image by 27147

As we live a life of ease
Every one of us has all we need,
Sky of blue, and sea green,
In our yellow submarine!

I'm amazed at how many of my friends are interested in living together. It makes me believe that maybe the culture I'm looking for here in Dallas isn't lost after all. I've seen an outpouring of ideas and offers from lots of people over the past week or so and it's really helped me flesh this out a bit.

One of the most interesting offers was to share a home with a family in Austin. The family is already very dear to my heart and like-minded in terms of family and responsibility. And I long ago decided that Austin was an ideal city for me if I was going to stay in Texas. This seemed like a perfect situation.

But, the more I consider it the more I realize how much risk and difficulty there is involved with it. I'd have to take C away from her Mom. It's only a few hours away and she'd still be able to see her almost as often as she'd like. But, it adds some complication. Factor in that I'd need to drop everything, move, look for a job, rent out my house, and leave everything I know and love here in DFW, it was just too much to do all at once. I still think this is ideal, and if I haven't found what I'm looking for in Dallas within a few years, I'll start looking out that way again. But for now, I think I have to let that go.

Another amazing offer I received was to share a home with a family in North Richland Hills. This place is beautiful! There's lots of room! I've been friends (though not incredibly close friends) with half of the parental unit for over 10 years. I met the rest of the family and we all got along wonderfully. I'm still having conversations with them and working some bits out in my head.

But, as I see it now, there are a few limiting factors. Despite being a huge home, there are only 4 bedrooms. 3 of them are occupied by this family, so C and I would share a room. We do that now, so that's okay. But as she gets older I'd prefer she share with another child. There's nothing to say she couldn't share with one of the other kids though. So that's a wait-and-see kind of thing. The other limiting factor is that this house very much belongs to this family. I had envisioned a "our home" mentality and perhaps this would blossom into that as time progressed, but that isn't the feel I got right away. So, another wait-and-see. The biggest limiting factor, though, is that, because after I move in all the rooms would be taken, it will be, at most, a two family home. Again, the family there said that there might be opportunity for more but wants to do it on a wait-and-see basis. So there's a whole lot of wait-and-see.

I'm okay with wait-and-see. But I'd like to limit the disruptions to my daughter's life as much as possible. With a move, a change in schooling/daycare, a whole new city, and the need to untie us from our current house, that's a LOT to go with for so much wait-and-see. I'm still talking with them, and we're going to have lots of sleep overs in the future, both to see where this goes and also because I'm excited to have met a friendly, open, like-minded family with an open-door policy so similar to my own.

So that leaves me with three options for now. I intend to pursue all three until one pans out.

I am going to keep looking for an existing home that I could share with another family. Ideally, there'd be room for at least three families but I'm flexible there for the right situation. Proximity to Irving, Denton, or Dallas is ideal, though not required. If you know of anyone that lives in a home with a room or two that they would spare and are interested in an intentional community of this nature, please let me know or send them my way.

I am going to think of ways to make my current home more suited to multi-family living and seek out families to share it with. I got an offer from a friend who would be willing to share my home. However, with her and her daughter here, that exhausts all of the "conventional" sleeping space my home has to offer (and that's with our daughters sharing a room). The rooms in my house are large, however. So I'm looking for creative ways to split them into smaller spaces suitable for children as well adults who would consider even more open-minded living arrangements (like large rooms being shared by adults, etc). If you're creative and budget-minded and would like to help me think of ways to split up this space let me know. If you would be open to "interesting" living arrangements with a very small financial obligation, contact me.

Finally, I'm looking to buy a home more suitable to what I want. Something large-ish with emphasis on the number of rooms not the size of them. Ideally in the Denton, Coppell, or Dallas (Oak Cliff, likely) areas. If you know of a home like this, or would be interested in helping to find one and share it, please let me know.

Image by James Booth

Have you ever heard Akon's "Right Now"? WAIT! STOP! Don't click that link! I don't want to be responsible for what may happen afterward. I'm sure you've heard it. I'm quite far removed from the "cool guy" scene and I've heard it before now.

Maybe in the bathroom at that bootie-bumping club. Your "accidental" stop on the Top-40 station on your way across the dial. Standing outside the changing room waiting for your new fling to try on what must be the 40th pair of shoes. Through earbuds in an attempt to drown out the nagging about how fat and lazy you are that reminds you far too much of the last fling you had and this one isn't even half as cute. You've heard it.

This song must be the worst song ever written. Ever.

I wanna make love right now now now.
Wish we never broke up right now now now.
We need to link up right now now now.

So why didn't I just turn it off?

I started Couch to 5K (C25K, A program designed to take you from the Couch to running a 5K in 9 weeks) today. I had done it once before in December of 2008 but was abruptly halted due to (ah hell let's use the oh-so-PC-term) Life Change Events. Unwilling to give myself any further cause for delay and working toward being a satisficier instead of a maximizer, I opted to let Pandora choose my music for me this time around. I've heard lots of warnings (no more ColdPlay!) about how inappropriate Pandora's music selections can be. Trapping myself into them by starting a run and not wanting to stop to fiddle with music was probably not the best idea.

Don't do this.

I picked one song that I thought was a good song to run to. Something with an upbeat tempo, uplifting lyrics, and not anything too heavy or thought provoking. I picked "I Gotta Feeling" by the Blackeyed Peas. Yeah, not the best song ever written, but it met my criteria and is apropos for my day considering I have a hot playdate tonight. (Yes, I used the words "hot" and "playdate" at the same time. Admit it, you're jealous of me and my high-rollin' life.)

I can't lie
Watching everyday that goes by
'Till I get you back I'm gon' try
'Cause you are the apple in my eye

Pandora spit out track after terrible track of the most boring, uninspired, uninteresting, nonsense music I have ever heard. Ok, that isn't entirely true. It did break out with Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'" which was quite welcome considering what had come before it and what was to follow. But that was the one and only exception and it isn't even remotely similar to the song I seeded it with. Among all of them, however, "Right Now" was the worst.

The run went well, though. Day 1 of Week 1 is meant to be easy. It wasn't.

20 minutes of a 90 second walk followed by a 60 second run sandwiched in between two 5 minute walks to warm up and cool down. I traveled a little over 2 miles giving me a just under 15 minute mile. Pathetic I know, but it sure beats the running I did yesterday ("hey, I'm going run into the kitchen for another bowl of popcorn"). I can tell how far off I am from where I was last time by how many streets in my neighborhood I was able to cover. Before I could hit each of them once and a couple of them a second time. This time, I skipped an entire chunk. But it felt good, anyway. Okay, the very first running interval felt good. Even the second one did. The eight one sucked and I felt like my heart was about to rip itself out of my chest for a more suitable mate.

I want you to fly with me
I miss how you lie with me
I wish you could dine with me
The one that'll grind with me

But still this song haunts me. You've heard it, right? The guy is basically saying, "I'm lonely and I want to have sex with you." And he's doing so in the worst possible way, over and over again. Any oversexed Junior High student with a Casio keyboard and Autotune could have made it.

Here, erase it from your mind. Instead, listen to a terrible Ukulele cover of "Right Now" that is, somehow, actually better than the original. What, that didn't help?

Image By Sarah Bodri

For over two years I've been taking baby steps and big jumps toward simplifying my life. A couple of time I've touched on simplifying my diet as well, but have never really made a strong effort. That's about to change.

The over all plan is to find myself eating mostly raw foods — vegetables, fruits, nuts, seeds, etc — as often as I feel the need to do so through out the day. Then to supplement that with 2-3 larger cooked meals per week. Anything that comes in a package (including cereal) will be removed from the house entirely with the exception of a few forms of easy to eat on-the-go type foods — wholesome granola bars, dried fruits, etc. Someday, I'd like to even make that stuff at home. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

So, my first little baby step is to deal with Lunch. It's a good place to start because it hardly affects my daughter, will buy me some free time during the middle of the work day, and will drastically reduce one of the sore spots in my budget. So here's the plan.

I will bring my lunch to work four days a week. It will consist of only raw foods or of leftovers from dinners that week. On the fifth day, I'm free to go out with a friend and I should do so without worry about cost, or time, or calories and just enjoy myself.

This little baby step should give me a good step toward weight loss and hunger detection and will also server as a good taste for which raw foods work well and how to prepare them for "on the go" consumption.

Wish me luck, or, better yet, join me and encourage me. Picnic lunch dates could be a lot of fun.

My vision of the Mini-Commune is between 2 and 5 families (depending on the size of those families and the size of the dwelling) sharing a single, larger house. Ideally, the house would have lots of smaller rooms to be used as bedrooms as well as several larger rooms to be used as communal living spaces. Certainly some properties will lend themselves better to this than others but, as long as it's large enough, almost anything can be made to work.

The benefits of even the mini-commune are quite impressive.

First, there's the sheer financial aspect of it all. Based on a house I've been able to find in the area and average expenses, with even 3 families living together the monthly cost would be around $575/family. When you factor in group meals (less eating out), bulk purchases, and reduced needs for travel, you save even more. Consider the fact that, under this arrangement, it might be possible to get rid of as many as half of the vehicles owned by the group, there's even more savings. Once you bundle in the social aspects of always having a "family" of people around to lend a helping hand, to make tedious tasks more enjoyable, to provide comfort, and to encourage it, the cons seem entirely manageable.

The cons, of course, having to share a space with other people. If people are inconsiderate, rude, sloppy, or selfish, sharing a space with them can be difficult if not impossible. Obviously, this would require appropriately minded people. I think it's very important to select fellow commune (or mini-commune) members based on their nature and their lifestyle and how close to your own that those things are more so than how well your interests mesh with theirs or how close of friends you may be now. As you get deeper into the communal unit, more cons can arise, like not having certain amenities (cars, showers, etc) available to you the very second that you want them. It is very much about personal sacrifice in order to increase the benefits for all, including yourself. However, in an ideal commune, these issues will be worked out as a matter of routine. In the fully fledged commune, one could alter the dwelling to more closely match the needs of those that lived there. In this mini-commune one would have to be willing to adapt to what was available.

The fully fledged commune would, of course, be able to grow vegetables, raise a garden, and contribute space to the greater community as well. These things would only be possible in much smaller doses in a mini-commune.

I haven't fully fleshed out where I'd like to live. But, my tentative selections are Denton, Coppell, Western Dallas (as long as we have home schoolers), and "The Sticks". If you're interested — truly interested — in joining let me know. And, if you have any advice (other than, simply, "COMMUNES SUCK") I'd love to hear it.

Here are a few things to consider as you make the decision.

Having a NON-interchangeable lens means you have less to worry about dust, about losing parts, and about being ready for the moment. This is a good thing.

And a huge downside to the DSLR (and there fore, a plus to the point-and-shoot) is that they are bigger and heavier. Do not underestimate this. The bigger and heavier a camera is the less likely you are to bring it. And the camera you bring is the camera you use. And any photo is better than no photo at all.

However, unless you're paying THOUSANDS for your non-SLR camera (which you can do and get the best of both worlds in some ways) then you're also getting a much smaller sensor. This equates to more noise, less quality, and a greater difficulty in those cool tricks like making the background out of focus, capturing fireworks, and working in really low light.

For, kids, especially young kids, nothing beats the speed of a DSLR. The point and shoots get close… really close… but they are not quite there. For macro photography and photos of flowers, the point-and-shoots have an edge due to the mechanics of the small lenses and small sensors.

In reality, I have one of each (and two more for good measure and I'm not even kidding). Based purely on the average person, I'd have to say the top-notch point and shoot may be the best option. One of the Panasonic travel zooms (like the Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS5/TZ8), or the beautiful new Canon G11 (or even the Canon S50 if you swing that way). These cameras are all smart, and fun, and fast, and take beautiful photos and all cost the same if not less than a DSLR would.

But, if you want that extra oomph in quality and speed, and really don't mind the extra weight and size, go for a bottom of the line DSLR. I shoot Nikon, but, truly, Canon is just as good. As long as you have something in the 30-50mm range for a lens, the kids photography will be covered. If you travel or hike a lot you might want 18-200mm range.

There are a few tasks that one camera style is more suited to than another. If you want to mess with studio lighting and dedicated flashes go for the DSLR (and shell out the moolah for the lights). If you want to shoot sporting events, go for the DSLR (and shell out the cash for a big, long lens). If you want to do long, artsy, night time photos, go for the DSLR (and throw down some dough for a wider aperture). If you're into macro photography, go for the point and shoot. It really is the cheapest easiest way to get that job done. If you want to take the camera to the beach, underwater, or on hiking trips in questionable weather, go for the point-and-shoot since the waterproof housings are cheaper.

"Pretend you live for a living."

–Buddy Wakefield

Flickr's Navel Gazing Society (otherwise known as Explore) is certainly no measure of greatness. Neither that of a photograph, nor that of the life of a photographer. But accepting it as an indicator I present the following:

I had 46 photos hit explore from 4/5/2005 until 11/23/2007.  That's 18 per year.

My daughter was born in 12/2007.

I had 14 photos hit explore from 11/23/2207 until 12/13/2008. That's 13 per year. A pretty steep drop from before, but still one a month. A baby does that to you and I wouldn't want it any other way.

My wife left in 01/2009. After a few months of depression I was left refreshed, ready to take on the world, and with a young child under my care for roughly 75% of my previously "free" time.

I had 0 photos hit explore from 12/13/2008 until now. That's 0 per year.

Again, I'm not complaining. I'm just trying to work it out in my head.

You see, the thing is, I'm very efficient, yet terrible at multi-tasking. Let me do one thing at a time and I'll do it quickly and very well. Make me do two things at once and I'll more than likely fail at both of them. Caring for a child takes at least some portion of my attention almost all of the time.

I don't have time to take the photos I used to. It's not that I don't have time to hold a camera point it at things and release the shutter. Many would argue that a child makes a beautiful interesting photographic subject. And, despite always carrying far too many things, keeping a camera (or three) on me at all times is something I'm quite good at. I take plenty of photos. But photography is about more than just pressing a button. It's about seeking out the light. It's about waiting for the perfect moment. Looking for light and waiting for a photo are two things incredibly hard to do with a young child. They don't like to sit still. And, doing so while watching a child is multi-tasking. So, I'm terrible at it.

I also don't have time to edit. Editing photos is a two part process. First, we throw away the junk. Then, we make the good stuff look better. This takes time. Lots of it. Sitting in front of a computer isn't something a young child enjoys, unless they enjoy it so much that they want to help, at which point, you're not getting the job done at all. The good news is, I can do this when she's asleep. The bad news is, that's the only time I have to do lots of other things as well.

Finally, I don't have time to promote. I used to spend a lot of time viewing photos, commenting on photos, discussing photos, and sharing photos. I have all but stopped doing any of these things.

So, now to the important part. How can I get back some of what I had without losing the wonderful things I have now? Because I can't multi-task, I have to find ways to make what I do more efficient and to find ways to allow me to juggle tasks better.

Of course, just because you're not me or not in this same situation doesn't mean that these tips won't make you more efficient too.

1) Take fewer photos

With film, releasing the shutter on your camera was a commitment to spending both time and money in order to actually see the image. Photographers acknowledged this and very few were willing to release the shutter until they were sure they had it right. When digital came along the mentality shifted: it's just digital. Click away! Sort them out later!

In theory, if you're looking for a certain shot taking as many as possible helps ensure you get the right one. In practice, if one of them is terrible, the rest probably will be too. Multiple shots approaching with different ideas and at multiple angles is one thing and certainly a good idea. But taking photographs just in case they might be good amounts to nothing but waste.

By spending more time looking and less time clicking, I might be more likely to anticipate a shot. And having fewer photos will drastically reduce the amount of time I spend in Phase 1 of editing, and somewhat reduce the time I spend in Phase 2.

2) Bring a Photo Friend

Bringing along a photographically inclined friend, particularly one with similar distractions (i.e. children, in my case) leaves us both with the ability to explore an idea more closely. As something strikes me as worthy of further examination, being able to trust my child in the other person's hands as I explore an idea more fully will let me free my mind completely for the task. And my friend gets the same benefit. Additionally, as children often become the subjects of photographs, it allows one of us to photograph while the other helps adjust and collect the children.

3) Involve the Children

This is only a small break, but every little bit counts. But sending the children seeking for the elements you're looking for in your photo, their minds focus a bit more and it makes them easier to monitor. Kids are great at looking for shadows, sticks, flowers, trees, letters, numbers, and things like this. Just don't ask them to look for soft lighting on the side of a fire hydrant with minimal background distraction. Or, at least wait until they are 12 or so.

Involving them in the 1st phase of editing (and parts of the 2nd phase as well) is also a good idea. You'll need software that allows you to rate photos quickly and with at least 3 or 4 different levels of rating (junk, keep for fun/memories, good, awesome). With this in place, children love to look at photos from an adventure they just took. Especially if there are photos of people and things they recognize. Making a habit out of unloading a photo card in the same way we unload our backpacks after an adventure will bring a child to anticipate doing so.

4) Involve Friends for Promotion

Nothing makes me want to photograph MORE than knowing that my work is enjoyed and appreciated. Promotion allows this to be fully realized. Friends can be a fantastic resource for promotion. Between Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Buzz, Blogs, and Email your friends can quickly and easily help get the word out about how wonderful a certain photos of yours is. Take the time to share with your friends and ask them to do the promotion for you.

And, if you are the friend of a photographer *cough, ahem, ME!*, share their work. Expose their art. Most social media outlets have icons you can drag to your browser toolbar to make sharing as simple as clicking a button. Here are some for Facebook, Twitter, Google Buzz, and Tumblr.

I hope this helps you with your photography. Do you have any other ideas to share that can help get better photos with a partially distracted mind?

As much as I enjoy cooking, love making extravagant meals and trying new techniques, the time it takes to do so is not worth what I'd have to give up to get it. So this means I either make very quick meals, eat raw foods, find people to share the cooking burden with, or hire the job out and eat at restaurants.

A month or two ago I finally broke down and paid someone to pull my weeds, trim my bushes, lay down landscapers cloth, and put down mulch. I was just tired of the letters from my HOA and they were claiming they were going to pay someone to do it and bill me and I was afraid of what they were going to cost. So now, my flower beds look beautiful.

But my yard still looks terrible. And my HOA has started sending notes about that. My grass is not really grass. It's mostly weeds — low weeds mind you — with grass in between. As evidenced by the vacant lots in my neighborhood, it's simply the nature of things around here. Without direct supervision and control, the weeds grow and the grass doesn't.

So I'm supposed to go buy some "weed and feed" product, lock my kid inside the house because she certainly can't be around that stuff, and spend a couple of days not enjoying her and, instead, following some intricate and arcane pattern of water then feed then water then rain dance. Then I can't let my kid outside for at least two or three days as I wait for that stuff to go away. The alternative, as I did with the flowerbeds, is to hire the job out. For $50-70 a month, someone trained to do so will apply a steady stream of life threatening chemicals to my lawn to ensure that it grows green and "Natural".

I get around to cleaning baseboards and fans every couple of months. Storage closets and such can go a whole year without being rearranged. I get to the toilets and bathroom counters once a week or so. The daily use surfaces like the kitchen counters and such get cleaned as soon as they are used in order to maintain a livable space. But, if you stick your hand in my couch cushions, to be honest, I have no idea what you'll find. If you take out the white glove and start wiping surfaces, well, you may as well buy those things in bulk. I try to teach my daughter about housework by including her in it. But spending hours and hours toiling with a toothbrush at bathroom tile grout just doesn't make any sense. Not when that means my kid is going to have to spend that time alone. For $400 a month, there are at least 10 different cleaning services that are more than willing to do the job for me.

Throw in the pest control service, the lawn guy, and some landscapers and, for $650 a month, I too could have a home kept up to societies standards. Assuming a salary of $40k a year, that means I only need to work 8 more hours every week to afford it. Well, aside from the eating thing. And an interior decorator. And a shopping assistant. And a wardrobe coordinator. And a crafts specialist.

So my options are to hire all of this stuff out and work my butt off to pay for it, force my child to play alone for a large portion of the time we have each day while I perform these tasks myself, or just not do them at all.

Currently I'm choosing some combination of the last two. I try to spend 30-60 minutes each day cleaning with my daughter's help. This is, of course, above and beyond the basic pick up and cleaning and laundry and such. And I try to spend another 30-60 minutes cleaning on my own before she wakes up in the morning. This works well for all the small jobs. But for anything that needs more than 30-60 minutes of my time, it just doesn't get done.

The right way!

So I'm trying to find new ways to do things that allow me to tackle the big jobs in small pieces.

I'm trying to find non-dangerous, child-friendly ways of, fertilizing the lawn, killing weeds, and cleaning hard water deposits out of the shower.

I try to decorate the house in ways that don't require renovation or lengthy installation efforts. And when something does require some additional time, I try to find people to help.

I'm trying to find people to share meals with. Ideally on a semi-planned schedule. This saves the cost of restaurants and either lets someone else do the cooking or brings someone else around to keep my daughter from being alone as I do the cooking or some combination of the two.

And maybe some day I'll make so much money that I'll laugh at myself for ever wondering why people tried to do this stuff themselves.

Whether you're a single person without kids, a single parent, a double income family, or a stay at home parent with an active lifestyle — if you've got any ideas, tips, secrets, or magic tricks about how you get things done, I'd love to hear them.

First, let's point out the only OS to get it right: iPhone. Right out of the box iPhone displays your contact's photo beautiful with no additional software required. It crops, resizes, scales, and gives you the best looking photo possible displayed very largely on the iPhone's display.

Android tries. But it has quite a few issues. First of all, it only uses about 1/4 of the screen's display to show the photo. Since there's nothing useful on almost all of the remaining 3/4 of the display, why not fill the screen? Even worse, however, is when you activate your contacts for Google Sync. You see, almost everyone activates their contacts for Google Sync, because it's easy and awesome. Except for when it comes to Photo Caller ID. You see the phone saves a nice large image to use for the Photo Caller ID. Even lets you crop it square yourself to decide what to show. Then your phone Syncs with Google. Well, Google only supports a 96×96 pixel image for a contact photo. So, when the sync is finished, that's all you're left with on your phone. The end result is that Android does the best it can to scale a puny little 96×96 pixel image up to fit the space reserved for contact photo display. You get a nasty looking, pixelated photo that barely resembles your contact at all.

Windows Mobile requires a 3rd party app to get this right. At least, however, once you have it it works well enough. Of course Windows Mobile is dead, so who cares.

Symbian Series 60 requires a 3rd party app as well. Lame.

When it comes to non smart phones, Nokia's Series 40 is king. The phone does a pretty good job of displaying the photo in as much space as it can acquire. However, it doesn't maintain aspect ratio, doesn't give you the option to crop, and really only displays a chunk out of the center of the photo due to other onscreen display items being present. I've yet to find a template that shows exactly what size the image should be and which parts of it are completely obscured by onscreen text.

Can all the handset OS developers all just sit down and fix this problem already? And if someone has a template for Series 40 phones, can you send it my way so I don't have to send myself 100 photos to reverse engineer it?

Child: What's that?

You: An Apple.

Child: What's that?

You: A Knife.

Child: What are you doing?

You: Cutting the apple with the knife.

*30 seconds goes by*

Child: What's that?

You: AN APPLE!

If you've EVER been around any children under the age of 5 then you've, no doubt, witnessed or been a part of a conversation just like this one. Despite knowing exactly what you're doing, what you're doing it to, and why you're doing it in the first place, they ask you about it. Maybe you've been around the block a few times and you've learned to roll with it. Or maybe it drives you further up the wall of insanity with each passing day. Either way, it makes one wonder, why do children do this?

The answer, much like the answer to most of the things kids under age 5 do, is simple: they are imitating you. As a species, human beings learn by watching and imitating. This is why kids like to put on yours shoes, eat what you're eating, drink what you're drinking, watch what you're watching, do what you're doing, and play with whatever thing you happen to have in your hands.

I know you are probably thinking, "but my kid has never seen me question someone else like that! Why would I ask someone a question I already know the answer to?!". But consider, carefully, the fact that your child is a "someone else" too.

Imagine your kid is playing with blocks in the middle of the living room floor. It's quiet, you've been doing some chore, you've just finished, and you want to interact with him. "What are you playing with?" Blocks. "What are you building?" A Tower. "What color is that block?" Green. "How many fingers do I have up?" Three. "What color is your shirt?" Purple. "What's this a picture of?" A Caterpillar. "How do you say Hat in French?" Chapeau.

Ah ha! You knew the answer to every single one of those questions, didn't you? Well, close enough. The reason why you asked them and whether or not you should is another topic altogether. But at least now you realize that it isn't the genetic predisposition of our children to annoy us to death that causes them to ask such questions. They are asking because they've learned that this is what people do. And they've learned this because that's how you act toward them.

Buzz is like Twitter in that it's easy to use and by default open and public. It's like Facebook in that you can share more than just a status update. It's like Tumblr in that each of the different types of things you can share is formatted in a way best suited to it. It's like Loopt in that you can publish your location as well.

It's different than all of these in that it does these things in a way that is easy to understand, integrated with the gMail experience, very mobile capable, and built using a hybrid of open standards as up and coming protocols to tape it all together.

Will it let you do something that you couldn't already do? Not exactly. Just like  gMail, it's about making an existing experience better, not about making something altogether new. But, I'd argue that, even at one month old, it does a lot of things better already. Of course, it has some room for improvement too.

To understand what is better about it, you really have to try it. But it can be compared and contrasted with other services.

Take Twitter, for example. When it comes to making a status update, typing text into a box is typing text into a box. There's no "better" or "worse" about it unless it can read our minds. Google hasn't announced that feature, yet. However, Twitter was built around the age of the the text message, SMS. And while SMS is still widely used and isn't going away anytime soon, smart and capable platforms (like iPhone, Android, and others) make SMS seem archaic in comparison. The 140 character limit of a Twitter status update is an example of this. As a PRO, Buzz has no such limitation. As a CON, however, Buzz is not capable of being delivered to your mobile handset by SMS.

The use off Twitter has sort of evolved though. It's initial use case — a sort of global, opt in, mobile connected chat room — is no longer all it is used for. While it's usage patterns have evolved, the service really hasn't. People now include links, and hash tags with many of their Twitter updates. Even with URL shorteners getting shorter and shorter, a link takes up about 19 characters. Include a space separator, 5 characters for a hashtag, plus the hash and a separating space, and you've used up 27 characters leaving you only 113 to write commentary. This means that Twitter is being used less and less for new content and more and more for passing around content written somewhere else.

With its lack of character limitation, Buzz is better suited for sharing links and various media with commentary. Even without commentary, Buzz does a better job simply because, in Twitter, a link is still just a link. In Buzz, smart display features kick in to highlight photos, embed movies, and play audio.

Tumblr is an interesting service in that they were one of the first to realize that due to trending usage patterns, Twitter was, literally, dying for feature enhancements. They took the idea behind Twitter, stripped it of its SMS roots, and added new display features for the most commonly shared media types. They gave users the ability to embed and customize, tacked on comments and group blogs, and added features to allow for sharing and searching amongst one another. What was born was a beautiful, feature rich platform for sharing both thoughts and links to interesting things.

Tumblr pretty much stopped right there, but maybe that's enough. As an engine for publishing short form thoughts and links, in a manner that allows you to express your own personality in look and feel, it is one of the best. Buzz doesn't come close to the customization and embedding features Tumblr provides. And though Tumblr only allows two protocols for integration with other services, they are the most commonly used protocols: RSS and ATOM.

Since Tumblr, other services have come out with a slight twist on the feature set. The most notable of these is Posterous. While it lacks some of Tumblr's customization and rebroadcasting features, it adds additional points of outgoing integration– Twitter, Facebook, and Flickr, to name a few. However, it doesn't allow for any incoming service integration at all. And it's preferred method of interaction is plain ole email. This means that there probably won't be "an app for that" and you probably don't need one.

Buzz's greatest competition is Facebook. Compared with this social networking giant, the biggest differences are lock-in and open standards. Buzz relies, as often as possible, on open standards. This means that, as long as the site you wish to connect it to is using open standards, there is little to no learning curve or development required to get the two to integrate. Facebook, on the other hand, requires an application to be developed for it specifically suited to that integration task. The difference is subtle and, because of this, I'd argue that, right now, Buzz is closest to Facebook in it's realized feature set.

Buzz has the strong, technical upper hand between the two in that it is more open and encourages interoperability. In fact, someone else could, tomorrow, invent a Buzz-alike service and, right out of the box, it would play nice with Buzz allowing content to flow back and forth between the two with little to no effort. Also, being integrated with gMail, Buzz has the potential of competing with Facebook's user base. However, users, in the end, don't care about this. What they care about is the answer to this question: who and what can I connect with RIGHT NOW? And, at least RIGHT NOW, between the two, Facebook wins.

But know this: Buzz is a force to be reckoned with. It doesn't have everything right on the first pass. Not by a long shot. But if it continues to maintain technical superiority over Facebook, while adding new features implemented elsewhere (like Tumblr and Posterous and Twitter) and not currently present ion Facebook while maintaining its influx of users, it won't be long before the two are neck and neck in who and what can be connected to. And at that point, Buzz might just take the lead.

To get a feel for some of these services, check me out there.

twitter: revjim (status updates)
twitter: revjimweb (automated updates from all my various blogs)
facebook: Facebook
tumblr: revjim
posterous: Now, Daniel! (status updates)
posterous: Life of Daniel (a log of interesting communication)
Google Profile
Google Buzz (all of my sites fed in along with some original content)

Each of them has their own strengths and weaknesses from the Checkin-centric services like FourSquare and Gowalla, to the real-time location based services like Latitude, and hybrids like Loopt. But, in every case, one important feature is missing.

It's nice to be able to let people know where you are. Real-time location provides that and, with tenacity on the part of your contacts, can even indicate if you is currently in transit. But if your friends don't find out where you are until you get there, it often makes it difficult if not impossible to actually meet you there.

What these services lack is the ability to indicate the intent to arrive at a particular location and even an estimated arrival time. Instead of checking in at my local pizza place when I get there and finding my friends showing up just as I'm leaving, I should be able to, instead, check in my intent to go to that establishment at a certain time. Then my friends could contribute their mutual intents and then our paths would be highly more likely to collide.

A truly smart service could even indicate when a person was in transit and where they were in transit from based on either real GPS data or their last check in location.

I'm sure someone will build it. I'm just waiting to see who. Until then, I use Foursquare and Latitude, each with different purposes and neither really providing the most useful service.

I call this a salad because it's vegetables covered in a dressing. But, that's about as far as the definition carries. It's a very colorful dish, especially since the beet juice will dye all the other vegetables a pinkish/purplish color.

Ingredients

1 medium sized beet
1 medium sized turnip
2 large carrots
6 cloves of garlic
1 tbsp butter
water
goat cheese, parmesan,  or romano cheese
salt
pepper

Directions

Boil at least 2 quarts of heavily salted water.

Peel the vegetables. Then slice thinly (1/8" or so). Consistency in thickness is important for consistency in cooking time. Use a mandolin if you have one.

Place butter in a pan over medium heat. Mince the garlic and add it to the pan. When the garlic begins to brown, add 1/4c of water, reduce hear to simmer, and add salt and pepper to taste. This is your "dressing".

Once your water is boiling, toss the vegetables in and cook for about 10 minutes. Drain the water (or save it for a vegetable broth) and return the vegetables to the pan. Pour the dressing over the vegetables and mix well.

Serve with sprinkled cheese on top. Choose a cheese that will suit the rest of the meal. If you can't decide, go with goat cheese.

Variations

Depending on what you're serving these vegetables with you can (and should) add fresh or dried herbs to taste. Place them in the dressing along with the water. Sage, basil, oregano, dill, and rosemary would all work well in this dish.

Christmas Eve, Celeste and I didn't quite make it to our friends house as we had planned. Sure, I have AWD. Sure I could have made it. But after hearing reports of over 300 accident reports in Fort Worth alone, it was no longer the ice, the snow, or my vehicle that I was concerned about. It was all those other drivers. So we stayed put at my mom's house despite the fact that everyone else had left for church/other festivities.

Christmas was awesome. Despite Celeste never taking a nap worth mentioning and having more sugar in one day than any 2 year old should be allowed in her entire second year, she did quite well. Yeah, she was cranky from time to time toward the end, but, I'm getting quite good at offsetting it.

She loved all of her gifts. The biggest hits were the play kitchen my parents got her, the piggy bank my sister got her, and the playsilks that I got her. I thought the wooden cars and trees that Santa got her would be a big hit too, but she hasn't given them a second glance yet.

The only odd, strange, unpredictable aspect of Christmas was, once again, my parents. At some point in the not too distant past they decided that immediately following Christmas they'd be taking a vacation to Arkansas to photograph the many waterfalls of the Buffalo River, a worthwhile adventure by any account. But they decided to do so and the hell with anything else.

Celeste's birthday is today (the 26th). It was going to be celebrated today. We were going to spend one more night at my mom's and celebrate it over there, saving them and my sister a trip out, and ensuring that my brother would come. My mom, instead, suddenly pushed very hard to have it after dinner on Christmas evening citing that they wanted to get a head start on their vacation. So… that's exactly what we did. Almost immediately following cake and presents we were — though never specifically stated — kicked out of the house.

It was a mad dash, without reason, to pack up all of our stuff, get it all in the car, and get out on the road. Celeste was crying. Everyone was far too busy to help with anything because they were all packing up their stuff too. I'm glad that C's mom decided to spend Christmas afternoon with us, for all the obvious reasons of having her there for Celeste on Christmas day but also to help soothe her as everything turned to chaos.

Ideally, I'd have stayed at my mom's a few more hours and drove back in the evening when Celeste would have slept. Would have made it easier to unload the car and I hate making her take 1 hour road trips to and from when I don't have to.

All in all it worked out fine, of course, I just don't particularly care for the the unexpected scramble, nor do I tolerate it very well. I kept imagining myself with a friend/partner who could say "Daniel, calm down!" in the nicest way possible to help keep me even instead of all stressed out. Yeah, I know I should be more "independent" than that, and I do okay on my own. But, I've always believed that the true power of a team was based in the ability to rely on each others strengths in order to help cover or improve each others weaknesses. Yes, some of you dream of being rockstars, super models, pimp daddys, and race car drivers. Not me. I just dream of being unstressed, of breathing fresh air, and of laughing as much as possible.

No Christmas recap would be complete without a list of Christmas booty (unfortunately, there was no Christmas "Bootie" to be had, but that can wait for another day). I got a shopvac from my sister, which I am very excited about. I got a netbook from my parents which will hopefully make travel with the kiddo and updating new thoughts and photos a little easier (I'm typing this on it right now). I got a pretty candle/decorative thing from my brother. Celeste loves little decorations, especially those that hold candles, so I'm sure this will be a hit. I also got a nice little pile of random stocking stuffs from that fat guy in a red suit. More than anything I'm excited about all of Celeste's gifts and eager to see her play with them and watch her imagination create new uses for them.

Merry Christmas to you all. May you find your own life filled with many blessings during this coming year and may you offer even more blessing to those you love and care about.

I'm not going to my brothers. That amounted to the most work for the least benefit.

However, a friend (Hi, Skwid!) has offered an invitation to their Christmas festivities. There will even be another kid there and several other friends.

Staying home for Christmas Eve and Christmas Morning just doesn't sound ideal. Several of you wrote to say that doing your own thing in your own home with your own kids is the nicest way to spend the holiday. And, in principal, I'd agree. But my situation makes that less desirable. If we only leave gifts under the tree for which there is someone present to receive it, then every gift will be for Celeste, either from me, from a few long distance family members, or from some fat guy in a red coat and silly hat. There are no other kids here. There are no other adults here. And Celeste isn't old enough to have made or bought me anything on her own. Anyone else that could have helped her do so didn't. Or at least, if they did, I don't know about it and the gift isn't here to open. While I'm a big fan of making our own traditions and having our own little life, I don't ever want Christmas to amount to a tower of gifts in front of a child and nothing more. Because, to me, that's not what Christmas is about at all.

To me Christmas is supposed to be about family (chosen and inherited), friendship, and togetherness. It's supposed to be about giving, and sharing, and believing. It's supposed to be about hope, and rebirth. The best way to make that happen is to spend it with people that care about us and that want us around.

My parents (well, my dad anyway. my mom still isn't talking to me) have said, "come whenever you want". And while that may seem ideal and certainly is from a "cram the most into two days as possible" standpoint, I want to feel wanted. That doesn't make me feel wanted. Christmas in the past has always been at my parent's and it has always been mandatory. There was simply no doubt about where everyone was going to be on Christmas day. If you had other stuff going on, that was fine, but you'd better show up and you'd better be there a lot. I liked it that way. Between me spending every other Christmas in Canada with my ex-wife, my older brother moving to Vermont, my sister desiring to have Christmas in her new home the year she bought it, and my brother having to share his kid with his ex-wife on the holidays, the ritual was strained. It could have lasted anyway. Because it was NEVER about WHERE we met, only about who we were meeting with and why. But, all of that fell through the cracks.

I put a lot of importance on ritual: with family and friends, in our day to day lives, and in my own spirituality. This is part of what makes living my life so special to me but also what makes it so difficult from time to time. If I didn't, then these days would just be ordinary days like any other day and it wouldn't matter nearly as much what we did or who we saw or whether everything worked out in an ideal fashion. I give Celeste gifts all the time. And we spend time with people all the time. And we spend many, many, many days and nights home together alone. And these days should be no different. Except they are.

So, all of this means that spending time with friends on Christmas Eve is really the best possible option. Friends that have gone out of their way to make sure that we know we're invited and very welcome. It is, sadly, also the most difficult. Since I'd rather not have Celeste wake up in our empty house on Christmas morning this means that I'd have to drive out to my parent's house late that night after Christmas Eve festivities, get our room ready for sleeping, put a toddler to bed, unpack a car full of gifts, and then get myself settled in. Or, go to my parent's house earlier, set everything up, then head out for a lovely Christmas Eve, then head back.

So, in the midst of this pile of wrapping paper and ribbon and tape and too many cups of tea, I'm trying to figure out a plan of action that's actually going to work, involve the least amount of driving, leave me with the least amount of stress and, most of all, let Celeste have the best possible time.

This is the first Christmas Celeste will really remember. I'm trying to make it really nice for her and it seems like my family is doing everything they can to combat that.

For starters, I flat out told my mom that I hadn't completely decided how I was going to do the "Santa" story with Celeste but that, whatever it was, her mom and I would work it out together so that we had the same idea. So, the next time my mom got Celeste alone, she told her only two things about Christmas: 1) Santa says "HO HO HO" and 2) Santa brings you new toys. Skip over the spirit of giving, all of the fun folk lore, the idea that Santa brings every kid toys, and just focus on the worst aspect of it all: "Santa brings new toys".

But that's just an annoyance more than anything. My mom has also decided she's not speaking to me. Or, rather, speaking to me as little as possible so as to not seem like she's doing the whole "I'm not talking to you" thing. On top of that, my mom and my brother live 15 minutes from each other. Of all of us, they live the closest. Yet they are the two deciding to be stubborn and unwilling to leave their own houses Christmas morning or Christmas eve. So, no matter what, I can have one or the other, but not both, even though neither of them have anyone else coming over unless Celeste and I show up. I really wanted Celeste to enjoy Christmas with family around, including her cousin and her grandparents. But, my family is making it difficult.

These are my options, I think:

1) Spend Christmas Eve/Morning at my brother's house. His son will be gone from 5pm to 9pm on Christmas Eve which means it'll just be Celeste and him and I for a big chunk of the evening. Then, when his son gets home, we can leave out some cookies and such and then do the whole Christmas thing in the morning. Then, we'd go to my mom's house and he'd go do a few other things and eventually show up there himself.

2) Spend Christmas Eve/Morning at my mom's house. My sister won't be there for Christmas Eve. And my mom isn't talking to me. So, it'd basically just be Celeste and my Dad and I. Then in the morning my sister would be there. And then, later still in the morning, my brother would show up. This is slightly better because Celeste will have grandparents and an aunt and uncle there, but slightly worse because she won't have any other kids to enjoy it with.

3) Spend Christmas Eve at our house and show up to my mom's house on Christmas Day when my brother does. This is slightly better because we can have our own traditions and our own house and I can really make it special for Celeste in whatever way I believe to be best. But this is a lot worse because it'll just be her and I for most of it and I really want to to be about togetherness.

I know I'm making this into more than it needs to be. It just frustrates me, that's all. I think, more than anything, I hate having to beg people to spend time with me, and hate even more to have to beg people to spend time with my daughter, and yet that's exactly what I feel like I'm doing.