Month: February 2009

Author’s Guide To Sue Amazon

On By Michel McDonaldIn KindleLeave a comment

I’m obsessed with the Kindle 2.  I can’t stop googling it lol.

I found this article about how the authors guild is suing Amazon because of the text-to-speech feature on the Kindle 2.  Because they sell books plus they sell books on tape so by having a text-to-speech feature available, they are giving away the audio book version for free with the sale of e-books.  But that is so not true because nothing can compare to the emotion in the voice of a person reading a book on a tape or cd.  It’s totally not the same because text-to-speech sounds robotic.  There is no emotion.  We will see what happens.  I mean, what’s preventing people from using text-to-speech on their PC to listen to e-books?  They aren’t suing Microsoft.

Kindle Blog

On By Michel McDonaldIn eBook, KindleLeave a comment

I was looking at Kindle the other day and as I was there I saw that you can read people’s blogs on the kindle.  I thought that you could just go to either their website or there was a think where you tell them who you subscribe to but apparently it’s not like that.

If you want to read a blog their blog site has to be registered through Kindle and you have to pay for it.  Well, I don’t want to charge people to read my ramblings.  Although the money would be nice but why charge people when they can read it for free here through my website either on the PC or through a mobile phone like the iPhone or iPod or even PSP.

If they make it so that I don’t have to charge people at all then I will add it to Kindle but I honestly don’t know anyone who even has a Kindle.  I would like to publish my blog though because I currently have 0 readers.  So frankly, nobody is going to read this.  Hell, I don’t even read my own blog.  I just blog it.  I do read it after I’ve posted it to see if there are any corrections needed or I go back.  Anyway lol I was rambling.  I would like to get it on Kindle but not as a pay blog.

Little Known Fact About Sleep Apnea

On By Michel McDonaldIn HealthLeave a comment

There is a little known fact about sleep apnea that most people don’t realize.  I’ve been using a Bi-Pap machine (in case someone is unaware, it’s a machine that has a mask that I put over my nose, the hose goes to the machine and the machine pushes air into my lungs so I can sleep at night because my airway closes when I sleep) for a couple of years now and when I wake up every single morning I have a dry mouth (due to some medications, so say the people at the C-Pap Company) and also my nose is dry.

My bi-pap machine has a little tank filled with water which is on a heater also known as an evaporator.  The heat heats the water and then the air pushes the evaporated water into my nose and lungs so I don’t wake up with a dry nose, throat, lungs and mouth.  Well, it doesn’t work that great.  As I said it’s due to my medication but I don’t know.  I mean, my nose is always so dry that it starts hurting.  I’m always sniffling because of the dryness and I am also doing this half twitch, you know like Samantha in Bewitched, I don’t do the full twitch, just half to try to I don’t know actually why I do it but I’m always doing it lol.

So tonight I was flossing and I went to look for toothpaste and came across this tube that looked like toothpaste but it was Vaseline so I squirted some on a Q-Tip and put it inside my nostrils around inside there to cover up all the dry areas.  It’s only been a few minutes and it is already starting to help.  I never thought about that before and I’m glad I saw it.

I don’t normally use Vaseline because it’s a female product in my opinion.  I remember watching my mom after she got out of the shower and had her nightgown on and she just started smearing that stuff all over her legs and arms.  She had psoriasis so I don’t know if that’s why, because her legs and arms were dry from that.  But she also would put it on her face full of make-up and she would use a wash rag to wipe it all off and all the make-up was gone.  So because I’ve never really had a need for it so I don’t buy it.  But it is a good product I guess.

If this works with my nose then perhaps I might think about buying some more if I run out of what I have.  I’m really sick of all this dryness in my nose.

KFC Weekend Special

On By Michel McDonaldIn FoodLeave a comment

Starting today until Tuesday Feb 17th, KFC has a weekend special for President’s day.  Although their weekend special seems to be about 6 days.  Anyway, the commercial says that you get a whole chicken which is 8 pieces, mashed potato’s and gravy, cole slaw and 4 biscuits all for $12.95.

Well, it’s kinda false advertising.  A whole chicken would consist of 2 breasts, 2 thighs, 2 legs (drumsticks) and 2 wings.  We went there today and the pieces were 4 thighs and 4 legs.  Not exactly a whole chicken.

Personally it doesn’t matter to me.  2 pieces of chicken, mashed potato’s and gravy, cole slaw and a biscuit is enough for 1 meal.  Darrin bought an extra order of Macaroni and cheese, the family size and I added 4 apple turnovers (2 for him and 2 for me).

We don’t normally go there because they are a bit expensive compared to Albertson’s chicken dinner which is like 8 pieces of chicken and 1lb of salad (cole slaw, potato salad or macaroni salad) and a package of 4 Hawaiian rolls for like $5.  I do prefer KFC over grocery store chicken but I just can’t afford it.

It was good though mmmm mmmm so good.

My Last Kindle Obsessed Post… Maybe

On By Michel McDonaldIn Books, eBook, KindleLeave a comment

Ok, 1 last thing about the Kindle.  I know I mentioned in my first Kindle post about how you can email your text files to your Kindle but as I read more about it I find out more stuff.

It’s not just text files.  It’s also pdf files so if you have a manual in pdf format then you will have it on your Kindle.  Sometimes if you buy like a DVD player or a printer or whatever, I’m pulling at straws here, you can go to that manufacturer’s website and download the manual in pdf format.  Well, who wants to sit and read the manual on the computer?  Especially if the hardware you need to read about is in the other room.  Say it’s your tv’s manual or your washer and dryer.  You can just download that and send it to your Kindle and it converts it to Kindle format so you can read it.

I’m not sure if the Kindle puts your e-books, e-magazines and e-newspapers in categories or not, I think it would be a good idea though because if you get e-newspapers you will want them to be stores in there in folders.  Like say you get the LA times and the NY times.  Well, you don’t want them to be in the same area as everything else like your books.  If you get the newspaper and magazines on a daily, weekly or even monthly basis then the list will be too long so if you want to search for the book you are reading you have to scroll through the list of stuff.

Ok getting back to what I was talking about with sending text and pdf files to your kindle.  You can also download free e-books and send them to your kindle.  Oh and I read you can send pictures too.  Now, I’m not too sure about pictures with black and white technology.  I think I would much rather enjoy my pictures in color so that would certainly be something I would want to have but somewhere down the line when it has color.  Right now I have all of my photo albums cropped to widescreen 3×5 for my PSP and the pictures are pretty small so when I go to show them off it’s still a good size to look at but you know, it’s still small.  But at least I can carry all of my pictures.  But you can’t see them in the sunlight on my PSP.

Oh that reminds me.  You can read your kindle out in the sunlight and it shows up just like a regular book thanks to e-ink.  The screen isn’t shiny either so there is no glare from the screen.  If you are using a cell phone or pda or something as an e-book you have to cover it with your hands to be able to see it outside in the sunlight.  Well, the Kindle with e-ink allows you to actually see what you are reading.  And since it doesn’t have a tv type of screen you can’t see it in the dark but the new Kindle 2 has lights around the page I think on both sides.  Or maybe that was another e-book, I don’t remember now, I’m getting them confused.  I did see a Kindle light that clips to the kindle but it was made for the Kindle 1.

Ok, I can’t make any promises that I won’t obsess any more about this.  I’ve pretty much touched on everything that I can think of but who knows, maybe tomorrow I might read about something that I didn’t know and obsess about that.  Maybe my obsession will have so much text that you will have to convert it all into pdf format and it will be so long that it will be your next e-book or e-novel.  Maybe I’ll shut up about it.  Who knows.

Amazon Kindle 2

On By Michel McDonaldIn Books, eBook, Kindle, TechLeave a comment

In my previous blog about e-books I talked about the pro’s and con’s of e-books.  Well, most of the day I’ve been obsessively researching e-book technology and I have to say that I’m really excited about the future.

E-books use e-ink.  They don’t hardly use any power so the battery lasts a whole week.  You turn it on, press the menu and find the book you are reading, and by the way it shows in that menu the page you were on so you don’t have to find where you were at, it keeps it bookmarked from the last page you were reading.  Then you click the book you want to read and start reading.  Once that page is loaded it stops using any of the power from the battery.  You can have it sitting there for an hour on that page and it won’t use any power.  Once you press the button to turn the page then it uses power to turn the page then you see the words change and then no more power usage.  The battery will last basically a week before you have to charge it at all.  And when you do charge it, it takes about 2 hours to charge.

If however you are flipping through the Amazon website and flipping through pages of a e-magazine then yeah, it’s going to use a lot more of your battery and it will probably last 2 or 3 days before needing charged.

I love the idea of waking up every morning and the newspaper is already downloaded on your kindle.

It would also be good if the catalog companies would deliver their catalogs directly to your Kindle so that you don’t have to 1, wait for them to come in the mail and clog up your mail box and 2, waste paper when you throw it out.  This way you can flip through them then delete the file when you are finished reading it.  That is if you decide you want to, you can keep it if you want.

Another thing I want to obsess er um I mean discuss is the hard drive.  The previous Kindle 1 from last year only has a 256mb hard drive allowing you to store 200 e-books but the new Kindle 2 has a 2GB allowing you to have a hell of a lot more.  I don’t know exactly how many but it’s a lot.  Can you just imagine maybe in another year or 2 when they come out with the Kindle 3 it might have 2TB.  Then you will have a crap load of books and magazines and newspapers.  You won’t ever have to delete anything because you will have tons of room.

As I said in my last post, I’m waiting for it to be cheaper, in color and have touch screen.  Well, I watched a video today of the guy who invented Amazon talking to Martha Stewart and she kept mentioning color e-ink and he said it was in the labs.  Not their labs but in labs period.  Well, I’ve been seeing e-books with color e-ink so I know it is possible and I’m sure in Kindle 3 it will have color e-ink.

My other issue is about the touch screen.  I think it is a lot better than buttons.  I saw an e-book from Dvice.com that was touch screen, all you do is press and drag the page and it turns the page, or you just press the right side of the pager to flip it.  And also when you are on the website trying to buy a book you touch the screen for the keyboard and it comes up so you can type the name of the author or book title.  I think the Kindle keyboard is just too much.  Although it does have more of a use than just buying books, you can make notes in your books.  You can also highlight sentences.

DTV Transition

On By Michel McDonaldIn TVLeave a comment

OK, I’ve been seeing these DTV commercials since last year when they first started them.  It’s not only commercials but a ticker at the top of the screen all freakin’ day long.  Thank goodness I don’t have to see that while watching my shows at night.

If you don’t have a TV then you don’t know what I’m talking about but basically it says that if you use an antenna to watch TV you have to buy a digital converter box and you can get a coupon from the government who is forcing this upon everyone for a free box.  The cable companies are even offering a very basic cable for $10 a month which is unusual.  I was paying $55 a month for basic cable which was 2-77 so I’m sure that $10 cable is 2-13 and all the UHF stations like PBS and the Spanish channels.

They were saying that you have until February 19th or somewhere around there to get this box or you will get static on the tv.  Well, now they’ve decided to postpone it until June 12th.  Well, that’s good for all the procrastinators out there but it’s not good for those of us who are well prepared because we gotta hear about it for another 5 months.  Can we please just stop these commercials and tickers?  Or if not stop them just limit them to 1000 times a day lol.  I mean come on, I am so sick of hearing about it.  I get it.  Put billboards up and quit interrupting my shows with your tickers.

A lot of the commercials are from Bright House cable telling me that I am taken care of because I have Bright House Cable but that I need to tell all my Antenna friends to upgrade.  Please stop these commercials lol.  I don’t want to keep hearing about it.  Oh and after June 12th they are going to continue the commercials for another year telling me to tell all the people who don’t get a signal anymore to get cable lol.

Caylee Anthony Memorial

On By Michel McDonaldIn NewsLeave a comment

The Caylee Anthony memorial was today and Casey had the opportunity to watch it on tv but she didn’t even ask for it.  What the heck is wrong with this woman?  Is she that deranged that she won’t even watch her own daughters funeral service?

Doesn’t she know that every action has a consequence?  By not requesting to watch it on tv she is implicating herself even more because had she watched it and cried the jury would see that she has at least some remorse for murdering her own daughter and they wouldn’t be so harsh on her.  Or it would’ve shown the jury that maybe she didn’t do it.  Who knows.

At least by watching it she would’ve shown the jury and the public that she doesn’t have a heart of stone or ice.

Worst Fears Realized

On By Michel McDonaldIn DreamsLeave a comment

I just woke up out of the worst dream a nerd could ever have in his ENTIRE life!  Have you ever had a dream where you worst fears have been realized?  I just did.

Darrin and I were traveling… somewhere which I still am not clear with.  I was leaving my Aunt Louise’s house in Texas and for some reason Darrin was with me.  So we were going to go on another trip but the only way to get to the airport was by city bus.  So we had all of our things on the bus with us, he pretty much just had clothes.  He’s not real into nerdy things like me.  I on the other hand had some clothes but for the most part all my electronics.

List: I had my laptop, psp, cell phone, video camera (dvd cam), bi-pap machine and my Dell DJ which doesn’t work right now lol.  I also had some books in my suitcase.  If I had a Kindle I would’ve been totally screwed but my bags would’ve been lighter lol.

The bus runs a red light and we get pulled over.  All the passengers are taken off the bus and put onto another bus for a few minutes.  Then the police come to the bus we were taken to and says we can get on our bus now.  The bus pretty much empties and I’m the last one off.  I get off the bus and look around and the bus I was originally on was nowhere to be seen.  It was totally gone… with ALL of my stuff.  Darrin was gone too.

I had to think… real hard… maybe Darrin will keep an eye on my stuff and when he gets to our destination he will bring it with him.  Although, I finally catch the next bus and get to our destination which for some odd reason is another bus but it’s a totally different kind of bus which I would so love to explain except that I can’t because it was so strange I literally have to draw you a picture to describe it.  And since I can’t draw let me just say it was strange.

I get on that bus and say please tell me you have all my stuff and Darrin says “what stuff?”  AHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!  What do you mean what stuff?  OMG I cannot believe it.  So I pick up a cell phone which by the way makes no sense.  It wasn’t my cell phone but I look at it and it has “property of….” and it says a name that I can’t recall and I realize that the person who took all my things have already assimilated it all.  But how could I know that by looking at “a” cell phone?  Hey, it’s a dream sequence, what do you want?

We end up at someones house and Darrin is sleeping in a bed and I’m trying to use the phone to call my cell phone and my cousin Brandi is on the other line and she won’t get off the phone.  And so I keep picking up the phone and instead of a dial tone I can hear her talking and she tells me to get off the phone.

Ok, I realize that all these things can be replaced.  My cell phone is actually just a pre-paid cell phone.  I’ve had it since 2002 and pre-paid gives you a crappy amount of minutes.  I think for $25 I get 2.5 hours to talk.  I think that the newer pre-paid are different.

Anyway, I can always get a new everything else but come on, all my pictures are on the SD card in my camcorder, all my saved games are in the memory stick in my PSP and my simm card in my cell phone with all my phone numbers.  It’s a hassle to have to get it all back and it costs way more money than I have to spend.  It took me years to get all of those electronics and all by pure luck too.  Some were gifts and some were things that took me years to save up for.

Octomom

On By Michel McDonaldIn Daily BlogLeave a comment

There is this story that everyone is talking about.  This woman who is unemployed and not married had 6 children but she is addicted to having children.  I believe that she had all of her first 6 children via fertility doctor.  I know that she went back to the fertility doctor for her other 8 kids that she had all at once.  Apparently they were all frozen and she didn’t want them to go to waste so she had them all put inside her.

“The Web site posted photographs from inside Angela Suleman’s disheveled three-bedroom home, where Nadya and her brood also live. Heaps of clothing pour from an open closet door and a carpeted bedroom, where a bed sheet serves as a curtain, is cluttered with cribs.”

That is a quote from The Associated Press, yes, I admit, I googled it for this blog.

This woman’s mother is so upset with her for doing this because she doesn’t have any help and expects her mother to help her.  There is only so much help a mother can give to her daughter who now has 14 children.  But what gives her the right to have 14 children with no job and no husband?  She sent her story to all these companies like Pampers and Gerber because she wanted free diapers and free baby food.  They apparently had no sympathy for her because they didn’t respond to her.  I don’t blame them because her story is a liability to them.  They can’t afford to be associated with someone who is abusing her god given right to have children and also abusing the system.

If she has no job and no husband, how is she supposed to support all these children?  Welfare?  Exactly!  She is putting her dilemma on the state.  So everyone gets to pay to raise her children.

I was watching Chelsea Lately tonight on E! and she asked “why is it that this woman can have 18 children but gay people still can’t get married?”  The audience and 2 of her 3 panel members were clapping.  The 2 clapper were women, the other one was a guy who is obviously homophobic since he didn’t clap.

You have to be secure with your own sexuality to be comfortable with gay people I guess.  I know lots of straight people who are rednecks who are the last people you would think would be gay friendly but they are.  So think about that.  How did this go from the Octomom to gay people?  LMAO!