My new goal

Over the past few years I’ve become very disgusted with Florida, both politically & socially. I finally decided to do something about it. I’ve set a goal for myself to move out of here by November 24, 2009.

The only reason I moved here was because my mother got sick. Since she’s no longer with us, there’s nothing keeping me here. Socially, there’s nothing for me here. I don’t know any other developers here. Most of my local friends & neighbors barely know how to turn on a computer. Almost everyone I deal with every day is either in the San Francisco bay area or Vancouver. I really need to live in a high-tech area like that, since I feel isolated from everyone else in the computer industry.

I work at home, although I’m not self-employed, so I can live anywhere. If I lived somewhere like San Francisco it would give me the option of working in a co-working space instead of at home, or if I lived in Vancouver I could actually work in the office. I hate driving, but that’s my only option here. I prefer living in a real city with an actual downtown area like San Francisco or Vancouver where I can walk to restaurants, theaters, and clubs.

I’m also strongly at odds with Florida politics. Here, it’s not unusual to see people flying a Confederate flag, but when I see a confederate flag I have the urge to tear it up, spit on it, and stomp on it. My political views were formed growing up in New York City, which makes me feel very out of place here.

The first part of my plan is to start cleaning up my place and getting rid of the junk that has accumulated over the years, a large portion of it includes all of my mother’s possessions & documents which I’m storing in my extra bedroom. I’ve always resisted doing that, which is the main thing that has kept me from moving. Once I have it cleaned up, I can start getting my condo ready to sell. Hopefully prices will start to recover by that time, although even at the worst, units were still selling for more than I paid for this one.

I’ve found in previous moves, especially across the country, it’s a lot easier & cheaper to get rid of my furniture and buy new stuff rather than packing & moving it. I plan to take only my computers & cameras and sell all of my furniture.

links for 2009-04-24

Tweetie comes to the Mac

My favorite iPhone twitter application, Tweetie, is now available for the Mac. It’s replaced Twhirl & Nambu as my favorite Twitter client.

Tweetie’s user interface is clean & gorgeous. It has the features I want in a Twitter client: separate views for friend’s tweets, replies, and direct messages, and makes it easy to track new tweets by maintaining the proper scroll position to show current tweets until you explicitly scroll.

Atebits paid a lot of attention to detail. Animation effects are a nice touch, without being annoying. Double clicking brings up the user’s profile or all tweets in the reply threads. Most importantly, Tweetie doesn’t get in your face, so you can concentrate on work without being distracted, unlike many other twitter clients that demand your attention, yet you can easily see when new tweets arrive.

The only features Tweetie is missing are groups, saved searches, and trends.

Plane Crash

Earlier today a small plane crashed into a house a few blocks from here. I wasn’t able to see it from my window, but my neighbor banged on my door to let me know and dragged me over to see it. I just took my point & shoot camera, because I was afraid I’d be hassled too much if I brought the D90. When I got there, the fire was already under control, with fire & rescue workers at the scene.

IMG_0107

I’ve posted more photos here.

Nikon's new D5000

Earlier this week, Nikon introduced the D5000, which shares several features of the D90, but in a smaller & lighter camera that costs several hundred dollars less. It adds several compelling new features, most notably a 180-degree tilt/swivel screen and several new scene modes.

The D5000 uses the same sensor as the D90, so the image quality should be very similar to the D90 and D300, making it a worthwhile step up from the D40 or D60. However, the D5000 has a few very significant drawbacks: it lacks the D90’s internal focus motor, which means it can’t auto-focus with non AF-S lenses, such as Nikon’s wonderful 50mm f/1.8 AF. The D5000’s LCD screen is only 2.7″ with a resolution of 240×320 vs. the D90’s beautiful 640×480 3″ screen. The D5000 also lacks a subcommand dial, so most likely it will be necessary to use the menu for many settings, where they could be changed with one button on the D90. If you use an external flash such as the SB800 or SB900, the D5000’s built-in flash can’t be used as a remote trigger, unlike the D90.

I’d like to see a swivel screen in other future models, but I wouldn’t give up the D90’s features for it.