All posts in everyday

otterbox.

By On 08.09.09 In everyday With 1 Comment Permanent Link to otterbox.Permalink

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Tomorrow marks my first day as the graphic designer at OtterBox in Old Town, Fort Collins. They make all sorts of cases and protection for portable devices like the iPhone, Blackberry, and iPod. I’ll be heading up most of the design, branding, and advertising, in addition to doing product photography and some videography work. I’m a little reluctant to give up the freedoms that come along with freelancing, but I’m confident that OtterBox will be a great place to work. Wish me luck!

p1010656

For my last day of freedom, I decided to plant a tree in the yard. I planted it in the side yard… the “dog area.” A previously rather bleak area of gravel. I’ve been wanting to add some life and shade over there, this seemed like a great opportunity. The tree marks my fresh start. For those interested, I decided on a Washington Hawthorne. I had marked it two years ago in a Colorado xeriscaping book. It has “persistent” tiny berries, 2-3″ thorns (you can see a few on the right side, lower branches near the trunk), and turns a nice red in the Fall.

the boss.

By On 04.11.09 In everyday With 1 Comment Permanent Link to the boss.Permalink

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Last night marked my fourth time seeing Springsteen. He’s getting up there in age, but man, he still rocks out something fierce! The man can swing his Fender around his neck on its strap, and play it as it swings back around. Hard to explain, but astonishing to see. Every time I’ve seen, you wonder if it’s his last tour, but there we were again. Excellent show to say the least.

just add water – pt. 2

By On 05.25.08 In everyday With 1 Comment Permanent Link to just add water – pt. 2Permalink

The landscaping finally got finished (for the most part) last week. I wouldn’t exactly say it was “just add water” any more though. The last week our landscaper was here, I was putting in just as many hours helping out as they were; moving rock, finishing the patio, planting, installing gate hardware, fiddling with the irrigation system, etc.

Front boulder, from North Dakota Front boulder, from North Dakota
Back yard Garden

All said and done, it was long process with excellent rewards. Over 9 tons of large decorative boulders/rock, 8 tons of the 3″-6″ cobble/river rock around the front yard, and 12 tons of chip seal rock for the dog pen area, well over 50 plants, shrubs, and grasses. The garden features tomatos, peppers, cucumber, peas, beans, lettuce, broccoli, and a sprinkling of herbs. The only thing left to do is hope all the plants/trees survive and a couple of straggling plants that still need to hit the dirt. I had two frosty nights after the initial wave of planting; lost a butterfly bush and several shrubs suffered severe foilage damage. Hopefully they come back.

Garden w/ dog area Front Front walk w/ Blood grass
Front at night Front at night Back at night

where.

By On 05.18.08 In everyday With 1 Comment Permanent Link to where.Permalink

Where We Do What We Do. A pretty neat site where creative’s and geeks across the world post images of their workspace. It gets a little addictive flipping through the photos, so be careful.

Via Veerle

just add water – pt 1.

By On 04.18.08 In everyday With No Comments Permanent Link to just add water – pt 1.Permalink

In ya go. Ditch Witch.
Continued from git er dun.

Progress is a little slow getting started here, but we have four huge trees in the ground and trenches dug for the sprinkler and drainage systems. The trees are Spring Snow. These are almost fully mature (8-9 years old) that you can’t come by very often (or for the deal we got on them). I feel giddy and a little sorry that our trees are easily the biggest in the whole neighborhood. Most everyone else planted spindly four-footers that more resemble a weed than a tree. The neighbor directly behind us has a similar variety of tree, but at half the size. It’s amusing that one day I had a dirt lot, the next we have instant trees. I was a bit worried about their size and ability to withstand the replanting abuse, but the landscaper isn’t worried about them at all. In any case he warranties them for a year regardless.

error.

By On 04.16.08 In everyday With 2 Comments Permanent Link to error.Permalink


In the past month I have experienced more product and software failures, errors, and stuff just plain not working right than any person should ever. Everyday something new is f*cked up.

1. Sony XDCAM EX1: Yes, my brand-spankin’-new camera had to ship out to San Jose to have Sony techs fix multiple problems with the lens and camera. Including the fact that they won’t let users update the camera’s firmware, you must send it in. Blasphemy!

2. MacBook Pro: OS X Leopard (10.5.2) shipped on my shiny new laptop a few weeks ago, which included the latest updates from Apple, one of which caused system freezing due to a graphics driver issue. The machine would freeze randomly while I was feverishly trying to finish the tradeshow booth graphics for Integro. Luckily, I had the original release disc of Leopard (10.5.0) which didn’t include this erroneous update; had to reinstall the entire system.

3. Canon MP530 printer: April 14th, tax day-eve, trying to print my returns to get them in the mail… “Error U150 – Check Ink M.” Hmm, the magenta cartridge is brand-new, full. Apparently, it’s a known problem with Canon ink cartridges; the little electronic chip on the cartridge dies, rendering the cartridge dead, thus rendering the entire printer (and all it’s 5 “multi-functions) dead at the same time until you replace the rogue cart. Sigh. And of course I don’t have an extra magenta cartridge sitting around.

4. Belkin Vision N wireless router: Two days ago, this dumb thing decides it will just shut off completely whenever it feels like it. If you unplug it and plug it back in, it will startup and come on for a while, only to die again when it feels bad; sometimes not even making it through the startup process. An emergency trip to Best Buy for an Apple Airport Extreme gets me back online.

5. Western Digital 500gb drive: DoA when I took it out of the safe to do a backup. I keep dupes of all my info/drives and store them in a water/fire proof safe. This poor drive decided his time had come, even though he was less than 2 years old. Another emergency trip to Best Buy; I just can’t sleep at night knowing I only have one copy of over a decade of photographs and design work.

6. Apple Motion 3: Installed it and the whole Final Cut Studio 2 to start work on motion graphics piece for Integro. Motion just won’t play nice. It quits randomly too. I have no recourse, just lost work and time. Waiting for an Apple update to fix it.

7. DirecTV HD DVR: The whole DirecTV experience has been less than stellar, but this DVR box is just the icing. You only have about a 50/50 chance of your recorded program actually being watchable. Sometimes stuff won’t play at all, sometimes a half-hour show will be recorded as like 23 hours long, or sometimes they switch the channels on you and then programs just flat out won’t record. The best though is I restart the box when it’s misbehaving and it will randomly delete about half of the stuff you have recorded. This is a big deal for us because we never watch live tv; usually just recordings from Nat. Geographic or Discovery, sans commercials.

8. APC UPS battery backups: I’ve went through three of these in as many weeks. I bought a new one for more office; turned out it hummed and whined loud enough to be heard down the hall. Totally not able to work in the same room as it. After about 25 messages back and forth with APC customer support, a new unit arrived on my doorstep. Quiet, finally. Then the battery backup I use in the basement for my big printer started freaking out. It would audibly click-click-click for hours at a time, stopping randomly. Until finally it died one night, issuing a deafening flatline tone at like 3am. I left it unplugged for a few days and decided to plug the printer into the regular outlet, sans UPS protection for now. It will need replaced.

I’m pretty sure I have more, but that’s all I can think of right now. It amazes me who as technology “improves,” reliability decreases. Look at our fancy automobiles, computers, cell phones, and equipment all around; you’re lucky if it works reliably as it should without any quirks, bugs, or problems.

snort.

By On 03.05.08 In everyday With 1 Comment Permanent Link to snort.Permalink

Strange fact of the day (from WIRED magazine):

You may have enough cocaine in your wallet to attract a drug-sniffing dog. Studies indicate that blow can be found on between 70 and 100 percent of US bills. Of course, that doesn’t necessarily mean your greenbacks were used to snort the stuff. ATM mechanisms quickly spread the dust across the entire money supply.

what cancer?

By On 01.24.08 In everyday With No Comments Permanent Link to what cancer?Permalink

Mutant Strawberry

It’s not a wonder cancer is ravaging our country when our genetically-modified, pesticide-ridden produce looks like this. And this is supposed to be a healthy food. Not saying this mutant berry is going to kill you, but it’s a pretty obvious sign that nothing is what it seems anymore. We are introducing chemicals and treatments into the food chain that just aren’t meant to be there.

roomba.

By On 01.23.08 In everyday With 2 Comments Permanent Link to roomba.Permalink

Roomba.

No matter how smart he makes you think he is, never leave him alone with a stack of papers within reach.

hopi.

By On 01.20.08 In everyday With No Comments Permanent Link to hopi.Permalink

Hopi bracelet.

I picked up this impressive hand-crafted Hopi bracelet yesterday in downtown Fort Collins. It’s a small shop named Meanwhile Back at the Ranch that deals exclusively in handmade Native American jewelry and art; everything from turquoise encrusted rings and necklaces to woven rugs and engraved pottery. This bracelet will join my growing collection of other Native American jewelry.

The shop owner explained to me that the corn stalk in the middle of the design signifies prosperity; the zigzags on either side are lightning; the spiral next to that, a tornado; the rounded shape with the tiny dot in it is a cloud, and there is rain falling from the cloud, which can barely be seen in this shot. I don’t know how much of that is actually true, nor do I really know what it means, or if the scene signifies anything. Perhaps it’s just a great looking design that the craftsman had fun with, knowing an oblivious American like myself would buy it. I’d like to think it has special meaning, but I’m happy wearing it anyway.

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