Technology

Tech Vader at the Gym

September 22, 2008 by Kathryn

Well I just wouldn’t be me if I didn’t take my techie nerdesty into the gym. I find that the more technological equipment I can strap to my person, the better I feel about the whole workout experience.

It started with tunes. I find it nearly impossible to work out without a good mix of sweatastic jams. And the mix has to be perfect. I spend weeks tweaking the mix, adding songs, deleting them, taking them for test runs and then adding and deleting some more from my MP3 player. Just when I think I’ve found the perfect mix, I get bored with it and start the whole process over again.

When I’m in my spinning class, the instructor picks the music and I actually don’t mind it. I think of her songs as stationary biking songs and my music as everything else music. And she does a pretty good job, serving as both freakishly awesome teacherly person and DJ simultaneously. On International Talk Like a Pirate Day, I greeted her in Piratese and asked that she conduct the day’s class in a manner befitting the occasion. Glad that I had reminded her of the holiday, she pulled from her CD wallet a disc entitled “Pirate Mix.” I kid you not. The first song was from the soundtrack of that one Johnny Depp pirate movie. The name escapes me… And we all let loose with a hearty “Arrrr Mateys!” and when the going got rough, we suggested that our instructor walk the plank if she felt so inclined.

Tunes ARRRRRR important. I keep my MP3 player strapped to my arm with a black band. It’s a cheap 1 gigger but I’m dreaming of the new Zune. Am I the only one who loves the Zune in all its hotness? Also, I ask you all why you are not downloading all of your music from the Zune site. It’s cheaper than iTunes and comes in a more versatile format, playable on all kinds of devices. If you have iTunes software, it will convert your Zune files into iPod-accessible format in a jiffy so you can play your songs anywhere.

Next in my oh-so-important Darth Vader-like arsenal of life-sustaining workout devices is my heart monitor. I lerve it so greatly. With that strap around my chest and that watch on my wrist I can always see how fast my heart is going so I know if I’m getting a decent workout or not. There are times when I look around the gym and feel like an over-sized mollusk, schlumping my way along on the treadmill and then I look at my heart rate monitor and see that I’m actually getting quite a nice workout. So I take heart and keep on keepin’ on. When I’m stronger and have shed a few layers of myself, there will be time for running like a gazelle. For now, I’ll settle for mollusk if it’s getting me where I need to be.

Truly I used to get so frustrated with my speed compared to everyone else around me. Now I just compare my speed today with my speed yesterday. It’s been 3 weeks and I already have to work much harder to keep my heart rate where it needs to be for a good cardio workout. It’s encouraging and the monitor helps me notice the teeny little baby steps I’m making.

A word of advice — if you’re going to get a heart rate monitor, spend the extra money and get one with a chest strap that keeps constant track of your heart rate. Attempting to save money, I originally bought one for $40 at Target that required me to stop moving and put my free hand on the watch to make a complete circuit in order for it to read my pulse. It was a big waste of money and really frustrating to use. Strangely enough, I found a decent Reebok chest strap monitor on Woot a few months later for $19.95. It works great and I love it.

The third piece of equipment that really keeps me going is my pedometer. I’d used one in the past and didn’t know what the big deal was with counting steps. Mine wasn’t accurate and I forgot to keep track so I could compare my activity levels from day to day. The one I have now, a $30 model from Omron, rests in my pocket or clips onto my belt and keeps really accurate track of how much I’m moving. It has a digital display that calculates number of steps, number of aerobic steps and distance traveled based on me entering the average length of my stride. It keeps track of 7 days worth of data at any one time, resetting itself automatically at midnight. I wear it to work out and try to beat my step record from the previous day.

Then I continue to wear it throughout the day, trying to log as many steps as possible. I have chosen to walk 2 or more miles to meetings just so I can see a higher number on the pedometer. The moral of the story is, if I make fitness a game, I’m much more likely to get on board and stay there.

Faces in my Book

July 28, 2008 by Kathryn

I have been thinking about it for a while now and have come to the conclusion that Facebook = one of the best things ever.

This afternoon I had lunch with a friend of mine from junior high band. She lives in Canada with her husband. We haven’t spoken for 15 years. We found each other on Facebook, she happened to be coming to Seattle on vacation and voila, there I was in a gelato shop downtown with my whiny kids, telling junior high band stories.

For some reason my kids thought the stories were boring and for some reason Laylee resented being toted all over town with an ear infection. After 10 days of home-bound sickness, 3 doctor’s visits and the start of a second round of antibiotics, I decided that we just had to all become portable again. Not sure it was the wisest decision but it was so good to see my friend again and meet her awesome husband.

There are people you were sure would do great things with their lives and it’s so much fun to find out that they actually did. It’s especially fun when your 3-year-old son falls in love with your friend’s husband and refuses to let go of his hand while your normally gregarious daughter spends the whole time you’re together scowling and refusing to talk to anyone unless it’s to tell them how boring they are.

On Sunday I found myself talking on the phone with one of my best friends from high school who I hadn’t heard from in years. Where did I find out he was still alive? That’s right. Facebook.

I’ve also used it to hook up with friends from film school, 6th grade frenemies who have miraculously turned into unbeastly adult-type people who will talk to me now even if I don’t have an ESPRIT school bag, and old coworkers.

It’s like an online matchmaking service for your past, a high school reunion without the awkward moments, bad dancing or drunkishness.

What’s the most unlikely relationship you’ve resurrected on Facebook?

My Junk is Your Junk if You Pay Me For It

July 27, 2008 by Kathryn

I have a lot of useless junk in my house and I want to have money to buy new better junk that won’t become useless for at least another 5 minutes. I enjoy sorting through my junk multiple times and then sitting around all day trying to convince strangers that it has great worth to them even though to me personally it is, alas, junk. I especially love to haggle over a fiddy-cent price difference.

So my neighbors and I decided to host a garage-sale-ic event later this summer. I’ve been piling all garbage that is not compostable or recyclable up in my garage in the hopes that someone will want to give me money for it. I’ve scoured the house from top to bottom looking for any little thing that might not be enriching my health and happiness fully or that might be slowly poisoning me or my children to death with its questionably toxic toxicity. Phthalates in plastic, lead in paint, parabens in beauty products, mysterious things that clean really well in cleaning products and must therefore be carcinogenic.

So the Magic Date Ball, the too-short shirts, the old nail polish, and the stacking rings all had to go. I was going to wait until September to do a sale with my whole street but a friend asked me to bring a few things over to bulk up her garage sale this weekend and I decided to consider it a practice run.

I learned from my previous mistakes and decided not to dress up like a millionaire prom queen for the sale. A couple of weekends ago I went garage-saleing dressed in my nicest possible mom clothes and no one had any pity or mercy on me when it came to haggling. They gave me that look that said, “If you can dress like that, then you don’t need to get a deal from me.” I tried to give them a look that said, “But I got it at Ross! On clearance! And I just want my husband to think I’m hot for the day!” But it didn’t translate well. I was like a character on the show What Not To Wear — Garage Sale Edition, where all the rules are the exact opposite of the conventional show. So this weekend I wore ripped worn-out cords, an old t-shirt, no makeup and no jewelry.

Besides the toys and household items I was selling, I pulled together all the non-natural cleaning products and personal hygiene items I’d been planning to toss, marked them 50 cents or a dollar each and tossed them in big Tupperwares, not expecting anyone to buy them.

Surprise surprise! They were my biggest sellers. Seriously. People were all over my lightly used lotions, cleaners and nail polishes. Sweet.

In fact my favorite customer was an elderly woman with an Eastern European accent, which I will exaggerate slightly in the following dialogue to give you a feel for the way she talked and for added comic effect, who had her eye on my box of cleaners. There were 15-20 bottles in the Tupperware, marked at 50 cents each. She stood there for a while inspecting each one. Pinesol, softscrub with bleach, windex, stainless steel cleaner. She looked thoughtful.

“I give you two dollars for whole box,” she offered.

“Sure,” I said, glad to avoid a trip to the dump. “Let me help you with these.” I started to pull the bottles out of their case.

“No!” she said sternly. “I want the box.”

“Oh. Well. The box doesn’t come with them.”

“WHAT?! NO BOX!? I only wanted them because uff the box. This is horrible.”

“It’s my kids’ toy box. It’s worth more than 2 dollars.”

“Well this is horrible! I don’t want it now.” She started walking away and then called out over her shoulder, “Unless you give me all uff them for $1.50.”

“Um. Sure.”

“I luff you! You are vunderful girls!”

As she continued to shop through our junk, she would periodically call out how vunderful we were… because we gave her a 50 cent discount and because she LUFFED us.

As you can tell, I am a master bargainer/negotiator and saleswoman. I worked the sale hard, although not as hard as my friend’s cute 12-year-old son who walked past people muttering under his breath about Xbox games being the best thing ever and why didn’t anyone want his Xbox games? Didn’t people play Xbox games anymore? Wasn’t it great that we had Xbox games available at this very garage sale?

Can you guess who would get the money if any of his games sold? Yep. I almost had mercy and bought one from him. Almost, but not quite. The last thing we need is one more electronic game in this house. With Dan and his Call of Duty addiction and me with my love of the Wii, it’s a shock we ever speak to each other anymore.

Last night I created a Mii that looks like a demonic butt-ugly mutant and Laylee has named her Floraburr. Whenever I think of or see her, I laugh until my guts liquefy and drain out the corners of my eyes as hysterical funny-farm-worthy tears. Aaaahhh, the joy of my own electronical hilarity.

Sony Reader Digital Book — Giveaway

July 10, 2008 by Kathryn

I was so excited to get my hands on the Sony Digital Reader, give it a spin and tell you all what I thought of it. When I supervised the media department at a public library after college, we were always talking about the latest technology in video, music and book readers. This was about 5 years ago and digital books were out there in the market but none of them truly felt like you were reading a book. I thought they’d never catch on.

For a few years now I’ve had the scriptures and a few other books uploaded to my PDA and it’s great for quick reference but not particularly enjoyable to use and I don’t want to feel like I’m reading from a computer. I wanted to review the Sony Reader Digital Book so I could tell you how the technology was coming along and all the reasons it wasn’t good enough.

Well, that was a couple of months ago. The reader showed up at my house and I pulled it out of the box and started using it immediately. And it feels like a book. It’s small and lightweight and the screen is such that it looks like paper, truly. The font and spacing feel like a paperback except that you can CHANGE the font size. I like to keep it somewhere between itty bitty Lord of the Rings font and granny-needs-glasses large print.

There’s no backlight, which may seem like a downside, but what book glows? Not this one. It’s really like you’re reading from paper, only it always saves your place, you can fit hundreds of books in one small device, and most importantly you don’t have that lopsided page flipping problem. You know when you’re lying on your side reading and one side is always more comfortable to lay on, depending on how far along you are in the book and whether you’re reading the left or right page? But then you switch to the other page and you have to flip over on your other side or hold the book in some really weird way?

You don’t have to do that with this book. It is never lopsided and there are buttons on both sides to turn the pages.

If you’re looking for an all-in-one digital blog reader and wireless device, this is not the toy for you. But that’s not what I’m looking for. I’m looking for this. It does also have a black and white picture viewer, an MP3 player, and two storage card slots so you can use it to store and use a TON of media. You can even play music while you read.

It has a long battery life and the screen is viewable even in direct sunlight… like… I don’t know… a book!

There are a few negatives. The books do load slower than I’d like because you know, I like it fast. The software interface for downloading and uploading books is not super user-friendly. I fancy myself somewhat of a techie and I had some trouble figuring out how to get the books on the device the first time. There is no way to use the book while it is plugged in your computer to charge and you have to buy the DC power adapter separately, which I would highly recommend. Sony also doesn’t have the greatest selection of books in the world. They have a good amount of classic titles and a lot of new releases but the selection is not as broad as that for the Amazon Kindle.

However, I prefer the Sony reader to what I’ve seen of the Kindle because I want a book, a real book, but better. I hope they continue to grow their inventory of content.

I waited weeks to do this review because I’m so enjoying using it and because of my advertising contract now I must pass it on to one of you. So weighing in at a retail value of $299.00, I give you the Sony Reader Digital Book. It also comes with 100 free classic titles from Shakespeare to George Eliot.

Now does anyone want to give me one? It’s on my wish list. Oh the joys of carrying my entire library around all the time!

If you’re willing to enter this giveaway, even though the reader is lightly used and has my cooties on it, leave a comment listing 2 non-religious books you’d like to carry around with you everywhere. I know you all love the Bible and the Koran. What else do you love? (I’m willing to ship within the US. Anywhere else, I’ll be happy to send it if you pay the postage.)

I’ll randomly choose a winner Sunday night at 10pm PST. Oh, and Sony wants me to let you know that they’re not responsible if you fall and hurt yourself while reading it or if it self-destructs when you disassemble it to see the little men turning the gears on the inside.

Click to Read My Product Review Policy

Send Condolences

February 13, 2008 by Kathryn

My internet is dead.

Remember me? I’m Today’s tech mom.

Well yeah.

I don’t have internet access at this time. My internet’s been down since Saturday and my ISP is telling me it will be several days before they can even come look at it. The original service date was 2 weeks from when I called but they’ve squeezed me in for early next week. HOW THOUGHTFUL!

So we tried to switch companies but the only other high speed internet company in town has been so flooded with people switching from the company we’re currently with that they have completely saturated their infrastructure. They are not accepting any new accounts unless one of their current clients cancels their service.

No. I’m really not kidding about that.

So no online bill pay. No fixing my crazy blog header. No looking up things when I say, “Oh. I’ll just look that up online.” Limited email access on my phone where I can read my messages 8 words at a time and type responses with my thumbs. No IMing or webcam with Dan. No blogging or commenting on blogs though I can read your sites on my tiny phone screen… but let’s be honest, I won’t. I’m typing this at Eve’s house, heaven love her. She is my technological benefactor.

I am amazed at how dependent I am on technology. It’s quite pathetic actually. I miss you all. Please don’t be mad if I haven’t responded to your email or comments. My thumbs hurt real bad.

On a positive note – For the last few days I’ve been reading actual print books and cleaning my house. It’s sort of like a mini vacation… without the little umbrellas in my drinks.

My Self-Imposed Interactive Nanny Cam

February 3, 2008 by Kathryn

We miss Dan a lot. You see, he works all day… at an office… far far away from our raucous good times. Sometimes he doesn’t make it home in time for dinner and we think about him and talk about him and set his place at the table just in case.

A couple of weeks ago we finally got our webcam hooked up and working so I decided to video conference him in to our evening meal. We sat the laptop on his placemat and initiated a web call right before we said the prayer. Then we started to eat while he worked, showing him bites of food in an effort to entice him home. It worked. It’s possible he came home because he could no longer get anything done with the sounds of our dinnertime filling his office.

It was so fun to have him “with us” that I’ve been connecting to him with the web cam frequently throughout the day. We’ll say hi and smile and wave a lot and then I’ll leave the camera running as I go about the day. He turns the volume down so he can get some work done and then periodically glances up at us to see what we’re doing. The sound of his fingers hammering away at the keyboard is comforting to me and it feels almost like he’s here with us. The sound of a keyboard is the sound of Dan.

Every once in a while he uses his view of the house to tell Laylee not to eat so close to the computer or to call out to Magoo to stop whatever he’s doing or face the most dire of consequences.

When I’m making dinner, I position the camera in the kitchen so he can have his own personal cooking show if he cares to glance up.

To me, this kind of big brother bonding is AWESOME. However I’ve spoken to a couple of other moms who were not so keen on the idea of having a live video feed of their day being broadcast to their husbands at work.

What do you think? Would you do it? Do you do it?

My Pore Cleaner Sucks

September 4, 2007 by Kathryn

While I was “researching” the Harriet Carter catalog for blog fodder, I came across a pore cleaning device “as seen on TV” and felt it was ridiculous, possibly useless, and I must have it. However, I was unwilling to pay $7.95 on the off chance that one of my pores could be cleansed of impurity.

Then, the stars aligned and by some miracle the DOLLAR STORE got in a shipment of the coveted pore cleaners. These particular cleaners were not “as seen on TV” per se, but they were as seen at the DOLLAR STORE, which meant that they would only cost approximately one dollar. I dug into my piggy bank and indulged.

The box claimed that the device would provide a personal spa experience. I am a person and I like spas and experiencing things. Great-o.

Inside the box there were no instructions, just this helpful warning insert.

There are a few things I love about the insert.

1. The CAUTION — “Purple spots or scars may appear on your skin.” With the use of this device, you must forever choose between dirty pores or purple spots and scars.

2. The fact that PORE CLEANER is always typed in ALL CAPS.

3. The part where it says “do not use PORE CLEANER if you have pimples or any skin inflammation.” What exactly are you supposed to clean out of your pores if you’re not someone who’s prone to pimples or skin inflammation? Also, if the cleaner does what it says it will do to your skin, everyone who uses it will have skin inflammation. Maybe you can only use it the one time, until your skin becomes inflamed and then you have to stop. Or maybe you can only use it once on each patch of skin until your entire face turns purple and then you have to stop. Maybe you can only use it on that really soft part of your skin right behind your earlobes.

4. That you cannot use the PORE CLEANER for more than one minute around the nose or 4 minutes around the cheeks, chin or forehead. You cannot use it ever around your eyes, the top of your nose, head, hairline border, or on areas of thin skin, or on the same point more than twice.

After all this I put a battery in, started her up and pressed her to the very thick and unblemished tip of my nose. Nothing. Nada. Not even the promised purple polka dot.

Well that’s just one more thing I’ve seen on TV that I’m not willing to spend a dollar on. For a real spa experience, I guess I’ll need to shell out at least a buck and a quarter.

Lunch Engine Optimization

August 13, 2007 by Kathryn

I hear a lot of people talking shmack about Search Engine Optimization, the art of getting your website as high in the search results as possible on Google, MSN, Yahoo or Hakia.

There are many ways to do this. One is to creatively add popular keywords all over your site, in your post titles, your categories and tags, anywhere that would be picked up by a search engine. If you say “Purple Manatees” 400 times on the front page of your website, chances are you will rank pretty high on an MSN search for purple manatees. If you say “purple manatees” 400 times AND “large redish-blue sea creatures that are also known as cows of the sea, who live in the ocean in salt water and swim like fishes even though they’re mammals who are larger than PARIS HILTON or BRITNEY SPEARS,” you really broaden the search results people can use to find your site.

I’ve never really done this, but I hear the key is to use terms that a lot of people search for and to use as many different terms as possible.

Today I noticed that although I don’t do this on my website, I totally do it to get my kids to put the lunch I’ve made high on their personal search results page. Laylee wanted peanut butter and Magoo just wanted some BREAD!

Instead of — “peanut butter sandwiches,” I made, “Peanut butter and jam sandwiches on bread with pink jelly, sugar sauce that tastes like candy, creamy brown sauce, squishy homemade pastry and protein.”

That way, if they’re searching for peanuts, butter, jam, sandwiches, bread, pink things, jelly/jello/gelatinous anything, sugar, sauce, brown items, things that squish, homemade things, pastries, or vital protein-type nutrients, my PB&J creation will match their search perfectly.

Tomorrow I may whip up some “Kraft macaroni and cheese, slightly overcooked but almost al dente, pasta noodles with orange cheesish sauce, made with milk (an ingredient also found in ice cream), butter, unknown chemicals, saturated fat, refined carbohydrates, fun, slurpable goodness and joy.”

the reasons: cilantro, blue sky, Dan greeting me in the morning with an invitation to go clothes shopping

Subscribe to Daring Young Mom

August 4, 2007 by Kathryn

I learned a few techie things at BlogHer and now I’m trying to act on them. I’ve finally gotten friendly with FeedBurner so if you’d like to subscribe to my RSS for your reader, you can click here.

If you’d like my new posts delivered to your email inbox, you can subscribe by entering your addres below. (Mom – I’m talking to you!)

Ultimately, I still Have to do the Laundry

May 7, 2007 by Kathryn

Evidence is mounting that I may in fact be ULTIMATE.

When we bought my new laptop, Dan went out to buy software. He came home with Windows Vista and Office and I protested, “The computer came with Vista already installed.”

“No,” said Dan, “It came with Vista Home Edition. I got you Vista ULTIMATE.”

Apparently you can buy several versions of Microsoft Windows Vista — Toddler, Student, Dropout, Home, Vacation Home, Feckless Slacker, Bidness, Successful Bidness, and ULTIMATE.

Dan thinks I’m neither “Feckless” nor “Home” very often and he certainly doesn’t want to get all up in my “Bidness.” Indeed one of the reasons he married me was because I am ULTIMATE so there you go.

He also purchased the ULTIMATE edition of Office and later asked me how I was enjoying it. “It’s ULTIMATE,” I replied and I was mostly serious.

That same week I ran out of mascara and called up Stephanie, my favorite Mary Kay-vangelist for some assistance.

“Which mascara do you suggest? I want my lashes to look nice but not like a caterpillar curled up and died on my eyelids. I also don’t want to have to burn the mascara off with acid at the end of each day so I try to steer clear of waterproof.”

“Then you want the ULTIMATE Mascara.”

“Why of course I do.”

So I’ve been wearing the ULTIMATE Mascara for a while now and the coverage and lengthening properties are not the only things that are ULTIMATE about it.

Each night when I wash my face, I dry my eyes on a towel, leaving two black mascara spots. I’ve done this for years. Normally, I’m left with a small black residue around each eye which I either wash off or sort of blend away with moisturizer.

No more. Each night when I wash the ULTIMATE Mascara from my eyes, I’m left with the ULTIMATE Mascara circles.

So now I want to upgrade everything in my house. Hook me up with Kashi Go Lean ULTIMATE — now with even more natural-looking twigs and branches, Google Translator ULTIMATE — now offering translations of Magoolish dialogue into English, Spanish and Pig Latin, Laundry Room ULTIMATE — now with clothes sorting and folding features.

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