ve been cooped up in my house for so long. I’m getting cabin fever. I go out to work, shop, or pick up my mother in-law for her weekend visits. I’m sure I could schedule a weekend where she would stay at home. She has done so in the past.

Don’t get me wrong. I’ve gone to visit friends and such, but I feel like there is more to life then that. I want to go to concerts, the zoo, the aquarium, bike rides, horseback riding, the beach, a walk through the park. You know … live a little.

Unfortunately, I have no one to spend it with. No one ever wants to go and I hate doing these things alone. I’m that guy who takes a week off of work to spend time at home and do nothing. I’ve got about 2 weeks of vacation queried up and it keeps growing.

One day I will be somebody … one day I will live.

Tags: Cabin Fever, Cooped Up, Going Out, Work, Shopping, Mother In-law, Weekend, Friends, Visiting, Concerts, Zoo, Aquarium, Bike Riding, Horseback Riding, Beach, Park, Vacation, Live, I want to live

I’ve started hunting the internet for products to integrate my iPod with my car. I started out looking for FM Transmitters such as iTrip and AirPlay ranging between $22 and $32. Along with those, I was searching for iPod chargers that would connect to my cars cigarette lighter. I found that Griffen and Xtreme Mac had had some cheap ones ranging between $12 and $14 dollars.

Last, I started hunting for car mounts to hold my iPod in place. There were plenty of styles and methods of mounting. One would set rite in your cup holder, another would attatch directly to your air vents. I could also go with mounts that would attatch to the top of the dashboard. Most of these mounts ranged from $16 to $50.

During my search, I started comming accross car kits that contained two of the items that I needed (FM Transmitter and Charger). Eventually I found some on eBay that contained all three items. It was usually the iTrip transmitter in the kit. Most reviews that I had seen gave the iTrip a bad name due to the AirPlay. The AirPlay is also known as “the iTrip killer”. Funny, eh? So my search was for something with a digital read out on the FM Transmitter that could easily be adjusted.

Eventually, I started finding 3 in 1 solutions. This is where the FM Transmitter is built into the car mount as well as the charger. I was finding a lot of cheap ones from Hong Kong called “CTA DIGITAL 3 in 1 iPod Car Kit”. They were starting out bids for $9. Jumping back over to Amazon.com, I found that they go for $45. That was about $5 cheaper then the cheapest solution if I were to buy all the parts seperate.

This kit sent me in a new direction searching for other 3 in 1 solutions. I eventually found the ultimate solution to my needs. It is called the RoadTrip All-In-One Car Solution for iPod & iPod mini. It had the digital FM Transmitter, the charger, and the car mount. There were two additional features that I loved when I read it. First, it can hold my iPod if I later get a skin for it (and I probably will). Second - the top audio jack and data port are free for any other attachment. I had considered the iTalk to convert it into a digital voice recorder before I got the iPod. Maybe I’ll look into that later.

Any how the price is $70 and Amazon.com is currently sold out. What to do? Well it appears that a few people were selling it through amazon at $53. I searched on eBay just in case someone had it at a cheaper price, but no luck. I went ahead and ordered it. The item appears to be very easy to setup and use. Simplicity, convienience, expandability and price were the main reasons for going with this solution.

Tags: iPod, Car, FM Transmitter, iTrip, AirPlay, Price Hunting, Charger, Cigarette Lighter, Griffen, Xtreme Mac, Car Mounts, Cup Holder, Dashboard, Air Vents, Mounts, Search, Car Kits, eBay, iTrip Killer, Amazon, Frugal, The Ultimate Solution, RoadTrip, All-In-One, iPod mini, Digital, Skin, Audio Player, Voice Recorder, Cheap, Penny Pincher, Simplicity, Convienience, Expandability, Easy Setup, Purchase

I’ve been starting to really get into this iTunes stuff since I had received my free iPod. After importing 20 GB of MP3’s, I’ve been starting to create playlists. I like the smart playlists that are pretty much real-time filters.

iTunes lacks a feature that I would like to have. I’ve been making so many playlists that I would really like to categorize my playlists as well. iTunes doesn’t support creating folders to put playlists under. Everything is under one folder.

I started searching on the internet to find if anyone has a hack or a way around this that I am just not aware of. I found that someone else also had this idea for playlist folders on there own wishlist of things that iTunes would do. It appears that it just isn’t possible rite now. She did suggest to just prefix playlists with specific characters to keep them in a better order when sorted. Hopefully Steve Jobs will give us this feature in iTunes 5.0.

Tags: iTunes, Ideas, Playlists, Folders, Steve Jobs, Features, Wish List, MP3, Categories, Free iPod, iPod, Music, Audio

Silly me forgot to check in with Columbia House this past month. Arriving in the mail was a DVD of The Aviator. I must be living under a rock or something because I haven’t heard of this movie before.

First, the main actor is Leonardo DiCaprio. I don’t know why, but I don’t like him as an actor. If the director would replace him with Brendan Fraser, then I might have been a little more happier with the movie.

The movie just didn’t click for me. It wasn’t just the main actor. I think it was the story as a whole. I now understand the life of Howard Hughes much better, but a documentary would have been more exciting to watch. Mr. Hughes was an aviator, movie producer, billionaire and a hypochondriac. This movie gets very involved with the internal struggles that Hughes went through on his path to madness. It also highlights his brilliance to come up with some aeronautical designs and how crazy it was to attempt giant feats that seemed impossible. This guy was so crazy that he invented the future.

So what was it that I didn’t like? Boring. Boring is the work for long drawn out sceens. The movie alone was almost three hours. The movie didn’t really have much excitement. There were parts that are just funny or very entertaining. Throughout most of the movie, I was just waiting for it to be over.

Leonardo is still a little young for this part. Throughout the 25 year timespan that the movie is based on, Leonardo doesn’t age a day. His hair grows long at one point and at the end of the movie he has a mustache. It’s hard to believe that the character had gained 25 years of wisdom when you still see the young face that he started out with.

My advice for you is to execute every plan possible from having to see this movie. The only reasons to “want” to see this movie is if you are doing research on

• Howard Hughes
• Katharine Hepburn
• History of TWA Airlines
• History of Pan Am Airlines
• 1920’s
• 1930’s
• 1940’s
• Hypochondria
• Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
• History of Aviation

But to be honest, it would probably be better if you just tuned into The History Channel or The Discovery Channel every now and then.

Tags: Aviator, Movie Review, Movie, Review, Aviation, History, Documentary, Hypochondria, 1920s, 1930s, 1940s, Pan Am, TWA, Katharine Hepburn, Howard Hughes, Boring, The Aviator, Leonardo DiCaprio, Brendan Fraser, Movie Producer, Billionaire, Hypochondriac, Internal Struggle, Hughes, Aeronautics, Design, Brilliant, Impossible, Columbia House, DVD, Living under a rock

Have you ever seen an advertisment that just didn’t make sense? I was looking at one where a woman had really big shoulders and her head looked tiny. I saw that the advertisment said something about “broadband”. I kept trying to relate how broadband was applied to the womans broad shoulders. Suddenly I realize that I’m not looking at her shoulders at all. She is setting back in a chair. The sad thing is, I know that I’ve been tricked by this same banner advertisment before.

So, have you ever seen advertisments that were strange at first until you realized what the image actually was?

Tags: Advertising, Advertisments, Optical Illusion, Vonage, Banners, eBay, Humor, Confusion, Broadband

I stumbled upon this little video on the internet a few days ago. I was talking to my brother about it and figured I would post the link here for him. A parody video of the iPods was made that looks pretty professional. It advertises The iPod Flea. I was cracking up.

Here are a few notes about the flea:

• iPod Flea
  • Comes in multiple colors
  • Plays 1 MP3 encoded song
  • Plays song over and over again
  • Plays for up to 1 hour
  • You’ll be itching to use it
• iFlea Accessory Kit with
  • Stop, start, rewind or pause song
  • iPic compression module
  • 750x iZoom visual enlargement device
  • Space age polymer resin used to activate fleas microscopic button
• iPod Flea Collar Multisong Accessory
  • plays up to 6 different songs
• iTunes Flea Market
• Flea Infestation Kit
  • Stores multiple songs
• iPod Tick
  • extends battery life of your Flea
  • Can sit comfortably on any large sturdy surface
• Flea & Tick Control
  • Bluetooth wireless remote
  • Activates flea and tick
• Flea Bag
  • Used to carry all of your flea accessories

Thanks goes to Quick Online Tips with screen catpuring instructions for Windows Media Player by simply hitting the “Print Screeen” button.

• Open Window Media Player
• Then go to Tools>Options
• In Options, select the Performance Tab
• Way below you click on the Advanced Button
• Uncheck “Use Overlays”
• Click Ok
• And you are ready

Tags: iPod, Flea, Parody, Video, Funny, Humor, iFlea, iPod Mini, iPod Shuffle, Mini, Shuffle, Small, Tiny, Tic-Tac, Tictac, MP3, Audio Player, Space Age Polymer, Space Age, Polymer, Resin, Flea Collar, Accessories, Flea Market, iTunes, iTunes Flea Market, Flea Infestation, Kit, Tick, Battery Life, Flea Bag, Bluetooth, Wireless, Windows Media Player, Screen Capture, Tips