Entries from July 2008 ↓

As I write this article, I am getting ready to trek off to the mountains for a week with my family to participate in a “camp”. We stay in dormitories and eat in the cafeteria, but we have to bring items that are not standard for other trips. Here is how I have simplified preparation [...]

Too many people think that to read a PDF document, you need Adobe Reader. PDFs are standard these days, but there are also non-standard readers out there.
Reader is a good tool, but it has bulked up over the years, making load times extensive. Because of the load time, it also leaves parts of itself resident [...]

I like my current client, because I know what to do, when to do it, and with minimal interference in how to do it. It was not always so. My previous client was very complicated, stressful, and at points I loathed it.
I love the way Zen monks always look so peaceful and happy. So the [...]

I’ve been falling into habits of both not writing things down, or writing things down on bits of paper. I decided to take a look at this, because my backsliding into these habits indicates to me there is a problem with how I am capturing information.
Why Don’t I Capture?

Inconvenience. My PDA would logically be the [...]

I have a tendency to overbook and take on more than I can accomplish. As my life gets busier, I get more stressed. But it seems to me that there is a need to step off the hamster wheel and start living a more relaxed schedule.
I ran across an article over at Dumb Little Man [...]

Spybot Search and Destroy is a really good spyware detector. I’ve used it in conjunction with Lavasoft’s Adaware and my AVG anti-virus for years. Spybot, though, unlike the free versions of the other two applications, can be automated.
Why Automate Spybot?
Spyware protection has two phases: one as information is coming to your computer, and one for [...]

Morning Coffee gets the day going. And I’m not talking about the beverage here, I’m talking about the FireFox extension.
Most people I know check multiple websites per day. We may want to glance at the headlines, read comics, check email, read a few blogs or whatever.
It is possible that you can set your home page [...]

I am trying to instill in my daughter the non-consumer mentality. She understands at a certain level that commercials are meant to make you want to buy things, even if you don’t need them or like them. However, when the influence is coming from her friends, this is much more difficult to combat.
The recent rise [...]