Jenny Craig: Week Thirty Two Results

After our company picnic BBQ and tailgating at a Giant's game, I actually gained 0.4 pounds this week. I'm actually surprised it wasn't more than this considering what I ate :-)

In any case, I may be reaching my first real plateau. And with our Florida/Georgia trip coming soon, there are some challenges ahead.

Jenny Craig: Week Thirty One Results

Well this week I broke even and didn't lose any weight. But still down 36.2 pounds total. Of course, our company picnic is this week plus a Giant's game on Saturday...gonna be a tough week!

Apple - Bunch of Filthy Liars

Is it petty of me to enjoy seeing Apple caught in a scandalous pickle? TechCrunch reports how Apple lied to the FCC about blocking the Google Voice app. This just makes them look jealous and sneaky. Awww, Apple fanboys will now have to admit that there's a blemish on their golden savior. Kool Aid not tasting so good?

Sorry, I must sound absolutely terrible rooting for Apple to fail. Nah, who we kiddin'? :-)

Translationparty.com's Zazzle integration

Last week I posted about Translationparty, a fun site that translates an English phrase into Japanese, back to English, back to Japanese, etc. until hilarity ensues.

Well this week we find out that they added a Zazzle API integration all on their own! After you enter your phrase and the site does it's translations, you can buy a t-shirt, mug, or other products, with the final phrase on it! Cool!

Here's an example...when entering the phrase "What would this look like on a t-shirt?", the final translation becomes "In this case, tshirt?"

Jenny Craig: Week Thirty Results

Wow, thirty weeks of Jenny Craig. This week I dropped 1.2 pounds for a total of 36.2. This was more than I expected for this week :-)

My average per week is 1.2 pounds. Slow and steady. They say taking it off slow makes it easier to keep off. Here's hoping!

Jenny Craig: Week Twenty Nine Results

Down 0.4 pounds this week, even after "cheating" on Saturday. Of course, I was up 0.6 last week, so I'm still making up for it :-) Total = 35 even.

Let's have a Translation Party!

1. Enter a phrase in English
2. The phrase gets translated into Japanese, back to English, back to Japanese, etc...until the translations reach equilibrium and match.
3. Hilarity ensues.

http://translationparty.com

Jenny Craig: Week Twenty Eight Results

Well, after tailgating before a concert, with some yummy food I might add, I'm up 0.6 pounds. And this coming week isn't looking too promising, but heck...I'm still down around 35 pounds, so as long as I can make it up, I'm good.

It's ok to fall off the wagon every now and then...keeps me on my toes. I have to learn to simply keep a balance in what I eat. If I go up a bit, I'll take it back off.

Around the World on a Motorcycle in the 1960's, Carlos Caggiani Writes About His Adventure

PRESS RELEASE:

Around the World on a Motorcycle in the 1960's, Carlos Caggiani Writes About His Adventure

"Huellas y Horizontes" now available on Amazon!

My dad's book (previously announced in this post) is now available on Amazon.com! If you speak Spanish, I highly recommend this read. It chronicles a two year period in his life (1964-1966) when he embarked on an adventure to travel around the world on an old Indian Chief motorcycle.

He suffered many hardships, including being caught in the crossfire of a Bolivian revolution, being chased by the FBI in New Jersey, instense heat/cold/hunger, and a few accidents.

If you don't read Spanish, stay tuned for the English version, hopefully sometime this year. I am working on the translation...a slow but very rewarding process. Kindle versions will also follow.

Check out the book's webpage at http://www.huellasyhorizontes.com

Jenny Craig: Week Twenty Seven Results

Down 1.2 pounds this week for a total of 35.2! Slowly but surely...

Zazzle's Friday Caliente!

On Friday, July 24th, 2009, Zazzle held a little hot sauce and spicy food tasting party. We brought in hot Hooters wings, which ended up being the least spicy thing there!

Hot sauces ranging from mild to OMG WTF were tasted. And Eric brought in his own special recipe...homemade fire he calls W263 (it's about the hottest thing I have ever tasted!)

Check out the vid!

Zazzle's Friday Caliente! from Zazzle on Vimeo.

My dad's book is published!

My dad wrote a book in Spanish, called "Huellas y Horizontes" ("Tracks and Horizons"). It's an autobiographical story of a trip around the world on a motorcycle in 1964. Very entertaining read! I designed the cover art and helped him publish it online.

The Spanish version is now available through CreateSpace, and soon to be on Amazon as well. I am currently working on the English translation.

Check out the book's webpage at http://www.huellasyhorizontes.com

Jenny Craig: Week Twenty Six Results

Ok, down 0.6 pounds this week...short week, but nonetheless :-) Slowly clawing my way back after gaining last week! 34.2 total.

Jenny Craig: Week Twenty Five Results

Yup. After our fun long weekend in Bodega Bay and Point Reyes, I expectedly gained 1.4 pounds. Still down 33.4 though :-)

Jenny Craig: Week Twenty Four Results

Down 1.6 pounds even after tailgating my butt off at the Giants game this weekend! That's a total of 34.8 pounds so far. I'm wearing my 38 jeans that I haven't fit into in a long time. I'd love to get back into 34's, but I think that's still a long way away! :-)

String Cheese Incident on Austin City Limits

This is just...awesome!

Jenny Craig: Week Twenty Three Results

Woo hoo! Lost 1.6 pounds...that's .2 more than I gained last week! 33.2 total :-)

After Near Miss, New RAID is Bliss

As I stated in my previous post, I recently purchased five 1TB drives to expand my home NAS system (a Thecus N5200). I had two ways to set this up:

1. Replace each of my old drives separately, one at a time, with a new drive. Rebuild the RAID with each drive replacement. When all new drives were in and all old ones out, I would click "EXPAND" in the NAS's admin screen and it would use all drive space.

2. Remove all old drives, and replace with all new drives. Build a new empty RAID5 on the new drives. Then copy over all my data from an external backup.

#1 has the advantage of keeping all my data and NAS settings intact during the process, but would take infinitely longer since I would have had to rebuild the entire RAID at least three times, most likely 5.

#2 would be way faster, but would require copying all the data from backup, and the files would not be accessible until the upgrade was complete.

So I chose #2. I didn't want to rebuild the RAID tons of times, when each time could take many hours, if not days.

Now here's the kicker...my backup included everything from the NAS, including NAS system files. I figured copying those back could keep my settings and modules intact.

Long story short...I replaced all drives at once, started copying the files back, and all seemed fine. Until I rebooted the NAS.

After a reboot, I noticed that all the data was there, but it was read-only. I couldn't write any files onto the NAS at all. Plus, all the modules I had installed (like SSH support, FTP server, etc) were showing as installed, but would not work. I couldn't even uninstall and reinstall modules. When I tried, nothing would happen.

I quickly realized that copying the modules back from my backup probably overwrote the proper permissions/ownerships on all those files, causing the NAS not to be able to read them correctly. If I had SSH access into the box, I could fix that, but SSH access was only available as a module. Crap.

Plus, why was it all read-only? Uggg!

Anyway, after resetting to factory defaults, updating the firmware, and other non-successful rescue attempts, I did some research. Luckily, I found a script someone wrote that I could install on the NAS (through the firmware upgrade screen) that would simply rename the old modules database, causing the NAS to create a new empty one. Perfect. This would allow me to reinstall all my modules and get SSH working. (Script is named Renmod and can be found here)

That worked beautifully. Now I was able to SSH in and start changing permissions and such. Well, I changed all the permissions and owners of the data, but the filesystem was still read-only.

So last thing I did was edit each share through the NAS admin. I had to disable the public flag, edit the ACL to add all my users to the share, then re-enable the public flag. That did the trick!

Now I have all my data, tons of space, and a scripted nightly backup to an external 1TB drive connected through the NAS's esata port. Sweet! I'll have to create a How-To at some point to explain how I got the nightly RSYNC to work. It's an interesting bunch of scripts :-)

Expanding my NAS

For the last few years I've been using a Thecus N5200 NAS storage system. I've been very happy with it, but I've actually underutilized it. It has five drive bays, and I've only ever had three 500GB drives in it running in a RAID 5 configuration. That's a total of just under 1TB of usable space.

Well, the price of hard drive storage has gone way down, and I finally decided to go the distance. I purchased five 1TB Western Digital Caviar Green drives from Amazon for a total of $424.95. Not bad!

Haven't installed them yet, but it will be nice to have 4TB of usable space!

Jenny Craig: Week Twenty Two Results

Yup. Bad week. Gained 1.4 pounds. But I kinda knew that was coming since I ate a lot on Saturday. Good food, great friends...it was worth it! Still down 31.6 total :-)

Sometimes you need these little setbacks to break the monotony and keep you sane. Plus, it's really hard to say no to cheese, guacamole, steak, and brownies!

Jenny Craig: Week Twenty One Results

Down another 1.8! So total now is 33 pounds :-) Slowly but surely!

Jenny Craig: Week Twenty Results

I finally passed the 30 pound barrier! I lost 1.4 pounds this week, bringing my total to 31.2 pounds lost!

Chickenfoot - Tastes Good!

Joe Satriani, Sammy Hagar, Michael Anthony, and Chad Smith have formed a new rock band named Chickenfoot...and it's pretty rockin'! Check out the video of their song "Oh Yeah", then head on over to their site to hear more!


visit chickenfoot.us for more info

Jenny Craig: Week Nineteen Results

Woo hoo! Lost 1.8 pounds (one of which I gained last week). Down 29.8 total...geez, should I just say 30? ;-)

Look ma! No hands!

As this video shows, Microsoft unveiled an amazing new technology for its Xbox 360 platform. It's called Project Natal...and it looks amazing! Have a look...

Bing! There it is!

Microsoft's new search engine is actually pretty good! I haven't done side-by-side comparisons with Google yet, but I'm digging the features so far. Image and video searches rock. Nice job, Microsoft!

Jenny Craig: Week Eighteen Results

Yeah so I gained a pound this week due to tailgating at a Giants game, and going out to dinner one night. So 28 pounds total. Maybe next week will be better :-)

Ride the Google Wave

This has got to be one of the coolest things Google has done since Google Earth. It's called Google Wave, and this video shows how it turns what we know about Web communications on it's ear.

New Dog Apparel at Zazzle!

Last week we launched dog apparel at Zazzle! Yes, now your pups don't have to be naked all the time...they can wear a cool t-shirt with a design that matches their personality!

Here's a few of my first doggie designs:

Hello My Name Is Dog Shirt by ecaggiani
Create your Pet Clothing online with zazzle.com

Get Outta My Grill by ecaggiani
See more Dog Pet Clothing

Jenny Craig: Week Seventeen Results

Good week! I lost 2.8 pounds, even with the chocolate and cheese we had at work last Friday. Mmmmmm, chocolate.

So that brings the grand total to 29 pounds so far! Onward and downward!

Jenny Craig: Week Sixteen Results

This week went a little better. Lost 1.2 pounds, bringing my grand total to 26 pounds. Yay! Almost 30!

Jenny Craig: Week Fifteen Results

Posting this late, but last weigh in was a 0.2 pound gain. Must have been because of our little "gross food" party we had at work (beef hearts, raw snails, durian fruit, head cheese, etc.) That, plus the tacos I had for lunch on Cinco de Mayo.

Oh well. I knew what I was getting into, and kinda figured it would be a bad week :-)

Maybe this coming Tuesday will fare better!

Jenny Craig: Week Fourteen Results

I guess I forgot to post here last week (week 13), but it's ok because I broke even and didn't lose or gain.

But this week I lost exactly 2 more pounds, bringing the total lost to exactly 25 pounds!

Reb Beach Cuts It Loose

This just rocks!

My Fiji Pictures!

Jenny Craig: Week Twelve Results

Phew! I lost exactly 2.2 pounds (the same 2.2 I gained in Fiji)! So let's pretend my vacation never happened. Total: 23 pounds.

Jenny Craig: Week Eleven-ish Results

Back from Fiji, and after eight days there with no Jenny, and only being able to eat the delicious rich food of the Nakia resort, I gained 2.2 pounds.

It could have been way worse...probably was, actually, but I didn't get to my Jenny weigh-in until three days after we got back. So I probably lost a bit those three days since I was back on the diet.

Anyway, nothing to be upset or alarmed about. I'm back on track now, and very happy to be back in the States!

Jenny Craig: Week Ten Results

This past week: down 1.6 pounds.
Ten week total: 23 pounds even.

Wow, that's an average of 2.3 pounds a week! Of course, the first week I lost 6.6 pounds, so that brings the average up :-)

Jenny Craig: Week Nine Results

Down 1.6 pounds this week for a total of 21.4! Finally broke the 20 pound barrier :-)

Jenny Craig: Week Eight Results

Down 1.2 more pounds this week! So that brings the total to 19.8 pounds...just missed 20! There's always next week!

Jenny Craig: Week Seven Results

So this past weekend I had to fly to New York for my aunt's funeral. It was a short notice trip and I decided to not worry about bringing my Jenny food or even finding a center in NY.

I tested myself to see if I could make good choices on my own. Since we were only going to be there for a few days, I thought it was safe.

Overall, I did well, except on the last day I just HAD to get a slice of NY pizza! IT...WAS...AWESOME!

Anyway, the bottom line: I still lost 1.8 pounds! That's a total of 18.6 so far!

Jenny Craig: Week Six Results

Week six came and went...and so did two more pounds! That brings the total so far to 16.8 pounds in 6 weeks! So far, that's an average of 2.8 pounds per week. Not too shabby!

Jenny Craig: Week Five Results

Only lost 0.8 pounds this week, for a total of 14.8 pounds in 5 weeks. At least it's still going in the right direction!

What Would Jason Do?

WWJD? by ecaggiani
Get t-shirts from www.Zazzle.com
See other Humor Sayings T-Shirts

Jenny Craig: Week Four Results

I was pleasantly surprised this week! I lost another 2.6 pounds bringing the grand total to 14 pounds!

Jenny Craig: Week Three Results

I really excpected less from this week, but luckily I still lost 2.2 pounds, bringing the grand total for 3 weeks to 11.4 pounds! Still a looong way to go, but this keeps me motivated!

I actually took a walk at work the other day...yes I actually did an activity! I need to keep that up!

Superbowl Commercials

Jenny Craig: Week Two Results

Ok, so after last week's wonderful 6.6 pounds, I didn't expect much for my second week. This week I lost 2.6 pounds, bringing my total to 9.2 pounds in two weeks. Every little bit helps!

The differences between the Windows 7 Taskbar and the OSX Dock

I recently installed Windows 7 Beta on an old laptop of mine (Pentium M, 1.69 GHz, 1GB RAM) to see how it runs on older hardware and basically test out the new OS from Redmond. I'm very impressed at the overall feel (it's quite snappy!) and seems to be running great.

The most noticeable change is the Taskbar. Here's an article from arstechnica.com that does a great job outlining the functionality of the new Windows 7 Taskbar, and even talks about how it's different than Apple's OSX Dock. Worth a read!

George Bush Top 10 Moments - David Letterman Show

Jenny Craig: Week One Results

Ok, the results are in! On my first week on Jenny Craig I lost...

6.6 pounds!

A good start! Now I have to just keep doing what I'm doing :-)

Back on Jenny...

Yes folks, I am now on Day 2 of Jenny Craig. A few years ago, before starting at Zazzle, I joined Jenny Craig and lost nearly 40 pounds. Then I kind of dropped the ball and slipped back into my old eating habits (Zazzle's wonderful kitchen didn't help!)

But now it's 2009. A fresh start. And I need to do this for me. For my health as well as for my self image. I turned 39 this month, and I don't want to go into my 40's being overweight and lacking energy.

I'm blogging this simply to make myself accountable. The more people I tell, the more I feel obligated to follow through.

I'll post some results when I have any ;-)

New bill to add warnings on games

Just as Jack Thompson fades into oblivion after being disbarred, we get CA Congressman Joe Baca who picks up the torch. He introduced Bill HR 231, which states that ALL games rated T or higher by the ESRB need to carry this warning:

“WARNING: Excessive exposure to violent video games and other violent media has been linked to aggressive behavior.”

http://www.gamepolitics.com/2009/01/12/new-bill-congress-would-add-cigarette-warning-labels-video-games

Top 5 R.A. Salvatore Books

See more: Top 5 R.A. Salvatore Books

2009 Official Britney Spears Calendar

Zazzle has partnered with Britney Spears and has released the Official Britney Spears 2009 Calendar!

Britney Spears Official 'Circus' 2009 Calendar by britneyspears
Make promotional calendars at zazzle.com
Browse Party Music Entertainment Calendars

Embroidered Snowflake Bag

Cool embroidered snowflake bag! Perfect for the holidays!

McCain FAIL T-shirt

McCain FAIL T-shirt by ecaggiani

Picwing...is this the digital photo frame I've been looking for?

Ever since I saw my very first digital photo frame, I've wondered why it wasn't easy to simply email pictures to it. My dream frame was one I could buy for my family, and keep them updated with new pictures by simply emailing the pics to the frame. Sounds simple enough.

I'd even be ok with having to login to a site to add pictures to the frame. What I found out, though, was that the only digital photo frames that had this functionality were either a) subscription based (boo!) or b) not easy or reliable for both the sender and receiver.

Now Picwing promises to change all this. They're taking the approach from a software point of view...building a simple, easy to use interface for creating albums, uploading or emailing pictures to that album, and having multiple photo "clients" to view them on, including a digital photo frame they are developing.

The Picwing frame is still in beta, and built by hand, so it's a bit pricey right now at $249. But the software...or rather the website...is dang simple to use. Every album gets its own email address...set who is allowed to add pictures to the album, and that's it!

And you don't NEED the photo frame. You can view your album through a desktop client, a Chumby, or through a cool Flash app! Here's my first album. Please feel free to send funny pictures to this album at funnypics@picwing.com. The subject of your email becomes the caption.

Tina Fey Voting for Princess Leia in ‘08

If you happened to catch Tina Fey’s highly publicized cameo as Sarah Palin in Saturday Night Live’s season premiere last night, you may have caught her flashing a bit of Star Wars fandom in the show’s closer — yep, Fey’s donning one of the Zazzle's Star Wars Election ‘08 t-shirts, available exclusively at www.zazzle.com/starwarselection.

read more | digg story

Custom Skateboards. Wow. Just wow.

I know I'm a bit late blogging this, but Zazzle recently released custom skateboards! Let me repeat that. CUSTOM SKATEBOARDS! Now anyone can put their own artwork, or buy someone else's, on several deck styles and sizes.

Here's one I found that I like by thecuteinstitute:


To start making your own, check out Zazzle Custom Skateboards!

Fried Jesus Fish!

I was driving to work the other day and saw a Jesus fish on the back of a car, and I got a hankerin' for some good ol' fried seafood. This image just popped into my head, so I had to make it!



View the one for dark t-shirts here, and the one for light colored shirts here.

Zazzle releases Zazzle Store Builder 1.0!

Have a Zazzle shop and a website you use to promote it? Well, if your host supports PHP, have a look at the new Zazzle Store Builder. This script essentially allows you to pull a feed of products from any gallery, and render it onto your website in a nice looking grid:



The colors and grid size can be configured, and you can add your own associate referral ID to make the extra 7%. Oh, and want Google Analytics to track your site? If you have an Analytics account, just enter your account code and turn it on!

This is a project I was directly involved with and I'm very excited to see it live. It'll be interesting to see how everyone implements and uses the Zazzle Store Builder!

Phelps Phanaticism

Looks like everyone has Phelps Phever!

Glass Flowers Keds shoe

This is my wife's latest design...I think it makes an amazing shoe!

Glass Ceiling Keds shoe from Zazzle.com

My Meat Shoe

I'm sure PETA would approve since this is faux meat :-)

Meat Shoe
by
ecaggiani

Keds & Zazzle Introduce WORLDS 1ST CUSTOMIZABLE SHOE!!

This is the first time in history that you can fully customize a shoe!! Upload your own photos or graphics to create a full custom shoe!


read more | digg story

The 2008 Star Wars Election!

Check out some of the amazing and funny designs inspired by Star Wars and the Election!LET THE WOOKIE WIN!

read more | digg story

Found a cool gaming gallery that uses Zazzle

I love video games, so I'm always looking for gaming gear, games, news about games, etc. I even like to wear gaming related t-shirts (from Zazzle of course!).

Doing a search on Google for "game shirts" I found CustomGameShirts.com. When I saw the site, I instantly recognized the models being used as Zazzle's. And sure enough, it's a Zazzle gallery!

Check it out...they have some pretty cool stuff! I may have to do a little shopping! :-)

I hate being an Apple hater

It's based on my long history with PC's. Back when it was Apple IIc versus TRS-80's. Back when I could hack around with my Tandy 1000 and add more memory. Back when I ran a BBS. It was all about PC's. They were more flexible, expandable, prevalent.

Apple was a curious sidenote...more expensive and less configurable. There was no reason for me to like it. As time marched on, it got worse for Apple. If you were into gaming at all (and I was...still am), then Apple was not the camp for you.

All this added up to a deep hatred for a cocky company that felt it was doing things better, yet I had no proof of it. If it was truly better, than I would have been able to get one at a reasonable price, open it up and add 3rd party parts to improve it, and play all the cool games i wanted to on it. But that was not the case. So in my mind, Apple = Crapple.

Fast forward to now. Apple is gaining market share like crazy, and they are being heralded as the best thing to happen to the industry since the Internet. Why is this? Here is what makes them the golden child right now:

• Marketing: Brilliant ads that make it cool to like Apple, and nerdy to like Windows
• Simplicity: A perception that Apple products are just easier to use
• Functionality: Whiz-bang, flashy apps (cover flow, iPhone UI, etc)
• Security: How many times do I have to hear "there are no viruses for the Mac"
• Dependibility: Apple zealots are always telling me "it just works"

Some of these have merits. Others are hyped up. But in this day and age, it's really a user preference to go Apple vs. Microsoft. You can accomplish the same things with either, so pick your favorite.

Vista has been getting bad press (I actually like it better than XP, but whatever). So Microsoft's image to the unwashed masses is marred by good Apple marketing and bad general press (maybe because many writers have switched to Mac? hmmm...)

In any case, Steve Jobs is the new hero, Bill Gates is a nerdy geek, and Steve Ballmer is...well, a little out of his mind. All these things add up to Apple market share.

So do I still hate Apple? Yes. It's hard not to given my history. But do I like hating them? No, I really don't.

Apple has done some great things with user interfaces. The iPhone's multi-touch display is revolutionary (though NOT invented by Apple...but they definitely brought that technology to the public's consciousness). How they captured the MP3 player market with the iPod is historically significant.

I hate being an Apple hater because many of my friends and colleagues are fans of Apple (to varying degrees), and are always talking about this cool new feature, or that cool new device. I bring up that there are similar solutions outside of Apple, but they just look at me and and say things like "whatever, Apple hater!".

Am I missing out on the new direction in the industry? Should I swallow my pride and join the crowd? Well, I'm probably not to that point yet. The only Apple product I own is an iPod, and mostly because it's the industry standard. Try finding a Zune adapter for your car.

With this post I am trying to open up and become less of an Apple basher. This is hard for me. I hate the fanaticism that surrounds the company. I hate Steve Jobs' cult like status. I hate all the hype. I hate the smear campaigns. But I don't hate the technology. I don't hate the user interfaces. I don't hate what they are trying to do...reach out to the common man and bring technology to their reach. A noble cause no matter who is doing it.

Crapple by ecaggiani
Make personalized t-shirts on zazzle

600 miles on a single tank

I finally got 600 miles on a single tank of gas! My 2005 Civic Hybrid has an 11.9 gallon tank, but when I filled up (at 601.4 miles) I only needed to put in 10.22 gallons. So this tank gave me about 58.8 MPG!

Want something for $10?

This is actually a pretty cool idea. You send them $10, they send you something...randomly...from their warehouse. Could be a nice leather wallet, or could be a USB Rocket Launcher. Who knows! It's the surprise that makes this fun!

Hey, now you can send yourself a gift on your birthday and not know what you're buying yourself!

Adding Twitter to my blog

Now that I have a fancy new phone, I decided to try Twitter, a cool service that allows you to keep friends updated with what you are doing at any particular time.

The concept is simple. You login and type a quick update, like "I'm eating a cheese sandwich...and it reminds me of summer." Or anything you want, really. But it can only be 140 characters long. No blog posts, no novels. Just a quick blurb. The cool part is you can use your mobile phone to text in your update, and receive updates from friends or people you are "following".

I added the Twitter feed to the top of my blog here, so quick updates will show there, while full blown blog posts are shown here.

Ok, I got the Moto Q9c

So I went with the Q9c from Sprint...and so far, it rocks! I'm actually posting this from the phone itself!

I know I said I had to wait until June, but apparently Sprint mixed it up (my WIFE has to wait till June to upgrade, but my account was ready now). So I was able to get the best discount (with a 2 year renewal, of course).

OneNote 2007, Tablet PC's, and Smartphones

Been a while since I've posted anything here. Been busy. But now I feel I have something to share...and it's almost entirely not Zazzle related! :-)

So I've recently shifted positions at Zazzle (I said "almost"!). My new role is in our product group, specifically acting as an Interaction Designer. This means more mockups, prototypes, and wireframes. It also means being involved in a few more meetings every week, where I need to be a bit more organized about my To Do lists. Before, as an engineer, I was more focused on writing code, so it was always more obvious what I needed to be working on at any given time.

Getting digitally organized - The Hardware
Now, I am involved in more projects, and need to prioritize my time better. So I decided to get an old Tablet PC to take notes. I wanted a pen device because I wanted to be able to draw ideas and have it in a digital format. I searched eBay and found a Motion Computing M1400 Tablet PC, and got it for around $400.

Yes, it's a few years old, but it's powerful enough for what I need. It runs Windows XP Tablet Edition, which means I can install any Windows software I'm already used to or depend on. To that end, I installed Microsoft Office 2007 and noticed something interesting.

Getting digitally organized - The Software
I chose to do a custom install of Office because I knew I wouldn't need to install the whole suite. When I saw the list of programs that I could choose from, I saw something called OneNote 2007. I decided to try it out.

Here's what the Amazon product page for OneNote says:

• Digital notebook provides one place to gather and manage notes and information
• Offers powerful search capabilities to find what you're looking for quickly, and easy-to-use shared notebooks to help manage information overload and work with others more effectively
• An integrated part of the 2007 Microsoft Office system
• Helps consolidate various types of information-- including freeform notes, images, documents, files from other Microsoft Office system programs, and rich media-- and organize it in the way that works best for you
• Creates a living repository of group decisions and brainstorming sessions that adds continuity and context to business meetings and memos

Well that's perfect! So I set it up on my tablet as well as on my desktop, and now I can take notes in meetings using digital ink, and have it fully integrated into my work Outlook! I can even create To Do items in OneNote that automatically get added to my tasks in Outlook. And as long as my OneNote notebook files are on our network, I have access to it from both my desktop and tablet.

Going Mobile
So this now brings me to the Smartphone part of this post. I will be getting a new phone come June, when my current phone turns two years old and Sprint will give me a nice discount on any new phone to keep me as a customer.

While researching smartphones on Sprint, I liked the Samsung Ace (Windows Mobile), Blackberry 8130 (Blackberry, duh), and Moto Q9c (Windows Mobile). Sprint is also slated to get the shiny new Blackberry Curve soon, and I love the specs on that thing.

But now that I am using OneNote, it changes my view a bit. See, OneNote comes with a Windows Mobile version, but NOT a Blackberry version. Hmmm. So come June, I have a choice to make. I could get one of the Windows phones (which are pretty cool), or go with the slightly better specs of the new Curve.

Decisions, decisions. If I keep using OneNote and find it increasingly useful (as I do so far), then I'll probably lean toward a Windows Mobile phone. It's nice to be completely synced with all my devices (I hear push email on a Windows Mobile device is better than Blackberry if you are using Microsoft Exchange). But I still need to do more research and weigh the pros and cons.

I mean, I may not really need to use OneNote on my phone. At the office, I'll always have my tablet with me, so the phone is extra. But if I can sync offline notes I take on the phone with my OneNote notebook at work, it's a no brainer. Or, better yet, if I can open my office notebook remotely on my phone, that would rock! I kind of doubt that will be possible, however, since it resides on our corporate network.

But maybe I can VPN from a Windows Mobile smartphone....hmmmmm?

Zigg - Submit your Zazzle designs!

I've just created Zigg, a new website that allows Zazzle contributors to submit and rate Zazzle designs, a la Digg style.

Even if you are not a Zazzle contributor, you should visit and rate the designs you like! The website uses CoRank.com as the host, which made it super easy to create. So the full URL to Zigg is http://zigg.corank.com/

We are all human

Human
by
ecaggiani
Get this custom shirt
 at Zazzle

My Xbox now has a blog

In a geeky turn of events, I decided to let my Xbox 360 get its own blog. Yes, my Xbox now blogs. On its own. By itself.

"What on Earth would your Xbox blog about?" you ask? Simple. It talks about the games I play! Check it out!

Mass Effect Conversation T-Shirt!

This is too cool not to share! So I've been playing Mass Effect on my Xbox 360. It's a sci-fi role playing game and it's quite an immersive, deep game with plot twists, side quests, and a great storyline. Love it.

The method used to select conversation choices is very easy, with all choices as a "spoke" on a wheel. It's so effective it becomes second nature.

That being said, I decided to see what if there was anything on Zazzle that was Mass Effect related. I found this shirt, which is a template that allows you to change each text option. Check it out!

Conversation choices template by CustomGameShirts
See other Xbox T-Shirts

IE8 passes Acid2 test for first time!

The IE Dev Team at Microsoft just announced that they have reached a milestone in development by having a build of IE8 that successfully passes the Acid2 Face Test.

This is a great step for IE's standards compliance. Watch the video interview with some IE devs explaining what this all means.

What if the Beatles sang Stairway to Heaven?

I got it on wiiBay!

I got it on wiiBay
by
ecaggiani
Get this custom shirt at Zazzle

The Bible is Bullshit

Penn & Teller show how the bible is bullshit:

For all you guitar heroes out there!

Get this t-shirt on Zazzle. You can choose from hundreds of styles and colors with this design on it, customize this shirt with more images or text, or create your own t-shirts from scratch!

I Rock!
by
ecaggiani
Get this custom shirt at Zazzle

Major League Jamming

Major League Jamming
by
ecaggiani
Get this custom shirt
 at Zazzle

Get outta my grill!

I just put this new design up on Zazzle. It's the first design I made starting from a pencil drawing. I drew the dog, scanned it in, then colorized it and added the text in Photoshop. Get it on a shirt!

Get outta my grill
by
ecaggiani

Get this custom shirt at Zazzle

Get your Xbox Gamertag on a t-shirt!

Go to this page and enter your gamertag, gamer score, and upload an avatar and five game icons. Totally customize this shirt with your personal info!

Sorry folks, apparently this shirt has been removed due to copyright issues. But here are some other cool gaming related t-shirt sites I found:

CustomGameShirts
PlayFish
GameZone
CasuallyHardcore
Strk3

Jack Thompson - GTA 4 Mission "clearly a reference to me"

GamePolitics.com reports that lawyer/crusader for video game legislation Jack Thompson is saying that Rockstar Games has put him in their next Grand Theft Auto game...as a target to kill. He is threatening to sue and try to block the sale of the game if he is not removed from the game.

Well, first, he is apparently not mentioned in the game. There is simply a lawyer character who believes in banning violent video games. Jack Thompson is sure it's a jab at him.

"...the fact that the lawyer, killed on Niko's first mission, would bring up video games, makes it clearly a reference to me..."

Hmmm, you know, come to think of it, I could be mistaken for Mario...maybe I should sue. Come on, Mr. Thompson. Seriously? The fact that the Florida Bar had to impose disciplinary action on you, and that you lost your license to practice law in Alabama says to me you're basically an idiot.

I wasn't planning on buying GTA 4, but now I may do so just so I can play that mission and pretend it's you.

Kathy Griffin tells Jesus to "Suck it"

Comedian Kathy Griffin, upon winning the award for Outstanding Reality Program for her show "My Life on the D-List" on Saturday, Sept. 8th, shouted "Suck it, Jesus, this award is my god now!"

Apparently, the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences has decided to censor the remarks from the E! taped airing of the award show this Sunday. This is in response to complaints from the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights.

Great. Now we have to start censoring comments from comedians that are not meant to be insulting, but rather funny.

How on Earth does her jokingly saying she is denouncing Jesus become a censorable offense? Who is she hurting with this? It's not like she called religious people idiots, or made derogatory comments about those who believe. She made a joke.

It's 2007, people. Why are we so Victorian in this country? Why can't we all laugh at an obvious joke, and stop being offended by the littlest things?

Oh, and by the way, suck it, Jesus. The Internet is my god now!

The Top 10 Most Influential or Memorable Monty Python Sketches

The following list comprises my top 10 most influential or memorable Monty Python sketches. Each one of these has, to some degree or another, influenced comedy, or at the very least become a memorable part of American geek culture. Why is it that Monty Python is currently very popular amongst the geek chic? Maybe these little nuggets offer some insight:


10. Military Drilling

No need to be politically correct when it comes to the Pythons making fun of homosexuality. Right, stop that. It's silly.

First aired: December 7, 1969

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9. How Not To Be Seen

Explosive comedy.

First aired: December 8, 1970

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8. Ministry of Silly Walks

A more physical sketch for the Pythons shows Michael Palin trying to get a grant to develop his silly walk, which isn't very silly at all. At least not compared to John Cleese's.

First aired: September 15, 1970

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7. Fresh Fruit

How about teaching us how to defend ourselves against someone with a pointed stick? I guess bananas are more dangerous.

First aired: October 26, 1969

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6. Cheese Shop

Another John Cleese classic. Just how many cheese's are there?

First aired: November 30, 1972

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5. Funniest Joke in the World

This sketch shows just how far the Pythons take an idea. Storytelling at it's craziest.

First aired: October 5, 1969 (first ever episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus)

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4. Dead Parrot

The Dead Parrot sketch showcases John Cleese and his verbal prowess. How many different ways can he say the parrot is dead?

First aired: December 7, 1969

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3. Argument Clinic

This sketch shows how clever the Pythons were for their time. Or at least that they were smoking something in the 70's.

First aired: November 2, 1972

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2. The Lumberjack Song

It's so well known that, besides Spam, it's probably one of the most mentioned, mimicked, and memorable songs they have ever come up with.

First aired: December 14, 1969

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1. Spam

Arguably the most influential Monty Python sketch ever. It brought life to the term "Spam" for unwanted junk email. (Wikipedia)

First aired: December 15, 1970

Added Digg link -------------------->

I just added a link to Digg on each story in this blog. So, if you like the post, feel free to Digg it!

New cable modem, faster speeds?

The other day my old cable modem gave out. So I went to best Buy and got a new one, same model, just slightly updated. After calling Comcast and setting it up, I decided to run a speed test. Here are the results:

Ok, that's way faster than it ever was! So now my question is, was my old modem holding me back, or did Comcast do something?

Make your own Super Shirt!

Wear your super letter proudly. This is my latest Zazzle API product. Check it out and make your own!

Super Template
by
ecaggiani

Get this custom shirt at Zazzle

Vista better than OS X?

As you may or may not know, I am NOT an Apple fan. As a matter of fact, I have an irrational hatred for the company, which probably stems from some childhood trauma regarding a cracked monitor and a guy named Steve.

So I am probably not the right guy to write any sort of review of Apple's OS X since whenever I get near a Mac, my skin starts to burn and I inexplicably start vomiting pea soup.

But thanks to Meowcules, I can now read about how OS X is not all that...which is music to my ears after hearing nothing but brainwashed praise for Jobs and his minions.

Best use of an iPhone!

Saw this on Engadget and just HAD to share! I think this is the best use I've seen for an iPhone yet!



The best part is in the comments section on Engadget. Apple fan boys talk about how impressed they are at how long the phone stayed on while blending, saying things like "Say what you will about the iPhone, it sure must have some serious durability." Come on, people! They're BLENDING an iPhone!

Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock guitar designs revealed for all platforms!

Actvision has announced their partnership with Gibson Guitars and have revealed designs for new style guitar controllers for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, Nintendo Wii, and Xbox 360. The next iteration of the popular games gets a longer title, too -- Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock!

read more | digg story

Aliens exist, but we're not looking right - Scientific Report

Recent discoveries of extremophiles - organisms living in conditions of heat, cold and dark and using chemicals once thought incompatible with life - have changed ideas of where life can survive. Prof Baross said lab experiments also showed water did not necessarily have to be the basis for life. Yet Mars Robots look for evidence of water.

read more | digg story

The Simpsons Chief Wiggum spotted at Mountain View Kwik-E-Mart!

From Habitforming's digg post: "I was checking out my friends iPhone and read about the 7-11 that was converted into a Kwik-E-Mart for the Simpsons movie that's coming up soon. To make things cooler, when I got there, there was a cop that looked some what similar Chief Wiggums... the resemblance is scary... This picture is hotter than Paris Hilton in the slammer!"

read more | digg story

Gates vs Jobs...ding ding ding!

Engadget has a recap of today's historical meeting between these two HUGE icons of the computer world. Here's the first 15 minutes.

Starbucks...Anti-god? Pro-god? Whatever.

WorldNet Daily has a story about Starbucks' new "The Way I See It" campaign, and how it's causing an uproar.

The campaign is meant to collect different viewpoints from notable figures and customers, and foster debate and discussion by printing these quotes on their coffee cups. One such quote did just that...started a heated discussion on whether Starbucks is promoting anti-god sentiment.

"Why in moments of crisis do we ask God for strength and help? As cognitive beings, why would we ask something that may well be a figment of our imaginations for guidance? Why not search inside ourselves for the power to overcome? After all, we are strong enough to cause most of the catastrophes we need to endure."

This was written by a customer in Canada. It's his viewpoint. It is attributed to him...not Starbucks. They have also printed some quotes that could be construed as pro-religion. Two different viewpoints by two different people. Discuss.

So what really grinds my gears (as Peter Griffin would say) is that some people are so upset by this that they are boycotting Starbucks! WHA?!? Come on, people, this is in no way saying that they, as a company, are anti-god, pro-god, devil-worshippers, or Twinkie-eaters. It's plainly stated that they are simply trying to spur discussion. Done.

This is not a religious issue. It's an issue with people. People that are so sensitive to attacks on their belief system, that they are ready to make a stand when there isn't even anything to get standy about.

Starbucks...great job. Great job on a great campaign meant to start discussions. Mission accomplished. Great job on not buckling down to oppressors. And great job on making a damn good cup of coffee.

Oh shit...I hope saying your coffee is damned isn't going to get me in trouble now.