Highlights of 2003: Part 2

See the Highlights of 2003: Part 1

June 21, 2003

Changes

I came back from two weeks in Hawaii (including the MacMania Geek Cruise II—more below!) to find out that the facility at which we’ve been receiving our mail was closing. We will now be receiving our mail

at our home address on Father Sky Ct. (Note: This was the inspiration for several branch businesses, including a shift to a more generic Father Sky Industries, down the road.)

In addition to notifying everybody in creation, it also means new stationery and business cards, shipping labels, checks, the works! What a headache.

Well, our 20-year-old company image was due for a make-over anyhow, and so having finally decided on a new logo and finishing the initial design considerations for the new website, I guess this is timely.

Geek Cruise #2

Having so enjoyed the last Geek Cruise (Alaska), I was very excited about the second one, which left Honolulu on June 1 for stops on the Big Island (Hilo), Maui, and Kauai, as well as Fanning Island in the Republic of Kiribati. (I feel really cool just saying that! A lovely place—think Gilligan!

In any event, the 3 days at sea were devoted to a wide range of truly fantastic seminars. I attended two seminars on Dreamweaver by my on-board roommate, Laura Gutman, that were both excellent. (One other change coming up is that I’ll be switching from GoLive, which has been very good to me, to Dreamweaver, which, from what I’ve seen, seems to have a slightly more intuitive interface—to me, at least.

I also got a great deal out of Marc Rubenstein’s session on “Shrinking Vinyl to CD” as I’ve just begun “shrinking” a rather embarrassingly large collection of LPs and music cassettes to digital. Bob LeVitus, as always, had tons of Mac tips, tricks, and shareware ideas. I wrote my first AppleScript in Sal Soghoian’s intro class (brilliant!) and really tweaked my understanding of iPhoto in David Pogue’s presentation. Wil Wheaton (yes, THAT Wil Wheaton) had some great ideas on blogging—an idea I’ve been playing with in these pages.

The best part of the week—and simply having access to some of the most brilliant minds in the Mac world—was that I left feeling not just more knowledgeable, but more grounded and confident in my knowledge and understanding, and especially in my ability to gain knowledge and understanding where and when I need it. I spend a lot of time at the keyboard, either of my G4 tower at home or my G3 laptop (bless it’s little 400 MHz heart) on the road.

I met a lot of wonderful new people (including Andy Inhatko, whose columns I have read and loved for years, regardless of whether I understand the topic or not—a genuinely nice person in addition to being incredibly intelligent and funny) and thoroughly enjoyed the reunions with the cruisers from last year’s trip. There was also a Trek Cruise on our ship with over 300 Star Trek enthusiasts. I happened to be passing by just as their photo shoot was winding up, and managed to get my picture taken with a few (very nice) Star Trek cast and crew members!

Travel

Tired of hearing myself moan about being gone as much as I’ve been (about 50% of my life during the past two years or so), I’ve decided to cut back on the time I’ve spent extending my work schedule to visit friends and family, or simply enjoy a few extra days of wherever I was. I’m starting to feel a little burned out and need some time at home that isn’t devoted exclusively to getting ready for the next trip or recovering (and unpacking and catching up from) the last one. I’m not looking to cut back on work dates yet so I don’t think I’ll be turning down jobs anytime soon, but I’d like to take a little time off from the visits and “vacations” for a bit.

July 26, 2003

Schedule updates

I just received the cities in which I’ll be presenting for the Bureau of Education and Research during the 2003-2004 school year, and I have updated my calendar accordingly. Check it out to see if I’ll be near you—with 35 dates, and 35 cities, it’s a fair bet I’ll get close this year.

New website

I’ve finally begun construction of the new site, which has been an interesting process as I’m using new software (Dreamweaver MX) after years of comfortable familiarity with GoLive and have no idea what I’m doing. I’ve also had to learn all sorts of maneuvering in Photoshop to come up with the graphics for this site.

I have most of the “front end” pages designed and am now venturing into the world of frames for the 9 sections represented by the hands in the center of the page. Much to learn. Overwhelming amount of new stuff to learn. But one page at a time…

Sept. 30, 2003

I’ll keep this short. I’m frantically finishing pages, checking links and spelling, validating code. I’m leaving town in 36 hours and want to get this site online before I go. Preferably before I go to bed tonight.

So, if you’re looking at this site, you know exactly what I’ve been up to— almost to the exclusion of everything else in my life—for the past several months.

No it’s not perfect, and there are a bunch more pages to go up, but I’m thinking this is a pretty good start. Let me know what you think, what you want me to add, where I missed a spot…

More later…

Dec. 24, 2003

Happy Holidays, everyone! Resting up after a busy and exhausting semester, preparing to hit the ground running very soon after the first of the year.

Plans to add to this site, and pretty much all of the plans I had for my month at home, were sidelined after the sudden loss of our beloved dog, Chelsea. The fact that she had been with us since puppyhood and had a long, happy life right up until the end helps, but the hole in our hearts is large and will take time to heal.

Needless to say, we’re sort of going through the motions with regard to the holidays and pretty much everything right now. At some point, I suspect I’ll get excited about the fact that my coauthor, Eric Katz, and I have a contract to do a new book for Health Communications, Inc. (It will be my 6th book with them!)

Entitled High School Isn’t Forever, this book has been “cooking” in the back of my mind for a number of years. Look for news and a bunch of surveys—we need a lot of input from site visitors, workshop participants and friends—on this site in the coming days.

So as I count my many blessings at this special time of the year, please know that anyone reading this page is high on the list. From my heart to yours, sincerest wishes for health, happiness, and abundance during the season and in the coming year.