Google Reader

Posted by admin - 12/08/06 at 04:08:41 am

Google Reader isn’t really that new of an obsession for me, but I don’t recall writing anything about it. And since I am such a big fan, I figured I should at least mention it.

I was pretty late to the game with RSS and RSS Readers. I knew what they were and how they were supposed to work, but I tried one several years ago and it was clunky, so I never really tried it again. Several months ago while I was messing around with the BlackBerry, I downloaded Google’s Mobile Pack. Google Reader was part of the update. I logged in just to check it out. The rest is pretty much history.

At work I am expected to know pretty much every Internet fad. It is kinda hard to keep up with everything and get other real things done. I got to where my morning blog/news regiment took about an hour. With Google Reader, I was able to read the same sites and cut the routine down to about 15 minutes. I’ve since added a ton of new feeds so it still takes longer, but I am able to skim things much more quickly.

The best thing about Google Reader is the share feature. Once you add friends through gmail’s chat function, you can share articles with your friends just by clicking on a single button. It is really quite amazing. In the past couple of weeks, they’ve added a “share with notes” feature that allows you to comment on why you are sharing a particular article. Google Reader can even create a RSS feed frommy shared items. This is what I use to power the “What I Am Reading Online” section on the right.

Welcome to the future… Bitch!

Posted by admin - 07/08/06 at 01:08:13 pm

photo credit: Afroswede

At this point in our evolution, weren’t we supposed to be habitating the moon, owning a flying car and residing in a house that cleans itself? Isn’t that what we were promised? Isn’t that what the new Millenium was supposed to bring? Not global warming, the shadow of terrorism and nuclear proliferation…

I was feeling seriously cheated until yesterday… Yesterday while picking up cat litter (God is my life depressing… I have become the crazy cat guy.) at the grocery store I saw it. I saw the future… And I had to have it!

It caught my eye because it was on an end cap display, otherwise I may have walked right past it as I’m sure I’d done so many times before… There it sat, as large as life, bright and shiny with all the promise of a brave new world beckoning me… Calling to me to take it home!

Of what modern miracle do I speak? What device has restored my faith in the promise of my future… Nay the future of all mankind? Why the Scrubbing Bubbles Automatic Shower Cleaner of course!

I had to have it! They had me at “Cleans your shower with the touch of a button!”

Finally! This is what I had been waiting for! I snatched the box from the display and half ran half walked to the checkout counter hurriedly paying for my piece of the future and rushed home to install it.

When I got home I was like a kid at Christmas! I threw my bags down on the living room floor, not bothering to put anything away… Instead I grabbed my prize and tore open the packaging, fumbling with the latch for the batteries I was giddy with anticipation…

Finally a company that understands the promise, and a product that lives up to that promise… that promise of the future.

photo credit: Phil Romans

Quickly… positive end to positive terminal, negative end to negative terminal… Reclose the latch… Insert the bottle of cleaner with an extremely satisfying audible “POP”… And then dash upstairs to the master bath where…

In a moment of revery I hung the cleaner on my shower head and stepped back to admire it in all of its wonder and glory… It gleamed in the waning sunlight that shone through the frosted glass of the bathroom window. It begged to be inaugurated… To show its stuff! I stepped forward and pressed the blue button and heard a soft beeping sound much like a muffled alarm.

Immediately impressed I stepped back and shut the glass door that encloses the shower stall… The cleaner was emitting beeps at regular intervals, seemingly counting down to ignition. I waited… envisioning a massive spray of bubbles shooting out of the sprayer end… Expecting a cavalcade of foam and suds to explode at any second… Beep… Beep… Beep… Beep and then…

photo credit: alexik

The sprayer end spun around two and a half times and stopped… No scrubbing bubbles… No foam… No suds… In fact nothing at all came out. I frantically grabbed for the directions which I… Like all real men immediately threw to the side when I opened the package, never to look at again! I scanned down the page making mental notes in my head… Batteries - check, cleaning solution installed - check, bottle installed correctly - check… Aha! Apparently upon initial use you may need to push the button several times before cleaning fluid emits… Gotcha!!! Ok… Now I feel better. So I push the button again…

Beep… Beep… Beep… Beep… spins two and a half times and nothin!

Again… Beep… Beep… Beep… spins two and a half times and nothin!

Again… Beep… Beep… Beep…And this time it spins two and a half times spraying a wispy mist as it turns sputtering like a clogged aerosol can… What? That can’t be it right? I mean where is the spray… The foam… The suds… The future?

photo credit: limbte

Well guess what folks after several more runs… I have determined that the future isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be!

I still have hope though… I mean have you seen that Dyson Vacuum, That shit never loses suction!

I’m just sayin’…

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