Ferris Bueller Superbowl ad buzz
31 Tuesday Jan 2012
Posted Wicked Cool Stuff
in31 Tuesday Jan 2012
Posted Wicked Cool Stuff
in30 Monday Jan 2012
Posted Everything Else
inTags
LOL. Google has a new privacy policy. They have sent me an email every day for three days to tell me this. It’s kind of like reminding your child to empty the dishwasher–if they nag, I mean remind, me enough, will I read the new privacy policy? Yup, and I read it very carefully. And in the course of thoroughly educating myself on the new privacy policy–like a good internet citizen–I clicked on Ads Preferences Manager, thinking that I might actually have a chance to change my Ads Preferences.
I have decided to leave my Ads Preferences just the way they are. Because I love that under “Your Demographics” Google says to me: We infer your age and gender based on the websites you’ve visited. Age: 35-44. Gender: Male. What the heck does that say about me? I guess that I have more in common with 30-something males than my 50-something female peers. More to the point, I wonder what Google makes of my handbag-stalking on Piperlime and Zappos if I am a 30-something male.
Actually, the real question is: does Google know that I have read the new policy and will they therefore stop sending me emails? Scary thought.
UPDATE: Sure enough–it’s 48 hours later and Big Brother, I mean Google, has not sent me another email notification of their new privacy act, I’m guessing because it knows that I have read it!
30 Monday Jan 2012
Posted Travel Reviews
inIn February 2004 we took our three children out of school for two months and traveled in India, Cambodia, Thailand, Hong Kong & Tokyo. 38 days, 37 hours on a plane, 23 hours in an airport, 20 time zones, 35 hours of driving, 10 hours of animal riding (specifically camels and elephants), 190 malaria pills (38 each), 360 antibacterial Handi-wipes (15 boxes), 2 bottles of Purell, and 5 cuisines later, we flew to Hawaii for a “vacation”. This post is part of a series on that trip.
I went tiger hunting. For real. With my kids too. And my husband of course, without whom no tiger hunting excursion would be complete. Ok, not with guns, because that would be SO un-pc, but with cameras. It was a while ago, but of all the places we’ve travelled and the things we have done (more on that later) it was by far one of the coolest. And our family is all about The Coolest Experience.
We were staying at Vanyavilas Hotel in Ranthambore National Park in India, which is also THE coolest hotel I have ever stayed at. (I clearly need to consult an online thesaurus for some synonyms for “cool”.) Our beautiful “rooms” were actually luxury tents–complete with full bathrooms, hardwood floors, and four-poster beds. The service was impeccable, and the food was fresh and delicious. The following is an excerpt from my journal about our 4 days of tiger hunting with our three children ages 8, 11, and 14:
“Despite repeated safaris, and rising ever earlier (5:30am) we spotted no tigers. We saw lots of tiger tracks and poop, heard monkeys’ warning calls and tigers roaring, and spoke to people who heard tigers, but did not actually see tigers. We had the best time, though, on our tiger hunts. It was freezing cold in the early mornings when we got in our open-air safari jeep. We would zoom to the Park about 15 minutes away, risking frostbite to our ears, and the local naturalist assigned to us would jump out to the office “to get our route”. We quickly figured out that the best route was to be had in direct proportion to the tip to the guide the day before. Continue reading
30 Monday Jan 2012
Posted Wicked Cool Stuff
inTags
30 Monday Jan 2012
Posted Tech Reviews
inTags
Amazon review, Hewlett-Packard, HP Envy 100, HP printer, ipad, Printers, Printing, review, technology
Good printer which meets our needs, but has some minor issues, January 13, 2012
Amazon Verified Purchase(What’s this?)
This review is from: HP Envy 100 e-All-in-One D410a Printer (CN517A#B1H) (Office Product)
I have now owned this printer for 4 months and it has proved to be a printer that meets our needs, although there have been a few small problems. Canon is usually my printer brand of choice because of my experience with excellent reliability, but for wireless printing from a variety of PCs, Macs, and iPads, (which Canon does not offer) this printer seems like the best choice. PROS: Wireless printing for all devices: the printer prints well from the various PCs (Windows 7), Macs (both Lion and Snow Leopard), and iPads we have in our house. We initially had trouble installing the printer to a new MacBook Pro running Lion, but the problem was resolved after completing a system update. Continue reading |
30 Monday Jan 2012
Posted Wicked Cool Stuff
in30 Monday Jan 2012
Posted Travel Reviews
inTags
apartment, apartment rental, Rentals, Rome, terrace, travel, Vacation Rental, view
TRIP ADVISOR REVIEW:
Reviewed October 24, 2011
In June 2011, we had a magical trip to Rome with our three kids. We rented an apartment through Trip Advisor’s Vacation Rental website–which is a leap of faith since you are required to fork over a hefty deposit (through PayPal) and for all we knew the apartment with the “astonishing view” didn’t exist but someone on the other end of my PayPal account was hundreds of dollars richer. Happily, the apartment existed and was everything we had hoped. My TripAdvisor review follows:
The best: The location around the corner from Campo dei Fiori can’t be beat. We went out every morning for coffee and fresh bread, and stocked up for our picnic at the Campo dei Fiori market (open daily except Sundays from about 7am to 2pm). Our teens came and went as necessary and found everything (food, bars, shopping) all within an easy walk. We had daily picnics on the terrace, which has an absolutely wonderful view. As the apartment is small, it made all the difference as a place to relax and (of course!) have a glass of wine.
30 Monday Jan 2012
Posted Tech How-To
inTags
Android, Android Market, galaxy nexus, GalaxyNexus, how to, ice cream sandwich, swype, technology
UPDATE (2/17/12): Today the official Swype Beta with ICS support was released! To get it:
1. If you have the unofficial version of Swype, uninstall it. (Settings > Apps > Swype > Uninstall)
2. Go to beta.swype.com and register with an email that is accessible to your phone.
3. From your phone, open the account activation email you receive. Take note of the “account code” and then click on the link to download the Swype Installer.
4. Download the Installer, open it, login with your email and password, enter the account key when prompted, and follow the instruction from there.
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If you have a new Galaxy Nexus and have tried to install a Swype from the Android Market, you have received an error message. According to Swype, “the screen size is not supported”, and therefore Swype is incompatible with Ice Cream Sandwich. They said in December that an update would come out at the end of January 2012, but so far there is no Swype for Ice Cream Sandwich in sight. However, other enterprising folks have created a Swype that works beautifully on my Galaxy Nexus. I have had it for a week now, and give an inward sigh of relief every time I use it. Here’s how to install it:
29 Sunday Jan 2012
Posted Tech How-To
inTags
App Store, apple, download ibook, E-book, how to, ibook, ipad, technology, Textbook
With the introduction of Apple’s new textbook program, there has been a surge of interest in downloading textbooks to the iPad. However, in trying to download a textbook, the book will appear on your iBook bookshelf, but you might run into the error message “Unable to download [your book]” with no explanation of why; or when tapping on the book you may receive the “paused” status indefinitely.
SOLUTION: There are 2 possible problems: insufficient space and/or needing to sync with your computer in order to download. To resolve: Continue reading
29 Sunday Jan 2012
Posted Everything Else
inMy daughter, Sara Remsen–who will be graduating from Dartmouth College in June 2012 with a major in Biology, a minor in Digital Arts, and a passion for science education–suggested that I create a blog to gather, consolidate, and share all of the interesting ideas that I come across and which I normally send only to her. This blog is dedicated to her.