NikkelNet

This weekend saw yet another glamorous gun show come to Tucson, and I partakethed in the frenzy.  Suffice it to say that damn near all of Tucson showed up to this thing, what with the upcomingrein reinstatement (and worsening?) of the Assault Weapons Ban.

I’ll say this…great place to get ammo for CHEAP.  Got a 1000 rds of Wolf .55 grain FMJ for $270.  Cheapest I’ve ever found it.  Those Russians know how to make it CHEAP.  No problems with it either…I put 500 rds through the AR last month, and not a single mis-fire.

Got a couple new toys to pimp out (and I think complete) the AR: the 3X EOtech scope, a very light composite bipod, and a two-point harness.  Check it out:

Well, I decided it’s high time I started building cool shit again, so I got busy with the ga-rage. Everything’s all spic’n’span now…tools are hung up, shelves are installed, hangers for ladders, shovels, etc. It’s nice. I won’t bore you with a pic…you’ve seen it before…just a bit different arrangement.

So…I decided a long while back that I need to have a PC, more importantly, a Linux PC, in there in my work area so I can do robot-like things again. Then the chinese house firedrill happened and I got set back on those plans. But no more…I finally got the sucker set up to the point now where I can use it in there on wireless.

I got the box set up with Ubuntu 7.10 a while back…installation was painless. Just pop a CD in from windows, click and button, and off you go….into dual-boot land.

Unfortunately, networking is not quite as painless as the fanboys would lead you to think. The nice networking setup GUI does everything BUT set up your networking. It tends to screw things up more than it helps…so I just deleted it, boned up on all the command-line networking voodoo, and got it going the hard way (it took me 3 hours of reading and struggling to recover from the ill state the stupid GUI left the machine in).

Time to build some cool stuff.

So remind me again…why would I want to spend $500 on an iPhone, when I can buy a Blackberry Pearl which is sleaker, and nearly as functional?

The only thing that is really missing from this thing is the snazzy touchscreen interface, although I’m still not convinced it would have been the best way to go anyways. The thumbball is very functional.

What I have working for me on this puppy:

• Broadband internet on the go for my laptop, anywhere. I’ve yet to go anywhere that the service is unavailable (and I’ve been travelling for the last month straight). It is fast too….faster than DSL…I see downlinks of 50 - 100kB/s regularly.
• A fully functional browser on my phone. Not the mobile internet crap. This is the real deal.
• Any number of apps to install. My favorites so far: Flipside (a music player that works much better than the pre-installed one), and Google Maps Mobile, which can now triangulate you to within a couple km using cell tower info.
• 2 GB microSD card…why do i need an iPOD? I don’t anymore.
• Bluetooth as you need it (handsfree, file transfer, etc)
• Great battery life so far. I keep bluetooth off by default, and keep the screen dimmed way down.
• A 1.3 MPixel camera that can do stills and video, with an LED flash that is actually pretty bright.
• Calendering, email, etc, from work is syncable via a Lotus Notes plugin.

iCrap on the iPhone.

Not sure if you all have used Google Sky yet (part of Google Earth), but I saw this link today on the Google Earth Blog: Exoplanets. Being able to look and see where all of the known planets in the galaxy are at a moments notice is pretty darn cool in my book.

Movie recommendation for the week: Lions for Lambs. This film has been stirring up some controversy apparently, but trust me: it’s worth the $10. Proud to be an American.

-J