Yet another beautiful Sunday!  This summer has simply been amazing in terms of weather … not too hot, though often times cool.  I don’t think I’d have it any other way!

Today was a major cleaning for the Nano Cube.  I had neglected it for far too long, and algae had built up all over the glass and the sand was due for a good vacuuming.  I can gladly report the scum is gone from the top of the water and the tank once again sparkles.  I put in a new phosphate sponge and introduce some new blue-legged hermit crabs and some more turbo snails.   Hopefully this new crew will get to cleaning and help out overall, as the last crew succumbed to some unknown force of nature.

The MP3 ripping?  It continues.  I think I’ve completed another 25 or so today.  Just throwin’ ‘em in and lettin’ ‘em copy.  The only down side is when I come across a disk that isn’t in AMG’s database and have to hand-enter the obscure stuff.

I’m taking advantage of the fact that that the iPod is really a 40GB hard drive connected via USB 2.0 to play back music using Windows Media Player 9.  In doing this, I get full fidelity in WMP including things like album art, ratings, frequently played tracks, automatic playlist generation, etc.

To make it work, I deleted all of the entries from my existing media library and then imported all of the music that is sitting on the iPod.  However, note that it’s necessary to remove the Hidden bits from \iPod_Control\Music\F00-F49 folders, as Windows Media Player refuses to search hidden directories.

I now have a notebook hard drive that is free from music – thereby returning over 15GB of space to me! – yet still have the exact same experience as I had before in Windows Media Player.  Nice.  The only thing I would like now is for synchronization between ratings and play counts on the iPod with Windows Media Player.  That would be cool.

Let me just say it’s hard to stay motivated to rip CDs when you’re down to the “junk.”  By junk, I don’t mean that I don’t appreciate the music, but its stuff that I just normally wouldn’t listen to.  I’ve done all the stuff that I would listen to and now I’m looking at the remaining discs with apathy. Yet to complete the project of packing away all our CDs, it must be done.  I did a size check last night and am estimating that once everything is ripped, it will take up less than 20GB.  Nice.

With this post, I hit a whooping 10 for the month of July J  I’m trying to disprove Dan’s theory that I only do something with zealousness while it is “new.” 

I just drove about 800 miles over the course of two-and-a-half days and brought my iPod in tow.  Unfortunately, I don’t yet have the “iPod your BMW” part installed, so I used the Monster iCarPlay Wireless - FM Transmitter instead.  The overall experience was pretty good – static would only be introduced if the station you were tuned to was also broadcasting locally, and it seemed that as you drove different locations did have local stations broadcasting, forcing you to switch channels.  Once the part is in and installed, this will be a thing of the past.

Having 2,208 songs on the iPod and putting into shuffle play is quite a fun experience – though you can do this with any digital audio player out there.  But just letting it cycle through music randomly was a great way to gain exposure to lots of different styles and types of music that I wouldn’t normally listen to.

My next step is to get into playlists and begin organizing music the way I want to listen to it rather than always listening “by album.”

I’m actively ripping my CD collection to MP3 using CyberLink’s MP3 encoder for Windows Media Player.  I had ripped about 100 CDs at a fixed 192 bit rate and then discovered that the CyberLink encoder supports variable bit rate.  The size difference is significant, with the variable bit rate files being smaller than their fixed rate counterparts.  I was a big variable bit rate fan for Windows Media, so I’ll give the MP3 version a shot for a while.  If I don’t notice any audio quality problems, I may go back and redo the 100 CDs I already did in order to save on space.  The down side is encoding of the variable bit rate files takes noticable longer than fixed rate files.

I spent the day cleaning up the basement with Angelique … we’re getting ready to redo the basement and the first step is to get rid of all the crap.  At the same time, I was pulling the CD collection to MP3 and am up to 10GB with about 1/3 of the CDs converted.  We’re really enjoying the Creative Wireless Music device as it’s reinvigorated our interest in music because now the stuff we like is accessible and easy to find. 

Yesterday I broke down and bought an iPod.  One of the new 40GB models with the Click Wheel.  This was a very tough decision for me to make, as I work for Microsoft and I inherently want to support the company as much as possible – especially knowing some of the very cool stuff that is coming in the near term.

What drove me to the iPod?  Well, there were a couple of factors that played into my decision:

1.      I wanted a device big enough to hold my entire music collection; my wife and I are tired of the eye sore that is our collection of CDs, so I’m making a concerted effort to move all of that music over to the PC

2.      I wanted a device that I could use in the car; this – more than any other factor – is the reason why I bought the iPod.  Yeah, I know you can use FM transmitters or the line in on a lot of car stereos to enable any media player to work with a car, but I want tight integration with the car’s stero controls.  Since I own a 2004 BMW 325i, the whole “iPod Your BMW” pulled me in.  I considered PhatNoise – and with their support for Windows Media 9, it is a very tempting offer – but in the end it is $400-$500 more expensive for PhatNoise and it’s not very portable.

3.      I wanted a device that was stylish and felt like it was well engineered; Apple has a unique knack for making nice devices with better feeling quality for a premium price; most WMA-based players, on the other hand, provide commodity pricing and commodity feel.  Personally, I believe this is about to change – especially with the introduction of Creative’s Zen Touch

4.      I wanted it and I wanted it now; I’m an instant gratification kind of guy and, once I get a bug for something – a media player, in this case – I begin to argue very hard why I shouldn’t knowing all the time I will, so I’ve just started giving myself over rather than wasting time and energy worrying about the “right” decision

Through all of this, I’m taking some crap from my Microsoft friends.  Dan and Rob, in particular right now.  Rob had the excellent idea of working with Creative to come up with a similar, more widespread solution for connecting the likes of the Zen Touch to any car stereo, similar to what PhatNoise does.  I think I’ll take him up on that idea and reach out to Creative.  I’ll blog a bit more about the experience in another post.

Well, truthfully they really don’t.  However, tonight my wife bought a new Eddie Bauer diaper bag.  It’s pretty nice, actually.

When I arrived home – amidst playing with the kids, putting away my bags and generally settling in (you know, those 5 minutes when you walk through the door and everything hits you at once?) – my wife tells me she bought a new diaper bag.  “Oh, great honey,” I replied.  [Note: I only read the first chapter of “Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus.”  In it, I learned women don’t want you to fix their problems, they just want you to listen.]  I assumed this would be the end of it.  She bought a bag.  I acknowledged it.  Time to move on?  Nope.

I’m informed a few short minutes later that I expressed indifference to the diaper bag.  Okay, I’m sorry – I should respect and pay homage to the diaper bag.  All hail the new diaper bag – it is, after all, a nice diaper bag.  Turns out the root cause here is that this is the first diaper bag that she picked out.  The first one we had was a kick ass Kelty Kid’s backpack/diaper bag that I picked out at Galyans.  The second one was the standard blue and yellow diaper bag that the hospital gives you with your new arrival.  So, neither were “personalized” for her – this one was.  She found it.  She liked it.  She bought it.  It’s hers.

I flew to Atlanta today, seat 17F of an Airbus 319, and observed a couple of things:

For the first time since United hit their bankruptcy, the understaffing was apparent.  While doing the self-service check for Premiers, there was one person for every five or so counters.  No way for that person to – in a timely fashion – handle the bags and issues for all those people before queues begin to spin up.  If they were smart, they’d limit the number of self-service machines that are open so people don’t just stand there waiting for some dude to never arrive.

There was an entire juvenile team of martial artists who boarded the plane prior to the boarding announcement.  No big deal – especially as they were mostly minors in need of escorts.  What is really funny was to watch the first class and programmed frequent flyers get their nose turned up in a snit.  What was a big deal was when I boarded the plane, this group – who was taking up the last four rows or so of the plane – had managed to store all of their luggage from the rear up to row 17!  It didn’t seem that any of them managed to check any of their luggage and instead felt that the overhead space between rows 17 and 28 was inherently theirs.  Fortunately for me, I just had my backpack and could throw it under the seat in front of me (mind you, the airlines now consider the seat in front of you to be your primary storage location.  Those overhead bins?  Why, they’re secondary storage, of course!)  Unfortunately for lots of other folks, they really didn’t have room to store their carry ons in the “secondary” location, which resulted in bags having to be gate checked and slowing down our departure.

For once, I had a very attractive woman sit next to me in seat 17E.  This was a welcome change, though when she sat down she managed to throw her used snot rag onto my back pack that was under the seat in front of me.  It was quite an awkward moment for both of us, as she couldn’t reach it and I wasn’t about to touch it.  What is even more interesting is the guy in 17C is the husband of the wife in 17B and the father of the child in 17A.  He seems very preoccupied with the endowment of the woman next to me in 17E, which is quite an accomplishment, as he has to stare over the aisle, over the guy in 17D and avoid not being seen by any of us.  Suffice to say, he failed.  If only his wife could have seen …

I didn’t have anything to read on this flight, choosing instead to listen to my Mahan Khalsa “Let’s Get Real or Let’s Not Play” training series.  However, from time to time I found myself reading “over the shoulder” of the woman in 17E.  What’s the etiquette on that, anyway?  Regardless, there were a few uncomfortable moments where I would swear she thought I was “staring” when in fact I was indeed reading a story in People magazine.

The pilot, lacking complete tact, makes an announcement that basically states, “Hey!  Those of you in coach … don’t even think of coming up here into first class and disturbing the passengers.”  Most flights I’ve been on as of late hide this message under the guise of “increased security,” which sends the wonderful message of, “Hey!  Those of you in coach … we don’t trust you so just stay in your seats!”  It’s true.  In fact, try out this little test … when flying coach and the fasten seatbelt sign is on, stand up and start taking something out of the overhead compartment.  Go on, I dare you.  I bet within seconds of you doing so, one of the waitresses with wings will make an announcement about how the fasten seatbelt sign is on and for your safety and the safety of those around you, they ask that you please respect it.  Now, try the same thing in first class.  Hell, I bet you could run up and down the aisle of the entire plane as a first class passenger and they wouldn’t give it a second thought.  Mind you, I’m not bitter over this as I fly first class more often than not these days as an “upgrade” passenger.  I just find it wild the difference in treatment between the two sets of passengers when there’s very little that separates the two classes of people on most flights (i.e., the majority of passengers in first class would be in coach if they didn’t jockey for position and leverage their frequent flyer status to “upgrade.”)

After landing and visiting the restroom, there were two things that caught my attention.  The first was the big, sweaty fat guy who, rather than using the privacy of a stall, found it necessary to drop his pants at the sink and completely readjust himself.  The second thing was the looping audio announcement informing all passengers to not leave bags unattended, to not take items from strangers and take precautions to avoid accidentally carrying “dangerous” items onto the plane.  It would seem that I’m not the only one who has little faith in the TSAs ability to prevent “dangerous” items from getting through the security checkpoint.  I mean, if we had confidence in their ability to locate “dangerous” items, would there really be a need to notify me continually about not accepting said items?

Which reminds me … two weeks ago I flew first class on three of four legs, each of which served lunch or dinner.  The airlines – ever safety conscious – give you a grey plastic knife along side a metal fork and spoon.  Somehow masking the knife in grey is supposed to make it feel more elegant than simply including a standard white picnic knife.  Obviously, someone thought that it would be possible to hijack a plane – God forbid even threaten someone – with a butter knife.  When are they going to realize I could probably do more damage with the fork than I could with the knife?

I can’t wait for the return trip.