Month: August 2006

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Plasmas beat out sports cars and diamonds

It appears that if guys want to really score with chicks these days, you’re better off going for technology than you are for the bling in order to woo(buy) her love.

Diamonds are no longer a girl’s best friend, according to a new study that found three of four women would prefer a new plasma TV to a diamond necklace.  […]

The Girls Gone Wired survey of 1,400 women and 700 men aged 15 to 49, which was conducted by market researcher TRU, found that given the choice, women would opt for tech items rather than luxury items like jewelry or vacations.

The study found 77 percent of women surveyed would prefer a new plasma television to a diamond solitaire necklace and 56 percent would opt for a new plasma TV over a weekend vacation in Florida.

Even shoes lost out. The study found 86 percent would prefer a new digital video camera to a pair of designer shoes.  [wired]

Interesting that TV’s win out here.  You can get something that would make her want to stay inside and be a couch potato versus going out and actually doing something fun out of the home.  On the other hand, it is Florida we’re talking about here.  I might want to stay home and watch Anderson Cooper report live as yet another hurricane slams into the sunshine state in high-def.  I also feel like I should be making a correlation here of this to obesity rates and laziness.

Still, and I think Rebecca would agree with me, we’ll take a trip before we toss down money on a flat panel TV.  Tech can be cool, but memories last a life time.  So does screen burn in on a plasma.

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Getting clear on the whole story

I was checking out BlogCritics today and found this post about Charles Whitman[wiki]. He’s a guy that I had always known about, but never knew who he was. You know what I mean? There are things you know that happened in history, but you never know the whole story.

Here in Austin this was a big day in the media, though not one recognized nationwide. Forty years ago today a troubled ex-Marine named Charles Whitman climbed the clock tower of the University of Texas administration building and began to gun down students and passersby on the south and west malls of the University and on nearby Guadalupe Street.

Before heading to the University Whitman had killed his mother and his wife in their home, leaving behind a detailed suicide note with instructions to give his estate to psychological research and do an autopsy to determine if there was something physically wrong with his brain. As it turned out there was a tumor in his hypothalamus which may have been pressing on his amygdala and altering his emotional state.

He was able to get a footlocker and a small wooden crate full of guns into the building and to the top of the 27-story tower, including a Remington 700 rifle with a hunting scope, an M1 Carbine, another rifle, a shotgun and a variety of small arms. He started firing at 11:48 and ultimately killed 16 people and wounded another 31. [blogcritics]

Weird part is that I’ve been to Austin for SXSW and seen that tower. I never knew that’s where this event took place. You see this story copied into TV shows and movies all the time. It’s a morbid thought, but now I’ve got the facts a little more straight.

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Audacity is great when it works

I’ve been fighting with editing a bunch of audio that we recorded in Stanley Park over the weekend. It’s something that I’ve wanted to do for a long time, and Rebecca was happy to accompany on a little adventure through the park, on and off the trails. We had a lot of fun and got lots of great stuff recorded, but it’s not that I am fighting with the pains of editing it all.

I’ve become comfortable with editing within Audacity when it comes to projects like this. However, I got bit by not living by my own mantras, “save and save often.”

I was nearly three quarters of the way through everything when Audacity puked and quit. And from beginning edit to where I was, I hadn’t saved a thing. Heartbreak doesn’t even begin to describe it. It’s more along the lines of constant profanity for a good fifteen minutes. I’m fighting with starting over, and it’s so depressing.

After the meltdown, I got curious and decided to check on the latest news about Audacity. If you’re strapped for cash, it doesn’t get better than using this program to edit because it’s completely free. It’s fairly powerful with what it can do, but you have to really master it until you become comfortable. I’ve used my fair share of applications to edit audio, so the task wasn’t overly daunting. Obviously, it can’t always be relied upon for it’s stability.

It’s been stuck at the same version for a while now. There is a newer, beta version going through the trial process, but that has been a constant for a good number of months. This is open source development at its best. One can’t expect things to be done at an incredible rate when there isn’t a lot of money to be exchanged. Just make it more stable, guys. That would be great, mmmkay?