*sigh*

10. Create (and Stick to) a Realistic Budget
9. Get a Better Education
8. Make New Friends
7. Keep Your Home Cleaner
6. Start Working Out
5. Learn a New Skill
4. Get that Promotion (or New Job)
3. Reboot Your Sleep Cycle
2. Eat Healthier
1. Back Up Your Data

For me, I think 2012 will be primarily a year of refinement, though there may be some minor revolutions. With that in mind, here are my interpretations & what I’ll try to do in each area…

10. Create (and Stick to) a Realistic Budget

Well, I sort of try to do this now. I at least keep track of everything using Mint. However, I don’t see myself doing much more. My version of this would be to continue to save where possible & cut expenses where I can.

9. Get a Better Education

Well, I am already doing this … I should graduate in May!

8. Make New Friends

This is definitely on my list. And really has 3 parts.

• Make new friends & be more social with them.
• Improve my networking habits professionally & personally.
• Strengthen existing friendships where it’s justified and cull them where it isn’t.

7. Keep Your Home Cleaner

For this one the emphasis is on my clutter. It’s past time to purge. There is definitely a cleaning aspect too, all that clutter makes it hard to do things like dust & vacuum & mop regularly. So far I am doing a bit better already.

6. Start Working Out

It’s more about working out more constantly for me. I already work out, just not as regularly as I would like.

5. Learn a New Skill

I’m thinking this would be good, but really, I just want to brush up on some of my existing ones. Perhaps dust off my Spanish, or get back to painting & such.

4. Get that Promotion (or New Job)

I think #9 will help with this. I’m a bit overdue in that regard. I’ve been in the same position for more than a bit too long.

3. Reboot Your Sleep Cycle

This would be nice, but it’s another one I don’t see happening. I think I will try to get to bed earlier so I can get a bit more sleep though.

2. Eat Healthier

I started this already. But I will never eat really healthily, I like the naughty stuff too much.

1. Back Up Your Data

I’ve been doing this for ages. Nothing offsite beyond Dropbox yet though, that’s something I may add in … I’m just not sure how.

This is a bit inaccurate. Obama needs to take ownership of some of those policies that he either continued or even helped to implement from the Bush Administration. Pretty sure those wars are still going on and money is being spent on them. And how about TARP that Obama helped to implement? And that nebulous “Domestic & Defense Spending” is likely still occurring.

And they wonder why no one believes anything that comes out of Washington.

Debt Chart (July 26, 2011)

Here’s my summary of the address/response:

Republicrats shoulda paid debt instead of cutting taxes. Democans shouldn’t spend so much.

Did I miss anything?

I then noticed a snippet during several commentaries. It was reported on The Huffington Post that the President’s call to action, to let you Representative know how you feel caused an unintentional DDoS attack on the Congressional servers. Ooops.

“Usama Bin Landen Dead Fox News Confrims”

Usama Bin Landen Dead Fox News Confrims

And regarding the news, I’m not sure what difference him being dead makes in reality. And I’m actually a little surprised that Obama didn’t find a way to keep th news under wraps til election time. Better yet, hide him someplace on life support and pull the plug next October.

I want some. they are adorable. Apparently these micro-frogs breed in vegetarian pitcher plants in Borneo. They are less than 1/2 an inch long.

Though, they aren’t the smallest. That honor goes to a little Cuban frog called Eleutherodactylus iberia that is about 1cm long.

Eleutherodactylus iberia - smallest frog in the world

Here’s the book:

UPDATE: Not sure, but it may make you sign in, which means signing up for an account. Grrr. Sorry about that. Still vote for me, but only if you want or already have a blurb account. FWIW, the books are good quality & the software is easy to use.

Cons

• Of course, everyone knows about the antenna issue. iOS 4.0.1 did seem to make the antenna meter a bit more accurate (now I get about 3 bars max at my house instead of bouncing between 5 & 1), but of course the hardware issue is still a hardware issue.
• Case availability, as usual, is terrible. It’s improving now, but still a bit lacking. Luckily the 3G cases kinda sorta fit. I finally ended up going for a cheap case that is a bit too padded. It nearly doubles the thickness of the phone. This lack of cases is especially bad, considering the ‘antenna issue’.
• Multitasking can be a bit annoying - particularly that non-multitasking apps go to the launch bar too. It would be nice to be able to exclude apps from multitasking so they actually exit when you exit them. There are some apps that just don’t need to be backgrounded.
• Proximity sensor issues - when talking on the phone, the sensor doesn’t always sense that the phone is by your head. This might have improved a little with 4.0.1, but not much.
• Weird audio bug - after using an app with its own volume level, such as Pandora or YouTube, you have to reboot to adjust the ringer volume. This was resolved with iOS 4.0.1.
• They skimped a bit leaving out the microfiber cloth that came with the 3G. Perhaps the oleophobic coating is supposed to make this unnecessary.

Pros

• Seriously fast. This is even more pronounced since my 3G was running iOS 4 and had seemed to be slowing down even before that. Even little things like contact scrolling are noticeably faster. The iPhone 4 may pay for itself just in app launch time.
• GPS seems faster & more accurate. GPS based apps lock on a lot faster than with the 3G.
• FaceTime works great once you turn it on. It seems that some phones default to having it off, others have it on. I’ve used it a couple time now & it’s pretty smooth.
• Text is gorgeous. No, really. Small text on the new screen is amazing. Reading on the new phone is a lot more comfortable than the old one.
• The new cameras are pretty good stuff too. The video quality & photo quality is quite good for a phone. One oddity with iMovie is the inability to split clips. That seems like something that should be doable. Perhaps implementing it in the interface was too much of a challenge. I’m hoping to get it after launch. Along with the ability to put titles over photos. & upload 720p to YouTube.

Those’re the basics. In short, yes it’s worth it. The only long term issue is the antenna debacle. Perhaps they’ll come up with a more permanent solution than using a case. Oh, another thing: Developers, update your apps. Especially the icons. The bundled Apple apps are so much purdier than most of my 3rd party apps.

So, I called. Closed of course.

Then I tried to submit feedback using the link at the bottom of the black page. Upon submitting the feedback I got an error that Safari couldn’t connect to the server. Nice. It finally went on the 3rd try, but now I’m annoyed, so I’m posting this just to let Buena Vista Home Entertainment know how incredibly incompetent I think they are. Apparently Disney sucks a the Internet. And technology in general.

Around a dozen toads attempting to mate in my rain diluted, but still chlorinated swimming pool. I hope they don’t expect their endeavors to be successful. It’s amazing how loud they are.

I’m not looking forward to skimming out all the eggs tomorrow.

UPDATE: I rescued 15 live male toads this morning … 3 dead ones. One of which was the female. :^/ Most of them were in the skimmer. So I had at least 18 out there last night.

Just a thought.

Not soon enough, dangit!

I was up a bit late anyway, so I thought I’d brave the extra half hour just to see if they enabled the pre-order at midnight Pacific. It looks like they’ve started the process at least. *sigh*