I still can’t sleep so I went out to my court yard to take some pictures. Here’s the view off my balcony around 5:15am during sunrise.

Alright, now I got to get ready for work. I can already tell this is going to be a fun day.

Look at the time. Jesus God, I can’t sleep! This is so gonna hurt when I go to work in another 3 hours. I’m going to try and lay down again. Good luck to us all…

So it seems I’ve swayed someone away from LiveJournal in in favor of Radio Userland. That brings a warm fuzzy feeling to my heart. Yes, you pay a little extra for Radio, but you get so much more. I hope some of you other LJ users decide to make the switch, but if not, it’s still nice that you’re at least blogging. The readers who aren’t yet doing so, what are you waiting for? Get over to Radio and start.

I’m watching Superman on the Sci Fi channel right now. I haven’t seen this thing in years and forgot how great of a movie it truly is. This is the special edition widescreen version of the movie and you can really tell how much it’s been cleaned up. Almost makes it hard to believe that it came out in 1978 (my birth year). John Williams‘ score is all over this thing and brilliant as usual. Superman II is on later tonight, so I’ll probably check it out also and continue revisiting my childhood. Maybe I’ll go pick up the box set soon.

I’ve been contemplating buying a new camera for a couple of months now. I’m not trying to upgrade from my Nikon Coolpix 5000 I got back in January. It’s a great prosumer camera that I can take around almost anywhere. Instead, I’m looking to get a digital SLR to compliment my prosumer and I’ve narrowed it down to 2 choices. First is the Nikon D100 ($1889) which is getting all around great reviews. The second is the Fujifilm FinePix S2 Pro ($2169) which has a little heftier price tag, but seems to have a couple more features that the D100 doesn’t. Both cameras have excelent image quality, but the S2 seems to have a bit of an edge. I am leaning towards the D100 though because I’m so use to the Nikon control scheme at this point though and I think I can be a little more productive with that camera.

The camera isn’t the only cost here though. Also keep in mind that I’m having to purchase lenses for the thing (the prices above are just for the body) and that’s where the real money is going to be thrown down. The real good thing about this, though, is that it’s a one time investment and I’ll be able to uses them for very many years to come with other SLR’s. The following are all of the lenses I’ve been researching:

Fixed Focalul>li>Nikon AF 28mm f/2.8D Nikkor – $219.00li>Nikon AF 50mm f/1.4D Nikkor – $228.85li>Nikon AF 85mm f/1.8D Nikkor – $319.99/ul>i>Zoomul>li>Nikon AF 24-85mm f/2.8-4.0D Zoom-Nikkor – $465.00li>Sigma AF 28-105mm f/2.8-4.0 – $153.99li>Sigma AF 28-70mm f/2.8 EX Aspherical DF – $314.99/ul>i>Panoul>li>Nikon AF 16mm f/2.8D Fisheye-Nikkor – $699.00li>Sigma AF 15mm f/2.8 EX – $335.99/ul>

The ones in red are what I’m definitely getting right away if I do pick up either of the cameras. So let’s work this out real quick. The camera, both lenses, and 2 extra batteries will bring the total initial cost around $2700. Hmm. What’s the word I’m looking for? I think it’s… OUCH!!!

I got the new Filter album, The Amalgamut, last week. All of their past albums have always been real solid and this one is no exception. Anyway, the reason I bring it up is because there’s one track on it called The Only Way Is The Wrong Way that completely reminds me of a particular person right now and also of another separate relationship (not any of mine) that I know of. The chorus is as follows:

And it feels like that you’re with me or against me,
And it feels like that your promises are all a mess,
And it feels like that to push me is to shove me,
And it feels like that the only way is the wrong way.

So the way I interpret this is that someone has pushed someone else so much and so long to the point where they’re blocked into a corner with only one option left. They know what they must do and they feel like it’s the “wrong way” to go, but at the same time, they know it’s the “only way” left because all other options have been exhausted. I’m the person in the corner and I think it’s the same (although a completely different situation) for this other relationship I know of. Of course, I could be completely wrong.

Reader beware: This is going to be a wild flying hormone of a post.

If you know me, then you know how much I’m into the blondes. All of my girlfriends have been blonde. A large majority of the girls I’ve dated are blonde (though the current one is fire red). I’m just always going to have that thing for blondes and I’m watching the uber blonde of all blondes right now. I’m watching Anna Kournikova.

This is the stuff that dreams are made of. She’s playing tennis right now and I don’t know much about tennis, but I do know I like the noises the girls make when they hit that damn ball. This other girl she’s playing, Jelena Dokic, isn’t too bad either from certain angles, but she’s got nothing on Anna. I read some report that came out about a month ago saying Kournikova is the most downloaded person on the internet. I believe it. I mean look at her! Gentlemen, this is perfection.

I did warn you before you started reading this.

Amanda is coming over tonight to spend the night. Looks like I’m going to be taking a 3 day weekend. I really shouldn’t be taking any days off right now, but after the events that happened today, I really need it. I’m sure I’ll tell ya about it soon.

A friend turned me onto a different web browser, Chimera, which is powered by the Gecko rendering engine. I’m posting this from it right now and hope there’s no strange compatibility issue with it and Radio. It’s still in beta form (0.4) and seems to lack a couple of basic features, but this thing is damn nice and I see how it could be THE default browser for the Mac if MS decides to drop all support for Apple in the future.

That seems like a very real option considering some of the things going on right now like Apple partnering with Sun Microsystems to bring office applications to the Mac. At first, I thought it could be the worst thing to happen to Apple, but after thinking about it and talking with a friend, I’m starting to see how positive of a move this is for Apple and how MS should be the worried ones (and they probably are). I’m probably about to mention something he told me word for word, so I hope he’ll forgive me if I do. Everyone has been so programmed to think that you NEED MS for some reason or another and if you don’t use them, you don’t survive. You need Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Internet Explorer, and Outlook (Entourage). No. You need a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation, web browser, and e-mail application. OpenOffice could fill the office apps easily. Chimera could be the browser replacement. Apple’s Mail app sucks, but there’s potential and there’s plenty of other e-mail clients out there.

Imagine it though. A platform void of anything Microsoft and running just as well or better than any Wintel computer. I think a lot of people would welcome that idea. Most people don’t use MS products because they like them anyway. Hell, most consumers already see MS as America’s “evil empire”. People use MS products because they know of no other. You don’t NEED MS for anything (as far as end-users go). I think Apple knows this and (if they do what I think they may do in the future) they have a lot of balls to be the ones to aggressively go out there and prove it. It’s all very exciting!

Mac Rumors is reporting on an unconfirmed list of Apple Stores that are opening soon and Pasadena, CA was on that list. If you can’t put two and two together, that’s right where I am. Although it is from one of those damn dirty rumor sites, it’s a rumor I’d really love to believe. As a friend just put it, “The mothership is gonna consume you soon!”

I kind of feel a little bad, though, for the independent Apple retailers that have been in that area for very many years such as Di-No Computers. I was a very loyal customer to them for many years until e-commerce hit real big. I know they’ve been just hanging on for a while. This new Apple Store might actually be the thing that does them in.