Bernie’s Blog

In case you don’t know, FTTotW is short for Favorite Threadless Tee of the Week. This week, my favorite is “Wanted”.

I just relaunched my Ratlover community site on the Ning platform. The old ratlover.net site was using Wordpress/phpBB/Gallery. It worked ok, but it wasn’t so dynamic. I toyed around with switching to Drupal, with more control over the administration part, but then decided to test it out on Ning. The results are not too bad so far. What I really like about it is how easy it is for people to post comments, photos, and videos, and how easy it is for me to moderate them, sort them into different albums, and to create new albums. I can also add widgets from third-party widget providers, which was cool. What I didn’t like about it is the forum. I’m a little old-skool, and like my forums to look like forums, with the title on the left, how many views, and how many replies on the right, in a table format. Ning’s forum is more like a blog entry with comments on the bottom, which does take getting used to. I hope they might change that format to the old-skool style, or maybe offer two options for the network owners to choose from.

They do have a developer section which I’ve just started to explore, so I’m not sure how much customization to the code I can make.

So here’s my Ratlover 2.0 site. Well, you might be interested if you have a Rat Terrier.

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There are times when I don’t want too many people to view my videos, especially those of Rebecca, either doing something silly or a clip that would seem interesting only if you knew us personally, either a relative or friend. In situations like these I try to look for a video converting alternative to YouTube. My web hosting company does offer a utility that helps you convert your video files to flash format, but the results are very good. Recently, DivX announced that they are offering a free download of the DivX Pro software for Mac, only for one day. I quickly downloaded it. I tried to convert a few AVI files and I must say the encoding process was fast, and the result was pretty good. Pictures are not blurry, and the resolution is pretty good for a compressed video file. There’s even embed codes to help you embed your divx video on your site. The downside is that visitors who want to view your DivX video need to download the DivX player and plugin for their browser. Some people might shun away from downloading applications that they don’t understand. But anyway, I plan to stick to this way of converting my AVI files for family and friends. Find out more from the DivX website.

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I’ve been spending the last week getting my MacBookPro nice and clean (reformat) for installing Windows XP on. First I had to back up all the data (junk) I have. I was looking at the 500GB external hard disks for sale, and it seems that now you could get one of those for less than $200. But since I was able to cram all my junk between my three hard disks (2 x 160GB, and 100GB) so that was good.

After that was done I reformatted my hard disk. That was the easy part. The next step was a little tricky. I had to decide whether to go wotih Bootcamp or Parallels. The former needed a reboot of every time I want to switch OS’s, whereas the other didn’t need any reboot. However, one needed an outlay of $79 (Parallels). I decided not to be cheap and got a copy of Parallels. Now I’m thankful I did it because the latest version (ver. 3.0) is so smooth in transitioning between OS X and Windows XP.

Why do I need XP? Well, some apps I needed at work needed Windows. Plus, I’m thinking that in the future I might get PC games, and then I can play it on my Mac.

So, my MBP is bi-OS now, and happy.

I’m a Threadless Junkie, but have not been buying them for a few weeks now as I already have a big collection. So in an attempt to bookmark my favorites to buy at another time, I’m going to add a blog entry every Monday when new Threadless Tees come out. This is mine this week:

SURPRISE

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This (Children’s Discovery Museum) is one of those places where, if you don’t have a kid, you’ll never set foot on it, ever. I see it all the time while driving by the 87 Freeway because of the gigantic promo blow-up characters that sit on the rooftops of the building. This time it was Clifford the red dog. Rebecca only knows Kipper, from the Sprout channel, but today she got to meet a new doggy, a RED one at that!

When we entered the place, Rebecca was her usual cautious self, assessing the place and trying to decide if she’s going to like it or not. Now that she knows how to walk, she insists on being carried, and let me tell you, having close to 25 pounds on your arms for and extended period of time is not pleasant, especially when you know you just can’t throw that weight off your hands and walk away. I know believe that Moms have the strongest arms out there. I’ve seen a Mom carry TWO girls, about 2 and 3 years old, one on each arm!

But I digress. So, the place is definitely one for the kids. For an adult, it can be pretty boring. They have an old fire truck and ambulance in there, and traffic lights, and different sections of the place with different activities. For example, there’s a section where you can see all things that make use of circles, like gears, wheels, pulleys and spinners. There’s another section where you can play with water, and another one with bubbles. They have a place specially for infants and toddlers, with lots of play areas, story books, and stuffed animals.

Our first stop though, was the Clifford “room”, where all the characters from the cartoon were represented there. I’ve not really read any of the Clifford books, neither has Rebecca, but she really loves doggy charaters, so she was pretty happy.

The infants/toddlers area was pretty fun too, for her.

I think we probably spent about 2 hours in there, following little Rebecca around while she explored the place. Like I said, its a place that’s all for the kids.

MORE PICTURES HERE.

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Enjoy this clip of Rebecca trying to balance her sippy cup on a stool.

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No word on pricing yet, but I would assume that it’s going to be in the range of high 20’s to low 30’s depending on your options. This is pretty exciting! Based on the teaser microsite, it looks like there will be two coupe models, 128i (230hp), and 135i (300hp). This means that they will have similar or maybe more than some of the current 3-series models. My guess is the specs on the 3-series would be beefed up to accommodate the addition of this “Baby Beemer”.

I really want a hatchback version though.

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Ever since Sony announced a $100 price drop on the 60GB PS3 I’ve been toying with the idea of getting one. Before that I was focused on getting a Wii. Ok, if I had a choice personally, I much prefer games on the PS3 – I’m into racing, and action/adventure games, and I really appreciate the graphical superiority the PS3 has over the Wii. But I also have a toddler, a husband who doesn’t really like playing video games, and friends who are also not video game people, I know that having a Wii would be sure to liven up the living room with hours of family gaming fun. The PS3, well, I’ll definitely be playing Gran Turismo alone.

I still don’t have a Wii. Why? I just couldn’t keep up with watching Wii Tracker 24/7, which I have come to think that the info they provide is not very accurate, or have any friends who are willing to help me get one. I don’t want to pay extra for a Wii, or get any sort of bundle. So that’s my story. I know that if I’d decided to get a PS3 I could just walk into Bestbuy and get one. Easy Peasy.

Honestly, I want both. Today I just found out that LocoRoco, my favorite Sony game on the PSP, is going to be on PS3, adding another plus to my getting one.

Ok, I’ll stop my ranting now. Back to work.

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You wouldn’t see this one on the main Tour de France highlights. Cyclist Marcus Burghardt had an encounter with a Lab. Click on the photo to see what happens next

Source: Gavin Rodgers via Guardian Unlimited

On Saturday we drove down to Monterey to visit the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Rebecca’s been looking at pictures of fish that I want her to experience the real thing. When she was about 9 months old we took her to the aquarium at Pier 39 in San Francisco, but that was a real waste of money. Monterey Bay Aquarium is so much bigger and better.

When we arrived there was a long line for tickets, but it didn’t take long for us to get them. We went in just in time for the Kelp feeding time. We were lucky to get a seat right in front, but after a few minutes, I realized it was a mistake as I started becoming dizzy from looking up at the huge tank and the thick rounded glass. Rebecca was fine though (thankfully!). We watched as the diver fed the fishies while chatting with us from an internal speaker.

After that we walked around the place, looking at jellyfish, anchovies, stingrays, otters, and some microscopic aquatic animals. There is an exhibit that you should not miss – its a huge tank filled with turtles, gigantic tuna (maybe?) and even Sun Fish. When you look at the tank you just feel so small compared to the fish, and I think that’s my favorite exhibit.

There’s a play area on the second level where little kids can play and learn more about marine life. As we each took turns on our toilet breaks, Rebecca walked round and pushed all the buttons she could reach.

I must say we had fun at the place, and I’m sure when Reb’s older she’ll be able to appreciate it more. When I asked her “Did you have fun?” She nodded her head and grinned. That was all I needed to know. See more pictures here.

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I’m such a Flickr fangirl. I think I spend the largest percentage of my daily web surfing browsing the pictures of Flickr. So when I wanted to find images from Tour de France, naturally I went to Flickr. If you use a search tag “tourdefrance” you will come up with lots of awesome tour pics.

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I was going to but the Ladybug one, but they were out of stock in my size, so I got these instead. I’m glad I got these coz they look so cute!

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Last evening was the first in a series of outdoor summer concerts at Cuesta Park, Mountain View. I love these outdoor concerts because its an opportunity to lay a mat down on the grass, share some food, relax, and listen to live music. Rebecca was dancing and goofing around the whole time, so I’m sure she enjoyed herself.

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Last year I was in a Carnivorous Plants (CPs) collecting craze. It started with a pot of Drosera that I bought from the local plant shop, and then I started ordering all kinds of CPs online. I also traded some with fellow forum members on the CP community sites, and for a time there I had more than 10 species of CPs – definitely something I was very proud of. Then came time for our vacation, and I didn’t have anyone to help take care of my plants, so for about 6 weeks they were left to fend for themselves. Thinking back I should’ve taken better care of them, but since they were outside, and I thought the rain would help with the watering. When I came back, all of them had dried up and all but one did not make it. The one that did survive was an Asian pitcher plant (N. sanguinea). It was showing signs of dying, but I kept up with the waterings, and soon new growth started to appear.

A couple months ago, my office was moved to a new location, where I had the privilege of having a window cube. I brought my little Nep. to work and placed it so that it could get the morning sun. I can’t believe how happy it became. Every new pitcher that grew was bigger than the one before. Now it is a permanent resident on my desk, and definitely a happy plant. Check out some pictures I took just the other day:

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