Burnerblog

The phones are quite amazing, and very usable. The texting is easy and fast, picture mail is fun (we use it a lot now), the camera is quite nice, the calling is very nice, and overall, it’s just a great device. It has tethering built in as well.

The GPS works well, and the voice-activated live search is batting 1.000 for me so far with recognizing my voice and finding businesses. The Telenav GPS software is okay (not as slick as my wife’s TomTom), but is overall very usable and useful.

It was not a very hard decision for me to go from the Q9c to the Instinct. The interace is fast and snappy, and it just does what it’s supposed to do, and does it well. Every application I run on mine runs nicely, and the sports apps are especially well-done. Watching videos on youtube even works without any monkeying.

Music plays very well… and the headphone jack is regular size. I can connect it to my car’s aux-in and listen to music on my car’s stereo just as I can from my iPods or Zune. My nice headphones finally find use again… not that I needed any. The Instinct comes with a pair of nice stereo headphones that also double as a extended headset w/mic.

No AIM… yet.

Browser is okay, but there are supposed to be other options coming soon.

As for email, I will say that it connects VERY nicely to Gmail. Attachments download from Gmail without problems (not sure about Exchange; I haven’t had any attachments from that account yet).

Obviously, the keypad of the Q/Q9c (my former phones) is better suited to power texters who are writing long emails on their devices, but for regular use (I type about 10-20 emails a day with about 10-25 text messages), it’s quite easy to use (and actually quite fun). The handwriting recognition (a little touted feature) is very nice, and works very well albeit it’s actually faster to just type it in with your fingers.

The accessories it comes with are quite welcome considering the trend lately of companies cutting out the accessories that devices ship with.

Also, I posted a quick video of the kids on their Instincts on Youtube; it’s pretty funny.

…and so did Sherry, Gelli, and Brendon. What did we get?

The Sprint Instinct! It’s what I was drooling over when it was first announced, and after seeing it live, I just had to get one (as did Gelli; she bought her own). Brendon, Sherry, and I all have birthdays within the next month or so, so we used that as an excuse to get these phones as our birthday presents this year.

So far, we all are amazed with the phone. Super-usable, super-fast, very responsive, and not laggy or buggy at all. There are some things to get used to, but even the handwriting recognition works on this thing! It came with an optional use stylus (there isn’t a stylus slot on the phone, but there is on the included case) that I haven’t tried to use yet, but may.

The screen is nice and bright, the speaker and ringer are loud and clear, and my son is in love with one of the ringtones. He plays it on his phone (he has affectionately named it “soundsystem”). There he goes again, playing that ringtone! lol

I’m at the point where my phone is everything I’ve always wanted in a phone. It’s awesome… convergence devices. GPS/mp3 player/video player/Internet access/telephone/camera/etc. It’s sweet!

Oh, and best of all, it doesn’t bear a fruit logo. :/

I’ve been busy. So busy, in fact, that I’ve neglected ol’ Burnerblog once again.

Here is the kind of post I hate to read on other people’s’s’s’s’s blogs.

I’ve been playing bass in two bands, playing Age of Conan online with friends, racing in NCNASCAR (and winning some races!), having friends over from out of town, reading neat websites with cool ideas, and many other things.

Next up for me is making a compost pile, organizing one corner of the garage, and waxing my car.

And maybe keeping this place a little more up-to-date than I have been.

…was on April 26th. My mom came over for an early Mother’s Day for Sherry and brought a bunch of plants, soil, mulch, and other stuff for planting. She forgot the significance of the date. As we were sitting at the table eating lunch, I said, “And at about this time exactly five years ago today, you forgot the orange tort.” She just blinked a few times and started laughing. “Ahh, it’s your anniversary! Happy anniversary!” It was pretty funny as we recounted the fact that on our wedding day, my mom forgot to bring the orange tort that was to be the groom’s cake. They recovered quickly by getting some chocolate cake to stand-in, allowing us to gorge ourselves on the orange tort the next day.

Anyway, I bought Sherry a 500GB external HD for all the pictures we have since she does scrapbooking and needs the images to be local to her machine so that she doesn’t have to wait too long pulling images from my computer over the network (many of which are very large due to the high resolution). Well, on Thursday, I had had enough of my computer turning itself off, rebooting, and losing network connectivity. I had tried just about everything to solve the problems, but nothing seemed to work. Since I work on my computer from home, this was a dire situation. She told me to go ahead and get a new computer. SWEET! So, what did I get? I got a Gateway from Best Buy (’cause I’m too old and impatient to build my own systems anymore) which is a quad-core 2.5GHz Intel with 4GB RAM, and Nvidia 8800GT with 512MB RAM, a 640GB HD, and a bunch of other goodies (DVD burner, etc). Then, as luck (or misfortune) would have it, on Friday night one of my monitors died. I used dual monitors because of the writing work I do; it just makes my life so much easier. I looked at getting another 20″ monitor, but decided to just get a new 24″ widescreen instead to replace both monitors with one. That would allow me to replace the last CRT in use in the house (upstairs) and would give me a nice new huge desktop space to work with.

So… I now have a new, fast computer with a honking huge HD-capable 1080p 24″ monitor with 1920×1400 resolution (or some number like that). It’s very fast on the refresh rate, and was on sale when I got it.

I took Gelli to see a show last night: Circa Survive and Thrice. The funniest part about this is the fact that I didn’t actually see the show with her as I normally do. She saw it with a boy, Zach. They’ve been tearing up the text messaging on their phones and have been IM-ing each other pretty heavily for the past few weeks since meeting a few months ago at a car club BBQ. He’s a year or so older than Gelli, and the two have hit it off.

I finally relented and gave in to the fact that time moves on and that my little girl is growing up. I can’t keep her locked away in some tower only to be rescued by a Prince Charming. I think we’ve taught her well, and that she’s armed with the right tools to get her through the situations she’ll face when out with boys. Dropping her off was tough, but seeing how happy she was made me happy. I’m sure that last night was one of her most exciting nights yet, and I’m happy for her.

It’s been busy around here. On Saturday night, I took the family out to a “cuise,” where a bunch of us in the car club I belong to drove down the majority of Westheimer and ended with a dinner at Taco Cabana. It was pretty fun. Gelli rode with her friend-boy Zach while Brendon rode with a friend in the club named Vlad. Sherry rode with me, and the weather was so pleasant, we drove with the windows down and the sunroof open. I got to race twice (and *cough* won both times), hehe, and Sherry joked that it was the “oldest kid” in the club who did the stuff we’re not supposed to do.

I’ve also been playing the bass nearly every day, and for the first time in over 20 years, I actually feel improvement in my playing. It’s a lot of fun playing weekly with the band, but it’s an even better feeling being able to walk into a practice knowing all my songs cold. It also helps on the songs I have to both sing and play. Yes, you read that right: I sing and play a few songs.

I was so set on writing at least one post a day, yet I didn’t count on life getting busy. Oh well. I’ve done the cliche “I’ve been bad, I’ll post more” so I’ll spare you the pixels.

BUT… BUT… BUT…

Tomorrow is going to be a hella busy day for me. I’ve got to get my user guide (work project) out for a production review by the editors, go get my car into the shop for it’s first 5k service (yay!), take Gelli’s camera in for LCD replacement (she dropped it and broke it), go get some money back from Best Buy due to the 30 day money-back price guarantee, and then pay my car note. While I’m at it, I may take a look at a Fender Jazz Bass I’ve had my eye on for a few days since finding one at a GREAT price, but that’ll depend on how much I spend getting the car serviced and how the budget holds up. Oh yeah… I’m supposed to pick up some Monster Mats for the car tomorrow, too. I may not get that Jazz Bass just yet afterall.

Oh, I went and saw Southern Culture on the Skids with Sherry, Stevie, Anita, and Lawrence at The Continental Club on Saturday night. It was a lot of fun, but I had a stomach ache and some nausea from something I ate at The Spaghetti Warehouse. Coupled with the tall asshat who thought nothing of standing right in front of us (while he could have moved three feet to the right and blocked no-one’s view), it made for not the best evening. The band was great… music was great… but the stomach and the inconsiderate asswipes kind of made it not as awesome as it otherwise would have been. So how did I take care of my stomach? By agreeing to go to Waffle House with the crew. Eggs, hash browns, and sausage. Does the stomach good.

My stomach hurt almost the entire next day while I watched the NASCAR race, but was better by the time we went over to Stevie and Anita’s for beans and corn bread.

Well, I think I’m FINALLY starting to get over it, but Sherry is still suffering quite a bit. The flu has hit us hard this year. I can see this flu killing older people, ’cause it really took the wind out of our sails. Stevie had it earlier in the week as well, and he was off work for a few days because of it.

Brendon kicked it off, and I think Gelli is starting to come down with it, but at least Sherry and I don’t get sick at the same time. It’s nice, ’cause that way we can take care of each other when the other is sick.

Today would have been my dad’s 70th birthday.

For the past few years on this day, I was kind of irritable and unpleasant. This year I think I’m feeling much better about it. Sure, I miss my dad daily, and I still (and will always) feel like I’ve been cheated out of a dad too early in life, but I’ve come to terms with losing him.

We used to celebrate it together, eating his favorite food. In his honor, we celebrate his birthday the way he liked to; eating some good Mexican food.  We’ll be doing that tonight.

Today was the day that Brendon and I went around the house hanging things. We hung a shelf in the master bathroom, hung a gun rack in his closet, and hung his belt display rack (finally) just outside his bedroom door (a gift from Elaine a few years back). Then, we went out front and washed Sherry’s car and then waxed it. She hasn’t had it washed in probably a year or so, and last week’s wash was the first time the dirt had been “agitated” in a long time. This week, we washed it but it still looked dirty. It turns out the paint was in the early stages of oxidization. Brendon and I set to the car with wax applicators and Mother’s Carnauba California Gold Wax, and about an hour later, the car was shining as if it were brand new. Many small scratches became invisible while the rest of the car regained it’s new-car look. It’s quite spectacular! Now we will need to detail the inside of the car next weekend, but at least the outside looks great and we’ll only have to do an easy wash since it’s waxed.

We then went out for dinner after watching Dallas lose to the Giants (and who thought San Diego would win today?!?!) after which we came home and just chillaxed for a while.