So about 3 years ago or so I was pretty technologically bare. I didn't have a cell phone, had no computer or internet service. My desktop died and I never got around to replacing it and if I really needed the internet I went to my local public library. I also had no cable TV. That didn't matter much to me though for the most part because I had other things to keep me happy. I painted, hung out with friends and also was busy at one point working full time and going to school.
Then I started getting things. I got cable TV and internet because due to ownership change where I worked I got them for free. Before they were discounted but because I would have used the services so little (due to being in school while working) I didn't think it was worth me paying even a discounted rate. But free... free is good. The TV service includes 3 hookups, 1 basic, 1 standard digital box and 1 DVR digital box. The internet is a standard 10x1 mbps service, fairly speedy. After that I got a cell phone because it was just so much more convenient, and because of my Time Warner affiliation I get 20 - 25 % off my bill with AT&T. For awhile I didn't use my own internet service (my brother did) because I didn't have a computer still. I changed that by buying a laptop (which I am blogging on now!) and a wireless router. Mmm surfing the internet while laying in bed... So now I have 3 laptops... 2 I bought second hand from a co-worker who fixes computers on a side job. I have an old Mac iBook just so I could play around with one (hey it was only $60.00) and an IBM Thinkpad clone by Lenovo which my brother uses now that his desktop is kaput. Add to that collection of tech a spiffy digital camera (see my previous blog post) and a 500 GB portable HD (to store all my photos on) and now suddenly I have a decent amount of tech... I don't have a current game console though... oh wait I lied.... my friend gave me a free XBox 360. I don't have much time for video games though right now. Plus the 360 is just really being set aside til I get a house so I can get Rock Band II (III if it's out by then) for it.
That's all good and fine but I feel I am still fairly grounded though. TV I only watch once in awhile, I record my shows on DVR and then once a week watch a few hours or so of House, Bones etc... I do spend a fair amount of time online, but am cutting down on wastefully being online. Yes I have productive reasons for being online... So I wouldn't say tech has swallowed up my life like some people. Rather it has enhanced my life experience especially since without it I wouldn't have had a particular experience (or series of experiences) and met a certain special someone. More on that later though...
Monday, March 15, 2010
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Slacker Me!
So yea... totally slacking again... but now I am inspired. I have a friend who just recently started blogging and I just noticed she became a follower of mine. Also with a few dears friends having moved east to Albany I feel that updating my blog would be one good way to keep the abreast of happenings in my life. Somebody doesn't use Facebook! :-P
So what's happened since I last posted in May 2009. A lot of things... some noteworthy and some not so much. In June I went on a 2 week vacation, the first real vacation I've had in oh so long. I spent a week out in Portland Oregon visiting my friends Jonathan and Jennifer. Jonathan is a best friend from college days and Jennifer is his girlfriend, though I did know Jennifer from college as well. Portland is a great city which I wouldn't mind at all living in. I sampled some of the local beer joints. One of my favorite's was a place called The Green Dragon. It was a big open place with tables supplied with chalk that you could draw upon. Free games were up front that you could grab and play and there were a handful of pinball machines. I visited the Japanese Garden, Portland Rose Garden, Oregon Zoo, Multnomah Falls and Columbia River Gorge. I plan in going back out there again...
After 1 week in Portland I headed south to LA, to visit my college buddy Jeff. I hadn't seen him since our college days, some 18 years ago. I met his wife Auttie and their daughter Kaylie. I stayed there for 3 days before going to Las Vegas for 3 days. In Vegas I walked the strip, did a bit of gambling. The highlights of Vegas though were seeing Penn and Teller and going out to Red Rock Canyon. I took literally thousands of pictures on my vacation, which are posted on Facebook. I will have to find a site that I can dump pictures onto so that non Facebook people can see them. Oh yeah I have a new digital camera... well I never had one before. It's an very nice Canon SX10. I bought it because I was going on vacation and wanted something good for taking scenic shots with. It has 10.1 MP, 20x zoom and a ton of features that I am still figuring out...
In November I finished up the last of my student loan payments! What a huge relief. So not long after that I started thinking about buying a house. I'm still a little ways from doing so, needing to save up for a down-payment and wanting to pay down my credit card that I used on my vacation before my 0 % introductory APR rate goes away.
So what's happened since I last posted in May 2009. A lot of things... some noteworthy and some not so much. In June I went on a 2 week vacation, the first real vacation I've had in oh so long. I spent a week out in Portland Oregon visiting my friends Jonathan and Jennifer. Jonathan is a best friend from college days and Jennifer is his girlfriend, though I did know Jennifer from college as well. Portland is a great city which I wouldn't mind at all living in. I sampled some of the local beer joints. One of my favorite's was a place called The Green Dragon. It was a big open place with tables supplied with chalk that you could draw upon. Free games were up front that you could grab and play and there were a handful of pinball machines. I visited the Japanese Garden, Portland Rose Garden, Oregon Zoo, Multnomah Falls and Columbia River Gorge. I plan in going back out there again...
After 1 week in Portland I headed south to LA, to visit my college buddy Jeff. I hadn't seen him since our college days, some 18 years ago. I met his wife Auttie and their daughter Kaylie. I stayed there for 3 days before going to Las Vegas for 3 days. In Vegas I walked the strip, did a bit of gambling. The highlights of Vegas though were seeing Penn and Teller and going out to Red Rock Canyon. I took literally thousands of pictures on my vacation, which are posted on Facebook. I will have to find a site that I can dump pictures onto so that non Facebook people can see them. Oh yeah I have a new digital camera... well I never had one before. It's an very nice Canon SX10. I bought it because I was going on vacation and wanted something good for taking scenic shots with. It has 10.1 MP, 20x zoom and a ton of features that I am still figuring out...
In November I finished up the last of my student loan payments! What a huge relief. So not long after that I started thinking about buying a house. I'm still a little ways from doing so, needing to save up for a down-payment and wanting to pay down my credit card that I used on my vacation before my 0 % introductory APR rate goes away.
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
A long time coming...
Yeah again, I've been a slacker about updating this blog. 11 months... wow... yeah... a long time coming.
So what has transpired in those 11 months. A lot and but nothing earth shattering. My life has been pretty normal and somewhat mundane.
The summer came and went, I didn't travel as I wished to, mostly due to scheduling issues and also me not just organizing it. That is changing this summer. I have a 2 week vacation planned in mid June, with destinations of Portland, OR, Los Angeles, CA and Las Vegas, NV. Visiting friends... funny how a few posts ago I see I mentioned getting a digital camera, I haven't done that yet either. But again that is changing, I have decided on what I am getting, I'm going a bit upscale, getting a Canon SX10. It's a highly rated camera that is good for close up ranges as well as distance shots (which I want for taking photos of the scenery out west).
My New Year's resolution of raising my credit score was a resounding success, I am now in the 740 range with my credit score and have several lines of credit at my disposal. After the vacation and finishing off the remnants of my student loan, next up will be attempting to score a house.
I also have managed to re-establish ties with a few acquaintances and forge bonds of friendship, which was part of another resolution. The other resolutions I had have had mixed degrees of success and they are being carried over to this year.
I have had major progress on my tattos since I last posted. I have my koi with water surrounding it in place and the cloud background for the dragon is being worked on now. After that will be my upper arm...
Well that's enough for now... I'll be back for more summaries...
So what has transpired in those 11 months. A lot and but nothing earth shattering. My life has been pretty normal and somewhat mundane.
The summer came and went, I didn't travel as I wished to, mostly due to scheduling issues and also me not just organizing it. That is changing this summer. I have a 2 week vacation planned in mid June, with destinations of Portland, OR, Los Angeles, CA and Las Vegas, NV. Visiting friends... funny how a few posts ago I see I mentioned getting a digital camera, I haven't done that yet either. But again that is changing, I have decided on what I am getting, I'm going a bit upscale, getting a Canon SX10. It's a highly rated camera that is good for close up ranges as well as distance shots (which I want for taking photos of the scenery out west).
My New Year's resolution of raising my credit score was a resounding success, I am now in the 740 range with my credit score and have several lines of credit at my disposal. After the vacation and finishing off the remnants of my student loan, next up will be attempting to score a house.
I also have managed to re-establish ties with a few acquaintances and forge bonds of friendship, which was part of another resolution. The other resolutions I had have had mixed degrees of success and they are being carried over to this year.
I have had major progress on my tattos since I last posted. I have my koi with water surrounding it in place and the cloud background for the dragon is being worked on now. After that will be my upper arm...
Well that's enough for now... I'll be back for more summaries...
Friday, June 13, 2008
Tattoos
Okay this post is a little late... but I've been a bum about updating my blog I guess. A few weeks ago I went and got myself a tattoo on my left forearm. It's a fairly sizable one of a blue Japanese style dragon clasping a katana and an orb with the kanji for friendship in it. Below are some pictures of it just after the work was finished.
A friend and co-worker, Tammy, has a husband who does skin art. His name is Jay Spaeth, and he does pretty good work. Check him out on MySpace if you want to see more of his work. Right now the tattoo is still in the process of healing, some of it has already healed nicely, other parts are being a pain. But I have to be patient... Once it does heal I am thinking about getting a background, some dark storm clouds and then doing the reverse side with a koi like this one.
If you are wondering, there is a symbolism behind this. In legend if a koi succeeded in ascending waterfalls to a point called the Dragon Gate that it would be transformed into a dragon. As a result the koi itself is a symbol of aspiration and advancement. The koi represents courage, the ability to attain goals and the ability to overcome difficulties in life. With how my life has been in the past and where I am now and the progress I've made in my life so far I feel this is appropriate for me.
A friend and co-worker, Tammy, has a husband who does skin art. His name is Jay Spaeth, and he does pretty good work. Check him out on MySpace if you want to see more of his work. Right now the tattoo is still in the process of healing, some of it has already healed nicely, other parts are being a pain. But I have to be patient... Once it does heal I am thinking about getting a background, some dark storm clouds and then doing the reverse side with a koi like this one.
If you are wondering, there is a symbolism behind this. In legend if a koi succeeded in ascending waterfalls to a point called the Dragon Gate that it would be transformed into a dragon. As a result the koi itself is a symbol of aspiration and advancement. The koi represents courage, the ability to attain goals and the ability to overcome difficulties in life. With how my life has been in the past and where I am now and the progress I've made in my life so far I feel this is appropriate for me.
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Looking for a digital camera
So after getting this nifty laptop I've been thinking I should really get myself a digital camera. I am getting a bit more sentimental I guess and have been wanting to capture moments, and a digital camera would be so nice for doing so considering I have profiles on MySpace and Facebook as well as this blog. I could upload some of the pictures online for others to see if they wanted to. Mostly though I've been thinking about getting one because I plan on doing some fairly serious travel in the relatively near future. Domestically I'm thinking of going out to Rhode Island and Connecticut to visit a childhood friend and his parents (his father was my English teacher in middle school) and going out west to the Portland, Oregon area to visit another friend from my college days. Abroad the ideas of Italy and Cancun have come up in discussions with a friend. It would be a travesty to do that much travel and not have a photo log of it I think. So a digital camera it is. I do have myself a recently acquired Best Buy card with a $2000.00 line of credit. I don't know if the 18 months of no interest financing applies just to the computer I bought there or if applies the the line of credit. I'll find out because if so, I'll just charge it on my card so I don't put the squeeze on myself too much. Otherwise I'll just front the money, I'm not looking for anything extravagant anyhow, just something reliable with good quality. I don't know if anyone has any recommendations but those would be appreciated.
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