Long Beach Aquarium of the Pacific

Hope everyone is enjoying their Labor Day weekend so far. Had a short little ride this morning starting out with Como Street and am heading to the

Long Beach Aquarium

of the Pacific today to look at the fishies. If you’ve never been, I highly recommend it. It’s a small aquarium but very nice and has cool exhibits. The area has undergone some changes as well and is a nice place to walk around. The convention center is close by and they’ve built up The Pike which has shops and restaurants. There’s also Rainbow Harbor that’s been there a long time with more places to shop and eat.

We’ve had a membership since it first opened and go every now and then. Our favorite time to go it adults-only members only night. Although, adults can sometimes be just as bad as kids there. Anyway, enjoy your hot, humid Sunday and let’s hope this weather cools down a tad today!

So long Summer...

Can you feel that? Summer slipping away. I know, it’s a bummer. This past week I’ve noticed daylight starting a little later in the mornings and going away earlier in the evenings. On my Tuesday night mountain bike ride, when we get back, it seems to be just a bit chilly and darker. I hate it!

It’s Labor Day weekend and all downhill from here. Although, we’ll see if I can continue my riding and not escape into the cubby again in the off-season. I’m hoping to get out and do more mountain biking this Fall. Single Speed!!!

Labor Day

It’s Friday! And, there’s a holiday on Monday! Are you at all curious to know what exactly Labor Day and why we have it or do you just see ‘3-day weekend’?

Well, if you’re at all curious about what Labor Day is, check out

Wikipedia

for some history on the holiday.

Go Miniman Go!

I’m a LEGO freak. Love ‘em. Did you know that it’s the 30th anniversary of the Minimam? Neither did I. LEGO is celebrating the awesome little figures that come with most LEGO sets with a special

website

. Below is a cool little video they made.

Look out! A Storm is coming...

Thanks to

Engadget

, it’s been discovered that the BlackBerry Thunder touch screen is going to be called the BlackBerry 9530 Storm here on Verizon. Those of you attached to that ‘Thunder’ name? Not to worry, just head up to Canada on Rogers and to Europe on Vodafone and you’ll see some Thunder.

This is BlackBerry’s first touch screen device and looks pretty cool. I hope it does well. In my opinion, every touch screen that’s tried to go up against Apple hasn’t done so well. Click the link above if you want to see what that purdy box is gonna look like when released.

New Apple products coming soon?

Rumors are circulating around the web about a refresh of Apple products coming on September 9th. There’s even talk of an ‘Apple Event’ taking place the same day. Speculation of product releases include re-designed macbook pro’s. ipod nano’s and mac mini’s.

So, if you’re thinking of buying an Apple product, might want to hold off for just a bit longer and see if your intended purchase is getting a makeover.

How 'bout that Michael Phelps?

Good morning all! I received this from a friend and thought I’d share it with you. Thought it was pretty funny myself.

Oh, be sure to check out the new reviews section. I’ll be posting full reviews of tech gadgets and stuff there from time to time.

YouMail voicemail service

For the past few months, I’ve replaced my at&t voicemail service with

YouMail

. It’s a great service that’s free and I highly recommend it.

If you use voicemail on your home or mobile, you probably forward calls to a phone number that’s your voicemail service. After setting up an account with YouMail, simply change your forwarding number to the one they provide and that’s it!

But there’s some really cool features that come along with it. All your voicemails can be emailed to you with wav attachments or you can receive a text when you get a new message. Just added is text to speech beta. I’ve found that it’s not perfect but, for the most part, I can make out what the message is based on the text delivered.

Import your contacts and you can use

cool greetings

to play a specific greeting for each caller. In addition, there are also smart greetings that will play a standard message but use the caller ID, match it to your contact entry and greet the caller with their name.

The website is very easy to use and they’re a local company as well. So, sign up for their service. This is what all the cell phone providers and carriers should be offering.

Free ringtone generator site

Picked up from

BerryReview

, I thought I’d share this ringtone making website with you all. It’s called

Audiko

and the unique thing about this site is that it allows you to enter a

YouTube

URL and convert it to a ringtone. They have a pretty big selection that I’m sure will only increase as more people start using the service. As far as I can tell, there are no ‘extra’ charges for using this site. I downloaded a ringtone to my desktop as an mp3 and had no problems getting it on my BlackBerry. Check it out....I think one’s a keeper.

Sennheiser VMX 100 Full Review

Sennheiser has been in the headphones game for quite a while. As far as I know, getting into bluetooth headsets is something new for them. Today I’ll be reviewing the VMX 100 bluetooth headset that is paired up with my BlackBerry 8310 Curve. The first thing you immediately notice is that it’s big...real big. However, it’s surprisingly lightweight.

There are two models of this headset. One is titanium and one is black. The difference is that the black one comes with a car charger and case. Both come with a USB cable and AC adaptor. The box packaging is very nice.

The headset has a pretty cool feature...if you close the hook bringing the back and front together, it turns the headset off. Pull them apart and it turns it back on. Pairing the headset was very simple. There are two buttons on the headset; one to answer/end calls and a rocker switch for the volume.

The volume is very good. I had to turn the volume on my BlackBerry all the way down and the level was still good. The headset doesn’t go into your ear at all. The fit is great and much more comfortable than my Jabone II. There is a speaker on both sides so you can wear it in either ear.

The speaker on both sides is where I think it has some problems though. Most people I called said they heard me but said I sounded scratchy. Also, I heard from people that I sounded out of breath. I think this is the problem with the outside speaker. It picks up all the wind. Below are two sound files. One in a quiet room and one from my car. Funny thing is, the sound file in the quiet room sounds worse than the one in my car.


powered by ODEO
Indoors, quite room


powered by ODEO
In the car

Again, can’t say enough about the fit. It’s the best part of the headset but unfortunately, I don’t think it’s enough to make me keep it. The Jawbone is nice but does hurt my ear after awhile. Whereas the VMX 100 felt good the whole day.

Here’s a pic of the fit:

I’d recommend this headset to anyone who is looking for a good fitting headset and is not concerned about size. The call quality is decent.

Next up, I’ll try and get my hands on the new Jabra JX20!

Obama, Biden in '09?

So whadda ya think? Right choice? Wrong choice? Still missing Hillary? I know I am. I’m indifferent about the whole thing to be honest. I did like Hillary alot and was hoping I’d see her name announced this morning. But, I think there was just to much bad blood between the two of them during the campaign.

Now, I don’t think that polls are 100% believable. Seems to me you can swing a poll result anyway you’d like. But, I am surprised to see McCain holding his own against Obama. With all the hype that’s surrounded Obama, I thought he would be way out in front but that doesn’t seem to be the case. We’ll see how Biden changes those polls now...

The iHologram?

So this is pretty cool. It’s an application that projects what looks like a hologram coming out of your iPhone. The application is from

David O’Reilly

and is very cool. This is definitely one of those things to file under why the iPhone is way cooler than a BlackBerry.

Now when’s it gonna be available in the App Store?


iHologram - iPhone application from David OReilly on Vimeo.

Sennheiser VMX 100

Yesterday I received a cool new toy from UPS. It’s a Sennheiser VMX 100 bluetooth headset! One of the nice things about working for a telecommunications company is that you sometimes get these little treats from your headset vendor.

I’ll be trying it out and posting a full review but so far, I really like it. It’s very comfortable and sounds good. I was using a Jawbone II up until I received this one and I never really liked the fit.

More to come...

Please stand by...

I changed my website hosting to

GoDaddy

this morning so the site’s was offline until now. Sorry about that folks! Took a little longer than I thought.

Website issues...uh oh!

My blog posts aren’t being published! I just noticed it but hopefully they’ll start showing up again soon. This is really just a test to see if this makes it to the site. Hope so!

It's BlackBerry Bold Day...in Canada

Figures. Hasn’t at&t sold enough iPhones already? Rogers officially announced the Bold today but it’s hard to find so far. Reports are that most stores don’t even have them and those that do, only got a couple. Why is this device so delayed? I’d really like to hear the

real

reason for this. Personally, I think it’s all to do with the iPhone and how many they can sell before they release the Bold. Tsk, tsk at&t...

Ready for the VP's?

Seems as though all the talk this week is about who Obama will pick as veep. Are you at all interested? This election year has gone on for so long already. Do we really need all this speculation? The media is in a frenzy over it all. It’s just a veep. Okay, so maybe it’s kinda important....maybe I’m still hoping he’s going to pick Hillary...

Universal instant messaging application

Good morning. Yesterday BeeJive released a new version of their universal instant messaging application, Beejive IM. If you’ve never heard of it before, it’s a instant messaging application for BlackBerry, iPhone and Windows Mobile.

I really do like this application rather than using the standard AIM/iChat,Yahoo, MSN, or GoogleTalk, MySpace, Lotus Sametime, ICQ and Jabber apps. This one combines them all into one package where you can setup multiple accounts all under one roof.

The interface is nice, easy to use and the program itself is very stable. I use it on my BlackBerry just about everyday and it helps me keep in touch with contacts while I’m out n’ about. The iPhone version is in Beta and uses Safari to log you in.

Lots to do with the site

All of the blog entries have been moved over using RapidWeaver. I really like the software so far but there’s alot to learn with it. I will say that iWeb is truly WYSIWYG which makes it really easy to use.

RapidWeaver does have an easy to use GUI but is not WYSIWYG; nor does it claim to be. For personal pages and those looking to make a quick page for family and friends, I highly recommend iWeb. Unless you really want to get into website design and pure coding, stick to iWeb. Don’t get me wrong, RapidWeaver is great but it’s going to take some learning...and maybe some help from plug-ins...to really get a handle on it.

New website design!

For the next few days, my site will be undergoing a change. I took the leap and am now using RapidWeaver instead of iWeb to design my site. I thought if I ever started to design sites for others, it’d be a good idea to use another type of design program. Anyway, all of the blog entries will be migrated over and the site will be in shambles for a bit but it will all be back to normal soon. Thanks for your patience!

Harry Potter movie delayed

Over the weekend I hear that the new Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince movie has been delayed until next Summer. What the frak?!

Rumors over the internet today and now saying it was delayed because Daniel Radcliffe (Harry to me and you) is appearing naked in the Broadway play, ‘Equus’.

The studio claims that the delay is because “a spot opened on the Summer schedule”. Right...

Very silly if you ask me. These kids ain’t gettin’ any younger Warner Brothers. Plus, I heard the final book is being split into two movies (which I actually like) but that will take the Harry Potter franchise into 2011 if they do a film a year and don’t delay again.

Sigh...

Is it Friday yet?

I’m having one of those Monday mornings where I wish it was Friday already. This is not good. At least we have a three day weekend coming up.

I’ve still got Olympic Fever but what they were showing over the weekend was bringing it to a rapid cool-down. There was nothing good, in my opinion, going on. Maybe this week will be a little better.

I still think the coverage has been great so far. Maybe I’m just craving more swimming? But, track and field should be picking up this week so that should satisfy. Oh, and I am interested in seeing BMX of course.

And, don’t forget,

The House Bunny

comes out on the 22nd!

What's on your fridge?

Here’s another oldie but goodie from the old blog. Let’s play

What’s on your fridge?

where you can win absolutely nothing in prizes...sorry. But it’ll be alot of fun!

I found the image above online and my fridge is posted below. Is yours plain as the day you got it? Covered like the one above? Or minimally decorated with sentimental items?

Mine has magnets from Yosemite and Sequoia National Parks, postcards from my friends travels, a pineapple bottle opener magnet, and a picture of Charlie, my adopted sea otter (both from my friend as well).

So, show us your fridge. You can always post you pic in the dropbox in the Files section.

Spoiler alert!!

Let me start off by saying that I’m enjoying the

NBC coverage

of the Olympics on the web and on TV. However, I’m very annoyed right now. I live on the West Coast. That means I’m not watching this stuff live.

So, when I go to any news site online, I’m getting results flashed on the main page of events that I was waiting to watch! It’s been happening every day but this evening I had it when I found out that Michael Phelps won his eighth medal before I even had a chance to see it on TV.

It’s been happening all week but I’m getting sick of it. What about you all? Looks like I’ll have to stay away from any news sites while I’m watching the games. Are you getting tired of the spoilers too?

My site, now ad free

Good morning everyone. Are you all still recovering from the

Project Single Speed

celebration last night? And, Mr. Phelps, number 7 dedicated to the Project? You go to far my friend.

This morning I got to thinking about all of the self-imposed spam I’ve put on my website. If you’re a returning visitor, you probably have noticed ads like the one to the right here. Believe it or not, but I put those on my own site. Now why on Earth would I want to do that? Well, they’re Google Ads and you get money when you put them on your site. Turns out it’s not alot of money. Actually, I’m up to about 61 cents at this point.

So, I’ve cleaned the whole site of ads for your viewing pleasure. Instead of an ad to the right, you’ll now get to see my Twitter update.

Enjoy your weekend!

Project Single Speed is complete!

The single speed is complete! This evening I completed my project and there are so many people to acknowledge:

I’d like to thank all of the loyal readers of

Tales of a gadget freak

for their support.
My Mom. Cause what thank you speech would be complete without thanking Mom?
Michael Phelps and his quest to win six gold medals in support of Project Single Speed. Thanks Mikey.
Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama for putting aside their differences for a unified backing of Project Single Speed.
To the laundry mat in Tustin that doesn’t know I wash my shop towels in their machines really early in the mornings.
To Paul for helping me out by swapping a wheelset with me and his single speed building advice.
And, finally, to Joe Hageman who began this young mans quest with his immortal words, “Single speeds are cool, man!”

Check out the final pics in the Project Single Speed folder.

I’m going to try and get out on an inaugural ride this weekend at Peter’s Canyon. Woo Hoo!!

Project Single Speed, Day Two

Yesterday there was some good stuff happening with the Single Speed. I left work early on a mission to make some progress on the bike.

I went to

Performance Bike Shop

to pick up a handlebar. I thought a riser type bar might look pretty nice. Got a tube of grease while I was there and picked up a cheap Easton bar. While I was there I ran into a cycling friend and we got to talking about the single speed. I told him I was running

Mavic

X223 rims that came on my Specialized and I hardly used. He confirmed what I suspected; those rims are only for disc brakes, not v-brakes. Damn! The good part was that he’s going to trade me my wheelset for a v-brake compatible set. So, I’ll use my really old wheelset until we make the trade.

When I got home, I cut 5mm off the ends of the riser bar cause those bars are way to wide. Went to install it and hit another bump. The ControlTech stem I’ve had since...forever...didn’t like the bend in the riser. I scratched the hell out of it trying to install it. That’s when I realized I probably needed a new stem. Lucky for me, I had a brand new Profile stem stashed away but needed spacers to match the fork stem length. Oh yeah, and that handlebar ain’t gonna work on the Profile stem...Ugh...

Before I went out to get another handlebar, I decided to take the RST fork apart and see what was going on in there. Talk about nasty! The rubber elastomers inside the fork are completely broken down and un-usable. I’m going with the fork anyway but it may need to be replaced. We’ll have to see how the first ride goes.

Ran over to

Rock n’ Road

and got a spacer for the stem and another handlebar. Can’t return the other one since I cut it down. Oh well...

I cut down the new riser bar and think it looks really nice. The grips are awesome! Since when did they change them so you don’t have to use hairspray to install them? I put the v-brakes on and will work on the brake cabling and drivetrain next. I think I have the saddle adjustments and handlebar setup right now.

Till next time!

LOST: Re-designed

I’m re-hashing one of my previous blog entries from the old Tales of a Gadget Freak site today. Sorry.

I love the TV show

Lost

although I thought last season wasn’t great. This season was awesome and I can’t wait until it comes back.

Someone re-designed the opening sequence of the show to make it look like a more mainstream television show. It’s more traditional and pretty funny.

I found this from Pop Candy a few months ago.

Check it out

here

.

The House Bunny

Are you guys as excited as I am about the movie,

The House Bunny

opening next weekend? I for one am counting down the days till this delightful comedy starring Anna Faris hits the silver screen.

She stars as a Playboy bunny that’s been living in the mansion just a wee bit to long. So she finds a new home at a sorority house filled with misfits and hilarity ensues.

What more can I say...mark your calendars and check this one out when it hits the theaters.

Official website

Project Single Speed has begun!

My best friend has convinced me to modify one of my mountain bikes into a single speed work of art. I’ve had this Dagger mountain bike sitting in my garage for a long, long time. It started out as a Diamondback that I absolutely loved. All the parts on the Dagger are from the Diamondback.

Anyway, tonight I started ripping it apart to transform it into a single speed. I’ve never had a single speed before so I’m pretty excited about the whole thing.

I wish I had taken pictures of the bike before I tore it apart. Sorry, but I’m not putting it back together just to get pics. So, we’ll have to start from the tearing it apart stage.

Check out the photos section for the photo diary of how it becomes a single speed.

I’ll be adding more photos as I keep working on it and posting updates.

Do you Twitter?

Has anyone heard of

Twitter

? It’s a social website that asks the question, “What are you doing?” The idea is to be able to track and know what your friends are doing 24/7.

I started using it a few days ago and quickly started thinking, does

everyone

really want to know what I’m doing

all

the time? I mean, do you really need to know that I’m on my way to work or sitting at my desk?

I guess there are people out there that find information like that useful but I got a little tired with answering to Twitter all the time.

So, I still use it but now you’ll find less serious updates most days with the occasional accurate update. I’m sure you’ll have no problem telling my believable entries from the little white lies.

I did find it useful over the weekend tracking the US Nationals Road Race.

SoCalCycling

was updating their Twitter throughout the race which was fun.

To see what I may or may not be doing, check my

page

.

Lazy Sunday afternoon

Not much to report today. Well, nothing that I can think of anyway. Hope everyone has had a great weekend.

If you’re in Orange County, check out the US Nationals Elite Championships in Irvine. They’ve been racing in time trials, criteriums and road races that finish up the weekend.

Find more info

here

.

Poor little Subaru Outback

My Subaru adventure continues. Those that know me, are well aware of the first 2006 Subaru Outback I had which was a piece of sh*t! Long story short, I got a replacement 2007 Subaru that I really do love. Until today...

‘Blackie’ as I like to call him, wouldn’t start yesterday. It was very strange that my car was working fine and then, one hour later, it just wouldn’t start. So, I called roadside assistance today and someone came out and jump started it. Called Subaru and took the car in for them to check it out.

Turns out the battery was leaking acid and, of course, the warranty on the battery ran out at 36k miles. Lucky for me, I’m at 37k miles. Good heavens.

To calm my pissy attitude, the dealer is only charging me for the battery and none of the labor or other parts that got corroded by the battery acid. I guess that’s a nice gesture and I do thank them for that.

Do you have Olympic fever?

Happy Friday everyone! The Olympics kick off today with the Opening Ceremonies. NBC has the lock on the whole thing and with the 20 channels they have, I’m sure they’ll be able to cover every event for you.

Check out their site

here

for all the Olympics you can eat. There’s even ways to setup alerts on your mobile device for when watching is just a little too much but you gotta have your fix.

Enjoy your weekend!

Add your photos

Good afternoon everyone. I’ve added a photo album in the File page under MobileMe Gallery where you can upload your own photos if you’d like.

Or, feel free to email your photos to

brandongomez-3x65@post.me.com

and they’ll automatically be posted to that gallery.

Have fun!

Leave mountain lions alone!

I can’t believe this story. This morning at Whiting Ranch Wilderness Park, a hiker was attacked by a mountain lion after he....get this...went to pet one of the cougar’s three cubs!

What the frak?!

I mean, seriously. You’re hiking along, see a female lion with three of her cubs and think you should try and pet one of the cubs?? How incredibly dumb is that?!

What really gets me about this story is that, because of this, the policy is to generally put the mountain lion down for coming into contact with a human. Albeit a stupid human. The only good thing about this story is that officials have contacted a San Diego wildlife sanctuary that has agreed to take the lion and her cubs if found. Run kitty, run!!

People, DO NOT try and pet cubs if you’re ever out in the wild.

Read the full story

here

and you to will shake your head in disbelief.

Oh, and here’s

12 Safety Tips

for you all. I love #6...Do not approach a cougar!

A-B-C, Always Be Closing

In 1992, the greatest movie about sales was released,

Glengarry Glen Ross

. We have a new sales rep in our office that thinks

Boiler Room

is the greatest sales movie ever...poor kid. He came in one day talking about how great Boiler Room was and we told him to watch Glengarry Glen Ross. A couple days later he came back and said it was alright. Alright?! You’ve got to be kidding. Needless to say, he’s no longer allowed to utter any of the many memorable quotes from the movie anymore.

Anyway, here’s a funny video that’s on

YouTube

right now. I usually don’t like kids doing stuff like this but it’s pretty funny.

Free coffee!

Well, almost free. Gotcha!

Today, Starbucks announced a new promotion. If you purchase El Grande cup o’ joe in the AM, bring your receipt back after 2pm and get any cold medium sized beverage for $2.00 + tax.

Kind of a nice little promotion although it just makes you spend two more dollars a day and drink more caffeine. Do we really need more caffeine?

I saved my receipt just in case.

Read the full story

here

.

Great wallpaper site

Good morning people of the internet!

One of the things I love doing on my mac is constantly changing my wallpaper. So, where do I go to find great wallpaper you might ask? Well,

InterfaceLIFT

of course!

It’s a great site that offers great wallpapers submitted by users and just about every image can be downloaded in all resolutions; from all screen sizes down to iPhone and BlackBerry compatible sizes.

They also have icons that you can download for both PC and mac. Check out the site for quite a few wallpapers to choose from.

Alot of the BlackBerry wallpapers from my Photos page came from that site. Enjoy!

AOL radio for mac

There’s a new beta of AOL Radio for mac’s available today. I usually use players for XM and Sirius from third party developers but have been trying this one out and so far, it’s pretty nice. There’s a wide variety of channels to select from and the program has links built in to take you to iTunes should you hear a song you want to buy.

The interface is simple and has presets. Album artwork is displayed and if you dock the program, you’ll see the album artwork show up in your dock. Another nice feature is a desktop pop-up that will show the song and artwork when it starts.

There are commercials but not many and they are short. Check it out

here

. It’s a free download and doesn’t require you to sign up or anything like that.

Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog

I hope everyone enjoyed their weekend. Just thought I’d put up a quick post to recommend a web series that’s been out for a short time now.

There are three 15-minute episodes available through iTunes for purchase. You can also view them for free from

Hulu

.

The series was created by Joss Whedon (creator of one of my favorite series, Firefly). Although I must admit that I was turned onto Firefly through a friend but I loved it! This series stars Nathan Fillion from that same series, Neil Patrick Harris and Felicia Day.

It’s excellent, go download it from iTunes! It’s also developed a following on the net. You can go

here

for the official fan site or

here

for the official movie site.

Free songs from Starbucks

I admit, I am addicted to

Starbucks

. The Bucks, Buckies, Stirbucks, Starbuckies, Yuppiebucks, Fivebucks. What ever name you call it. Although, I don’t think I’m

truly

addicted. I can

not

have coffee and be fine. Though some people say I’m grumpy...I just don’t believe them.

But, this isn’t about Starbucks in general. This is a gadget blog after all so I thought I’d mention something that not everyone might know about. Did you know every Tuesday Starbucks offers a card that is a free downloadable song on

iTunes

? Yep, it started when the

3G iPhone

was introduced and Jobs said that we’d soon be able to walk into Starbucks and use our iPhones to find out what was playing in the store. Say, what happened to that anyway? As part of the announcement, Starbucks started the Song of the Week. It lasted a couple months and then stopped. But, it’s back again and I certainly make sure I grab my free song. I’ve also seen them change it up with video offerings on occasion.

So the next time you’re at Starbucks, check out the CD’s and you’ll find this weeks card...for free!

Palm Springs on a Friday

That was the one of the very few Palm Springs quotes I could find so it’ll have to do. Hello all, hope everyone is having a good Friday. Well, not the religious Good Friday...that would just be silly.

I’ll be sitting in my car for a couple of hours heading out to Palm Springs. Unfortunately, not for fun. Although, it wouldn’t be my pick for a fun destination. I think it’s rather hot there this time of year. Rather, I’m heading there for work. Oh well, at least I get to stop at the Cabazon Outlet to see if Timberland has any stuff I like. It’s one of the only reasons I like going to Palm Springs for work.

Maybe I’ll post again when I get back if I’m not out there all day. Have a good weekend everyone! Well, everyone that’s reading this....hmmm...who

is

reading this anyway??