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{ January 09, 2004 }
Some New Year House Cleaning
There has been much going on out there in the real world lately, even though there hasn’t been much going on here. So this is the time to unload a quick recap of all things of interest.
Redesigned Sites
Mr. Zeldman’s site has a new look…again. This one is our most favorite yet. Dan over at Hivelogic hates his newly redesigned site and promises to have another go at it soon. Everyone’s favorite DIY magazine, ReadyMade, has a brand-spankin’ new site up, loaded with new features.
Also on the redesign tip, the new version of this site should be shrink-wrapped and on the shelf sometime in the next week.
Sites New to Me
My brother Peter Santa Maria and his new band The Jukebox Zeros seek to bring rock to the masses, aided by their new website. Blasting you from the past is Retrolouge, stocked with plenty of stuff from the attic. CSS Vault contains a gallery of lovely CSS sites and a collection of CSS resources. We designers are once again made useless by Ready-Made Logos, your one-stop-shop for a company logo that looks just like every one else’s. The Daily Standards highlights and reviews a new standards compliant site each and every working day. 12am is a collective design agency with a very nice little site. Sofia Kinachtchouk is a very good photographer. OurType is a font foundry with some great fonts and a very impressive Flash site.
Randomness
Our short film, Dial-a-Spy, has won two awards as part of the National Film Challenge, Best in Genre for “Spy”, and Best Graphics! We are still patiently awaiting news of which 10 films from the competition will be on the National Film Challenge DVD. Any day now…
I am now the proud owner of a new iPod, not one of the new wee iPod minis, but a manly 20GB one now named Pseudopod. I am quite pleased with it (and am very thankful to those who have gifted it to me). Aside from holding all of my favorite music, it is kind enough to act as a FireWire drive for me to transport all of my work to and fro. With so many programs available for it like PodQuest (which allows you to download driving from MapQuest onto it), the iPod grows more useful daily. Though the iPod has received some bad press lately, I am confident it is merely circumstantial.
Did anyone know that Jonathan Brandis, young heartthrob from from the cross-dressing hit, Ladybugs, and Sidekicks with Chuck Norris, killed himself months ago?! 
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{ December 27, 2003 }
Return of the King
Just a quick bit, since praise of all shapes and sizes has already been dolled out. Return of the King marks the conclusion of one the most ambitious works in film history. The three Lord of the Rings films were shot at once combining enormous scale in terms of sets, props, and detail, as well as groundbreaking special effects (not necessarily new since many of the techniques were perfected before the creation of those new fangled “computers”). Peter Jackson (as well as many talented people including WETA) brought John Ronald Reuel Tolkien’s greatest work to screen with breathtaking realization. I enjoyed Return of the King immensely. The story was very true to the book (one small nit pick being the exclusion of The Mouth of Sauron…who will thankfully be in the Extended Edition) and the acting was spot on. A very good argument could be made for this being the best trilogy ever…
Great great great, ok, I am done stroking this movie off. Go see it if you haven’t, or call me if you are going to see it again.
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{ December 17, 2003 }
Panther and a 20 inch iMac
So long old friend! I have put my old workhorse blue and white G3 tower out to pasture and bought a new Apple 20 inch iMac. I giggled excitedly, not unlike a young schoolgirl, on the arrival of the new box…and to be honest, really haven’t stopped. It truly is a thing of beauty. The screen is gigantic with plenty of real estate for all of your program’s palettes to stretch their legs.
Perhaps the thing I was looking forward to most was being able to open a program without having to go watch a movie while waiting for it to startup. Heaps of RAM, a shiny new 1.8 GHZ processor, and the lovely Mac OS X Panther make me a very happy camper.
I can now finally partake in all of the buzz behind the new OS, including some nice leaps forward like Expose, Font Book (lacking but promising), and the vastly improved Finder. I also grabbed some nice 3rd party gems from the Iconfactory; Pixadex allows you to organize all of your icons iTunes style, and the ridiculously useful (for designers at least) xScope, a suite of tools for all manner of screen information.
A fine purchase, says I! Sure the price tag is a bit higher, but you get what you pay for. Get bent PC nay-sayers, Apple makes a damn fine computer. Now I need to find my old monitor a new home, though quite large and heavy, it comes complete with running water and a spare bedroom.
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{ December 08, 2003 }
A Splendid Day Off
Today I had off. Today my car got towed. Rob was nice enough to drive me to the impound lot. Rob was nicer still to wait with me amidst the lines, yelling people, and inane process of car retrieval. It costs $100 to spring your car from the joint, and an extra $25 for your parking ticket.
If you would like to count yourself among the extremely lucky cool kids, roll like me and score another parking ticket during the same day when you park your car outside of the cell phone store wherein you pay $85 for a new phone to replace the one that mysteriously disappeared this past weekend. After your 5 minutes exchange is up, come out to find a pleasant meter maid, who is predictably uninterested in your day’s sob story, writing you a $35 ticket. Instead he informs you that the time is now 3:31pm. The zone you are parked in becomes a rush-hour-high-volume-area at 3:30pm and you are in the way. Kindly offered him $35 to instead press down on the gas pedal while you lay down in front of your car. Skulk away unceremoniously when he is once again uninterested.
Today’s tally: $245.
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