Shades of Maybe » Geekery

In the Studio

innowen — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 18:33:43 +0000

Kender spent some time in his studio yesterday. He’s been rather melodious lately and it’s been great to hear what’s been rolling around in his head. The new tune was great but he really wanted to add vocals. So, I turn to him and told him the words that the song sorta kicked up in my head. He tried to run with it but it didn’t sound right.

Instead, I told him to let me give it a shot. So, we recorded a bunch of snippets of me singing and the result is “Make Me Bleed”. Go listen and be gentle please. This is my first attempt at singing since womens’ choir in college.

Perusing the Shelves

innowen — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 21:27:34 +0000

I was poking around on a website called Shelfari and found that they took pictures of Neil Gaiman’s library. Other author’s writing spaces and libraries fascinate me, so of course I gotta check out those images through to see what he keeps on his shelves.

I start clicking on the thumb nails to expand the images to their large size. That’s when I come across this:

OMG! I totally spotted Neil’s copy of Ravens in the Library. *insert fangirly squeeing here* Go read the original blog post to get an even LARGER photo where you can distinctly read the spine and see that it has been opened. While you do that I’m going to try and calm down and maybe do some back posts to the site.

DIYP Article Up: Review of Scrivener

innowen — Thu, 07 May 2009 06:01:36 +0000

This week, I wrote a review of my favorite writing application, Scrivener. If you own a Mac and are serious about writing in any capacity or genre, I highly recommend you get this application. It organizes your thoughts and has a built in revision tracking system that can keep up with all your drafts. It makes writing fun! Go read my review and see what else I had to say.

Meet the New Smudge

innowen — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 06:42:04 +0000

We picked my new Macbook up tonight. I was excited and just couldn’t wait a day. So, I rushed home from my acupuncture treatment and immediately hopped into the JackRabbit. Kender deftly drove all the way down to The Mac Store in Clackamas. Thanks to his skill, we got there with a few minutes to spare.

I knew that my friend Ducky transferred to this store awhile ago, but I never figured that I’d be seeing him. But as I pushed open the doors there he was… sitting behind the Support Desk. I pretty much ignored the sales guys (no offense, guys) and walked up to him with a big grin on my face and said, “Gimmeh Macbook!” He smiled back and waved his finger at me in that “I’m on the phone, give me a second” way.

Kender wandered around the store as I waited. He tested out the speakers and played some songs from across the room, just to verify that the speakers in the new lines were, indeed, louder. When he was off the phone, Ducky took my order. We caught up on life, current events, and general geekery. It was good to see him, it’s been awhile. And it felt like old times. Ten years ago, when I first arrived to PDX, he and his store sold me my first 12″ Powerbook. And now… here we are… with him selling me the latest body model for my Smudge.

Once we got home, kender took a few posterity pictures of me and my new beloved. I’ve done the whole “photograph the first unboxing” thing with my first iMac, Sage. But I decided that after owning about 10 different laptop systems, I really didn’t need to do that with this system. It’s not that big of a deal to me… more like this system is just a shiny new body for my existing Smudge.

Instead, we set to work on swapping the 250 gig hard drive that came with the system with my powerhouse 320 gig drive. And now, without further ado, ladies and gentlemen… welcome to the new smudge: shinier, faster and with more memory. And with a backlit keyboard *squees*

Here’s to many more years of use with this new system.