Blog.Treo

Looptopia 2008!!!

Click the image to go to the Looptopia site. I wanted to put up some kind of post tonight, but I’ll go into more detail tomorrow. I’ll definitely be there, I’m just not sure of the time yet, my son’s birthday is Friday as well.

I have a dozen or so pictures and a couple videos from last year. I haven’t completely decided if I’ll add them to a post here, or make a page on the main site. Either way, be looking out for it. Also, I strongly suggest subscribing to Twitter. Last year there was a “secret” roof-top party published via text updates. An event like Looptopia is made for Twitter.

Did Apple Make Geeks Cool?

A couple weeks ago I had an assignment in my English Composition class that made me reflect on my own adolescence. The assignment was to choose a word that has a dual meaning…a different connotation than denotation. We were to use a writing selection from our text as a model. In the story, a woman describes how a word, used as a term of endearment at home, is used with malice as a racial slur at school. I’m choosing not to site the work specifically because I don’t want to confine that experience to a particular group. During our childhood, we all had terms and words that could be used only by our family members.

For my assignment I chose a word whose meaning changed over a period of time rather than one with concurrent meanings at a single point in time. My word: Geek. People refer to me as a Geek fairly often these days, and I have no problem with it at all. In fact, I like it. But, it hasn’t always been this way. There was a time when being a Geek meant being an outcast, shunned by the “cool” people. Below is a selection from my paper:

Geek implied a deficiency in most other skills that were important to kids, (including hygiene.) Being a Geek meant you were ugly, didn’t communicate well, unaware of popular culture, and although you knew your way around electronics, being a Geek didn’t necessarily mean you had good grades.

That was up to about the 4^th grade, and then things changed. Popular culture started to embrace electronically inclined minds and gadgets became fashionable. Movies and music were extremely influential to pop culture in the mid-80′s and movies like “Back to the Future” found the main character embracing technology through the film. I wrote about Marty McFly in my English paper:

I was very popular by this point in grade school and was one of few students that regularly talked to every student in class. I noticed that I genuinely enjoyed the time I spent with the Geeks and I was scared to death! I had not always been popular. It took until the 4^th grade for me to be considered cool and I didn’t want to jeopardize it. But, Marty McFly saved me. He demonstrated that it was cool to be tech-savvy. This was a step in the right direction, but the role of Geek still existed. Marty learned enough to operate the DeLorean, but the highly technical skills resided with Doc, and no 9 year old kid I knew aspired to be Doc over Marty. So, I learned to temper my technology skills depending on my environment to avoid the Geek tag.

The Small Screen also had a major impact, possibly more than the Big Screen, on the evolution of the term Geek. Shows like “MacGyver,” (my personal favorite) took the Geek character from the supporting role and butt of jokes, to the lead and hero of the show. I can’t think of any character, movie or TV that single-handedly resolved bigger crisis situations than Mac. He made being a Geek cool on several levels: He was a pacifist, environmentalist, well-built, good-looking, scientific and engineering genius! He was oblivious to fashion, but oddly enough, if you walk into Old Navy today, half the clothes come straight from Mac’s closet. MacGyver made carrying a Swiss Army Knife and knowing obscure facts cool. Initially, only Geeks watched MacGyver, but soon it caught on and today he is a household name, associated with quirky, sexy, genius.

Moving on to the title subject I’ll quote my English paper again.

Personally, I think Steve Jobs and Apple is responsible for the conversion of the term Geek. Apple computers were flat out cool and anything associated with them was equally cool. With an immensely larger audience for Geeks to associate themselves, I believe they literally evolved. Previously, Geeks needed only communicate with other Geeks and developed only a limited scale of communication skills. Now that the entire world was enamored with Apple computers, Geeks learned to communicate with a broader range of individuals.

In my opinion, the negative connotation of Geek is rooted in poor communication. The fact that a Geek is well versed in technology or electronics is not why people looked down on them. Once Geeks expanded their (our) communication skill set, they (we) started to adopt more mainstream ideals with appearance. Nowadays, with the mobile and personal computing revolution, Geeks are an envied bunch!

Today, even a long-time Techy like me has to actively work to stay within the Geek circles. The parameters are moving so quickly in the direction of finite, specific genius, yet retaining a well rounded social skill set and other non-technical interests. Geeks now have their own genre of fashion, they influence automobile manufacturers, and have totally taken over how we communicate, work, and play. If you can believe it, being a Geek is so attractive nowadays that some fake it! :-p

So…any and all comments are welcome. What do you think of when you hear the term Geek? Positive, negative? Flattering, insulting? Is the term applicable today or is it dated?

Day 2 Part II

Yesterday I decided to do something, I’m still wondering if it was the right thing to do. More than 10 years ago I had surgery on my knee and I remember that sitting in the house waiting for the pain to come was very tough. So this time I decided I would go out and try and get my mind off of the pain. Although my right shoulder is the one that is hurt, I decided I would try to go bowling with my left hand. Surprisingly I did pretty well but I certainly paid for it when I got home. I had a friend with me and she was able to shoot some videos the best one was the first one and I’ve uploaded to my Web site. The link below will let you download the video to your computer.

http://TreoBenny.com/files/100_0087.MOV

New Look…

It’s 1:30am and I should be sleeping. If I’m not sleeping I should be doing schoolwork. Instead, I just had a breakthrough…

I downloaded a new template for this blog, (no, that’s not it.) I really like the layout, and the original header image is pretty cool. Very metropolitan:

I think to myself, “as cool as this image is, I’d rather have my logo there.” I’m thinking all I have to do is log in as the Admin and select a different image. I was SOOO wrong. Turns out I had to edit the php script that tells the page where to find the image. Oh, I had to discover which script that was Once I did that, I found the images folder, then resized my logo so it would fit without distortion.

I’m very proud of myself…now I can go to bed…

If you have questions about anything I just said, leave me a comment and I’ll explain in more detail. Just not tonight

Saturday Morning Schoolwork Never Tasted So Good…

I get really excited about food and drink in general. But when it comes to food or beverages I made myself, I get super excited!

Last night I went to bed early with the plan to get up early today and get some schoolwork done. I executed the sleep part to a tee and got up around 7. I went out to get milk for my coffee. Ironically, I don’t drink much coffee at home, but I’m known for my regular and voracious coffee drinking at work The truth is, I’m a coffee lover, not a coffee drinker. I love coffee enough to settle for a free lack-luster cup each morning, but if I’m going to take the time and energy to make coffee at home, it’s gonna be GOOD.

I bought some ground coffee from Lavazza recently (Crema Gusto something or other) and retrieved my press pot from a friend’s house just yesterday. I would normally drink cream (half & half) in brewed coffee, but I decided to try out a cappuccino-like drink this weekend. It’s not quite latte, not quite cafe au lait, not quite cappuccino, but ALL GOOD! I started with a full pot (I have an 8-cup press) of fine ground coffee. While it was brewing I put a little milk in a pot, I’d say 2 cups. Once the milk started to get mad, I poured the coffee from the press into a large mug big enough to hold all 8 cups. I washed the press and got it ready for the milk. A split second before the milk boiled, I took it off the heat and poured it in the press. Then I plunged up and down, fairly deliberately, to froth the milk. All the way to the bottom, then all the way up, back and forth.

BIV was standing there as I was doing this and noticed the milk getting higher and higher in the press. He says “How are you making the milk bigger Daddy?” He’s so cute…

I filled a cup half with coffee, half with the milk. While it’s still warm the milk and froth are in the perfect ratio and I didn’t need to use a spoon at all. The picture above is after a few sips (I couldn’t resist) and with a little nutmeg on top. All days should start this way…