Nothing going on

Just about each morning I stop by here and see if anything is going on.  There really isn't a reason to as this blog doesn't have a following and doesn't inspire conversation, but it's like picking up a diary and reading the last entry... it reminds me that I talk about what ever is on my mind.

When I see the last post at any given time it will remind me of what I had just talked/written about and will often inspire me to write something else.

Well... for the past couple weeks I haven't had much on my mind.  I see the last two posts I wrote (about Ginger and my new work watch) and see them as materialistic.  I don't mind materialism, but would like to think I'm deeper than that.

I normally write about an upcoming event... but there isn't much I'm currently looking forward too.  Short term, we're still a little short staffed at work and I can't get the days off.  Longer term, I'm in a holding pattern.  It's either too far away or I'm waiting on other people.  Watching the news will often bring up a subject that I want to parse out... writing about it helps me define my own feelings... but there isn't much news to get me thinking.  So.... I'm going to write up a quick little 'nothing' post.  At the very least, when I read this years later I'll be able to look at the last couple weeks of July 2015 and see that it was a calm time.

'Super Space Car'

I've had Ginger for four and a half months now.  I'm now over the 'new' aspect of her.  I've put over 10,000 miles on her, given her an oil change, driven her down to Texas and back, and have just now set up an appointment for her first recall (something about steering mounting bolts).

Now just because she's not 'new' doesn't mean I've fallen out of love with her.  I talked awhile back about how my love for her has lost the 'passion' that I had for Fiona.  And that's still true.  I don't go ga-ga over Ginger the same way I did with Fiona.  She can still make me smile, but it's more of an appreciation that she's the right car for me, rather than her being a special car for someone.
Why is she the right car for me?  She's roomy.  She's techy.  She's stylish.  She's quality.  She gets amazing gas mileage (for as big as she is). Those things are not easy to get all together, and are all very important to me.  But as 'right' as she is for me, she's just not on my mind all the time.  I'm not as eager to talk about her as I was Fiona (even after having Fiona for over a year).  But when she does come up in a conversation... well it's always a good thing.

Dumbed It Down

So I finally pulled the trigger and got a new dumb watch.  I settled on the Vestal Digital Doppler watch.  I had several others in contention, but like many dumb watches out there, they just aren't worth talking about.

I like watches.  I think they are a good combination of style and functionality, and seeing what someone has on their wrist can say a lot about them.  For example at work I see many of the officers have a simple leather/leatherette/rubber banded digital watch.  It's easy to look at, it can generally display in 24 hour time, and it can take a beating.

Most of the nurses have standard 'clock style' watches with metal bands.  The metal bands are far better when you have to get them wet (washing hands) many times a day.  And the clock style is great because they almost all have an easy to read seconds hand.

Style wise... well there are some people at work who care about the style of their watch, but most don't.   At least the ones that I've talked to about it.  Obviously I feel that the perfect combination of style/functionality is the Pebble Steel.  It just looks classically good, and with the faces I have for it, has GREAT functionality.  But we all know how that's going down.  I still don't see a future where they allow it.

Streaming Music?

I've talked about how I get my music (mostly iTunes).  How I explore for new music (movies, television, commercials, rarely online radio at work...), and in my last music post I talked about how I play music (my iPod and my phone).

For the most part, I assumed I was being high tech.  I know people that still get CDs.  I have a friend who's introduction to digital music was getting a car with an internal hard drive.  He would rent CDs from the library and rip them right into his car... leaving him with a good selection of music that will go away whenever he ditches that particular car!  So sharing my music between the computer, the iPod, and my phone was still rather cutting edge... at least I thought so until I listened to a podcast from Wired magazine.

It seems that the new 'it' thing in music is streaming services.  Google Play Music, Spotify, Pandora, Amazon Prime, and of course the new gorilla in the line up... Apple Music.  Here's what I 'knew' about these services before the podcast:

• You could use them for free.  You would have limited selections to start from and there would occasionally be commercials.  You could skip a song or two, but eventually you'd be prevented from skipping.  
• On the Free tier you could select a particular song to start from, but it wouldn't play that actual song. 
• If you paid for the service, you could get more skips, you would get no (or at least less) commercials.  You could also be more specific or general in your streaming... say you want chill 70's singer-song-writer guitar heavy songs.  
• And.... that's about all I knew.

Constitutional Questions

Happy Independence Day!

Yeah Yeah... I'm posting this on the 5th, but I was doing the whole 'family' thing on the 4th and this is the first opportunity to post.

Before I get into constitutional or political quandaries, lemme go over the holiday.  It was a rare holiday as both of my brothers and I had the day off.  R gets every weekend off, I get every other weekend off, but B normally works on Saturdays.  So having a Saturday holiday with all of us is quite rare.

We spent the day and grilled at my Aunt's house.  I'm sure I've said before, but my Mother and my Aunt always make too much food for the holiday meals.  I don't think they can quite come to terms that they make a LOT of great food and that it's just not reasonable for them to make everybody's favorite dishes.  Nor can they come to the conclusion that they aren't feeding the 15 people that we had before.  This year was large... 10 of us... but they still cooked as if feeding a small army.  We had burgers and dogs on the grill (this included my brother's chicken burgers), corn fresh off the cob, fried potatoes, baked beans, potato salad, taco salad, and tortilla chips and queso.  They really reigned it in for desert as we 'only' had strawberry cake, preacher's cake, and blueberry desert (more or less blueberry and whipped topping no-bake cheesecake).