I’ve been thinking about all the sweet new technology coming from Apple lately.  It has given me some things to drool over, and to consider.  For a while I was thinking about getting the Apple TV.  Now I am unsure.  First off I think it would be pretty sweet.  But I haven’t really gotten into downloading movies from iTunes.  Of course if I had the Apple TV I would probably get into it more.  But then there is the $$ factor.

Another factor in the Apple TV is the Hard Drive space.  It’s only got 40 gigs in it, aka 50 hours of video.  That’s not a lot.  If I’m going to jump into the digital age and do digital movies, etc. I would want to be able to store more than 50 hours of video.  Just taking a quick inventory of my movie collection I have WAY more than 50 hours of movies.  So space is limited.  (Also, the Apple TV syncs with your iTunes… so that means everything is on your compy as well as your Apple TV).

So those are my thoughts on Apple TV.

The new Airport Extreme looks cool too.  Basically the two things that have me interested: USB External HD, and 802.11n.  The speed boost would be fun to have.  The external HD would be sweet in the fact that anyone on your network could share files.  You could put all your pictures on the external HD so they’re not taking up space on your compy, and anyone can see them.  (And with the N technology you could probably run some programs off the HD). However it appears to me that with this Airport Extreme they have taken out Air Tunes and put it into the Apple TV.

The other thing in all of this is that I will be getting my old Desktop compy back from my brother.  It’s an older machine, but it’s got a 40 gig HD, AMD 800 (or so) processor.  I’m thinking of buying a TV tuner card and putting MythTV on there.  So in a way it would be similar to a TiVo, and sort of like an Apple TV?  Of course I couldn’t download movies from iTunes and watch them on the MythTV (at least I’m pretty sure I can’t), but I could probably import DVD’s and watch it from my compy (is that legal?), and have music on there and listen to it through my stereo.

So are there any thoughts on what I should do?  Should I go with one of the Apple Products?  Or should I go with my old compy, and buy a larger HD for it?  Or other thoughts are always welcome!

Okay, so now you’re probably thinking (once again) that my blog is broken. Cuz after all that’s what I said on Feb. 13 and Jan. 30. But it’s true once again. I have my third new job in less than a months time. How exciting is that?

So I started out Feb as an IT Person at the Carlson School of Management at the UMN. Then I moved to a Legislative Assistant (LA) position for Rep. Matt Dean and Rep. Chris DeLaForest in the MN House of Representatives. On Monday I will start my new position as a Media Writer for the House Republican Caucus. So I’ll be working with the same people, in the same area, but doing different things. That’s alright with me.

The LA job was a Session Only position, but I knew when I took it there would be a great chance for me to get on full time. That’s one of the main reasons I took the position. I thought to myself “I’ll be on fulltime by Easter.” Lo, it has come true. So now I get benefits, vacation, etc. All that good stuff. Also, it’s’ an 87% of the time job. Basically I work 100% of the time from Jan – June, and 75% of the time July – Dec. It’s salaried though, so that’s alright. What can I say, but it’s pretty nice!

I should maybe state that I hadn’t applied for this position specifically, but they were interested in me. They had me interview one day last week, and then this morning they asked me if I would take the job. I’m excited. I’ll be doing press releases for a dozen Representatives, and doing some Web Site/IT stuff along with it. So it’s kinda like the best of both worlds. I guess the IT stuff won’t be so much until this summer. But still, I’m excited about this new position. Although I do feel slightly bad for my reps to have to go through tansition and teach a new LA how they like everything done.

Also, Happy Birthday to Mr. Mooney!

I posted some new pictures.  Feel free to check them out.

I’m using iPhoto to export these ones, so it’s not as uniform as using Dreamweaver.  Does anyone else use iPhoto to do this?  I’m trying to figure out how to get it to name the main page index.html instead of the album name (ie. winter-carnival.html).  Any tips?

Or at least in our parking lot.  We were going ot go to church, but we couldn’t really get out of our parking spot, and into the semi-plowed  main path in the parking lot.  And there was one car that was stuck in that area, so we’d have to go around them and through high snow.  So, after not getting out of our spot, and watching one other person almost get stuck we decided against church.

But we were nice enough to spend 20 minutes helping the stuck car get back into their parking lot.  We did see 2 cars actually make it all the way out the lot.  Granted 1 was a 4-wheel drive, and the other was after the car was unstuck.  So far there is a total of 3 cars out of the parking lot.  All three after nearly getting stuck.

So I think we’ll stay in for today.  We might go for a walk though.  With the snow falling more it’s pretty outside.  A good day to enjoy the snow, and then come back in for some hot coca.

Is Google, or some one else, to do an overlay of their maps system and traffic data.  Because I drive to work each day, and the traffic can be a bit interesting, it’d be nice to know what the fastest route is.  Of course I use the MN DOT Traffic Map to help me decide which way would be the fastest route.  But that’s not always updated (as you can tell they don’t even have all the major highways).

And what if a slowdown occurs while you’re driving?  If you don’t hear it on the radio you don’t know about it.  (Of course if you have a Palm then you can just bring up that page to view the map, but that solution isn’t much of an option for me currently).

Because having an updated map isn’t always possible: Wouldn’t it be cool to have a site that calculates driving times from point A to point B using a variety of different roads?  Say I want to take 35E to 694.  That might be the fastest one day, but it could be super slow as well.  But what if there’s an accident some place.  Then it would tell me to take 35E to 36 to 35W to 694.  Sweet, I can avoid some traffic.  Or maybe 35E is really backed up.  Then it could say take Como to Dale to 36 to Snelling to 694.

The system would have to know the speedlimit of all the streets that it would have, stop light locations, etc.  It would also have to take information directly from MN DOT (or some other traffic site).  It would look at the traffic on all those streets, factor in speed limits, stop lights, etc.  and tell you which route is the fastest (based upon the current conditions).  This would be nice.

Granted there is no data out there for traffic conditions on the smaller roads (Like Dale or Como), but it would be pretty sweet.   If only I coded that much…. although there is a snow storm coming and I might not have a whole lot better to do.  On second thought, I problaby will.

It felt like a super busy day today.  I guess I spent a lot of time on the phone, talking with people, and doing a bunch of random things.  But it was fun.  I love the fast pace of it all.

I also got to meet Congresswoman Michelle Bachman today.  That was fun.  She’s a very nice lady, and super sweet.

I’d write more, but I’m tired and need my sleep.  Maybe tomorrow I can find more weird bills for you all to enjoy.

That’s right, it’s Tuesday!  That means I’ve been at my new job for a week.  I’m liking it so far.  It’s fun, and busy.  I like it more than the UMN, basically because it’s political stuff.  That’s the best part.  I get to be aware of the political process more so.

I went to see my new neice this weekend.  She’s a cutie.  It was fun to go down to New Ulm.  First time I had been there in about 2 years, I think.  It’s been a while.  We’ll go down there again this weekend (I think) for the baptism. That’ll be fun, cuz the whole family (minus Lacey) will be there.  If only that silly sister didn’t live so far away.  Although somedays I don’t blame her!

After some hassel taxes are filed.  Now we’re awaiting our return so that we can pay off some bills!  Yeah for getting our money back.

If you want to hear some crazy bills that are in the MN Legislature right now?  Check these out:

•  H.F. 1015: Some people are calling it the Freedom to Poop Act
• H.F. 1048: The DFL want a smaller government, but they don’t want anyone to loose their job.  So you loose a state department, but very little (if any) of the cost of it.

Only the latter aren’t mine, and it should really read baby.  My sister-in-law and brother had a baby yesterday.  Peyton Maurine (there’s some arguement as to if I’m spelling it right or not).  I do have some pictures that my brother posted on facebook yesterday, and those are here.  I’m heading down there in a little bit, and I’ll be sure to get some more (and better) pictures.

Taxes…. what a fun gig.  It’s nice that we’ll get money back!  A little over $2,400.  I’m pretty excited about that.  We can pay off a few things.  It’s been a mess trying to figure out everything for that though.

I gotta get ready so I can go see the baby!

Okay, some of you might be thinking this post is a little old, but it’s not. 

Yesterday afternoon I was working in my office and I got a phone call from the House Republican Caucus.  They asked me if I would like to come on and work for them.  It would be a session-only job being an Legislative Assistant for a Rep or two.  I told them I would think about it.

It’s a cut in pay, and only through this session.  But it’s my foot in the door, and if a fulltime job opens up (which usually happens about 2-3 times a month) I’d have a leg up. 

So after talking it over with my wife, and seeking out the counsel of some wise people I decided that I would take this job.  I start there tomorrow.  I feel kind of bad for leaving so soon, but it’s only a temp job here anyway.  Sometimes you have to take risks to get ahead, so that’s what I’m doing. 

Plus it’s on my career path, and it’s a good way to get in.  It’s using my degree, and seems like it will be fun.  So I’m excited to start at the Capitol at 8:30 am tomorrow.

So that’s what the stress was all about yesterday.

I talked about this a while back, about how people are mad at 24 for being mean and stuff.  Well here (as the title says) an Arab-American defends the show.  And here’s the link to his letter.  Props to Brad for sending me the link

All this job stuff is interesting and a little much at the moment.

That’s really all I can say at the moment.  Perhaps I’ll explain more at a later date, and maybe even give you a weekend review later on.

It seems like I’ve been hearing that statement a lot lately.  From politicians about their vote on the War, to the Duke Lacrosse Grand Jurors.  I don’t really buy that excuse.

Okay, so the information that you were given then are not the same as the information you hear now, and the old information might not have been right.  So does saying that you’d change your vote if you could go back in time make things better?  What happened to being responsible?  You made the vote, now take the heat (or stand by your vote).  Why is it that the media keeps asking that same question, trying to place the blame on some one other than who made the vote, or decided to indict? 

Based on the information was given you cast the vote you cast, and you had to of thought it was the right vote.  If you don’t feel that way right now say “I regret my vote, but I did cast it.”  Don’t try to pass the blame by saying the information was misleading (because there are plenty of people who voted the same way you did and still stand by their vote, which was based on the same info you had). 

If you’re an elected official you need to be able to take some heat and scrutiny and take responsibility for your actions. 

I’d love to hear some of your comments on this.

So reading some of my friends (likely a few of the ones who read my blog) I realize I post much more often then they do… what does this mean….  anyway

Work is fun.  I finally got set up with my email address here.  So now I have an official work email. I’ve been doing some real work, and it’s going well.  I’m really liking this job so far. It’s a lot of fun, and I get to do a lot with some fun technology.

Today I was in a Windows Vista meeting. We got some info on some of the features, how to use them, etc. Some of it was interesting, and gave me a few good tips.  The rest just pointed out to me how much Vista is like OS X.  But that’s alright.  Seeing how I can’t use a Mac here, I might as well use Vista and get to know it.  It’s always good to know the latest stuff (and what doesn’t work on it).  Office 2007 is interesting.  I kind of like it, but it has a few things that will take me a bit to get used to.

Novell is a little hard to get used to.  I’ve not used it much before here, and it doesn’t seem like it’s the best way to go.  Or maybe it’s just not set up the right way here (that’s what a few people think).  I’m looking forward to diving into that more and being able to learn more about it.  Of course their switching over to AD shortly, so my time with Novell could be limited.

I’ve recently started watching Season 3 of 24, and I must say I like it.  IT’s good with the suspense, and the plot is very intricate.  It almost seems a little bit better than the current season of 24.  And I must say that David Palmer was a much better President than his brother is. 

That’s my exciting life.  Hope everyone is staying warm out there.  Drink plenty of hot cocoa and make sure the heat doesn’t go out!

I kind of like it.  I like the quick tab feature that is has.  You can see thumbnails of all the open tabs.

I also like the look of drop down menus and buttons.  They jazzed that up, and it looks nice. 

The tabs are a little weird.  If you ctrl+click to open a link in a new tab, it puts that tab right next to the one you’re using, instead of putting in at the end of the tabs.  I don’t really like how the back and forward buttons are seperated from the home and other buttons.  I saw put all the buttons together, up top, and give me more room for tabs. 

No Office 2007 yet, but sometime soon.

The snow looked pretty this morning as I watched the flakes flutter past my window.  It was nice that I didn’t have to drive in it.  I saw a few car accidents though.  It looked like traffic was bad.  It’s kind of nice to be able to ride the bus.  I even bought a bus pass today, so I don’t have to pay cash. That’s kind of nice as well.