Thoughts on “Economic Stimulus”

I came across this great quote on American Thinker:

In the House Republicans' meeting with Obama on January 27^th, Maryland's sole Republican Congressman, Roscoe Bartlett, said it best:

"Mr. President, I probably come at this from a slightly different perspective. I remember when FDR beat Hoover in 1932. So I remember the Great Depression very well. I don't remember any of the many government programs affecting the course of the Depression. Government programs didn't work then; I don't know why we think they would work now. Mr. President, I think our obsessive borrowing has fully mortgaged my kids and my grandkids. Now we're working on mortgaging my two great-grandkids. Mr. President, I think it's more than a little bit selfish to try to solve our economic problems which we created by burdening future generations yet to be born

Here’s the article: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/01/republicans_won.html

Yeah, it’s a little pointed. It’s a little republican biased. But that quote is spot on.

Windows Media Center in Windows 7

I like the new “Now Playing” view in WMP in Windows 7:

Visualization with the controls and album art overlaid on top.  The controls appear when the mouse comes near (even when the window doesn’t have focus).

It’s the little spit-and-polish things like this that help to make a cohesive unified experience.  It just makes the OS feel much more complete.

More New Taskbar Goodness

Take a look at this:

In the WMP preview of the new taskbar there are previous, play/pause, and next controls for media.  That works for me a lot better than the previous WMP toolbar mini-player thingy that existed in XP/Vista.

Note: my screenshot didn’t capture the mouse pointer, but it’s hovering over the next button.

Windows 7 Personalization

Here’s some links for Windows 7 themes and such:

Microsoft provides some nice resources:

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/Windows7/Personalize

ithinkdifferent has a bunch of apple-ish ones, too:

http://www.ithinkdiff.com/windows-7-themes/

 

Grass is probably my favorite so far, sorry for the rip Apple fanboys!

Windows 7 and Windows Mobile

I was kind of confused that my Windows 7 beta installation didn’t support Windows Mobile out of the box, but good news: Windows Mobile Device Center for Vista will install and work just fine under Windows 7.  Syncs everything just great, including media.  This was the important part for me, since everything else goes through my company’s Exchange Server anyway.

Windows 7

Okay, I’ll admit it, I am definitely an early adopter.  And like most nerds I tend to go after flashy stuff.  So it should come as no great surprise to the esteemed reader that I am running the recently released beta of Windows 7.

This isn’t a new phenomenon for me, I started running Windows Vista when it was at Beta 2, and Office 2007 when it was in Beta.  Inevitably when a beta of a major OS is announced, I fire up my MSDN account ad start downloading it, “just to try it out” I tell myself.  I usually like it.

Enough to never go back.  I ran vista all the way through it’s Beta and Release Candidate stages on my personal laptop while I was in school, and put it on my work computer here as soon as I got my MSDN subscription.  The only reason my home computer isn’t running Vista is that the hardware kind of chokes on it (it’s an 8 year old machine).

Anyway, some first thoughts on Windows 7:

• Everything looks very familiar.  I had heard that Windows 7 would be very much a Windows Vista redux, and that’s the way it seems.  Aero looks the same, icons are the same, programs look the same, nothing like the jump from XP to Vista, or 95/98 to XP for that matter.
• The new taskbar is AWESOME. So full of win.  I like that the icon backgrounds become statusbars when an operation is completing (like downloading a file in IE).  And the new Aero Peek is nice, although it takes a little getting used to.
• Flip3D is still there. Meh.
• No Sidebar! Sidebar Gadgets function like desktop widgets now. That’s usually what I would do in Vista, anyway.
• User themes!  No more using VistaGlazz etc. to patch uxtheme.dll and whatnot.  Just download the theme and it gets applied.
More to come later, and yes, I’ll post screenshots.

Getting back on the Wagon

So, I have let a lot of things slip lately.  In the quest to “Get Back On Track” and “Be The Best I Can Be” and <insert other cliché here>, I’m back to writing this blog.

One of the other things I am doing is focusing on improving my physical shape (I like to call it Cam 2.0).  Technically, this started at New Year’s Day, but today is the first time I have been back to the gym in quite some time (months).  I took it pretty easy, 20 minutes on the bike for some cardio and warm-up, and then some easy weight lifting.  I really had to work to keep myself from going overboard, I want to do my max every time I pick up the weights.

This week I will take it pretty easy and try to help my body remember what it’s like to go to the gym.  Next week I’ll start the more intense lifting.  My goal: 200 lbs. by June 1.

I had better get back to work.  That’s another thing I’m working on, my focus, which leaves me less time to screw around (that’s a good thing).

And this lunch that my wife made for me is dang good.  Thanks Babes!