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Thought You Might Enjoy This

I'm going to get some cool gifts this year for Christmas and I'm thankful, if not a wee bit excited. But sometimes we get gifts that are easy to miss or we choose not to accept or appreciate. Below is a picture of one of the most beautiful sunsets I've seen in a long time. It's almost like God handed me a written invitation to witness something He created just for me. "Here ya go Ken, thought you might enjoy this."

The family and I make a 30 mile trek every year to cut down our own tree for Christmas and it's always a wonderful time for all of us. The same jokes always make their way into the experience; "That tree is a little too plump..... like daddy's belly". Or, "That one's too thin on top, like daddy's hair". Then we make our final decision and I lay on the ground to cut it down and kids get their pictures taken with their feet on my back like they just killed a grizzly bear. I just went through those pictures this morning and can't imagine a better gift for a otherwise slow Thursday. "Here ya go Ken, thought you might enjoy this".

Having loaded the tree in the back of the truck, we make our way to the front gate to have it wrapped up and then pay the nice old guy my $22. Standing and waiting, I was overcome with the beautiful sunset and was quickly reminded of all my gifts..... three of the best one's at my side, two of them hungry for pizza. That's when God showed me the sunset and I snapped the picture. There are moments we're I realize I have it all. I truly do. Every gift anyone could ever want and I'm so very thankful.

Merry Christmas everyone, please know that I am thankful for you. May this season find you safe, healthy, loved and blessed. So here you go friends..... thought you might enjoy this.

Your Friend,

Ken

No Clever Title

Why no whimsical title you ask? Because it's a troubling post. Palm Inc., a company that I have watched grow for just over 10 years, is reaching out of their own self-inflicted coffin and slowly tapping in the last nail.

A group of people once known for their undeniable innovation seems to be in the middle of a potentially fatal error-making rampage. I've been their biggest cheerleader and fan since the beginning but even I'm having trouble staying on board and have recently jumped in one of the many different life boats scattering the deck. Palm, are you there? Say it ain't so, Palm.

I didn't know how bad it was until recently. I've always taken the stance of "Palm will catch up" or "Everyone better watch out because when Palm rolls out it's new OSII (TM Alan Grassia) in the spring....err.....summer... uhhh.....fa..... next spring!" Seriously, I always thought that Palm was just waiting to release it's next big innovation. I was so, so wrong. Now we hear that there will be no new OS until 2009. Sorry, I'm done. Palm is losing market share hand over fist and when they can run off a customer like me who owned one of the first green screens, they're in trouble.

Okay, maybe "run off" is a bit harsh. I mean, I'll be back, won't I? If they come up with something new and cool, won't I pop back in and see what they have to offer? Won't I? I guess so. Some how, I think it might be like running into that friend from high school that you haven't seen in years and all they can talk about is how great they were back when they (insert relevant glory days story here).

When I say "I didn't know until recently", I'm not kidding. I can tell you the exact moment that I found out how bad things really were for the company I loved so much. It was September 29th of this year in the early afternoon. That's when my Apple iPod Touch arrived. Curse that Steve Jobs! As you know, I have a Palm TX and after having a few weeks to play with the Touch and see how it stacks up against the TX, I have this to say to Palm (Ken turns away from the blogesphere and looks towards the west in order to look Palm straight in the eye and says...): Are you freakin' kiddin' me?? You let them get this far ahead without a response? Do you realize that while you've been out picking berries, Apple has learned about fire, invented the wheel and taken our women? What, pray tell, have you been doing? Oh yeah, the Fauxlio, my bad. (Ken turns back to the growing crowd)

Sorry about that. I've been listening to Dennis Miller lately and now I'm off on a rant.

Here's the deal. Not even the Touch can touch my TX. What I wanted was a music player. Something that would allow me to take my rather large music collection digital and keep it nice and neat for me in one place. I also wanted something that would take care of organizing and keeping current my podcasts. Outside of that, I didn't need much more, so I ordered an iPod. What I got was enough to make me understand that Palm has missed the sex appeal boat. Don't get me wrong, the TX out preforms the Touch hands down. It's truly the Clydesdale work horse it was intended to be and the unbelievable ability to configure it still boggles the mind. However...... are you listening Palm? I said, however. This means I'm about to say something important. However, without some degree of sex appeal, wow factor, pizazz, sparkle...something! Anything! You will completely give up your position in the sector. Lay the TX down next to the iPod Touch and you have a perfect Mac vs PC commercial. The power users understand the ability of the TX, Joe Schmo doesn't. He wants to tingle. Apple is making us all tingle and when they finally allow in 3rd party apps next year (which will open the door for developers to make power users tingle)..... well, just ask Ed to shut off the lights on his way out the door.

Please Palm, when your next OS comes out in 2009 or 2010 or whenever..... go get our women and bring them back.

Ken

I love this Woman

I picked up on this little gem over at BH and couldn't stop reading..... or laughing. Who hasn't wanted to do this? Late at night as I lay in my bed thinking about all the things I could have said or could have done to someone who just flat out deserved it...... this is who I dream of being. Yep, I want to be Mona Shaw of Bristow, VA. I want to have her guts and complete understanding of how the customer should be treated. I just wish I wasn't such a wuss when I wake up. Thank goodness for people like Mona. Enjoy.

WASHINGTON — Sometimes truly American virtues arise in outlaws who — by dint of heroic but questionable endeavors — display the mettle of the national character.

For instance: The Dillinger Gang, robbing banks (and destroying mortgages) when banks were foreclosing on the poor. Stephanie St. Clair, matron of the numbers racket during the Harlem Renaissance, striking a (dubious) blow for both gender and racial equality. Junior Johnson bootlegging liquor during Prohibition (the benefits of which were self-evident).

Fear not, fellow Americans! In these dark days of war, pestilence and Paris Hilton, a new hero has arisen. She is none other than 75-year-old Mona "The Hammer" Shaw, who took the aforementioned implement to her local Comcast office to settle a score, and boy, did she ever.

This was after the company had scheduled installation of its much ballyhooed "Triple Play" service, which combines phone, cable and Internet services, in Shaw's brick home in suburban Bristow, Va. But Shaw said they failed to show up on the appointed day, Monday, Aug. 13. They came two days later but left with the job half done. On Friday morning, they cut off all service.

This was the company that has had consumer service problems serious enough to prompt the trade magazine Advertising Age to editorialize that Comcast and other cable providers should spend less on advertising and more on customer service. And has spawned a blog called ComcastMustDie.com that's filled with posts from angry customers.

So on that Friday, Mona Shaw and her husband, Don, went to the call center office in Manassas, Va., to complain.

Let's pick it up, mid-action, according to Shaw:

Mona demands to speak to a manager. A customer service representative says someone will be right with them. Directs them to a bench, outside. (Remember, it's mid-August.) Mona and Don sit.

Tick, tick, tick, goes the clock. Sit, sit, sit, go Mona and Don.

For. Two. Hours.

And then — this is the best part — the customer rep leans out the door and says the manager has left for the day. Thanks for coming!

Oh, the sputtering outrage!

The insulting idea that, as Shaw puts it, "they thought just because we're old enough to get Social Security that we lack both brains AND backbone."

So, after stewing over it all weekend, on the following Monday, she went downstairs, got Don's claw hammer and said, "C'mon, honey, we're going to Comcast."

Did you try to stop her, Mr. Shaw?

"Oh no, no," he says.

Hammer time: Shaw storms in the company's office. BAM! She whacks the keyboard of the customer service rep. BAM! Down goes the monitor. BAM! She totals the telephone. People scatter, scream, cops show up and what does she do? POW! A parting shot to the phone!

"They cuffed me right then," she says.

Her take on Comcast: "What a bunch of sub-moronic imbeciles."

Being a responsible newspaper, we must note that this is a misdemeanor, a crime, a completely inappropriate way of handling a business dispute.

Noted.

Who among us has not longed for a hammer in this age of incompetent "customer service representatives," of nimrods reading from a script at some 800-number location, of crumbs-in-their-beards plumbing installation people who tell you they'll grace you with their presence between 12 and 3, only never to show? And you'll call and call and finally some outsourced representative slings a dart at a calendar and tells you another guy will come back between 10 and 2 next Thursday? And when this guy comes, pants halfway down his behind, he'll tell you he brought the wrong part?

And there is nothing, nothing you can do.

Until there! On the horizon! It's Hammer Woman, avenger of oppressed cable subscribers everywhere! (Cue galloping "Lone Ranger" theme.)

"I scared the tar out of some people, at least," she says. "It had never occurred to me to take a hammer to a phone company before, but I was just so upset. ... After I hit the keyboard, I turned to this blonde who had been there the previous Friday, the one who told me to wait for the manager, and I said, 'NOW do I have your attention?' "

It wasn't all fun.

"My blood pressure went up around my ears. I started hyperventilating. They had to call the rescue squad and put me on a litter."

By the time it was over, she recalls, there were an ambulance, two police cruisers and a sergeant's car in the parking lot. Shaw received a three-month suspended sentence for disorderly conduct, a $345 fine in restitution and a year-long restraining order barring her from the Comcast office.

"Truly a unique and inappropriate situation," says Beth Bacha, a vice president for Comcast. She says company policy forbids disclosure of clients' records, but did say their files note that the service record wasn't exactly what Shaw has indicated. Besides, "nothing justifies this sort of dangerous behavior."

Bacha noted that Comcast has more than 25 million customers, the overwhelming majority of which are very satisfied with their service.

Manassas police spokesman Sgt. Tim Neumann says there have been other police calls to that Comcast office, but he doesn't know what prompted them.

Bob Garfield, who runs ComcastMustDie, wrote last week he was happy the site had become an outlet for "so much deep-seated rage," but hoped customers would "keep the hammer assaults down to a bare minimum."

From what we can tell, Mona Shaw is not, actually, a raving lunatic armed with construction tools.

She is a nice lady who lives in a nice house. She and Don are both retired from the Air Force (she was a registered nurse). They have been married 45 years. She is secretary of the local AARP, secretary of a square-dancing club and takes in strays for the local animal shelter (they have seven dogs at the moment). She has a heart condition. She lifts weights at a local gym. The couple attend a Unitarian Universalist church.

Police gave her the hammer back, though she swears she's content to ride off into the sunset of True Crime Stories in America, never again to go Com-smash-tic on her local cable provider.

She does, however, finally, have phone service.

With Verizon.

7th Son Is Over The Top

This book is just about to push me over the edge. I'm really enjoying my weekly chapters and can't believe that I somehow was lucky enough to stumble over it. If you put aside the great writing and cool story (which I can hardly do considering the quality of each), what you're left with is a gift. It's a free book in the form of a podcast with excellent reading by JCH himself, great production, sound design and an introduction to some pretty intense music. All that is supported by the author himself who answers his own fan mail, maintains a website for the beta clone army and seems to really care about the listener and their experience.

Speaking of the beta clone army, the fan base is growing in a cool, viral kinda way and this new vein of publication seems to be infecting a whole new marketing group. I'm wondering if publishers are taking note. They should. Maybe they're worried that he's giving everything away for free. I can't imagine why.....if this thing ever sees the inside of Barns & Noble, I'm buying a copy and then going to beg JC to autograph it for me.

Outside of this being such a great book, I'm even more excited to see how this experiment might change how we think about publishing online content. This book is special and I think it deserves a cover.

Beta Clone Wannabe,

Ken

Is DIY MIA?

A friend of mine recently asked a question about what you do when you get a flat tire. Do you fix it yourself or call a service to come out and get you running again? About the same time this took place, Popular Mechanics magazine came out with the 25 things every man should know how to do. I was only able to hitch my train to 17 of them which prompted me to wonder: Are we losing our ability to "do it yourself"?

The question about changing a tire was interesting because I always felt like that was one of those things you're born with. You know, how to eat, how to poop and how to fix a flat. I remember my dad running me through this drill almost every year and, being the oldest of six, a new sib got to sit in on each years lesson.

However, now that I look back, I can't do, make or fix a tenth of what my dad(s) could and, from what I understand, this is also the case for many people. Why is this? I fancy myself to be someone with a good skill set. I can hunt, fish, navigate my way through a forest with a compass and map, change my oil, effectively set up and make a computer work, run a business, make a deal, change a ballast, speak with some intelligence, listen, lead, follow and a host of other things that I find to be basic in nature but it doesn't seem like I can do a lot of those basic things that my dad could easily whip up.

I wanted to finish my basemant and I asked my father-in-law to come over and give me some insight. All I heard was "well, we can do that" and as it turned out, he was right. He showed me how to frame a wall, hang drywall, mud, sand and wire. It was quite the learning experience.... not to say that I can do any of it on my own again.

Am I losing touch with some skills that I should be able to teach and pass on? Or should I understand that as society advances the need for certain skills just changes. I mean, no one really builds sod houses anymore, right? Let's not rule out the fact that it's me who is the family guru for the interweb thingy. Maybe I do have something to offer after all.

Lemme know if you have thoughts on this. I'm off to learn how to paddle a canoe.

Walt's iTouch

This is Walt Mossberg from the tech department of the Wall Street Journal. He's always had a pretty level head when it comes to the next best thing so after reading his article and watching his video review, I decided just to let you see for yourself.

By the way, did I mention that my iPod Touch is on it's way? (Ken begins to do the happy dance and is very happy that no one can see)

P.S. To all the Pluckers of the world, you'll just have to wait until you get to work tomorrow to see it. ;-)

K

The iPod Touch

I get excited about new things pretty easily but only a select few have brought me to my current state of anticipation. There was the 4-6 week delivery waiting period for my Sony Tape Recorder (with external mic) from the JC Penny catalog nightmare in 1976. Then, there was the sleepless week before I bought my first car in 83. Then, of course, the Palm TX frenzy of Christmas 05.

Now, here we go again. Yesterday, the devil.... errrr...... Steve Jobs took the wrapper off the iPod Touch and thus melted my last defense against the evil Apple empire. Curse you Steve Jobs!!!

I don't think I can hold out this time around. I mean just look at it! They've added the 3.5" screen and all the cool stuff from the iPhone. Touch screen, Cover Flow, the flick thing (or whatever they call it). These are things we expected but they also filled it full of other cool stuff too. First and foremost it has WiFi and Safari. That's going to make Palm's Blazer look downright childish. On a side note, I'm really wondering about Palm in general. I've been the biggest Palm fanboy for ten years, but common.... they're living in the past and yesterdays announcement from Steve-O just makes them look silly. The TX might be able to do everything (and much, MUCH more) than the iPod but let's be real here. The iPod is an unbelievably sexy and appealing media device and if there is one thing to be sure of... sex sells.

Back on track now. They are also including a YouTube program, integrated Google and Yahoo search and a wireless iTunes download store. In partnership with Starbucks, you'll be able to walk in for a cup of joe and see all the current information on the last 10 songs played at that Starbucks location and have a chance to preview and buy them. To much commercializing for me but way cool tech none the less.

Did I mention that it has all this stuff and it's still about as thick as dental floss?

I gotta get one. That Steve Jobs guy, he's probably not so bad.

(Ken makes a note in what is now looking like a very old TX, that reads "send Mr. Jobs some fresh honey for Christmas.)

Ken

Ask and Ye Shall Receive?

I'm pretty sure that this isn't what God had in mind when He said all I had to do was ask. However, I do have to say that I did ask, and by the looks of things, I just may actually get to receive.

I've tried so hard to stay away from the iPod. Mostly because of the DRM issue and Apple's decisions concerning it thus far. Yes, I know there are other DRM players in the game but Jobs and his iTunes megaplex seem to be a figurehead, so he quickly becomes an easy target. I just want an MP3 player that plays MY MP3 files that I OWN. The ones that I purchased with cold, hard cash ...errr .... I mean credit. What's so stinking bad about that? And why is the concept so difficult to deal with? I should be able to play my music on ANY device and store it on ANY medium I own. Yeah, don't hassle me, I know the other side of the story and believe it or not, I agree with most of it. I really do want to see artists taken care of and not taken advantage of. I don't have answers, but I do have a right to gripe about they way my hands have been tied with music I paid money for. When I was in school, the best way to get a girl to go all goo-goo was to make her a mix tape, and now it's illegal. What sense does that make?

But. There's always a but, isn't there? I may not be able to hold out this time. It might be time to give in, become one of the lemmings, sell out to "the man", get on the bandwagon, ride the train and step into line. My geek factor is going to give me away and let everyone know that I too can be bought with cool and shiny objects. See, the iPhone was this sleek, sexy device that called out to my inner nerd and begged me to get it just for tech of it. Good thing we don't get AT&T down here in the boonies. The best I could do was hope that one day we might see an iPod with iPhone abilities, but I really didn't think it would happen this fast. What's it been? Two months?? Gimmeabreak.

Sure enough, this is what is expected on September 5th. News of a new iPod and a few other things. If all the rumors are true, me and Tully may have to finally take our iSelves to the iMart and get an iPod. It could turn out to be bogus though. One time, Jobs called the press together to announce new speakers. If that happens again, he may get run out of Silicon Vally on his iHorse.

Thanks for listening,

Ken

New Site

For those of you playing the home game, I've just started another blog about my bees. Boring as it may be for some, I'm really enjoying it.

Should you be interested, you can find it at: Kensbees.blogspot.com.

Ken

Hive Name

My new beehive will arrive tomorrow and I'm a little more than anxious. I think I'm on the downside of giddy. On the way to grandma's house this morning to drop off the kids, I asked them what we should name the hive. I mean....all hives have a name right?? Maybe a specific hive logo that lets all the other bees in the neighborhood know that this is "our hive pal so you can just buzz on by and take your second-rate honey elsewhere."

I've seen pictures of unique numbering and lettering systems used to keep the hives organized but that sounded a bit boring. Not to mention I only have one hive. Although it would look pretty funny to see a beehive sitting all by itself out in a field with a giant number "1" resting on top of it. None the less, we thought it needed a name and after much discussion we all agreed on an answer. Oddly enough the hive is loosely named after a movie that we all enjoy.

The photo below will be proudly be displayed above the hive entrance. It's sure to encourage pride in the hive as well as strike fear into the hearts of Yellow jackets everywhere.

The name of the hive is......






Thanks for reading,

Ken

Here we go again....

My wife thinks I have a tendency to jump from one hobby to another fairly frequently......and she's probably right, as usual. However, most of my hobbies have stayed with me in one form or another and, at the very least, have provided me with their unique and individual experience. My thinking is that whether or not the hobby stuck with me, it provided me with the opportunity the learn something interesting and have a little fun doing it. Ken's a little smarter and no one gets hurt......well, except for those two broken ribs during my stint in Taekwondo.

In years past I've taken up several different things. Geocaching started several years ago and I still enjoy it. However, I got bored of finding traditional caches that were easy and decided that if something challenging came up I would attempt it but otherwise I would only go find the easy caches when the mood struck. From Geocaching I learned all about the GPS system but now I usually use my GPS for hiking.

I took up Taekwondo for quite some time and loved it. It was great for keeping in shape and was a true confidence builder. After advancing through several belts, I gave it up when I accepted an invitation to serve on the pastor search committee for our church. After being away from TKD for several months, I just didn't ever go back. I'm hoping to return one of these days. The lessons learned from this hobby are truly endless.

My wife thinks hiking is a new hobby but it's actually one that's been around since the beginning. My dad liked to hike and that's where it all started when I was a kid. My goal now is to hike whenever I can, but to commit to one major overnight hike every year, somewhere in the back country. One of the reasons I liked geocaching so much was many of the caches were located out in the woods and required a bit of a trek.

At one point I wanted to fly. I started by taking some lessons in a single engine Cessna but quickly learned that this wasn't what I was looking for, I wanted to fly, but not high and fast.....low and slow was more my style. So how do you fly low and slow over corn fields and tree tops? Why in one of these of course. I spent months learning everything I could about ultralight flying. It was a beautiful hobby comprised of people with free spirits and a desire for nothing more than to enjoy the earth from 100 feet off the ground. It was easy to fall in love with the romance of such flight but my plans for buzzing fields every evening quickly came to an end. The guy who I had tapped to be my instructor was a local hero when it came to ultralight flying. No one knew more about the planes or had more hours in the sky. Making a routine flight one evening, he crashed. There was no chance of survival. It was an easy decision to make, my kids were too young for me to take up a risky sport. Daddyman still needs to be around for homework and bedtime snacks. Honestly, the whole thing just scared me.

So if you're one of those people who gets a new hobby every year.....good for you. Change as often as you like, learn something knew and be open both failure and success. I didn't take on any of these things because I thought it might do me good. Each one started out the same way, with the same thought. "Wow, that looks like fun".

Why do I tell all about this you ask?? Well, it's because I'm on to the next hobby, the next interesting and fun thing. I have a friend who is helping and guiding me and I've ordered everything I need to get started. I'm very excited and if all goes well, those lucky folks on my Christmas list will reap the benefits in 2008. I, my friends, am going to be a Beekeeper. :-)


Ken

Camp Site

It was a perfect night to sleep, about 58 degrees. Ate a huge meal including something new. Acorn Squash filled with brown sugar and maple syrup then baked in foil over the fire. Mmmmmmm.......wonderful. So wonderful that I'm now sure if I make it to heaven, I'll walk through the gates and St. Peter will say "Welcome to heaven, here's your squash."

Of course after a big meal we had to top off with brownies and ice cream. After being so full, I slipped in to a food coma and waddled off to bed. Did I mention it was a perfect night to sleep?

Anyway, I just wanted to drop off a picture of the Kiwi in action and what our camp site looked like. Hurry along now.

Ken

I want an iPhone....kinda

I want an iPhone... without the phone. The phone part I've got covered with the Treo 680 but I just can't look away from the very sleek interface that makes up the whole iPhone experience.

I currently have a Creative Zen Nano Plus. I get the Creative Zen Nano part, but have no idea what the Plus means. I keep thinking that it might be yet another one of those amazing marketing tricks that brilliant minds conceive in some room, where one guy stands up and says "No...not just "Creative Zen Nano", call it the "Creative Zen Nano Plus", as in 'It not only plays music....it plays music plus comes with headphones.' Yeah, that'll get them lined up at the store." Yeesh. Anyway, it has one gig of space and performs it's singular task very well, it plays audio. It serves it's sole purpose in life but severely lacks what I would like to have in an MP3 player.

Now to me, it would make sense to ditch the current line-up of iPods in favor of the new interface of the iPhone. Sounds easy doesn't it? Take out the phone and say "here's your new Video iPod. Enjoy!" I think it does too, even though I'm fairly certain it's not. However, it does seem like a logical next step for Apple and it's iPod line. If they do, I may have to finally cave and purchase an Apple product. What is the world coming to?

Just a thought.

Ken

7th Son

I've come across something that I think is a bit special. It's a book...I mean a podcast....errr....maybe a podiobook. One of those, I guess. Now, releasing a book online isn't exactly new but the buzz (and by buzz I mean something approaching cult status) surrounding this particular book is. J.C. Huctchins has written 7th Son, a techno-thriller that I haven't been able to stop listening to since I found it a few weeks ago. There are three books in the series and on 7-7-07 (imagine that) the third and final book will be released.

Here is a short intro to the book taken from the 7th Son website:

Three weeks ago, President Hank "Gator" Griffin was assassinated at a political rally by a four year old boy. The child, Jesse Fowler, said only one sentence during his week-long confinement in a psychiatric facility. It was an obscenity-filled phrase no four-year-old should know.

Jesse Fowler's abrupt death while in custody was equally inexplicable. A nosebleed -- and eyes so bloodshot the whites were completely red -- were the only clues to the boy's demise.

Two days ago, seven men living in different regions of the United States were kidnapped and brought to a "beyond Top Secret" government facility in rural Virginia. What they saw there was unbelievable, yet undeniable.

Despite slight physical differences, these seven strangers appeared to be the same man, the same age. Each man remembered growing up as an only child in Indiana, and each recalled a tragedy from their past: The death of their parents in a car accident sixteen years ago.

It was clear these seven "John Michael Smiths" had identical childhood memories.

Go to the site, start downloading chapters and let me know what you think.

Ken