Finally!!!

This is one of my favorite days of the year each year. It means summer is coming, which means late light. It is 7:20 pm, the kids are in bed, and it is still light. Yipee!!

Liberalism: Mortgaging the future to feel good today.

This came as an email forward, but pretty much sums up my feelings regarding lights on the house.

His wife had been on his case to get the Christmas lights up for a couple of weeks.

They are up now and for some reason she will not talk to him – go figure.

I noticed that I have 9 drafts half completed spanning months. And in a nutshell, that about sums up my life.

Walmart updated its DRM policies in response to user outcry. Good call, although not sustainable indefinitely.

Here is the letter that came via email last night:

NOTE: This is a follow-up to our email titled "Important Information
About Your Digital Music Purchases" from 9/26/08.

Based on feedback from our customers, we have decided to maintain our
digital rights management (DRM) servers for the present time.  What this
means to you is that our existing service continues and there is no
action required on your part.  Our customer service team will continue
to assist with DRM issues for protected windows media audio (WMA) files
purchased from Walmart.com.

While our customer support team is available to assist you with any
issues, we continue to recommend that you back up your songs by burning
them to a recordable audio CD. By backing up your songs, you insure
access to them from any personal computer at any time in the future.

We appreciate your support and patience as we work to provide the best
service possible to you.  As we move forward with our 100% MP3 store,
we’ll continue to update you with key decisions regarding our service
and your account via email.

Thank you for using Walmart MP3 Music Downloads.

The Walmart Digital Music Team

The day after I posted my original entry on Walmart’s DRM decision , I was contacted by a lawyer who wanted me to sue Walmart. Obviously, he hadn’t closely read my post because I was merely arguing was that DRM isn’t a platform that can survive in the long term.

This attorney was out to make himself a quick buck at Walmart’s expense. I really detest this type of lawyering. Actually, he should probably be reported to the California Bar because contacting me directly because he wanted me to sue Walmart is likely unethical .

Here is the email chain:

(more…)

I finally got around to it. It is a work in progress, and I am not sure the colors really work, but it is an improvement over the previous version (I think).

People who know me know that I spend most my day in the office listening to new music on Rhapsody. Well, part of the time is listening to new music, part just listening to the new songs I have found over and over and over again until I am sick of them.

Lately, I have been on a country music kick. So here are the country songs I have been listening to:

1. Love Story – Taylor Swift. If this song is any indication of her upcoming album, which I am going to buy, there will be no sophomore slump. Honorable mention: all of the bonus tracks on the re-release of Taylor Swift (the album), especially A Perfectly Good Heart. The most impressive thing about Taylor Swift is that she writes or co-writes all of her music. Artists who have somebody else write all their music is endemic in country music and irritates me a little bit.

2. I’m Still a Guy; Waitin’ for a Woman – Brad Paisley. I haven’t gotten too much traction on his albums yet, but admittedly, I haven’t listened more than once or twice.

3. That Kind of Day; Innocence – Sarah Buxton. No official album that I know of, just an EP. Her voice is interesting (not in a bad way). The song writing is fun. I note that Innocence sounds and themes really close to Strawberry Wine by Deana Carter, albeit with enough difference to stand on its own.

4. Stealing Cinderalla – Chuck Wicks. I have to admit that I looked up his music after reading a news blurb that Julianne Hough was dating him. Turns out he has a pretty good album (better than hers).

5. Sounds So Good; The Pickin’ Shed – Ashton Shepherd . She is obsessed with "cold beers" and "coolers," which makes for imagery rerun. But the song writing is solid, the hooks are catchy (i.e., if I turn on the music during dinner because I was singing it to myself all the way home), and twang is fun. Shepherd hearkens back to traditional country, so she might not be palatable to people who are indoctrinated only with country-pop as their country music experience.

6. Troubadour – George Strait. He still has it. And I still like it.

7. Nashville on XM Radio . Good balance of old country classics from the 90s and new stuff. One of those stations I can listen to at 6:15 am on the way to work.

When were minivans ever cool? (Hint: Not in high school when I drove my mom’s around.)

Let me just say, I am not a big Olympics fan. It has become a real circus and way too political for my taste. Yet somehow I find myself glued to the TV each night watching it. Some thoughts:

1. What ever happened to the Olympics having a pure ameteur code? I know, I know, the Soviets. Nevertheless, the games were much better when the athletes didn’t have multimillion dollar professional sports contracts or endorsement contracts.
2. I am over Michael Phelps. What he did was amazing, but the dude is cocky and poor sport. It is really hard to be gracious in winning, and from what I saw he wasn’t. I have to be honest that he embarrased me as an American on a couple of occasions. Poor sportsmanship seems to be the norm now, especially in track and field. Which brings me to…
3. Usain Bolt. HOLY. CRAP. I have never seen a 100M dash field destroyed like that. I loved his exuberance after the race in both the 100 and the 200. When I ran track, I always wanted to excel in the 100, and could never figure out why I was so much better in the 200 (I ran the 110 High Hurdles and the 300 Intermediate Hurdles and the 4×400 relay). Usain Bolt gives hope to guys like me who are geared to be faster on the top end speed that we really are fast just because we can’t get out of the block fast.
4. Beach Volleyball getting so much TV time. I am really insulted that slapping a couple of chicks into swimsuits that are a size too small makes a good sport. Apparently the TV ratings suggest I am the only one so insulted.
5. Men’s volleyball. Being a former BYU student, it is hard not to be addicted to Men’s Volleyball (BYU perenially has a top 5 men’s team in the NCAAs). I wish NBC would show the entire match, not just the final set. Men’s Volleyball and track are two event I really look forward to watching.
6. The Redeem Team. Who cares about that group of whiney thugs? Oh, and RAPISTS (Kobe). People have short memories, but I don’t. At some point Americans are going to have to admit that the rest of the world has caught up in the sport of basketball. Frankly, the sooner the better. I am proud to say I haven’t watched a single game or read a single article on US men’s basketball. By the way, I have to admit that one of the highlights of the last two Olympic games for me was watching the American Men’s Basketball team lose.
7. Baseball and softball. The entire western hemisphere and Asia play these games. Why are they being decommissioned from the Olympics? Because the world doesn’t stop when the Olymics are happening (as the IOC believes it shoud) and MLB, Japanese leagues, etc. continue to play their regular season?
8. Badmitton. Is this seriously an Olymic sport? Is it even a sport? Maybe we should introduce croquet (which, BTW is really fun to play on your lawn) or stone skipping as Olymic sports too…
9. I stand corrected, Speed Walking takes the cake as the all time dumbest sport ever . I have a hard time taking a bunch of people who are walking, grabbing the water bottle out the course crew’s hands, taking a swig, and throwing the water bottle in the gutter like they are riding the Alpe de Huez in Tour de France seriously. Really, you can stop to sign a few autographs and still win the gold.
10. NBC’s coverage of boxing. It was quaint when Americans were winning golds in the last few games. This time, they were all eliminated early and NBC has seemingly 24 hour coverage of boxing. I am just not that interested in seeing Cuban’s win gold medals.
11. China Cheating. Is anybody surprised? They cheat and lie to the rest of the world politically, why would we expect them to do any different at the Olympics.
12. Gymnast’s ages. So the girls are 14 years old. They still out performed the US team. Get over it. We lost. But, Mecki, we could have won if we had just started our 14 year old prodegies? OK, so we should have given them false passports and sent them to China. In any event, we could have won without our 14 year olds. But on the day, the best "little girls" won.I do get the argument that 14 year old girls are more flexible, have less fear (i.e., common sense), and are less likely to succomb to the pressure of the international stage. But they also have two less years of training. The Chinese government owns those girls and will ride them hard from birth irrespective of the age. So let’s just drop the age thing. All those gymnast girls are stunted in their growth from what they do and the stresses they put their bodies under. What difference is two years.
13. Still hard for me to root for a Russian in any form. Now with Georgia and Putin et al. I really hope US Volleyball sticks it to their #1 ranked team.