Yep, it seemed like a strangely long day. Some days just seem to take longer than others. I finally got to move into my new office. The walls seemed a little empty and bland. Starting tomorrow my office walls will be adorned with posters that commemorate some of my previous visits to national parks. How many wall posters can an office handle? I’m thinking 3 or maybe 4 wall posters might work.

Will the new Fox television show Terra Nova be picked up for a second season?

Who knows when the new Apple iPhone 5 will be released?

Will Apple decide to maximize efficiencies from very large economies of scale by using iPhone 5 components to power the new iPad 3?

Please consider the following technology expenditure options:

Technology scenarios:

1. Use the Sprint one year subscriber discount to upgrade from the HTC EVO 4G to a newer model.
2. Purchase a Wi-Fi enabled tablet computer.
3. Take no action and wait for the second generation of tablets.

Given the choice of upgrading cell phones from the HTC EVO 4G to a newer model or purchasing a Wi-Fi enabled tablet what option makes the most sense? The tablet would provide an alternative to using a laptop computer. Back on November 7, 2008, I purchased a Dell Studio 1535. My 4 year Dell warranty currently has 459 days remaining.

My Dell Studio 1535 Specs:

1. Windows 7 Home Premium
2. 64-bit operating system
3. Intel Core Duo CPU T5850 @ 2.16 GHz or 2.17 GHz
4. RAM: 4.00 GB
5. Storage: 40 GB Intel SSD

My major shopping consideration is the ability to have access to a full keyboard.

Please take the time to read the August 5, 2011 S&P US credit rating report, “Full Report: United States of America Long-Term Rating Lowered To ‘AA+’ On Political Risks And Rising Debt Burden; Outlook Negative.” The long term US debt rating has been lowered from AAA to AA+. Anybody with adjustable interest rate financing should increase strategic saving to match future expenses. Traditionally, negative debt rating changes are followed by periods of inflation. I would suggest some type of inflationary hedge…

Q: Has this weblog developed from presenting a single poignant narrative to presenting a series of derivative summaries?  

A: Something had to give. I have been out of the game for far too long. Maybe this weblog has been on autopilot for the last few years, but now would be the time to knock on the sky and think about the sound.

The weblog layout (appearance) will now include a Colorado links section as a sandbar widget. Given the divergent nature of local and national news broadcasts the requirement to intentionally target the consumption of local information online was inevitable.

Western Digital makes a few different models of various network attached storage (NAS) devices. My home network has some USB attached storage that runs behind a hardware firewall. I have been considering adding a NAS device. Will having a redundant array of independent disks (RAID) matter? Serious long term data storage options will always require redundant backup schemas.

Based on a recommendation from James at work,I have been reading a fair amount of Brad Cleveland’s weblog posts and books throughout the weekend.

Sometimes expanding a series of truncated thoughts requires a certain amount of time and energy. Over the course of time, I have taken being word economic to the extreme. As a young writer, I spent hours working over my thoughts by pounding out page after page of prose. Somewhere along the way, I became overly focused on the outcomes instead of the writing process.  Grammarian considerations including form and style have become increasingly more important to me on a personal level over the years.

Extremely short version:

Joni and I spent Saturday in Denver, Colorado. We shopped at Guys and Dolls Furniture store and spent the afternoon at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science. We went to the Gates Planetarium showing of Black Holes after visiting the Real Pirates (National Geographic) exhibit.

Expanded version:

Shopping for furniture has become a combination of physically examining products and performing a series of price checks on the internet. The furniture business is an example of capitalism in action. Consumers endeavor to make rational decisions that maximize value and minimize expense. In an effort to better understand the furniture market, Joni and I drove up to Denver to check out the 50,000 square foot showroom at Guys and Dolls Furniture. The showroom had a variety of furniture price ranges and staff was fairly knowledgeable.

Our trip to Denver would not be complete without visiting the Denver Museum of Nature and Sciences (DMNS). When we lived in Boulder, Colorado we were patrons of and held membership in the DMNS. After moving to Colorado Springs, we let our membership expire. In part our visit to the DMNS was inspired by the traveling “Real Pirates: The Untold Story of the Whydah” exhibit. Apparently, National Geographic has been supporting the recovery of a pirate ship off the coast of Cape Cod, Massachusetts.

Overall, the trip was worthwhile and entertaining.

For some unknown reason my TiVo Primer stopped downloading video podcasts. For several months everything worked swimmingly. However, for some reason the TiVo Video Podcasts Download Manager was not working (in fact the TiVo did not bother to download anything). I asked the TiVo support team, “What do I need to do to trigger the video podcast season passes to download properly?”  The support technician from TiVo suggested several generic resolutions, but did not provide any real advice to resolve my specific situation. Canned responses are virtually pointless in a troubleshooting environment and TiVo should reconsider the canned response strategy. Resolution was achieved by forcing a system restart and manually (item by tiem) permanently deleting every item from the deleted items folder.

What would it take to complete a total website redesign? Over the last few years the design of this weblog has changed incrementally and slowly. The coffee cup wallpaper is really the only standard iconography included in the weblog design. I got my monthly haircut today. Sport Clips had a thirty minute wait. My HTC EVO sporting Android Gingerbread 2.3.3 had the battery power to entertain me throughout the entire wait time.

The weblog updates this weekend went very well. Patching software across multiple weblog deployments always seems to be an adventure.

Software alone cannot sustain a program or ultimately a program. Based on economic purchasing power a pizza is worth about dozen tacos. Does the cost of pizza indicate that pizza is valued as superior to tacos? Outside of food considerations, I have been conversing with a variety of different people about the ramifications of the NFL lockout.

Over the course of the next few months, I will be focusing on using various data mining techniques to build datasets. At the heart of the rebuilding process, a new data collection framework has to be built. The second layer of data mining involves working with the data that has been collected.

What is the best language for data mining?

Why am I still thinking about ordering pizza?

What would be the best menu item to try at an Indian restaurant?

What is the best Twitter plugin for WordPress?

Update: My HTC EVO 4G Sprint phone running Android Gingerbread 2.3.3 has returned to normal operations. Over the course of the last year this perpetual (infinite) reboot issue was the first major error I encountered related to the Android operating system.

I have been trying to get Netflix to stream Star Trek Voyager all day. Streaming episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation worked well. Having complete access to streaming episodes of Star Trek episodes on Netflix  should provide a significant amount of entertainment for nerds worldwide.

In case you have not been paying attention to tech news over the last few months, on July 1, 2011 Netflix will start offering full streaming access to Star Trek episodes.

Recently, while shopping at JoS A Bank I came across a black and white VIP silk panel jacquard short sleeve sport shirt that Sam Axe (Burn Notice) would wear. In somewhat related shopping news, sometimes I wonder about why belt sizes do not correlate to pant sizes.

The newly planted Hawthorne tree in the front yard seems to be acclimating well. In other household related news, Peppercorn the dog seems to get wild at about 6:00 PM MST for approximately fifteen minutes.

Capturing an OTA HDTV single requires having the right equipment and being relatively close to the transmitter. Our Terk FDTV1A flat digital omnidirectional amplified indoor antenna used to be located in the family room. The antenna now resides in one of the upstairs bedrooms. Using the cable system in the house to pass the single back to the family room seems to be working better than having the antenna in the family room.

Will Sprint allow customers to add a tablet to the Everything Data Family plan?

I am considering the HTC Flyer, HTC EVO View, and the Motorola XOOM. At the same time, I am trying to determine if a Sunday marathon of South Park of the X-Files would be more rewarding. Hopefully, sometime soon Netflix will provide access to steaming Star Trek episodes. Sources on the internet have indicated that as of July 1, 2011 Netflix will be streaming the entire Star Trek catalog. Access to all five Star Trek series will be a major victory for geeks worldwide.

My omnidirectional antenna that receives over the air HDTV transmissions never seems to be able to sustain our local Fox affiliate for an entire show. The transmitters are apparently on the western side of Colorado Springs and my antenna resides on the eastern side of town.

Would buying an attic antenna be the best option?
Why is my omnidirectional antenna failing?
How can a stationary transmitter and a stationary received experience such variable signal strengths?

Battery life on my HTC EVO 4G significantly improved after updating to Gingerbread. Normally, the phone would sustain a charge for about half a work day. After the Gingerbread update the phone is fully capable of making it through one full workday.

DirecTV called today. The representative wanted to know what special offers would entice me to return to the world of satellite television. My current entertainment paradigm includes focusing on streaming video content. For example, a combination of OTA HDTV, HULU, Netflix, and VUDU provides enough streaming content to oversupply any reasonable consumer.

Part of my new office setup in the basement includes a rather large whiteboard. Maybe the whiteboard will help provide the thinking space necessary to push my academic research forward. Jaccie has argued (and I assume continues to argue) that the exploration of academic subjects naturally transitions into academic events and the publication of academic works. I have found that sketching out frameworks on a 4×6 whiteboard helps bring everything together.

Maybe the best part of the whole weblog project has been scheduling stream of consciousness writing sessions to explore a wide variety of topics. I contribute to some type of writing project every day. Not every writing project gets translated into a publishable weblog form. I used to believe in the ethic of publishing everything. Somewhere along the way my need to immediately publish everything faded into a more controlled and responsible publishing ethic.

Why am I looking at shoe cabinets on the Ikea website?

When did a closet redesign become worth considering?

The first season of Saving Grace showed great promise, but by the third season the writers must have lost interest. More or less the interesting show themes faded into a blaze of cliché and derivative cop drama. In an effort to right the ship, I decided to finish watching the first season of “How I met Your Mother.” I watched the entire first season box set. Unfortunately, Netflix does not own the rights to stream the show.

My office is now officially setup in the basement. I have been considering purchasing a new hard drive. I pulled the SSD out of my desktop and have been pleasantly surprised with the speed boast it provided my laptop. I know intensive video editing on a solid state drive could reduce the life expectancy of the drive.

What are the best options for Indian takeout?

Does anybody have any recommendations for Indian restaurants in Colorado Springs?