Day 1 – Pick up the car

Met the rep at the #tukeedevhouse to pick up the car…fully loaded…in white!  First impression – “its definitely not Grandpa’s Lincoln…”.  Ford has really stepped up the styling on the Lincoln brand with their newest vehicle releases – I’m totally loving the lines of the car!

Get in to the car – and its got Sirius Satellite Radio – that’s a given in most cars today.  I didn’t really have an opportunity to mess with it too much before heading back to work, but the THX sound system & the Sirius satellite radio was crystal clear cruising all the way back to Scottsdale.  Got out of work, and bolted over to the kids school for Dom’s end of the year party – still didn’t have too much time to mess with the gadgets or the car, but I planned on it as soon as the party was over.

Ended up leaving the party and I literally sat in the parking lot of 7 Eleven for 20 minutes or so going through the manual and playing with Microsoft Sync.  I had thought that since it was Microsoft software, it wasn’t going to really support my Blackberry 8900, however, I was wrong!  I paired up my phone within a minute or so and made a call to Lexi (again) to wish her happy birthday – this time, through the phone interface in the car.  Awesome!

My battery was dying on my phone, so I knew I was going to have to head home, plug my phone in to my laptop, and let it take a charge before I could play with it some more, but then that got me thinking.  I figured, ok, there’s got to be more to the Microsoft Sync – it HAS to have a USB port somewhere in the car.  Sitting out front of my parents house (I had to stop by and show them the car – both my parents were jealous), I began looking everywhere, and then I opened up the center console and found the USB port.  I figured there was no way this was going to be as cool as I had imagined…and since I just had 2 strikes against my thoughts about the car and the Sync technology…whooosh…swing and a miss!  My phone started charging, and then I noticed that I had a USB media option – it totally loaded up all the MP3’s I had on my internal SD card and I could access my full library of music.

Streaming MP3’s via USB + charging phone + Bluetooth tech + aggressive styling + smooth ride = BIG GRIN!!!

Later in the evening after stopping by Gangplank to show the boys the car and giving them a ride in it, I discovered how to stream my media from my phone over Bluetooth…holy freakin’ cool!

Tomorrow I’ll touch more on how the car drives and any more gadgets that I find!

Check out the video that Chuck filmed late last night while I paired up the 8900 again & streamed MP3’s over Bluetooth to the sound system…

To be perfectly honest, this blog post has been sitting in my drafts section for a few months.  I wanted to start this post about people bitching about the MLB.tv service, but I think I had this little voice in my head that told me to just give it some time, enjoy my already stellar experience, and see where it goes from there.

The journey to MLB.tv started late in the season last year when I wanted to be able to stream the playoff games from whatever office I may of been working out of that day, however, I forgot to read the fine print that stated all live playoff games were blacked out, but an archive copy of the game would be available AFTER the game…meh.  Small fail for me…but that seems to be some what of a daily occurence as I get older.

So fast forward a few months, and I start poking around and seeing if I could find ANYTHING on the internet about MLB.tv offering live games streaming in HD…I couldn’t find anything.  So I went to the social channels, sent out a msg on Twitter, and oddly, my friend Nicole of all people responded to me on Facebook (my Twitter feed goes through to Facebook as well).  She said that she knew all the MLB.tv guys from when she lived in New York for a few years and she immediately got on her IM, asked if they were going to be offering streaming HD content for 2009, and they said yes!

The power of social media is awesome!

So anyway, when it came time to roll out streaming HD over the internet from MLB.tv, I was on it like white on rice with my credit card in hand!  Its roughly $20/month for me to be able to watch ALL of the Red Sox games live in HD…ummm…yeah…IN!

When I signed up, the player was still in “beta” mode with some limited functionality, but it worked well for a beta…not gonna lie.  There were some issues with the “NextDef” java based plug-in initially, for many users, but as far as I can tell, those issues are gone.  The player itself is all Flash based, and has some really cool options.  You can literally use it as a DVR with an unlimited amount of space to store ALL games ALL season long…in HD!  Its like a media mecca for any diehard baseball fan.

We are a few months in to the MLB season now, and I’m still watching my HD stream every chance I can get.  The picture quality isn’t perfect all the time, but this is new technology, and since I’m REALLY in to new tech (oddly I’m writing this blog post on my PC that’s connected to my 46″ Samsung LCD TV), I can pretty much “go with the flow” when it comes to bumps in the road when new technologies roll out.

Kudos to the MLB.tv crew…you guys are doing a great job…love the service…keep pushing forward!  And, if you are a die hard baseball fan, and your team isn’t within your local market, do yourself a favor and get the service already…no…seriously…get it, and if you do get it, and don’t like it, come back and tell me why…maybe we can get some group collaboration together and get some new features packed in for the 2010 season!

The original site was created in ColdFusion and has been active for quite some time, however, the good people at BajaSurVacationRentals.com were experiencing not only downtime, but they have been overspending with Google Adwords to essentially “buy traffic” (not conversions), and have been hitting a cap when trying to expand.

My friend Erica, who is the Director of Sales & Marketing there, approached me about how they could expand because she was consistently hitting a wall with their current developer.  I took a look at the site and suggested that the site be written in PHP using the CodeIgniter framework to ensure that even if I get hit by a bus, there are more PHP developers out there than there are ColdFusion developers, and PHP is not so much of a dying technology.

Erica wanted to keep the look & feel of the site, so I basically spruced it up a little, and completely re-wrote the whole site (custom CMS included) in PHP & CodeIgniter.

We’re currently working on an SEO strategy to build traffic mainly organically instead of paying thousands of dollars buying traffic from Google.  After a little over 1 week after launch, the site is ranking quite highly on popular keywords for cabo rentals per my reports from the best keyword ranking tool out there.

I’ve heard there are some good deals to be had on both airfare and villa rentals in cabo these days…maybe you should go check the site out and plan a trip down to cabo?

Oh yeah…they also are on twitter as @caborentals – follow them for special announcements and so forth.

As a web developer, I have many things that I factor in when developing a new site, or adding on to an existing site, and you know, people could really save some cash if I didn’t have to spend extra time making Internet Explorer play nice like the other browsers do with no “extra” help.

Let’s say that some normal markup would take about 10 hours…well I’ll quote it out as 13+ just because of that extra bit I’m going to have to spend on making Internet Explorer display the same way that the other browsers do just because they conform to standards.

So do yourself a favor…if you want to save some development costs, spread the word, Internet Explorer is the devil as far as XHTML/CSS is concerned – it just HAS to be different and it is costing YOU more money.

I think Microsoft did it that way, because you know you didn’t pay for that Office software you are using…so they are just stickin’ it to ya in another way! hahahaha

Download Firefox or Download Safari – and save your soul!!!

ESPN Article: Warner, Cardinals Agree

All week long I have been biting my nails and screaming that the Cardinals just pay the man – the old man was definitely a large piece of the catalyst that got the Arizona Cardinals to the #2 spot for the 2008 season (although I would have preferred #1, #2 sits just fine with me).

Now on to other issues – Anquan Boldin and Edgerrin James.  I am still on the fence about Anquan, he’s a great player, but he’s no Larry Fitzgerald.  He does bring a certain David Boston’esque feel to the receiver line up tho with as big and as physical as he is, and having a big dude on the squad that can catch a ball and lead the league in TD’s while he was out for 3 games…ummm…the Cards better re-sign his ass!

Edgerrin…bye bye.  Yeah, you pulled some great stats out of your ass in the playoffs, but give me a break – we had to pull a McNabb on your ass to get you there.  See ya…I’ll take Hightower and Arrington over your ass any day of the week.

Exciting times right now…now only if we could trade Lienart to Detroit for that #1 pick in the draft???  Stafford > Lienart!

The “Sweet on Geeks” charity auction event is happening on March 14th, 2009 at Changing Hands Bookstore in Tempe, AZ at 8pm.  I think I’m gonna take the most in auction dollars…I decided…

This time of the year absolutely sucks – football season finished up a few weeks ago, and ugh…basketball is the only effin sport that seems to be crowding the available spots on all the sports channels.  I’m not a huge basketball fan…I just couldn’t get back to it after the Suns let me down for so many years (*cough*93 Finals*cough*) – I can only take one team in AZ to let me down for so many years and still stick with it…my Cardinals…the 2008 NFC Champions…

So here we go…another year of MLB baseball…who do you think is heading to the World Series this year?  Even though I’m a huge Red Sox fan, I hope the divisions are all battling it out again this year like they were last year – that makes for one hell of a season!

Oh…and go Red Sox!!!  Papi is back…slim and trim…

Native Phoenician Romance with a Twist

Harley’s Italian Bistro has been a well-kept secret in downtown Phoenix for longer than I can imagine. Personal service, excellent wine selection, and traditional italian cooking that will make you melt! The atmosphere is intimate and usually quiet so keep that in mind. (view more details)

North Phoenix Day of Hiking & Pampering

This date takes a bit of planning and thought, but provides a day full of adventure, relaxation and fun. You are certain to impress your loved-one! Start the morning with a cup of coffee, grab your date and head to the Arizona Hiking Shack in Cave Creek: http://www.hikingshack.com/. (view more details)

Valentines Day

Camelback Mountain(McDonald DR, Phoenix, AZ) – Take a morning Hike.  Jamba Juice(4811 N 16th Street, Phoenix, AZ) – Following the Hike go to a Juice Bar. (view more details)

Valentines Day For Pregnant Couples

So you or your partner is pregant? That means no wine for at least one of you. This is an all day kind of date, but she deserves it, right? (view more details)

Friday Art Night in Cave Creek

Start off the evening at El Encanto Mexican Restaurant for some authentic Mexican fare. The Pollo Fundido and Beef Fajitas come highly recommended, as well as dining near the duck pond. (view more details)

I wasn’t a fan at first, but its slowly been growing on me due to its vast features that allow you to create groups, and setup various searches so I’m not going back and forth in a Search.Twitter.com window all day long!

New Features

Language Translation: Sweet…now I can understand what all those 13 year old asian kids are talking about!

StockTwits Integration: I’m not totally in to stocks yet (although I probably should be since I’m still ‘relatively young’ – like that in quotes hahaha), and I do believe this site was made by local phoenix all star Howard Lindzon.  I like integration with other apps…A+.

Hash Tag Support: I love me some hash tags – no seriously #I #love #me #some #hash #tags…and I love when I am #thefirstonetocreateahashtag – I’m an attention whore…sue me.

User Search: Uh…I’m lost…can’t we just do that with a “global search”?  That’s what I do…so I can stalk @chuckreynolds and @miley__cyrus – ok, maybe not Miley Cyrus, cause that’d get me on “Dateline: To Catch a Predator” faster then Miller drops the soap in county lock-up, but definitely Chuck – that bastard never tells me when the cool shit is going down.  Wait…maybe that’s a sign……… :-/

Ok…well…here you go…read about the new Tweetdeck improvements in depth…and get a new version now!  W00T!