Time to be serious...

Well. This blog is dead. Why?

• I won't finish my last class until about 2 or 3 weeks after my 30th birthday.
• I won't get my diploma until 6-8 weeks after that.
• I still have neither the energy nor content to make something of it

So. What does that mean? I have family and friends that are all interested in me doing a blog at some point. I guess what it all measn is that a new blog will be out in the not to terribly distant future. If you have interest, you'll find it - especially if it turns out successful.

That's it.

Go home now...

What is it about blogging?

• Why is it so hard to keep up?
• Why is it difficult to think of a focus?
• Does it really accomplish anything for the average person?

I'm not going to pretend to have any answers for any of these questions. I am going to say that I like the idea of publishing a blog/personal website. I think the problem is that my life right now is relatively boring.

I have interesting going-ons at work I could talk about, but that's bad form. Additionally some people have been getting in real trouble by blogging about such things lately. Some people talk about family, and outside of my immediate family (my wife and I) I see this as bad form - not to mention I don't really know much of what goes on. I've thought about keeping school on the forefront - but I'm so sick of it that I don't want to think of it outside of what I need to.

In all, I hold on to the hope that when I'm done with school I'll be able to do something. It'll probably be a personal web site more so than a blog. I'll probably start it as a way to keep my hobbies active. I hope to get into doing something after school...

Another casualty in the Blogosphere?

I'd like to think not. I just might be though. I haven't updated in over a month, almost two now. I have two saved posts that are nothing more than a brief topic synopsis for me to expand on. I have no plans to join MySpace anytime soon - but maybe that's a sub-culture of the Blogosphere and therefore not an issue.

I plan to blame school until I've graduated. After it's done I guess I'll have to step back and consider that I'm just not the blogging type if I don't keep up.

Anyhow. I just wanted to try and help the brain burn I have going on. I have a paper to write and I just cannot get it started. This hasn't really helped - but it did at least distract me for a bit.

No more networking!

Wow. With those networking classes over I am actually pretty happy. I am in the second week of the UNIX class I have to take, which is really more of an introduction to the concept that UNIX can be used in business or some such thing.

Now, to get everything out on the table I am a "WinTel" kind of guy. I like to dabble in programming, but am more of a project manager than a programmer. I like to dabble in web stuff, but would rather pay someone else if it's a real web project. I am one of the system administrators at work, but am working to move into being a group lead on the track to management.

Ok. With that out of the way, we are really concentrating more on Linux than Unix. The instructor has recommended we use Knoppix. One of our classmates recommended DSL run in either qeum or vmware. My older brother gave me xandros for Christmas.

I've played with DSL a bit and it seems like it'll do for the majority of class. I have a second hard drive (alternate drive really) for the laptop and plan to install xandros on that within the week. I am currently downloading Knoppix via torrent.

After all is said and done I imagine I'll still be a windows guy because in addition to all the above, I like gaming. I admit there are games available for Linux, but the majority are still for PC, and moving forward also for consoles...

Time, oh how it flies.

It's already time for another entry as I struggle to keep somewhat of a schedule. It's interesting that I try so hard as I have no readership right now, even my older brother has forsaken me. I do this only for myself, and to try and create a steady habit. Eventually I may be able to use some of the old writings in here as fodder for a "real" blog in the future - but we shall see.

So, what shall I write about today? I think I should figure out something to add to the other blog I am a co-author on, the what did you learn today one. The problem is that I'm always learning so much, I never really know how to encapsulate it. I guess that means I wouldn't be a very good teacher. In fact, the ability to impart knowledge will be important whether or not I am a teacher as I hope to someday have a family. This does not actually address the main point of this topic though, which is what I should write about in this blog today but rather that I really should write something in the other one.

I'll have to get back to work for now and re-visit this later after some thought...


I never did think of anything. It's been a crazy week at work, and this class in school is killing me. Now it's three days later and things at work have come to a finely balanced point that could be going in either of a couple directions, most of which are not that great. I'll provide details later, when I have a better idea what's up. For now suffice to say that I need to spend some time playing video games...

iRobot Roomba Red Review

Ok, I'm a little later on this than I had originally planned, but here goes...

Background:

iRobot released the first automatic vacuum in the US a few years back. I remember hearing about it and knowing that this was something I wanted to have for my use. Part of this is because I do not like housework, and part of it is because I love gadgets. It really has nothing to do with wanting to clean the floors well while saving time for myself - but that's a pretty neat side benefit. I never did own one of these though, and from what I've heard it's not to big a deal that I didn't. These first issue robot vacuums were like many first issue products and had their fair share of "personality" from what I hear.

More recently, they released the new "Discovery" line of roomba robots. These were basically Roomba 2.0 and were all identical for the most part. The differences being color and accessories that were sold along with them.


The Roomba Red is the bottom of this pile in price, and has the only other change from the rest of the discovery line. There is a missing mode button on it for the "Max" mode. Apparently this functionality can be had simply by using one of the remote accessories. I have not tested this, but do not doubt the validity of the claims from those who have.

I had the perfect opportunity to buy one of these this year as I want more than anything to help my wife have more time. She was working a tremendous amount and felt horrible that she wasn't keeping the house as clean as she wanted (me, I thought she was doing better than needed - but that's another blog entry). With this product I could give her the ability to vacuum without having to take the time to vacuum. It is truly the closest I imagine we can currently come to giving the gift of time, save perhaps a robot lawn mower (again, another topic).

I had decided on this gift a couple of month before Christmas, but my wife is the financially responsible one so she handles our banks accounts. This meant I couldn't actually buy one until right before Christmas - the "blackout" date we set where neither of us was allowed to look at what was being spent where. Unfortunately this precluded me from a couple of small sales and deals that went by - but I was still able to get it for a pretty decent deal from Sears. I also got the extended warranty from Sears as I have had a couple of those from different retailers in the past that were well worth it.

Onto the review:

Opening the box we were greeted with a nice round red, relatively heavy thing. I think I was expecting it to be smaller and lighter than it actually was for some reason. I had even brought it home from Sears and still felt it should have been smaller and lighter than it was. This is not to say that it is to big or heavy, it's a pretty good size and has almost no weight. I think I had been thinking it would be closer to a Frisbee for some reason. As it is it's about the size of the part of an upright that is actually on the floor, the part with the brushes, brush motor, and wheels. It's probably about that heavy as well. It is very easy to pick up and carry in one hand.

It was packaged quite well and I think it would have survived shipping with no problems at all. There was a small manual that should appeal very nicely to the average consumer that wants to buy something and have it just work. There was also a cleaning tool, and a spare replacement filter. As with any other vacuum on the market most of the profit over time for the unit is probably from the filters (bags for the ones that have those instead) as opposed to the sale of the unit itself. An enterprising person or avid DIYer would probably be able to easily make new filters for the unit using the plastic frame from an old one to save money.

We had to start by charging the unit for at least 16 hours. The charge indicator light showed green after about 4 to 6, but we stuck with the instructions to be safe. The cord is lengthy enough to reach outlets behind objects with no trouble. There is an AC-DC converter built-in to the cord that increases the bulk, but it is not overly huge (as I've heard the one for the XBOX 360 is...). I would put it at around the same size as one for a notebook computer.

The next day we decided to try it out. I had done some serious reading on the unit so I had an idea what we needed to do. Additionally, the instructions gave tips as well. Basically, we needed to pick up before using, just like you would have to for a regular vacuum really. We also needed to watch it the first couple times it did a room. Not actively watch the entire process, but check in on it occasionally and make sure it hadn't gotten stuck.

We picked the bedroom. It's a decently sized room with little to nothing on the floor to being with. We closed off the closet and picked a small garbage can up off the floor. We then put it in the middle of the room, hit power, hit start, and got onto the bed. We watched the vacuum for a few minutes as it did a couple of patterns, and then we fired up the TV. The vacuum was quiet enough that we could watch TV with it running in the same room. We did have to run it loud, but not much louder than we have to when a train goes by. (We live in a condo with train tracks less than a full block away...)

The vacuum went for around an hour and a half, most of it's battery life. When it was done it made a "cheering" sound to indicate "mission successful" and that the room was clean. When it gets stuck or has trouble it makes a "sad" sound to indicate it needs help. We took the back off to empty the dustbin and it was quite full. We decided in the future to leave the bathroom door closed and do it as a separate room, but more on that later. Emptying the dustbin was very straight-forward, remove and dump. We also removed the filter and tapped the dust off of it. About every 3 or 4 times we run it we also use the provided tool to comb the brushes and cut anything wrapped around the brush or beater (threads/hair). We sometimes do this more such as after doing the bathroom.

It had been quite awhile since under the dresser or nightstand had been done - so we decided to try it on a room that had been vacuumed more recently next. We did the living room. Armed with the knowledge of how the bedroom went we sectioned off the room and cleared the floor. We started the vacuum and kept track of it. We discovered it occasionally got stuck under the loveseat to where it couldn't back out (we have since solved this - but I digress). When it got stuck we would free it and hit the button to get it to continue and it would jump right back into cleaning the floor. Again it took around an hour and a half. There were a couple of times it would get a blue light on the top, the noise level would increase slightly, and it would hang out in one particular area. This meant that its sensors detected more particulate than normal. Exactly what this baseline is and how it is determined I do not know, but it apparently can tell when the floor is especially dirty. At the end of the run the dustbin was again quite full. This may be partially explained by the fact that our old vacuum was in a state of dyeing.

At this point we decided the vacuum was a success and were ready to sell it to our friends and family.

Parting thoughts:

We have learned how to better use the vacuum over the last month and a half. We run it almost every night in one room or another. We have the house sectioned off into 7 or 8 days, about 10 areas. We keep a chart on the fridge dry-erase board so we know what has been done lately and what hasn't. Even now on a new filter and after weeks of use the dust bin still comes out pretty full after the vacuum runs. It may seem to take longer, but we can do the whole house by the end of the week only investing about 45-60 minutes of our time vacuuming. (Actually clearing the floor and restoring stuff after as well as cleaning the unit.) We have some rooms we can start on our way out the door and others we run during dinner. The filters are quite reasonable at around $5 each after shipping (packs of 6) They last anywhere from 1-3 months depending on the environment they are used in and the frequency of vacuuming.

Some say the roomba cannot replace your regular vacuum, but it has replaced ours. It easily has the power of an average upright and the versatility is much more than any regular vacuum on the market. We have a dirt devil for the stairs and our floors are doing quite well.

If you have a large house and want to do away with vacuuming you'll need a couple of them. If you want it to be hands free you'll need a few. The best value can be had by manually starting it in a room, charging it back up (there is a rapid charger available) and then manually starting it in another. This will also give the best overall coverage. When money is no object one of these in each room with a scheduler base station will make it so you only have to "empty the garbage" every day and clean the unit every week depending on the room. Everyone's needs will probably be somewhere in-between these two extremes. The more square and empty the room the better it will get it clean. Rooms that are separated by a doorway are usually best done as two separate rooms. Rooms that are side by side and only have a half-length wall may be done as one, but results will vary. The invisible wall is difficult to learn as there is absolutely no indication of where the massive beam is going, physical barriers work best.

There is a module you can get now to feed your own programs into the roomba. My initial thought was that this was great, but my follow-on cautionary thought was performance. Part of why the robot does such a good job is repetition. It goes over every spot in the room multiple times. Programming it to follow a specific path loses this and could result in rooms getting less clean. I do hope to get that module sometime in the future though, it would have its uses... ;)

Another class down.

I have finished another class at the University of Phoenix Online. This one was a 300 level networking class called Network and Telecommunications Concepts. It wasn't my type of thing really, I'm basically an application/os layer guy when it comes to computing. It did have some level of interest though, and will probably eventually help me in my programming while definitely helping me in my current network administration job.

Next I have Network and Telecommunications II, a 400 level course. Again, it's not really my thing but good to know. I hope I can make it through without a ton of trouble. My grades for the first one aren't posted yet, but I think I may be getting my 4th B of 19 classes. This wouldn't be so bad, but I did get 2 D's along the way so every A really helps bring that overall average back up.

I can definitely see the light at the end though. After these two classes I get a Unix intro class which should be easy, a Windows networking class that I need to check on testing out of, two web programming classes (can you say ASP?), and finally two C++ classes (I need to change the second class still as it's currently set to be some ebusiness class). Assuming I stay on track and pick up three lower div classes (all science of some sort I think) I'm graduating in less than a year, in fact about 11 months from now on December 17th of 2006.


That's all for now, I think I'll keep this post being about school and nothing else - part of the whole "focus" thing that blogs really should strive for. I think my next post will either be all about the Roomba Red or general happenings in my personal life. Both of these posts will be coming in the future tough.

A month later...

I know, I'm definitely the pot. In all fairness, my brother would have every right to rub it in, but hasn't so much as said a word - not even in his bit about dead blogs.

Anyhow, first and foremost - the MINI won. (See here and here for background...)



With that done, I said there would be a great write-up on the whole process. Since I was trying to surprise my brother with the car (and most especially my younger brother) I didn't write up anything here, but I did end up finding a great place to write, and that's here, at North American Motoring. I was able to share with others that went through the same stuff and keep my sanity for the most part. (I am CeridianMN on that board...)

The short version is that we ordered the car in October (the beginning) and then started to wait. We made a couple of small changes to the order, and then we kept waiting. I watched the cars progress all the way to the dealer, where we then waited some more for some more work to be done. We finally got the car right before Christmas, I am exceedingly happy and my wife is glad it's finally over (the wait).

I'll post some specs and info with many links in the near future. I don't have the time to make this a fully fledged MINI blog though.

That leads to the last point I want to address in this quick posting - what is this blog? As the about section mentions I am attempting to finish my degree. This takes much of my free time to be honest. As such I am not willing to commit to a single topic right now. When I finish school that may change, I may even branch out to multiple blogs for a couple of different topics I have in mind. Until then - this blog will have posts generally from those topics and personal life. Truth is that I'll probably ditch this blog when I do graduate. Probably I'll re-name the blog and use it as my personal one and/or the one for the idea that works the best.

What are those topics? I'll probably post about the MINI a bunch. I would like to get some PC gaming interest stuff covered. I am hoping to learn to program in JAVA and may talk about that experience some (worked through over half of the SAMS 24 hour book during my last between class time). I got my wife a roomba red for Christmas and may talk about that some. I might talk some about the church we are part of. The possibilities are endless really, especially since I need to try and also come up with things that I learn and fit into a small form factor for the other blog I'm part of.

I really can't say much, but....

It has been over a month since my older brother updated his blog. I have been the high side of two weeks. I had meant to update it last week but didn't finish my project, and then this weekend was horrid.

Anyhow, my project.

Nothing much this time. I finally made an Amazon.com wishlist. That's it. Search for my name on Amazon and you'll get my wishlist.

The more meaningful thing that comes of this is my project for next year (with a January birthday that's just too close). I've mentioned before the desire to move to programming, and now I have something I actually want to write. I want to figure out how to create an amazon wishlist that is comprised of links using my amazon associates account. Granted, this is a relatively simple web-building project more than an actual programming project, but I'd like to automate it to the point that you get a browser add-in that lets you search for items on amazon.com, and then when you get to the item/page you want you simply select a drop-down menu object or a button and it gets added to a wishlist. When someone browses your wishlist, clicks a link, and buys it you would then be credited with the sale as an amazon associate. Of course, this may kill some surprise if you do not have the fortitude to not look at what you've sold coming up on the holidays, but then again the regular wishlist is the same thing.

So, that's my project. I don't know that I'll finish it for next year, but after I graduate I will theoretically develop a little more time...

Not a bad week.

In the last week or two I have received two "Hollywood movie money" gift certificates in the mail for one free movie each, had a Weber portable charcoal grill delivered to my door to be discovered two days later, and saw Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire the night before it came out.

The first two were delivered by a prize fulfillment center. It turns out that all those times (every day for three weeks) that I logged in and tried to win the LG Life is good instant win game paid off. I didn't win the MINI Cooper S convertible, but I apparently did win the movie tickets as a second place prize in the sweepstakes drawing, and the the grill as a prize in the second chance drawing - I think. I'm actually not 100% sure what prize I won how, but do know that they both came from there. That's $60 or so worth of prizes! The downside is of course that we have a small portable grill already, but the prize one appears better, or worth more at least.

The advance screening of Harry potter was a little different. I once tried to start a business with a friend of mine. Did all the paperwork, registered with the state, everything like that. Turns out we didn't have a good business plan. We had good ideas and intentions, but no solid direction and not enough drive. The business was an IT focused business, and as such we ended up on a lot of mailing lists. Most of these have faded over the years, but some have followed me to my new address. A month and half ago I got one from APC. It had a picture of Harry Potter on it. Turns out they sponsored an advance screening. The invitation was for one person and a guest, so tonight my wife and I went from work to a restaurant, had a quick bite to eat, and then to a theater to watch a presentation of about 45 minutes from APC for some of their new technology. It was interesting to me, but bored my wife quite a bit. For our trouble we were then given a screening of Harry Potter, starting at 7:15. This was 4 hours and 45 minutes before they had their public showings. We also got some dollar bun cold sandwiches, chips, pop, and veggies before hand, and a voucher for a free popcorn and pop in the form of a survey. They also provided a packet for kids with a puzzle for them to have something to do during the presentation. These kids puzzles were all turned in and a drawing was held for a Harry Potter board game. Incidentally my wife was a bit bummed she didn't get a chance to enter that drawing.

On a more practical front we've talked to the bank and two reputable on-line lenders and are fairly (about 99%) sure of who we're going to borrow money from for a vehicle - but that's all I'm saying about that for now.

In all, it hasn't been a bad week.