I love technology

It's amazing how much the world has changed over the last ten years or so. When I was in college, waaay back in the late 90s, I lived about sixty miles from my girlfriend (who is now my wife). The only way to really keep in touch was via telephone. I'm not talking about the fancy i-phones of today. These phones had a cord that attached to the base of a wall, and that was hooked up to miles of copper wire that stretched across the country. Back then we had this thing called "long distance." The sixty miles between me and my girlfriend was considered "long distance." This meant that to talk to her via the telephone, I had to pay something like 25 cents every minute to speak to her, and we often had very long conversations. My phone bill would usually be at least 100 dollars a month. We had to restrict our communication with each other, making sixty miles seem very far. Also, I had no car to visit her with, and sixty miles is a long way to ride your bicycle.

My family (who lived about 45 miles away) seemed even farther away, because there was no way I was going to waste 25 cents a minute on them, when I couldn't even afford to spend it on my girlfriend! Sure, there was email, but that involved going to a computer lab, logging into a UNIX terminal, and (usually the kicker) the person you wanted to talk to having an email address of their own.

Today, cell phones and the proliferation of the Internet have changed the definition of "long distance." My wife and I share two cell phones that we pay a combined $50 dollars a month for, and we can talk for as long as we want, no matter where we are. (You can't get plans that cheap any more, so we are going to have these Florida numbers for a while). When we lived in Fort Lauderdale, 1300 miles away from our families, we could call, email, and instant message them all the time. While we only got to see them in person two or three times a year, all these communication options made 1300 miles seem not that much farther than 45 miles did back in college.

Today I got to experience another benefit of all this technology. I'm in Chicago, probably fewer than 200 miles from my wife and daughter. Today is Monday, and I won't be home again to see them until Wednesday. Now, Adelaide is only six months old, so when her mom gives her the phone to "Say hi to Daddy," I talk to her, but on the other end I can only hear the sounds of her trying to fit the phone into her mouth.

Tonight Abee and I got on MSN Messenger, and used its webcam call feature, which is basically the same way people talk to each other between their ships on Star Trek. We've done this a few times before, but today Adelaide was able to recognize me on the computer screen. I talked to her and her face lit up, as if to say "hey, I remember you from somewhere!" Then I played peek-a-boo with her, hiding behind my hands. She laughed. My six month old baby could see and hear and play with me from 200 miles away, and I got to see her laugh. I miss her and Abee a lot when I am on trips, and what happened today really made my day. I love technology.

Not fair to either of us

Adelaide is six months old now, and has yet to fall asleep on her own. She either requires to be nursing, on a car ride, or being rocked by her daddy (me). Now that she has cut her first two teeth (and is over her very first cold), we've decided it's time to try to lay her down to sleep by herself. Most parents will tell you that this involves some crying for the first few times you try it. I thought I was prepared. I was not.

Now, one of my favorite things to do with my baby girl is rock her to sleep. And by "rock," I don't mean quietly in a rocking chair. I mean the other kind of rock. And by that, I don't mean a large stone either. When Adelaide gets sleepy, I take her into the basement and turn on some music. I usually turn on something soft like Collective Soul or Billy Joel, and I have Windows Media Player set to display colorful patterns across the screen as the music plays. Then I turn the lights down and "dance" with her, holding her in my arms, humming or singing along with the music. She usually stares at the screen, mesmerized, and after a few songs, her head is resting comfortably on my shoulder, her eyes closed.

I've been doing this since the week she came home from the hospital. It's one of the warmest and most bonding activities we have together, and she has grown to love it too. When we sit in front of the computer and I pick the songs, she gets excited, her arms waving about. Sometimes I hold her up on my lap, and we have some fun with her dancing before I take her up into my arms.

Anyway, today I almost made a huge mistake. Following our new philosophy, I saw her getting tired, so I cued up some Collective Soul on her mp3 player (it has a built-in speaker), and laid her in her crib. She protested a little at first, but I laid on the bed across the room from her, telling her it's ok and shushing her. After fifteen agonizing minutes went by, her tears were running back into her ears. Her pleading cries seemed to say "Daddy! I miss you! I'm all alone in here! I haven't seen you in four days! I need you to hold me!"

I couldn't take it any more. Why should it have to be this way? They're only little for so long, and before you know it, they're going on dates and having kids of their own (hopefully with a wedding somewhere in between). Why should I deprive myself of something I love to do with my daughter? Why should I deprive her of it as well, when I know that some day she will not need me in this way? Well forget it! I'm going to dance with my baby girl every night she needs help getting to sleep, until she decides to tell me with her own voice that she no longer wishes me too. And if that time doesn't come until she's 29, then that's just fine with me.

"I'm a White Sox fan, Ma'am"

About 30 seconds into this video of CNN interviewing revelers in Grant Park, is something that made me smile. Yes, there are indeed TWO baseball teams in Chicago!



(If you can't see the video - I had some issues with Firefox - just click on the post title above.)

Also, note the hat:

"I have not met an audiophile who hasn't been an @sshole."

First of all, I don't consider myself an audiophile. However, I admit that, like audiophiles, I am extremely picky when it comes to many things whose quality can be somehow intangibly measured, such as buffalo sauce, hi-def TV picture quality, and the degree of realism in Microsoft Flight Simulator. I came across the above quotation while reading a Maximum PC article on whether or not different MP3 bit rates have a measurable effect on the quality of the converted source material (the article was mostly inconclusive as far as I could tell). Below the article, as is the current trend these days, there was a space for "ordinary people" to leave their comments. Some of the posters had gotten into a discussion about whether or not vinyl records were of better quality than CDs. Apparently one reader became fed up with the discussion. Here is the full comment:

"I have not met an audiophile who hasn't been an @sshole.

they like all other tech cultists, (Apple devotees, and Volkswagen cultisti just to name a few) are insufferable to be around.

if you actually can hear the difference between them....good for you....you must be a miserable human to be constantly disappointed in life."

The comment made me laugh, even though it made out to insult some personality traits that I possess. Though I am by no means an Apple devotee, the VW part ironically reinforces the fact that I could be lumped into this group. Therefore, as one of these "insufferable, miserable human beings," I feel it is my duty to clear some things up for the rest of you.

My brother knows that I actually spend more time tweaking my PC and my game settings to make them "just right" than I do actually playing the games themselves. My wife and other close family members see how I get when things do not meet my expectations, and they know it when they hear me sigh. I'm sure it bothers Abee the most, since she has the most exposure to it. She probably wonders how a person could possibly live life like this, and probably stays awake at night pitying me.

So, to Abee and to all who pity and otherwise think that I (and other perfectionists) lead a miserable existence: don't worry! We actually like being this way! The mild (yet frequent) disappointment that comes each and every time our expectations are not met, is far overshadowed by the satisfaction and pride we feel when everything falls into place. In addition, you should be thankful that there are those like us out there, who keep pushing to make things better, because there is no such things as "good enough." Without us, how would you know that your home theatre receiver is in the wrong surround mode, or that the tires on your car appear to be about 2-3 psi too low, that your desktop wallpaper is incorrectly sized in proportion to your computer monitor? You wouldn't even know half of the things that you are missing, or how to make them better. We've done all the hard work for you. So, on behalf of perfectionists everywhere, you're welcome.

It's like a haunted house for your PC

DOOM 3 is a game that came out about four years ago. It's a modernized retelling of the original DOOM that came out in 1994. I bought the game in early '05 from a friend who finished it shortly after it came out, and it has been sitting in my collection, along with many other games, ever since. Since I finished Half-Life 2: Episode 2 the other week, I decided that Halloween was the perfect time to finally play Doom 3. I'm maybe 25% through the game after a week, and I have to say I guessed right. Doom 3 is a very dark, scary, spooky game. The game still looks great even by today's standards, and the use of sparse lighting, tight confines, and sinister, grotesque monsters make it a lot of fun to play in the dark. I'm sorry it took me so long to get around to it, but there's that whole "real life" thing that kept getting in the way. That and my Freelancer addiction that lasted a couple years.