Touch 'n Go thoughts - Day Five

Moving from my iPod video 60 Gig model to an iPod Touch 16 Gig has been a real paradigm shift. Yes, yes, I know, it's a fairly obvious thing to say.

Here's some of the things that have struck me as I've lived with it for the last five days.

1. Stanza. How have I ever tolerated not having something this amazingly useful on my media player? And I can get books from free wireless? Do I need/want a Kindle now? No?

2. No disc mode. That's a little sad, b/c most of my portable apps live on my 60G. Ah well, 16 G really doesn't leave me with room that I'd feel comfortable throwing portable apps on anyway.

3. No click wheel. I understand that this was a selling point - See this really cool touch interface! But when I was listening to a playlist, or shuffle mode, and ran into a song that I wanted to skip, it was the work of a moment to reach down and hit the right side of the click wheel. Likewise, if I'm walking around the house and someone wants to talk to me, it used to be very quick to hit the Play/Pause at the bottom of the wheel by touch alone, while it was still in my pocket. No problem. Now, I absolutely have to have my eyes on what I'm doing, because there's no tactile feedback to what I'm doing.

4. Smaller size is not necessarily a bad thing. This is a fairly new thought to me. The fact that I now have an iPod that is about 1/4 the size of the one I was using means I have to be a lot more selective in what gets on it. Yes, it's still over 1k songs and hours of video, but compared with the space I had before it's a real shift. But that means that I'm a lot more focused on quality now, and particularly on rating the songs that come up. It's easier to get my head around the collection the way it is.

5. Apps are fantastic. For example, last night I was entering all my GutCheck weigh-ins into "WeightBot", a neat little app that tracks and charts weight loss, figures BMI, etc. (hat tip here to Download Squad). At once I was interested in seeing the progress I've made, and at the same time a little incensed that I seem to have really plateaued over the last month. Evernote keeps me synced with bookmarks, to-do lists, clips, quotes, etc. And all my devices need some form of Sudoku. (Though I wish the one I had selected had an option for entering custom puzzles and a solver mode, in case I wanted to take today's paper sudoku puzzle on the go - maybe in the next update?)

6. Wireless is a real battery-drainer.

So far, I wouldn't go back, but it's been an adjustment, no question about it.

Today's Project - The Positivity Playlist

I know, I know. I'm Mr. Optimism, right?

Sure I am.

Talking with My Sweet Honey's Grandmother last night, I showed her my iPod touch. (yes, by that standard, it was a very good Christmas) We got to talking, and I was showing her the books I've put on the "Touch 'N Go". Yes, it's a blatant Schlock Mercenary reference. She was amazed when I told her that books were a lot smaller than music. Thanks to Baen's Free Library, and Gutenberg, there's a lot of books on there.

As I explained that books were a lot smaller than songs, I got a weird thought - Music is naturally more information dense than pure text. I could put three David Drake novels in the space of one mp3. And music speaks at a more basic level than text. You have to learn to read. But put on Canned Heat, and your body just starts moving naturally. So, why not put that natural power to good use?

Now, as I've somehow become the guy that manages to find the black cloud that goes with every silver lining, I've been looking through my music for good tunes to lift the occasional dismal mood. Jumped on Twitter, and have gotten a lot of good suggestions.

So, here it is - my Positivity Playlist as it currently stands. Got any suggestions? What have I missed?

1. Accentuate the Positive - Perry Como, from "Today and Yesterday"
2. Nothing from Nothing - Billy Preston, from the "Elf" soundtrack
3. Jump Jive An' Wail - Brian Setzer Orchestra, from "The Dirty Boogie"
4. Prime Mover - Rush, from "Hold Your Fire" (anything can happen...)
5. Pennies from Heaven - Louis Prima, also from "Elf" (Shoobie Doobie!)
6. New World Man - Rush, from "Signals"
7. Radio Ga Ga - Queen, from "Classic Queen"
8. Energy - The Apples in Stereo, from "New Magnetic Wonder" (I got this free from Amazon)
9. Fa-Fa-Fa - Datarock, from "Datarock" (I need a shot, I need a shot of ambition)
10. Things Can Only Get Better - Howard Jones, from "The Best of Howard Jones"
11. Starchild - Jamiroquai, from "Dynamite" (Yeah, that's right. Not "Canned Heat")
12. That's What You Get - Paramore, from "Riot!" (Obligatory Rock Band 2 song)
13. History Repeating - Propellerheads & Shirley Bassey, from "Decksanddrumeandrockandroll" (She sang "Goldfinger")
14. I Should've Been After You - Rooney, from "Calling the World" (I think they're channelling Queen.)

Just shy of 55 minutes of positive, happy, upbeat music. I'll be the first to admit it needs some tweaking. So, what am I missing? What doesn't belong? What do you do to escape the blues?

What I'm grateful for this Christmas.

First, I'm grateful for the fact that I still have some hair.

And of course, I'm grateful to be a husband to a wonderful woman, and a dad to one of the best kids I know.

She really is. Because of where I live and go to church, I'm around an awful lot of kids, and Queso's one of the brightest, sweetest kids I know.

Here's hoping that 2009 is better than 2008, that the obstacles we will inevitably face will lead us to better paths, to stronger abilities, and to humbler hearts.

Merry Christmas!!

NaNoWriMo wrapup

Well, it was a week ago that I won NaNoWriMo, with 50,101 words. The problem is, the book isn't finished. I've got about five chapters to go before it's done.

That's the first problem, I suppose. The second one is that there are a plethora of ready excuses that I can pretend are keeping me from writing. For example, this being the holiday season, there's so much family coming through, it's difficult for me to turn around in a circle, let alone sit down at a computer and write. (Never mind the fact that I'm writing this blog post. Pay no attention.)

Also, while it's not necessarily eating into my evenings all that much, work has been insane over the last few weeks.

And I've started reviewing video games over at Tech Talk for Families. Which is pretty cool.

The fact of the matter is that the challenge of NaNoWriMo provided me with some much needed motivation. I suppose the thing to do at this point, is do something to regain it, and then push forward. I need about a week of writing to get it done.

As always, the book is sitting on Google Docs - here.