I didn’t even notice the added weight. This just would not have been possible with my purple bike. The basket upfront wouldn’t have had room for all those items, and if I had somehow fit it all in the added weight would have made steering difficult.  Just a another reason why, I LOVE MY NEW BIKE!

Now just to get some cute accessories!

I am putting this down as my “Carry a load on your bike — groceries, etc.” for Part II of the LGRAB Summer Games

I am also reading a fabulous book right now as part of “Read a book about cycling” for Part II of the LGRAB Summer Games.  I am reading “Along for the Ride” and I love it.  It is a great combination of a coming of age tale, romance, and bikes.  I would recommend it to anyone looking for a good readfor any reason and double recommend it  for anyone into biking.

Thanks for the recommendation Dottie

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I have had my new phone for 2 whole days now and I am feel like I have a good feel for it.  So I will share my first impressions of the phone.  I am sure over time some of these will change, but for now, here’s how I like it. (I LOVE it).

Keyboard:
One of the main reasons I wanted the Droid vs other Android phones on the market was because the Droid has a physical keyboard.  After using my enV 2 for two years I had fallen in love with the physical qwerty keyboard and considered it a must in my next phone.  However, as I have started to use the Droid with earnest, I find that I actually prefer the on-screen landscape keyboard for multiple reasons.

First, the physical keyboard is off-center on the device and causes my thumb and wrist on my right hand to cramp and hurt when I attempt to type more than one or two words. Second, the on-screen keyboard has predictive input and corrects my spelling errors.  Neither of these options are available when using the physical keyboard.  Third, the on-screen keyboard has haptic feedback and larger keys than the physical keyboard, which makes it easier for me to type quickly. And lastly, it is quicker and more convenient to simply use the on-screen keyboard.

I am honestly very surprised that I like the on-screen keyboard as much as I do, but for now, I think I will use it the most.

Homepage Screenshot

Launcher/Home:
Having a fellow geek for a husband, who is never happy with the status quo, means I often find out about options for our technology that “typical” users never see.  The Droid is no exception, and Matt quickly found out that you can change the launcher app (aka home screen) on the Droid.  While the original home screen was fun and useful, the Home++ home screen works a lot better for me.

It allows for up to 7 home screens instead of the standard 3, minimizes often used apps such as the phone and browser into smaller buttons that are constant at the bottom of your home screens, and allows you to hide the status bar at the top of the screen to provide more usable space.

Apps:
Like the iPhone, the Droid comes preloaded with an “app store”, the Android Market Place, where you can download thousands of applications. There is pretty much an app for anything you could possibly want to do on your phone and a large percentage of those handy-dandy apps are free.  The Market Place is also quite easy to use and installing applications is amazingly simple.  The Droid even sends you a friendly notification to let you know your download has completed, your app is installed, and allows you to open it up immediately.

I have used it to install multiple twitter apps, a flickr app, a ping.fm app, and a weather app and to update existing apps on the phone.  I am sure as I continue to use the phone and delve deeper into the market place, I will find even more useful apps.

Photo take with the Droid. Click to view full-size and see the blurriness

Camera:
The Droid  comes equipped with a 5 megapixel camera that offers auto-focus and a flash. However, whether due to user error or software bugs, I have not been able to take many pictures I am happy with.  They tend to come out blurry like the camera or subject has moved when the photo was snapped.

I am hoping after some further testing and searching online, I will be able to alleviate this problem.

Email, Contacts, & Calendar:
The Droid synchronizes with Google Contacts, Gmail, and Calendar nearly seamlessly. Your Google contacts are automatically pulled to your phone when you log-in to your Google account and you can manage them both from your phone or desktop computer. The Droid also allows you to merge your Facebook contact data in with this information.  You can choose to add all your Facebook contacts, or do what I did and only add information for contacts already present in your Google contacts list.

The Gmail app has push email so as soon as emails arrive at the Google server they are sent to your phone.  This can be both great and a pain depending on how many emails you get and how interested in seeing them you are.

The Calendar app is quite useful and probably one of my favorite features.  You can view all of your Google calendars and it even imports the colors you have assigned each calendar.  You can choose to view your events in agenda, day, week, or month format and the add event feature is quite comprehensive. I generally do a good job of remembering Matt’s and my schedule from week to week, but it is great to be able to have my calendar with me at all times.

Maps:
The Droid has a native Google Maps app that is amazing.  Not only can you do the typical maps stuff, but it provides GPS-based turn-by-turn voice navigation.  Matt and I tested it out and it is amazingly accurate and can even handle rerouting you if you make a wrong turn.  The voice it uses is a little synthetic, but otherwise it is fabulous.  I had hoped to get a GPS unit for my car this year as I tend to get lost, but the Droid’s Google maps app has totally fulfilled that wish!

Phone Calls:
So far I have done a lot more “playing” with my new phone than actually making phone calls, but what I have seen so far has been good.  There are multiple options for making phone calls, including a dial pad, contacts list, and home screen shortcuts.  The call quality is also great, though part of that may be due to the carrier not the phone itself.  I am also impressed with the speakerphone.  It is loud and clear and the person on the other end can actually understand what I am saying.  With a car dock, this could be a great hands-free setup to use when driving.

Display:
I love the display on the Droid.  It is bright, large, and responds well to touch.  My only complaint so far is fingerprints. I am sure this is a problem with all touch-screen phones, but I feel the need to compulsively clean my phone to remove all the fingerprints.  It is especially noticeable when using the phone in the sunlight.  The glare off the fingerprints can make the screen hard to read.  This is, however, a small price to pay to have such a capable computer at my finger tips (pun intended) virtually everywhere I go.

Facebook:
I would guess one of the most commonly used apps on most smart phones is Facebook.  However, the app on the Droid falls really really short of useful in my opinion.  The notification feature rarely works and almost never refreshes with out a forced refresh and even then it is flaky at best.  Also the news feed only refreshes in 30 minute intervals at the fastest.  In a world where people are carrying around smart phones and updating their status constantly 30 minutes is just not going to cut it.

The app does allow you to take and upload photos directly to your Facebook wall but you can use the camera interface for the same thing.  Or if you prefer you can use a service like ping.fm that allows you to add your photos to multiple sites at once.

I have been so dissatisfied with the Facebook app that I have stopped using it entirely and simply put a bookmark to the Facebook mobile-touch site on my home screen.  While it doesn’t give me nifty system notifications when someone does something exciting on Facebook, it is highly usable and is always up-to-date.

All in all I am highly pleased with my new phone.  It is capable of far more than I have described so far, and I am sure as I continue to use it, I will find more and more reasons to love it.

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Fegan created an ad mimicking the Dodge ad that gives voice to the typical female response.  This makes me very happy.  Check it out for yourself and let me know what you think.

For reference, here is the original ad from Dodge:

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I also started another new knitting project from “One More Skein“.  I am knitting myself a new washcloth using the Pencil Sketch pattern.  I started using one of the knitted washcloths I made for the Co-op sale, and I fell in love.  It is so much nicer than using the store-bought kind, so I am making myself a second.  This way I can actually wash my first washcloth .

The pattern includes a chart, which is not something I am familiar with, and it has been quite a learning experience.  There are definitely some mistakes, but I have learned a lot, and I am very excited to see the finished project.

While I was enjoying the snow and knitting, I also tried out our new Apple TV and the Boxee Beta app to start catching up on LOST episodes. Misleading name aside, the Apple TV is actually a set-top box that allows you to watch TV shows or movies, stream podcasts, listen to music, or view photos all through your television.

Despite a few moments of jerky video, it was a great experience. Using the Apple TV and Boxee, I was able to access Hulu and all 5 seasons of LOST on my TV totally free of cost.   This is especially exciting because Hulu allows you to watch pretty much all of the major TV networks’ shows (everything I watch except American Idol and Survivor is available).

Before we got our Apple TV, I was forced to watch shows on Hulu either by sitting at my desk or hooking up my laptop up to the TV. Now I can easily watch the shows from the comfort of my couch without any added steps.  There are still a few bugs in the system, and the threat of internet outages is a deterant, but I could see this a potential cable tv replacement in the not-so-distant future.

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As a pit bull owner and dog lover myself, I was devastated to hear this.  These two sweet adorable puppies are doomed to life of fear, distrust, and aggression, which they have no control over.  It is both reckless and plain stupid, in my opinion, to train ANY breed of dog to be a guard dog or an aggressive dog.  But, to take a breed of dog already getting a bad rap and further that by training it to be aggressive towards humans is reprehensible.

These people should have their dogs and possibly any children they have removed from their care!

It is irresponsible ownership such as this that has lead to the rise in dog attacks in recent years and caused pit bulls and other “vicious” breeds to be banned from some cities. Pit bulls by their very nature are not aggressive towards humans and many years ago were called nanny dogs for their love of, protection of, and loyalty to their owners children. The aggression that is sometimes seen in the breed these days has been trained there by misguided and careless owners like the two people I came across today.

If properly socialized, well trained, and loved like any other dog, pit bulls are amazing family dogs and are safe with children and adults alike.  However,  when people teach their dogs aggressive behavior either for the purpose of fighting or under the guise of protection, this leads to dangerous situations where a very strong animal can hurt people or other animals.

I am deeply saddened by the fact that there are two more dogs destined for a life of fear and anger.  Dogs of all types are amazingly caring and loving animals who want nothing more than to please their owners.  It is our job as owners to provide them with a safe and loving environment, and those who would train their dogs to be vicious should no longer be allowed the privialge of owning a pet.

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The systems consists of three sheer decorative panels that are attached to three tracks that run the length of our dining room wall.  If we want to use the panels to block the sun, we simply pull them in front of the sliding glass doors where they block the bright light but still allow you to see bits and pieces of the outside.  When they are not being used to block the sun, which is most of the time, they hang in front of our large purple wall next to the sliding doors and act as a decoration.

We are both quite pleased with the final product and enjoy the unique yet practical solution for our light blocking and decorative needs.  Setup of the curtains was relatively easy and only took Matt and I a couple of hours ( and we didn’t even have a fight).  The panels themselves came in 10ft rolls that we cut to the right length and secured to the tracks using panel mounting hardware that allows them to slide.

Our only question now is what length to leave the panels. We currently have them all the same length reaching about four inches from the floor.  This works great when the panels are in front of the door; however, we have baseboard heat, and the panels now hang in front of one of our heaters, and we are concerned this may be a fire hazard once we start using the heat again.  One solution is to shorten the panels so they are all above the heater but at varying lengths.  We think this would have a cool visual effect while still providing plenty of coverage on our sliding door.

What do you think?

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So, we were faced with the challenge of finding a way to get fresh vegetables without growing them in our own backyard.  The only two options that seemed worth considering were growing vegetables ourselves in a community garden space or joining a CSA (community supported agriculture) program.

We had already tried the community garden space here last summer to augment our backyard garden, and lets just say we were less than impressed.  Most everything we grew was devoured by local wildlife, and what didn’t get eaten was choked out by weeds that were impossible to keep up with.  Not to mention the hassle of remembering to drive across town to water things.  Apparently plants need to be watered.

Therefore, we decided to go with the CSA.  Kent and Dori Baxter run Abundant Acres Farm just outside of Richmond city limits, and they offer a CSA program. A CSA or Community Supported Agriculture is a program where at the beginning of the growing season people buy shares of the farms crops and livestock and then receive them throughout the season as they are ready.  The upside to this is you are able to get fresh, usually chemical-free vegetables without the time or space required to grow them yourself.  The downside is you have little control over what vegetables you get, if the farm has a bumper crop of red beets, you too have a bumper crop of red beets.

Matt and I paid $633 up front, and we have received various vegetables, 1 whole chicken, and a dozen eggs each week.  We will also receive a turkey at Thanksgiving.  So far we have gotten a wide variety of vegetables, including but not limited to yellow squash, zucchini, green beans, potatoes, tomatoes, beets, cauliflower, carrots, radishes, strawberries, snow peas, and salad greens.  All of them have been great and it has really pushed us to try new recipes.

It has been doubly convenient for us because the food has been dropped off at my office every Thursday , so I don’t have to worry about picking it up anywhere. While I still miss doing my own gardening, we will definitely continue to participate in the CSA program as long as we live in our current house.  It is really a great alternative to grocery stores or growing your own.

If you want more information about CSA programs in your area, check out Local Harvest.

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So, this morning we set out for the post office and received a small nondescript package postmarked Shanghai, China.  Still stumped!  So we ripped it open as we were walking to the car, and it turned out to be a Saxo Bank bicycling jersey and padded shorts in sizes medium and small respectively, with no note or invoice. Even more stumped.

Neither of us ordered these items and quite honestly both of us are bicycle commuters who have little to no use for such clothing.  We immediately called any of our family and friends who could have possibly sent the items to us, and no one has any idea where they might have come from.

Seeing that we had the mystery clothes, we of course each tried them on hoping that it might at least clear up who they were meant for.  The small shorts were far too small on me but seemed to fit Matt fine, while the medium top fit both of us. Further stumped!

To make matters even more confusing, these are NOT cheap bicycling clothes.  Matt did a quick google search, and they were $80 a piece.  He did, however, find sets on ebay (sold in China) for much less that are most likely knock offs.

So, we are left wondering, where did these clothes come from, who were they intended for, are they the real deal or knock offs, and what on earth should we do with them.

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As before, I am sure some of it will be an outlet for my strong opinions on life in general, but I would also like to think I will blog about things that people find useful or at the very least entertaining.  Otherwise, why would any one ready in the first place.

I would also like to write some about some of my new interstes including knitting, which Ijust can’t get enough of, and biking.  I am currently embroiled in multiple knitting projects, including but not limited to a sweater for myself, a baby sweater for friends in VA, a herring bone scarf for Matthew, a set of wash clothes for my mother in law, and a baby blanket for Loops of Love.  Needless to say it takes up a lot of my free  and not so free time.

I have also started biking more regularly thanks to a wonderful purple bike Matt found at a yardsale.  My current goal is to ride to work at least once a week.  It has been quite fun and a great way to squeeze in some excercise in my already full schedule.

So, if there is still someone out there paying attention to my, as of late neglected blog, I am back.  i will continue to blog about my life as a geek, knitting enthusiest, part-time bike commuter, extrovert, wife (pastor’s wife, if you must), friend, first time home owner, lover of stupid internet videos, and complexly unique individual.

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