I'm pooped, and it isn't even game time

Today I've:

1. Laundered my bedding and clothes
2. Changed out the spring and winter clothes, put spring clothes away, packed up the winter ones, and prepared to take them to storage
3. Swept and mopped the floors
4. Cleaned the bathroom
5. Taken out the trash and recyclables
6. Cleaned the cat boxes
7. Started a loaf of bread

Yesterday I cleaned a very dirty shelf with magazines and did YKWIA's laundry, and that was enough to make my back hurt quite a bit, so I laid down for awhile while he helped a friend out at his house who is battling cancer.  They called me to go get Subway and we all ate and visited, then we got home about 8:30 pm.  I think we were both done in by midnight (he's been over several days in a row and took the bus out Friday, getting lost on the walk over there, and probably walked four miles back and forth until he found it), and we .were up by 7:30 am.  I have no real reason to be as tired as I've felt lately.  I've done some housework and of course, I worked at the medical centre, but still, I'm just tired all the time.  I've been up doing my stuff and listening to shows he's watching (he finished the 'Almost Human' DVDs and we watched a couple of episodes of 'Up the Women'.  I unplugged my tablet, which has been on the charger for two days and really needed to be unplugged and just turned off.  He's got a lot of documents to transfer to it and we're going to see if there's enough room once I cleaned my stuff off of the microSD card.  There's not much on it, now, just some basic applications and one from Adobe for reading PDFs and one for reading Word files.  That should suffice for him.  I haven't used my old tablet for some time.  I'm not sure it'll have the processing speed he'll need, but it's worth a try since neither of us can afford a newer tablet or laptop right now.

Today I'm looking forward to the game.  I'm kind of grungy and should go ahead and take a shower, but I'm just not up to it.  I'd like to lie down for awhile, but the bed hasn't been made yet.   I just feel a mess today. 

My strawberry plant that Brenda gave me is back outside after being brought in for a frost advisory last night, and it has two ripe strawberries and one that is turning on it.  I have lost three smallish African violets recently, including the two pink ones in the bathroom and a purple one in the bedroom.  I'm not sure what happened; they got puny and I tried to save them, but it was a no go.  On the other hand, one of the orchids has grown a new leaf and I have two that are getting ready to re-bloom.  Maybe orchids are more my thing, although I've had no problem with violets before.  The window seat in YKWIA's room is lush with shamrocks, an umbrella tree I just repotted, dumb cane, and philodendrons.  They love that window:

So overall, the plants are doing well.  Also, the orchid at work is putting out new shoots and buds.  I separated the stems out to give them more room:

It's the same colour as part of my mousepad, my pen holder, and my water cup, so it's coordinated to the checkout bay. :)  What can I say, I like it when things match.

Okay, I'm going to go check on the last of the laundry.  I realised I started the bread while still running the dryer (the bread machine is on the washer, as that's a good place for it usually when I'm not washing, as it has a tendency to 'walk' as it mixes, which is apparently supposed to happen, according to the manual.  But the vibration isn't good for rising bread.  I don't want to mess up this loaf.  I'm experimenting with all-purpose rather than bread flour, as I'm low on the other.  But the other day I forgot to put the yeast in until 30 minutes into the cycle.  While it was edible and looked fine, it was chewier than usual.  I can't believe I did that.  I was washing dishes and remembered suddenly, doing what I could to fix things.  It wasn't bad, but not ideal.  Hopefully, this one will come out fine; I definitely put all the ingredients in. :)

I am at a friend's appointment

Just chilling,  listening to Pandora.  I slept really well for the first time in days last night. The day went well,  I gave a co-worker a pretty orchid for her birthday, and after work I went over to my friend's house and talked with a friend and her friend, who had brought her up to Lexington. We all had a good time.  Then it was time to come over here.

I've been on the Kindle and downloaded some free books,  was on the tablet briefly (I was going to blog on that,  but I like the SwiftKey keyboard I have in the phone better.  I don't think I've ever downloaded it on the tablet) .  I also read an issue of Yoga Journal.  So I've been doing things,  although I didn't really feel like cracking open a Kindle book and reading just now.

I think I'll just listen to the music and relax for awhile.  Hope you had a good day.  I'll probably write later,  once I get home.  My eyes are tired from data entry eyestrain and staring at a small screen is giving me a headache. My fluctuations in blood sugar make it hard to determine which pair of glasses or contacts I should be wearing. Right now it's my next to the last pair of glasses, which seem to be doing better than the most recent pair.

Okay. Time to wrap this up.  :)

I'm tired and my feet hurt

especially after spending an hour-and-a-half at the grocery with A and putting away groceries, but it was good to get it out of the way before the weekend, and I got some things, too. It's the longest I've worn my new shoes in one wearing, and I found that the soles of my feet aren't quite used to the insoles of the shoes, which are from Sure-Fit. Maybe I should put my custom diabetic orthotics in them instead. But I am well relaxed at this point and the pain is easing, as I've spent another hour-and-a-half streaming Pandora through my bedroom TV, with a channel built around Loreena McKennitt, so it's been Celtic and New Age music.

Today was about playing catch-up at work, since I didn't have to train in scheduling today, so there was time for the library and data entry stuff I needed to do, or at least most of it. I'll have to finish up some tomorrow. But I got a lot done anyway. Today was also our benefits fair, so I came home with lots of information and some fun swag. There was also a kickoff luncheon downtown (I didn't attend) for the campaign for the new hospital, with the mayor, our Congressman, and various other candidates in attendance. By all accounts, it went really well.

I've been updating my tablet and Kindle and charging my phone, in which for the first time I let the battery completely die. But it's charging quickly, almost to full and that's in less than two hours.

I think my betta may not be much longer for this world. I came home and he was on the floor of the aquarium and has scarcely moved at all, and he's usually very active. He's lying in front of the bubble stone. In fact, it could be that the bubbles are moving his fins, rather than him, and he's actually dead. It's hard to tell. I've had him for at least a year-and-a-half. Brenda was just saying the other day that they don't live much more than a couple of years. So I guess it's about time. But I've really enjoyed having him, and I'm sad at the thought of losing him.

Okay, it's after eleven and I'm really struggling to stay awake, much like this critter. I love when the meerkat falls over and then pops up, looking all around it, like, hey, did anyone notice? :)

Building up some stamina

I was up for seven hours earlier today; I've been up nearly six now and hope to go to bed about 11:30 or midnight. That's three days of staying up for goodly amounts of time. I am having some trouble with using the walker for fairly short trips, like down the hall and into the bathroom and bedroom without getting winded. I think my allergies are bothering me despite taking Claritin this morning.

I just spoke to YKWIA for two and a half hours on the phone. My poor phone is down to 25% of battery. But it was nice to chat. We both had a lovely Thanksgiving. I have to admit, I am more relaxed than usual during the holiday.

I was planning on working on the game notes tonight, but it's gotten late, so I may for just a little bit and save some for tomorrow, since there's nothing else on my agenda. I have checked and I have everything re-installed so that I can do so.

I've been playing with Windows 8 and getting the programs I need pinned to the right menus so I can go right into them either from the tiled interface or the desktop. I can already tell that if we ever need to upgrade YKWIA's computer, Windows 8 is enough of a radical change that there are going to be issues. I love YKWIA, but he doesn't like change much. He's still using an old copy of Office XP because it doesn't have the tabs and ribbon. Just taking the Start button away may be enough to make his head spin, but hey, I'm sure he'll do fine once he gets used to it. Hopefully that won't have to be for a long time. I will say it would be much easier to use on a touchscreen, but I'm not going to get one of those any time soon, and I already have my Android tablet, which I adore and which I am so thankful to have had during my recovery. I use it several times a day, and while the computer was busy updating, was able to look up several things on the tablet.

Now that we've almost reached the end of the holiday, I hope things went well for all of you in the US who celebrate it. The one regret I have is that I totally forgot about the Macy's parade; I'm usually on my way to my mom's during it. I could have watched it today. It's nice that it gave some cheer to those affected by Hurricane Sandy.

Why I won't be getting a new Kindle

If you're a techie, or an Amazon fan, then you probably heard the news about updated basic Kindle [$69] the two new Kindle Paperwhites (available with [$119, $179] and without special offers [$139, $199) and the four new Kindle Fires (7" [$159], 7" HD [$199], 8.9" HD wi-fi [$299], and 8.9" HD 4G LTE [$499]).

They're great products, and the tablet war just got a lot more interesting. They're offering the highest-end one, the 8.9" Kindle Fire HD with 4G LTE, for $499 with a 250 MB wireless plan for $50 a year. If this had been a year ago, when I was looking at getting a tablet, I probably would have gotten this one. It's a cost savings over both mine and the 4G iPad in that the yearly data plan is quite cost-effective. I pay about $20 a month for my wireless. But, the fact of the matter is, I love my tablet, it's still more versatile, running Android Ice Cream Sandwich now and not a forked system of Android, etc., etc. Although it's a great buy for lots of people, don't get me wrong (and one co-worker is going to trade her Kindle Fire for the new $499 one, I think, rather than get an iPad), it's not for me. By the way, that's a 32GB machine. There's a 64GB one that's $599.

Here are how the specs compare with mine, from what I could glean from Amazon, T-Mobile, and my own machine in particular (the Springboard shipped with Honeycomb, but an Ice Cream Sandwich update was pushed out last weekend):

Kindle Fire HD 8.9" display with 4G

Price: $499 for 32GB, $599 for 64GB

Display - 8.9" 10 point capacitive touch high definition color display; 1920x1200 resolution at 254 ppi, video playback up to 1080p, with IPS (in-plane switching) technology, advanced polarizing filter, and anti-glare technology

Processor - Dual-core, 1.5GHz OMAP4470

Size - 9.4" x 6.4" x 0.35" (240 mm x 164 mm x 8.8 mm)

Weight - 20 ounces (575 grams)

Memory - 32 GB model, or 64 GB model, internal memory, no expansion slot

Wi-Fi Connectivity - Dual-band, dual-antenna Wi-Fi (MIMO) for faster streaming and fewer dropped connections than standard Wi-Fi. Supports public and private Wi-Fi networks or hotspots that use the 802.11a, 802.11b, 802.11g, or 802.11n standard with support for WEP, WPA and WPA2 security using password authentication; does not support connecting to ad-hoc (or peer-to-peer) Wi-Fi networks 4G Connectivity 4G LTE 10 band wireless modem with HSPA+, HSDPA, and EDGE/GPRS fallback

Ports - USB 2.0 (micro-B connector) port for connection to a PC or Macintosh computer or to connect to the Kindle PowerFast charging accessory. Micro-HDMI (micro-D connector) port for high definition video output to televisions or A/V receivers

Audio - 3.5 mm stereo jack and integrated stereo speakers with exclusive Dolby audio engine. Stereo Bluetooth (A2DP) support for streaming audio to compatible headphones and speakers. Built-in microphone

Content Formats Supported - Kindle (AZW), TXT, PDF, unprotected MOBI, PRC natively, Audible Enhanced format (AAX), DOC, DOCX, JPEG, GIF, PNG, BMP, non-DRM AAC, MP3, MIDI, PCM/WAVE, OGG, WAV, MP4, AAC LC/LTP, HE-AACv1, HE-AACv2, AMR-NB, AMR-WB, HTML5, CSS3, MP4, 3GP, VP8(.webm)

Camera - Front-facing camera for video chat/Skype, not sure of the specs

Included in the Box - Kindle Fire HD 8.9" 4G tablet, USB 2.0 cable, and Quick Start Guide [power charger sold separately]

My T-Mobile® Springboard™

Price: I paid $179 down after a $50 rebate and pay $10 per month for 20 months (total $379); I think the actual retail price is $449: currently $249 with qualifying 2-year contract, not sure if that's a down-payment or special offer with plan.

Size - 7.48" x 5.08" x 0.41"

Weight: 14.1 oz

Display - 7-inch HD touch screen, 1280x800 TFT with IPS

Processor - 1.2 GHz dual-core mobile processor

OS: Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich)

Wi-Fi Connectivity - 14.4 Mbps 4G and Wi-Fi capable, 4G HSPA +14.4 EDGE/GPRS 850/900/1800/1900, Bluetooth v2.1 + EDR, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n

Ports - Micro 3.0 USB port, Micro-HDMI port

Audio - 3.5 mm stereo jack and integrated stereo speakers. Built-in microphone. Bluetooth support.

Content Formats Supported - MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, WMA, MPEG4, WAV, MIDI, Real Audio, HTML5,CSS3, also, with applications I have, Kindle books, Nook books, ePubs, PDFs, DOC, DOCX, JPEG, GIF, PNG, BMP, XLS, XLSX, PPT, PPTX, TXT, unprotected MOBI, plus Adobe Flash support

Memory - 16 GB built in memory, expandable up to additional 32 GB (total 48 GB) with Micro SD card; 1 GB RAM

Battery - upports up to 7 hours of continuous use and 12 days of standby time; Li-Polymer, 3.7V, 4100mAh

Camera, Photos, and Video: 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera for photos, video capture and video chat; 5-megapixel rear-facing camera for HD photos and video capture; Video codec: .3GP, MP4, MOV, MKV, ASF, WMV, H.264

Sensors - Accelerometer

Included in the Box - T-Mobile® SpringBoard™ with Google™ 7-inch tablet, Charger, Micro USB data cable, SIM Card [SD expansion card sold separately; I have a 32 GB card]

I pay $20/month for an unlimited up to 2GB with no overages plan; I use about 250 MB a month on average, so I'd be right at the edge of their $50/year plan.

But I did seriously consider upgrading my old Kindle 2 to the Paperwhite version and giving my old one to a friend. Paperwhite is basically a Kindle Touch with a new display that has a front-illuminated light in it. The display's been upgraded pixel-wise, etc., etc. and it has some nice features. What it doesn't have, like the Kindle Touch, is an audio output. This was the deal-breaker for me.

I can read Kindle books on my tablet--or Nook, or ePub, or MOBI; I just don't tend to. I prefer e-Ink screens for that experience. So that's why I was excited. But, the one feature I can't get through my Android application that I have on my old clunker of a Kindle is the text-to-speech option, which has its downsides in terms of natural voice, but sometimes I just like the machine to read to me. Unfortunately, because of the lack of audio output, there is no text-to-speech on the Kindle Paperwhite. Oh, well. End of story. (Sorry, Brandon, no old one for you just yet, I'm keeping mine for awhile it seems). So, even though I don't have wi-fi on mine (I have the 3G without it) and have to transfer my library books via USB, and even though I don't have page numbers (although those show up on my tablet), I'll keep my old Kindle. But, you might want to check out the various offers; perhaps you'll find one that you like that's right for you.

Heading for bed

Yesterday I spent all day at a friend's house working on his to-do list and then came home and watched the series 7 premiere of Doctor Who, which was great fun. Another great thing was my tablet had an update pushed to it by T-Mobile, so now it's running Android operating system Ice Cream Sandwich rather than Honeycomb. Most of the changes have been cosmetic, but it's fun to play with. So far, everything seems to work on the higher version.

Today I slept in for a Sunday, getting up at 6:30. I cleaned house to prepare for the game. Then Brenda came and we did the big grocery run, which wasn't giant this time. Then we played the game for about 6 hours, till 11 pm, doing a lot of investigation, which means I can't wait till the last minute to do notes next time, because it takes longer to transcribe investigation vs. action.

Tomorrow I have no firm plans. If Animal House is open, I'll take in my aquarium hood and see if they can get it going. Fortunately I got a new bus pass today, although tomorrow the buses are running on a Sunday schedule, which is pretty limited. I'm glad I don't still work in retail where you're expected to work on holidays, often at hours later than the bus runs. Otherwise I'll do some stuff around the house, I think. But my plan is to turn off all alarms and just wake up naturally, maybe do some yoga, and go from there. :)

Alright, I'm tired; it's time to head on to bed. If you celebrate the holiday, may it be a good one. Hope your weekend went fine if it's now over and done with. Good night.

I have a new gadget

It's the Targus AKB33US Bluetooth keyboard.  I'm using it to type this entry on my tablet.  This is actually quite a nice little keyboard. You just have to remember that the backspace is in the upper right corner and is smaller than the delete key, which is right under it. Some people have complained about that, but really it's not hard to adjust.

So far it's staying connected with no problem.  The first time you connect, you turn the Bluetooth on your device on, turn on the keyboard, press the connectivity button, and it 'discovers' the keyboard.  You type in the numbers indicated on the screen, and then you're connected.  After that, the device remembers the keyboard and you don't have to type in the numbers.  Or at least that's how it works with an Android device.

The on/off switch is on the bottom of the keyboard and therefore it might be harder to remember to turn off the keyboard when finished.  The keyboard takes two 'AAA' batteries. The ones that came with mine were Toys R' Us brand, which I thought funny. :)

What the keyboard didn't come with was any sort of guide, but I had already found that on the Targus website before I ordered, when I was trying to find out if it was compatible with my device.  According to Targus, it is compatible with any Android device running Android OS version  2.3.  It is also compatible with the iPad and several other types of tablets as well, so it's not just for Android tablets.

The feel to the tablet is pretty decent; it's easy to type on, and isn't too sensitive or not enough.  I highly recommend it. And at $35 from Amazon (as opposed to the $60 I found elsewhere), it's much less than getting a laptop I do not really need.

Supposedly you can type from up to 30 feet away. I'm not sure why you would want to, but it's nice that it doesn't have to be right at the device to do anything.

It would have been nice to have some sort of case for it; fortunately I have something it will fit in.  Some keyboards come with a stand for the tablet; this one doesn't, but then my cover for my tablet stands, so I didn't need one.  So I'm pretty happy with my purchase.

The application saga

I bought an application for Android through Amazon called Relax Melodies Premium, by Ipnos Software. I had tried the free version first and realy liked it. But when I opened the premium version on my tablet, it only had 36 sounds on it, much less than the 80-some-odd advertised.

Not to be deterred, I contacted Ipnos Software, and the tech support folks were really helpful. Turns out there was an update that fixed the problem that some devices were having, but it wasn't up on Amazon yet, so one of them sent me a link to the update that I could download and install from. I did so, and had instant success.

Then I noticed there were updates from Amazon. I thought oh, they updated their software there, so I went ahead and downloaded all the various application downloads listed. The Relax Melodies Premium is one of those that will totally uninstall before installing. So I hit yes, and then went into the application, and things were right back to how it used to be. Apparently since the versions didn't match, Amazon assumed there was an update needed. Argh!

So I uninstalled that and went to that link from before, but they had removed the file (which makes sense, as some people might just publicise it, as it was just something at Dropbox). Then I remembered that since I had actually downloaded the file, it should still be in downloads. I found it with my tablet's file manager, clicked on it, and yay, it re-installed without a problem and it's back to the way it should be. I'll just ignore any update requests until I'm sure it's a higher version.

Speaking of the tablet, I was thinking about a project I really need to work on that involves some word processing at another person's house. I had considered getting a laptop, but that seemed a bit excessive, as my desktop does well, my apartment is small so it's not like I have to have access in every room, and the tablet could theoretically do it--it's just the swiping of a virtual keyboard that is an issue. So, I looked around and all the keyboards I could find that connected to tablets with cables wouldn't work. But there are also Bluetooth keyboards. By reading reviews I found out that one I was considering wouldn't work because the Bluetooth version is higher than my tablet's. But I found one that should, and contacted the company, which said that as long as my Android version is high enough, all should do well. So I ordered it from Amazon and it should be here in a few days. Office Depot had it for about $60. Amazon had it for $35 and has an excellent return policy should it not work, and I checked and the seller who sells through Amazon and is fulfilling the order has the same policy regarding electronics. So, wish me luck. $35 is a tenth of what I would pay for a basic laptop, so I'm hoping it will connect and work well. We'll see.

Some days I really do feel like a tech geek. :)

I am the only person I know

who can twist an ankle trying to take off one's shoes. I don't think I did any damage, but it's the one foot that still hurts from when I had the stress fractures, and wow was it painful.

It's a beautiful day, considering it started out with rain. There's a nice breeze coming through the open windows, as well as happy sunlight. I was fortunate to get a ride to and from work today by two different co-workers, so I'm home a little earlier than I would be on the bus. Today was pretty decent, if a little hectic. I got some things crossed off my to-do lists (I have four lists, colour-coded, at work--one for the library, one for data entry, one for referrals, and one for personal/professional items outside of work. I'm getting it all finished one step at a time, but I'm glad it's Friday tomorrow. I suspect several people will be off tomorrow, as it's the last day of the Spring meet at the Keeneland race track. The Derby's coming up, of course, and people are gearing up for that.

Last night I wound up listening to the Old Time Radio application with a wartime (WWII) Sherlock Holmes story. It was entertaining. I love old radio shows. Then I listened to some music. I did really well until I put it over to classical, at which point I dozed off. But that was at nearly 10 pm, so not abnormally early. I accidentally found a channel (and I have no idea how to repeat it) with a jazz show on from a station in the south side of Chicago. It was very good. I got up at 11:30 to close the windows and take my medicine, then went to bed till about 7 am. I would have read on the Kindle for awhile but I went to do so and the poor thing's battery needed charging. I've been reading Kindle books on my SpringBoard instead. But I like the Kindle for the e-ink and also the text-to-speech. I like on the tablet how it will give me page numbers, whereas my version of the Kindle, the Kindle 2, doesn't do that. One other difference is that I find that on the tablet I download a book or two at one time, then remove it from the device. If I want to read something else, I have to page through all the different books, and I have almost 300 books. But on the Kindle, they're just on the device, all of them, and in nice little categories, so I can find them more easily. I don't always remember the title when trying to find one on the tablet. For example, I have several omnibus editions of various authors' works (such as Dickens, Hugo, Twain, Poe, Welles, Conan Doyle, Lovecraft, and Haggard, to name a few), and sometimes they're listed under 'Works of...' and sometimes 'Collected Works of...', etc. On the Kindle I just have them under their main genre. So there are good and bad points to each device.

Okay, I had some shrimp étouffée at work, an apple here, plus some lima beans. Time to go do something useful. I'll probably write later. YKWIA told me something that really was blogworthy, but I can't quite recall it. It'll come to me, or if not, I'll call him and find out. In the meantime, hope you're having a good week.

I cannot believe I just did that

So it's late, and I just got back from the game, and the gamemaster called me to let me know I'd left my SpringBoard over at his house. The plan is to go over tomorrow after work and pick it up. But it was such a brainless thing to do, although I will say it's the first time I've left it anywhere. I did leave the Kindle once at work, locked in my desk. And my phone once at home. So I'm not doing this sort of thing all the time. This is why I do normally put it back in my bag after reading the game notes. The sad thing is I'm not as tired as I normally am after a night's gaming--I went light on the caffeine during the game and drank the Sparkling Ice mostly, which has B vitamins and other things that might have perked me up. Plus, I got snacks yesterday and didn't have to wake up early to make a grocery run in the wee hours of the morning. So I'm not sure why I walked off and left it where it was. We are almost to the climax of our adventure and had just fought off two Bigfoot (Bigfeet?) in the game, so I guess my mind was on that, and what to do next.

It's been a fairly busy weekend. Yesterday I spent with friends and watched two episodes of 'Lark Rise to Candleford'. Today I took care of a dead animal that the dogs had brought up to the step, cleaned in preparation for the game, did the big Kroger run, and although I'm not exhausted, I am a bit tired and I'm going to go on to bed. Good night.

PS In celebration of Earth Day, the buses were free to ride today and I got a free shopping bag (not the big reusable tote bags, but a thin one of rip-stop nylon that folds up into a very small space but holds quite a bit of stuff.) Thanks LexTran!

Bleh

I didn't get much sleep last night. First of all, go me, I didn't fall asleep at something like 8 or 9 pm. I had just crawled in bed when a friend called (he has a talent for sensing when I do so) and we talked for awhile. Then, I decided to read Turn Coat, one of the Dresden Files books by Jim Butcher, which I had out from the library, but which was due today. So after nine chapters of being sucked in (and reading on the tablet, not the Kindle, for a change), I returned the book and re-checked it out so that I could finish it this time.

About then the storms rolled in. They weren't particularly violent where I was, but the electricity was flickering, my surge protector/battery backup shut down the computer to be safe, and I didn't feel comfortable going to bed and charging all the devices while I slept.

I went to bed for a little while, got up at 11:30 pm, took my medicine for my feet. Then I played with the tablet for awhile, took my insulin around 1 am, and fell back asleep. At 3 am I got up because my stomach was being touchy, and it was finally past storm time and I felt comfortable plugging everything in. But I was having trouble sleeping. I checked out the new free Amazon application of the day, and it was a shoot-'em-up, and I wasn't so sure about getting that, but I found a noise machine/sleep helper instead and downloaded that. It lets you layer up to three sounds. I discovered birds and crickets just keep me awake, but a babbling brook, rain, and thunder helped. So even though the storms were gone, I slept to thunder, amazing for someone who used to have brontophobia.

So I finally fell asleep about 4-something. And then my alarms started at 6:30. Oddly enough, one of my alarms, which gently wakes you with noises and then has you solve a short puzzle, doesn't have birds as a separate sound, but it's included in a 'row boat', with lapping water, so I changed it to that.

So I've checked my blood sugar, eaten, taken my medicine, and I'm putting some stuff over from a CD set to my tablet. I had it partly done, because at some point I'd chosen certain songs, but the third disc was missing (it's a Simon & Garfunkel collection). So I found that disc and now I've got all the songs, not just my favourites. I've also put some documents on the tablet for easy access, such as my living will/medical info, résumé, etc. I have an application where I can easily view and edit files like that. These are on a USB drive I have on my key chain, but it was falling off a bit ago and they do have a finite life. So I thought I should have backup, both on the computer and tablet. I also fixed the backup snafu that meant my external hard drive was almost out of room.

I'm almost tempted to see if I could go back to sleep for an hour. My stomach's still a bit touchy and I don't want to get moving just yet. But I should probably stay up, and just get ready. The good thing is even without sleep, I'm not having trouble getting up early, which will be good for the new schedule. And even with the lack of sleep, I'm glad I didn't go to bed too early.

Yay

Well, I figured out how to get music and documents onto the card where it can be seen by the various applications. It's a 32 GB microSD card, so I think I should be okay for awhile. I put several albums on as mp3s and it was only a couple of gigabytes. :) I also downloaded a Kindle library book to the tablet just to test that (I still prefer to read on the Kindle, but the screen isn't too bad, and you can play with the background) and the game notes. No more putting it into 24 point font and then making a PDF that I can read on the Kindle. Also, since I was able to get OfficeSuite 5 at some point free from Amazon, I can load the game notes and make changes if I need to right then and there. I do prefer Adobe Reader for bus schedules, though. They load faster with it, between the two, both on the phone and on the tablet.

Despite all I've done with it today, including cataloguing books, it's at 35% battery charge still. That's pretty decent. Since I got it, I've catalogued 196 books. I'm close to 700 now, out of a collection that if you included the family resource centre is about 1300. :)

I actually remembered Supernatural tonight. Grimm doesn't seem to be on; there's an award show on instead. I cleaned out a good portion of my DVR and went ahead and recorded Supernatural.

The plan tomorrow is to clean house and go to the grocery, and maybe go pick up my shoes from work if they come there in the mail. (It's 70 minutes between buses on the Saturday Richmond Road route, so I'm not sure I want to fool with it.) Oh, and do game notes, which shouldn't take too long to do.

I think I'll step away from the tablet for now and maybe take a nap. I know it's kind of late, but if I wake up early, I'll just work on the house earlier, and if I sleep in, that's fine, because my plans are flexible. :) Oh, and I do have to go to the library tomorrow--I let a book get overdue, although not too badly. Bad librarian!

Two out of three isn't bad

Well, I got the microSD card and my medications in the mail today. The shoes are scheduled to be delivered at the hospital tomorrow. I haven't decided whether I'll go over and pick them up or wait until Monday.

So now I have all my medicine, including some (mercifully small pills of) vitamin D, which I was apparently low on. The pharmacy also sent some more test strips, yay! And it all fit in my mailbox, so no trouble with the delivery.

When I ordered the SD card, the only complaint people had mentioned was not getting the USB reader and adapter with it, so when I saw the envelope they sent it in, at first I thought that had happened. But everything was there. The SD cards, especially microSD, are, of course, tiny, and the adapter is the size of a normal card. The USB reader, though, was about the size of the first joint of my little finger, and that threw me off. But it's nice to have them; they were essentially free when you compared their price for all three vs. a microSD card alone.

I got the tablet out of its case, took off the little cover that allows access to the SIM card and microSD slot, and put it in with no trouble, and the tablet recognises it. I also figured out how to move my music that I'd had on the internal storage over and the music player recognises it. But I then discovered that Honeycomb, unlike its predecessor Froyo, does not save internal storage by moving applications to the SD card. There's no option, and according to some, no need. Granted, I have 16 GB of internal storage, so I don't think it will be a problem any time soon, especially since my documents, pictures, music, etc. can all go on the SD card. But I had no idea until I Googled it, like so much of Android stuff. The manual is basically not collected together so much as available on forums as questions come up, as near as I can tell. On the other hand, I haven't had any question about Android that's come up I couldn't find the answer for.

The one thing that couldn't find documents on the SD card was Adobe Reader, which expected them in internal memory, so I moved my bus schedules back. I may just not have figured out how to point it to the SD card--it accesses the one in my phone with no problem. But it's not really an issue.

Anyway, I now have lots of space to play with. I also want to hook the tablet up to the computer and see if it recognises the SD card as a disk. Okay, I'm going to play with tech for a bit. Hope you had a good week. I'm so glad it's Friday. I'll write later.

I ordered

a micro SD card for my tablet today, with a price that was much better than the phone store and also includes an adapter and USB card reader for essentially free, given the price of the other cards alone. I also figured out how to take the tablet out of the case (the guy in the store had put it on) and get the door open on the back to see where to put said card. It should be here in 3-5 days. I love Amazon, despite my earlier post. I also ordered a couple of books, Elizabeth Peters' A River in the Sky which is now a bargain book, and I have it on the Kindle, but I have all the others in physical format and wanted to add it to my collection, as well as Jack Vance's Tales of the Dying Earth, which I have never read but which came highly recommended through YKWIA. I haven't bought any non-Kindle books from Amazon in awhile.

Speaking of YKWIA, he told me a story about a friend of his today that just made me sigh and shake my head in disbelief. She was in an accident before the holidays when she was sitting at a stop light and a truck whose driver wasn't paying attention ran right into her. Since she was on the job at the time, workman's comp paid for her therapy. But they were tired of doing so, and even though her physical therapist and doctor agree she needs two more months to get her stamina back, the workmans' comp people sent her to a doctor of their choosing who didn't even examine her, only asked a couple of questions, and then filled out paperwork that got them off the hook. That's wrong. But then there was what followed...she was at home and heard the mail carrier honk a horn a couple of times and went down to the mailbox. She had a certified letter she had to sign for. Inside the envelope were two things. One was a birthday card wishing her a happy day and expressing how great it was to work with her. The other was a termination notice. Really? That has got to be the tackiest thing I've heard in awhile.

10 reasons I'm glad I didn't settle for a Kindle Fire

That's a little inflammatory, I know. Lots of people have Kindle Fires, and love them dearly. I know I feel the same way about my Kindle 2. But every device has good and bad points about them, and each one should be evaluated for what the individual needs and will use it for. I know several people with Kindle Fires, of various technological abilities. Some ordered them the first day they were available. Others got them as gifts. Some ordered them without really looking at the requirements first. I've played with three different Fires hands-on, briefly, but even before it came out I determined that they would not fit my needs and instead pursued (and finally, with my tax return,) got a T-Mobile SpringBoard, which is also a 7" tablet, is overall more expensive, although I put up less money up front than a Fire, but in my opinion, the extras were worth it. So here are the things I don't like about the Fire, with the caveat that I am comparing it to what I eventually went with.

1. Wi-fi: The Kindle Fire is wi-fi dependent. Sure you can download material, watch movies, do cloud browsing--but only in a wi-fi network. I am almost never in one, except at the public library (and then I'm usually looking for books). We have a public one at work, but we're not supposed to use it. I don't have a wi-fi network at home. I've had trouble troubleshooting Fires because there was no way to access, say, a video to see if the volume was really okay without going onto a network. One person I know ordered the Fire without realising this, and had to actually go set up a wi-fi network (or rather, have a family member do it) after she got it. Granted, I pay $20 a month for 4G connectivity, but I can check my e-mail on the bus, look up odd medical terms for a friend while he's on his computer, watch a movie via Netflix at my grandmother's which has no computer, that sort of thing. It was the number one reason I decided the Fire was not for me.
   
2. The button to turn the thing on and off is on the bottom of the device. This means that when I've been holding it against me, I've inadvertently turned it off or made it sleep. Mine's on the side in portrait view, which turns out to be the top if you turn it in landscape.
   
3. The earphone jack is also on the bottom. To be honest yesterday when I was doing the troubleshooting, I wasn't sure whether the jack was an earphone or power switch, and had to look it up in the guide. Many tablets do not charge through a USB cord like a phone, and mine is no exception. The Kindle Fire is. That's not bad, that means you just need a cable and not a charger with you if you'll be around computers, but I wanted to make sure I didn't poke the earphones into the wrong jack, and I didn't like the placement in terms of listening if you're holding it portrait up.
   
4. The carousel: I don't care for it. Give me my five Android screens with widgets and icons that I can instantly go to wherever I want rather than scrolling through whatever the most recent stuff is. This is actually something I dislike about the regular Kindle. I'd rather put my categories in order alphabetically rather than most recent first, and there's no option for that.
   
5. No text-to-speech ability. I use this feature all the time on my Kindle 2, and it's sad that it's not available. It also means the device is less accessible to those with visual issues.
   
6. No camera: I have two cameras, a front-facing one and one on the back. That means if I wanted I could Skype or videochat, which I don't really do since I have no one to do it with. But I can scan information into applications like Google Goggles, and most importantly, I can catalogue my books through the LibraryThing scanner application, something I'm using at work and at home. Yesterday I catalogued 45 books alone, as opposed to doing about that many in a good two-week period.
   
7. Its thickness. The Fire is a thick little tablet, and well, seems a little clunky next to mine, which is slimmer and just a little bigger in the rest of the dimensions. But that's solely aesthetics.
   
8. The lack of customisation. The Fire pretty much looks the same except for the cases regardless of who has it. Oh, the content is different (and I'm learning you can tell a lot from a person by what they have on their Kindle), but the look is pretty much the same carousel. I have five home screens to change wallpapers, icons, widgets, whatever I need, and maybe this is something I just haven't played with enough and I'll get a bunch of comments about how you can put a live wallpaper on a Fire, but I'd still argue that in terms of sheer ability to customise, regular Android tablets and iPads win.
   
9. Which brings us to--Amazon content. Please realise, I am an Amazon girl. I adore Amazon products and customer service. But I can get an application from Amazon (and you should look into their free application a day feature in their store) or from the Amazon market. Sometimes the market has higher versions of the same programs, but they also have many more applications. I can have Netflix on either device, but to get Amazon videos, you need Prime, at $79 a year, which isn't a bad price and comes with 2-day shipping, but I already spend $8 a month on Netflix, so why should I add it? I agree it's brilliant the way they packaged it for their content, and you can get other stuff on there through applications or transferring files, but is primarily a device to deliver Amazon content, and I feel I have the best of both worlds.
   
10. Reading ease: This is go to apply to any tablet, including my own, and is rather a comparison of backlight vs. the eInk of the regular Kindles. If you're going to primarily play games, music, or videos, the Fire's great (I don't include productivity applications--I use a lot of those on my tablet, but really haven't tested them on the Fire). If you want really just to read--get another Kindle. The eInk is easier on the eyes, although you need a regular light source (no reading in the dark in bed with a regular Kindle). But in general, reading, I think, is a more pleasurable experience on a regular Kindle, and there's that text-to-speech issue.

There you have it. Maybe they'll change some of those in forthcoming iterations. And there's lots of good things about the Fire; you just have to decide if it's right for you. There was a news story about how it topped the list of most unused gifts this past holiday season. Some people aren't prepared for it, or lack simple tech know-how. I will say the Fire requires less than a standard Android tablet, so if you're less geeky, it may be better for you. But there you go.