Saturday morning two guys from the landscaping company came, delivered, and setup the playground. Michelle also bought a sandbox for them to dig around in. The kids enjoyed both. Michael likes the toddler swing. Daniel likes to climb the ladder and go down the slide. Abby likes the swing and glider. Claire enjoys hanging from the trapeze and twirling on the tire swing. I took a roll of pictures of them this weekend having fun. Yes, a roll, as in film. I'm trying out the new mini-lab that opened on Amherst Street: Photographix. I literally dusted off the Nikon and had some fun shooting with an SLR. I forget how much control the Nikon SLR has over my digital Canon point-and-shoot. Photographix specializes in making digital images from film and the printing of digital media. So in the end, I should be able to pick up a PhotoCD along with my prints. If all goes well, the pictures should be online in the next day or so.
I put up the rear speakers in our family room this weekend. Between the six different speakers in the family room, the sound certainly has improved over listening to the two little speakers built into the television. The kids and I watched Disney's Hercules on DVD. Last night Michelle and I watched the Matrix on DVD. We've also rented Kate and Leopold. (chick flick)
You can check out the resort hosting the Gerrits/Crowley family get-together. It looks like it should be a nice place to celebrate Peter and Donna's anniversary. I'm hoping the girls can see some of the scenery, like the Grand Canyon. We reserved a rental car for Michelle and the girls for the week they're there. It seemed like there wouldn't be enough vehicles to go around.
I re-installed a bunch of my unix tools on the Mac, including the GIMP. The GIMP is what I used for editting my digital pictures. I'll still need to install Imagemagick and iGal to make the online albums that you usually see under Sights and Sounds.
I skimmed an interesting business/technology story about the glut of bandwidth and the bankruptcies of the likes of WorldCom, Global Crossing, Genuity, etc. It was interesting that they came away saying that technology became its own worst enemy.
“Technology has created [Internet] capacity far ahead of the ability of it to be used. ... What remains to be seen is when the Internet industry will reach any kind of supply-demand equilibrium. Predictions in the 1990s that millions of Americans would upgrade to 'broadband' home Net connections that would gobble up core network capacity have raced far ahead of reality. Only about 13 million homes have signed up. ... millions of Americans see no compelling reason to spend the $40 or $50 a month for broadband - leaving the prospect of a near-term, consumer-driven solution to the Net glut remote. Even if demand doubles every few years, network capacity can be quickly, cheaply increased by factors of 10 and 20 just by sliding new circuit boards into telecom switches that squeeze new streams of traffic over existing fibers, creating relentless downward pressure on prices. As a result, big phone and Net companies say bandwidth has quickly become a commodity whose price is racing to zero.”And yet the average web site uses such a bandwidth hogging combination of Java, Flash, graphics, streaming video and audio, you'd think everyone has broadband. No wonder it still goes by the nickname "world wide wait". Dialup phone modems are not ready for such large websites. My prediction: when broadband can go "the last mile" (ie up to your home) for $25-30/month, folks will consider it.