Hummus!

This was my lunch today from Diet-to-Go. It's one of my absolute favorites: Hummus with warmed pita bread, string cheese and citrus.

I love this stuff and had no idea until today what it is. According to Wikipedia, hummus is chickpea paste.

According to the Two Sheiks web-site, both Plato and Socrates wrote about the benefits of hummus.

Whatever it is, I like it -- even if it does look like a pile of glop.

Aswad?

There is some kind of poetic justice in this: The Brits have now detained a man in Zambia who is suspected of being involved in last week's attempted bombings in London. The man's name is Jarum Rashid Aswad.

That's right, Aswad.

AHSS-wahd.

'nuff said.


UPDATE: Fox News is now spelling his last name "Aswat". I think my original comments still stand.

The All-Tevin Request Hour

At Tevin's request, here's a photo of my current Xbox game collection.

With a single caveat, noted below, it represents the entire North American Xbox catalog as of July 25, 2005. (Two titles were released on July 26, that I won't have for a few days.)

It now just about fills the longboy cabinet I keep them in, with the games stacked three deep on the shelves. (The upper shelf has some styrofoam risers in it that let you see titles in all three rows. The lower shelf did not have enough height to do this, so they are just layered three deep.)

This collection may find a new home in my bedroom closet soon.


Caveats and miscellaneous info:

• The Halo 2 Map Pack and Cold Fear were off visiting The Frozin One when this picture was taken.
  
• About 30 of the games are not boxed, but are in paper GameStop DVD sleeves. (They were purchased used.)
  
• There are a few duplicate titles:
  • Halo 2 -- For LAN partying
  • 007: Agent Under Fire -- Because the Platinum Hits version can't be used with the EvoX exploit. (I backup all my Xbox gamesave data to the home fileserver monthly.)
  • Deathrow -- I received a second copy as a pre-order bonus with Breakdown.
  • Motor Trend Presents: Lotus Challenge -- Faulty bookkeeping
  • NHL 2002 -- Really faulty bookkeeping.
  • The Hulk -- Because I was stupid.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh! The Dawn of Destiny -- Because I can occasionally be really stupid.
    
• Yes, there is a copy of Barbie Horse Adventures in there. And yes -- I've played it.
  
• 2/3 of the collection was purchased used from GameStop.com, EBGames.com and from people on eBay.
  
• According to my Xbox gamesaves directory, I've played 271 of the games represented here.
  
• There are about 60 titles that are still in the factory shrink-wrap.
  

Man, am I a geek...

---

Tevin also recently asked about the status of XboxRated.com. Well, he's a day or two ahead of me. There will be two new blogs coming online later this week that deal with XboxRated.com:

• xbrdeveloper.blogspot.com -- This will be my developer blog, commenting on the daily struggle to get the web-site on-line. This blog will also provide a few sneak-preview links into the site to see what it's all about.
• xboxrated.blogspot.com -- This will be mainly for public announcements regarding the site while it is in its infancy. Links to all new content posted on the site will be announced here. (This should be really nice for those of you using RSS or Atom feeds.)

Xbox Release Chart -- As of July 25, 2005

I just created this chart and thought it was rather interesting. (Click to get the full-size chart in a separate window.) It shows the North American Xbox titles that have been released each year, grouped by month.

There are a couple of historical values that may be bogus, such as the four titles shown to be released before the Xbox came out, but the rest of the data appears to be reliable. Historical data starting around June 2004 is accurate to the day.

Note that there is some projected release data for the remainder of this year and on into 2006. In practice, about 3% of those titles never get released, and another 15-20% get pushed further out - usually by a margin of 1-6 months. (At this time last year, there were 48 titles slated for release in November 2004. As you can see on the chart, only 35 actually made the November time frame. Most of the delayed titles slipped into 2005.)

The projected dates were gathered from Gamestop.com and EBGames.com. Where the two websites disagree, I've used the Gamestop.com date, since I have found it to be the more reliable projection.

As of today, there have been 633 Xbox titles released in North America. (Excluding Platinum Hits reissues, but including the Halo 2 Map Pack.)

Now Playing: Red Dwarf Series 5

Stan Lee: Resting on his laurels?

Lately, I've lost a modicum of respect for Stan Lee.

I've never been much of a comic book aficionado, but I was an avid reader of the comics in the newspaper, and my favorite strip was Spider-Man. I loved the character, not so much for his exploits against arch-criminals, but for the very human Peter Parker, who was wracked with guilt over his Uncle Ben's death. And the infinitely patient MJ also always struck me as a heroic character -- if maybe a little self-absorbed.

I think it's the flaws in those protagonists that drew me to the strip on a daily basis. Spider-Man was a demonstration of Stan's brilliance as a storyteller.

But lately, Stan the Man has let me down.

First off, he is the reputed creator of the animated series "Stan Lee's Stripperella". The name says it all. This piece of tripe didn't even last a full season. I don't think any more comment is even required. Gack!

Then there was the 2004 G-Phoria incident: Stan Lee was brought in to present the Lifetime Achievement Award to Hideo Kojima. To my mind, this should have been an honor to both of them -- two very creative men meeting on stage.

Before the show, Stan was asked about his participation in the event. Loosely paraphasing him, he admitted that he had no idea who this "HID-ee-oh KO-jim-ah" guy was, but he was sure he must have done some good work.

My goodness, man! You could have at least done some research. And have a little respect: "HID-ee-oh KO-jim-ah"? It's "hee-DAY-oh koh-JEE-mah".

Adding insult to injury, when Stan presented the award, he once again mangled Kojima-san's name (you'd think someone would have coached him) and made the entire presentation with the overblown affect of a man who knows he's faking it, but tries to pull it off anyway.

He almost came off as arrogant -- as if he was the highlight of the ceremony and he couldn't be bothered to consider the man he was supposed to be honoring.

Since then, I've seen Stan in several recent interviews. And while he still comes across as a sweet man, his early grandeur has been sublimated. Is this really the creator of those characters who seemed so complex and real in my youth?

And his cameo in the Fantastic Four movie -- oh my gosh, how embarrassing was that? I mean, it's a sentimental tradition to have Stan cameo, and it's something I normally enjoy. But -- it's as if the cameo was an after-thought. "Hey, we forgot to put Stan's cameo in the script." "Well, we're shooting the lobby scene today, let's add ten seconds of footage and and get it over with."

I mean, for an otherwise well-written script, that one scene felt forced and could have been easily left on the editor's desk -- except that it was Mr. Lee's cameo.

Note to Hollywood: cameos should be incidental to the story. They should flow seamlessly with the on-screen action. Dropping them in like a slide from last year's vacation roll accidentally mixed in with this year's Christmas photos is just sloppy.

Stan Lee, I still think the world of you, man. But like the apocryphal emperor, your royal raimants have failed to accompany you of late.

So, am I officially a pariah now?

Sony sub-licences Unreal 3 engine for PS3 dev kit

Sony is starting to play hardball now. Now the Unreal 3 engine will come standard with the PS3 development kit.

In a related story, Sony has also purchased SN Systems, makers of the ProDG integrated game development environment. This IDE will now also be a part of the standard PS3 development kit.

According to the second story, Sony has also inked deals with Havok and Aegis to include evaluation versions of their physics engines as part of the PS3 dev kit.

Girls In Prison

Sometimes I'll be watching a movie whose plot line is so badly contrived that I can't decide if it was supposed to be camp, or is the result a bad script.

Such is the case for Girls In Prison, a made-for-cable-TV flick released in 1994. I watched this sucker last night and by the end had no idea if the screenwriter, director and producer were serious or were poking fun at prison movies.

And I'm afraid it's the former.

The crimes committed by the first two girls, Melba (Bahni Turpin) and Carol (a very sexy Ione Skye), are ridiculous. There's a Tarantino-esque feel to those scenes, but somehow they come off flat, as if the director was satirizing a B-rated 1950s slasher movie.

The principal character, Aggie O'Hanlon (Missy Crider) is an aspiring country singer who gets framed for murdering a record studio executive. The frame-up is accomplished by Jennifer (Anne Heche), a slutty, yet sultry office assistant. And that's no spoiler -- the plot for this turkey is as predictable as an empty quart of prune juice: you always know what's coming next.

To make things worse, the movie introduces a Hispanic detective, nicknamed Lucky (Miguel Sandoval), who conducts a bizarre, almost Quixotic investigation to prove Aggie's innocence.

In the movie's denouement, Jennifer makes a confession under duress while Aggie repeats each line of her confession over a bullhorn. This scene, probably more than any other, feels so contrived that I was honestly pitying the actresses involved.

Bottom line: This is a bad movie. And it is not even bad in a "can't take my eyes off of the train wreck" kind of way -- it's just a stinker. So, unless you are just desperate to see Ione Skye and Bahni Turpin making out in a prison shower, keep this version of Girls In Prison off of your NetFlix queue. It's a big waste of time.

Fortunately, I had the pleasure of watching The Shawshank Redemption immediately afterward. Now that is a prison movie worth watching.

Fooling the concert violinist

This is one of those musician's moments.

I play a wind synthesizer (a Yamaha WX7, usually connected to a Yamaha VL1-m) in our church band on Sunday mornings. I mainly play emulative patches -- sounds that attempt to imitate non-electronic instruments, like saxes, trumpets, etc. Using a wind synth in this gig is ideal, since I never know what kind of wind instrument will be needed until I show up on Sunday morning -- and, more often than not, the charts call for instruments I don't play/don't have. So emulative synthesis fills the needs of this band.

The band is led by Rex, the lead guitarist and arranger for Disney On Ice. In addition to leading the band, he also writes music for the band to play during the greeting portion of the service. Typically, Rex's arrangements are hymns that have been written into a jazz, R&B or rock groove.

Two weeks ago, Rex pulled out an arrangement of "The Love of God" that he'd just put together. The chart had a very strong Count Basie feel and featured me playing a trumpet sound layered on top saxes (played by Shawn, our keyboard synth man, on a Kurzweil K2600.) Of course, having a Basie feel, there was a lot of piano filler by our pianist througout the piece.

This was a very tight swing chart, and by the second service, Shawn and I had gotten a super-tight sound. (This was achieved by my watching his hands as we played, ensuring that we articulated the music together.) I was really pleased with how it turned out and Rex was gushing afterward about how the tune sounded just like what he'd heard in his head when he'd arranged it.

Last week, we had a guest musician in the band -- a concert violinist who plays first violin with the Little Rock Symphony. Her parents go to our church and so she sits in with the band a few times a year. This gal can play. She gets an absolutely beautiful sound out of her violin, and was playing moderately difficult charts on the first read without a hitch.

Between services, she came up to me and introduced herself. She then immediately asked "were you the one playing the trumpet last week? I kept looking for the trumpet player until I figured out it was you. It sounded so real."

As an emulative synthesist, who has battled both the legit and synth-only camps of the musical community for years, that comment made my week.

When I can fool a symphony musician into looking for the trumpet player, I've done my job.

* smile *

Rhymes with James Dean

Most of you are going to hate this post.

Because I'm about to tell you about three words that you always mis-pronounce.

And pronouncing them right will make you sound like a dork.

Before we get to these three words, I want to share a little theory on how they got so screwed up -- at least in the American English dialect.

Childhood.

That's it. It's what these three words have in common. All of the nouns I'll be discussing are words that have been familiar to children for 100 years. And all of them are words that, for the most part, went unused during their teens. So the pronunciation was never corrected from childhood and generations of people grew up mangling these poor words until the barbarian of Common Usage took over, making the mis-pronunciations the more common variant.

The first word is the most contentious, because the right way to say it sounds the worst to people who grew up hearing and saying it wrong.

Iodine.

The correct pronunciation: EYE-oh-deen.

Yes, "deen". Not "dyne".

I knew you wouldn't like it.

But this word, more so than the others, has the greatest need to be pronounced correctly. Iodine ("EYE-oh-deen", remember?) is an element, and all elements are classified according to certain basic properties on the Periodic Table of Elements. The arrangement of the table is based on the orbital characteristics of each element's electrons.

Before we consider Iodine itself, I want you to look at two other columns in the table. (Click the image to bring up a larger version in a separate window.)

You will notice that the first column is broken, with "H" (Hydrogen) separated from the rest. This is because Hydrogen has no proton particles. Now notice the names of the remaining elements in that column:

Li = Lithium - LITH-ee-um
Na = Sodium - SEW-dee-um
K = Potassium = poh-TASS-ee-um
Rb = Rubidium = ru-BID-ee-um
Cs = Cesium = SEE-zee-um
Fr = Francium = FRANS-ee-um

Note that they all end with "-ium" and the "ee-um" sound. The -ium suffix is an indication of the properties of the element. One additional property of all of these elements (including Hydrogen) is that they are all highly reactive.

Now, let's look at the last column. Again, note that He - Helium is set apart from the remainder of the column. These are all inert gasses. And their names:

Ne - Neon - NEE-on
Ar - Argon - ARE-gon
Kr - Krypton - CRYP-ton
Xe - Xenon - ZEE-non
Rn - Radon - RAY-don

These elemental gasses all end in "-on" and the "on" sound.

Now, let's look at our friend. He's in the next-to-the-last column -- the one labeled "17/VIIA". The elements are:

F - Flourine - FLOOR-een
Cl - Chlorine - KLOR-een
Br - Bromine - BRO-meen
I - Iodine - EYE-oh-deen
At - Astatine - ASS-tuh-teen (heh-heh... he wrote "ass")

Again, they all end with the same suffix "-ine" -- and it is pronounced "een".

Now, if you look up this word in Merriam-Webster OnLine, you will see that the correct, scientific pronunciation has been relegated to the third position. This is the result of common usage, where most people (incorrectly) say either "EYE-oh-dyne" or "EYE-oh-den".

---

Next up is a simple one: Licorice.

The correct, but now almost out of use, pronunciation is "LICK-uh-riss". Word-o-philes have a field day with this one.

The word comes from Middle English and is a direct transplant from French. The French still pronounce it "LICK-o-riss".

This, again, I blame on childhood. LICK-uh-riss is one of those words that is hard for young children to get their mouths around. So they often end up saying "LICK-ur-rish" or even "LICK-rish". Unfortunately, parents didn't correct the pronunciation and now generations of adults use the infantile "LICK-rish" pronunciation.

Why do word-o-philes have a field day? Because the French licorice comes from the Latin liquiritia, which does have the "ish" sound in it. But, this is, in my opinion, a wild hare, since the French version of the word has no such sound.

---

And finally, another word that has been beaten down by common usage: caramel.

This particular word has fared better than the other two, because the mispronunciations appear to be regional. The correct, but now less favored, pronunciation is CARE-uh-mel. The more typical, incorrect, pronunciation is CAR-muhl. Again I fly in the face of Common Usage by declaring it to be wrong in this case.

And again, I blame childhood.

But here, the Bible may come into play. There is a Mount Carmel in the Bible. That, combined with the difficulty some children may have had saying CARE-uh-mel, may explain the popularity of CAR-muhl.

What's really odd is looking at the definition of caramel in most dictionaries: they will all show the entry with three syllables, but will show pronunciations with only two.

Even worse is the derived word caramelize/caramelise. Here again, the entry will show four syllables, but the pronunciation keys provide a three syllable word in the primary (most used) position.

---

I will note that for English, Common Usage is the rule. And for that reason, I would grudgingly concede caramel and licorice. But with words whose pronunciation is related to their scientific properties, like iodine, I will contend that Common Usage does not and can not apply.

She's singing, Karl.

Karl Rove, please, do the right thing.

You screwed up, man. Yeah, by the strictest sense of the law, you are innocent. But you confirmed the identity (yeah, we know you didn't user her name) of a covert CIA agent. And you did it at a time of war. To a reporter. That's a faux pas that can't be overlooked.

Yes, Joseph Williams is a pinhead with an agenda. We know he lied about his wife not being responsible for his getting the "Yellow-cake from Niger" assignment. We know his findings as reported to Congress contradicted his own filed report. Old Joey is a liar and a schmuck.

But none of that excuses your infringement of our national security -- no matter how pushy a broad Ambassador William's wife is.

Me? I'm still a true believer. There were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Hussein did have an on-going WMD program. And, as far as I have been able to determine, there were assorted chemical and biological weapons deployed on mobile platforms just days before the allied forces marched into Baghdad. In The Secrect History of the Iraq war, Yossef Bodansky, a man vehemently against the Iraq invasion, documents the existence and movement of WMDs shortly before the war began. (Bodansky names no sources, unfortunately, but why would someone so against the war work so hard to document the existence of the WMD threat?)

But whether or not there were WMDs in Iraq when the war began, whether or not Joe Williams is a putz, whether or not the lady Williams wears the pants in the family... Karl, ya done wrong.

She's singing the last stanza, Karl.

Get off the stage before you are left all alone out there with your knickers showing.

What a beauty!

My Yamaha YTS-875B Tenor arrived late yesterday afternoon. Wow! Everything I wrote about the YBS-62 Bari applies. It's a wonderful instrument.

Like the YSS-875B Soprano, this one also has a black lacquer body, which shows off the keyworks and engraving so well. I'll let the pictures do the talking.

Looks like it's time to get in the woodshed.

They're here! Well, two of 'em, anyway...

Today my soprano and baritone saxes arrived. And they rock.

The bari arrived this morning -- while I was finishing up today's earlier blog entry.

I haven't played a bari sax since 1982, when I used one to double bassoon parts in a production of Evita. (Thanks, Dad, for reminding me of that.) After so many years, I was afraid I wouldn't be able to play it.

Let me tell you, this instrument, the Yamaha YBS-62 is so well-made, it was a dream to play, even with chops as stale as mine.

WARNING: The next paragraph is full of gushing musician-speak.

From the low A on the bottom of the instrument, all the way into the altissimo register, this horn plays easily and consistently. And the intonation across the instrument is incredible. Even with my wasted-away embouchure, this baby had an absolutely sweet tone -- not too bright, not too dark. The action in the keyworks is incredible. Without a doubt, this is the best bari sax I've ever played. Check that, it's the best sax of any type that I've ever played. It's that good.

The soprano arrived late this afternoon. It's a flat-out beautiful horn. As you can see in the photo above and in the detail photos at left, the body is coated with black lacquer, with the keyworks in shiny brass and the keys themselves topped with mother-of-perl. There is intricate scrollwork engraved into the bell. The engraving was cut through the black lacquer, which really shows it off. (The entire bell of the bari is also engraved, but the engraving doesn't photograph nearly as well.)

The soprano also plays beautifully, but was not as forgiving of my years of saxophone neglect. The upper octave plays fluidly and has absolutely clean intonation from D to A. Above A, I need to adjust my bite to keep things in tune, but not by much. Playing the instrument's middle C in the upper ocatave (all holes closed) also has a noticeable intonation difference, but again, it is easily compensated for in the embouchure. (For the unitiated, soprano saxophones are infamous for their intonation problems, which are an artifact of their short tube length and small bore. This horn has the best intonation of any soprano I've ever tried -- by far.) The lower register has very clean intonation all the way through. I am having some difficulty initiating low D, but I suspect that has more to do with my poor emboucure than any possible defect in the horn.

The tone is beautiful -- maybe even a touch on the dark side, which is a surprise, considering my prior experience with Yamaha horns.

For the most part, the horn almost feels like it's playing itself. The action is very fast and perfectly even. Overall, it's a superior quality horn. I'm very pleased.

Now I need to call Dennis and tell him I'm ready for some lessons.

And just think: the Tenor arrives tomorrow.

Kudos to my wife

I've long been a fan of video and computer art. It's an area that I absolutely have no talent in. (I'm a fairly good amateur video editor, but I'm no artist.)

Enter my wife. (Oh grow up!)

"my wife" is the Xbox Live Gamertag of Adam Hilliker, who is, in my mind, a top-notch graphic artist. He is responsible for much of the sweet, minimalist look of Gamertag.com, including the design of the site's mascot and evil, world-dominating matriarch, Custard.

But where Adam excels, in my opinion, is in his video work. He is able to seamlessly blend video with kinetic graphic artwork. I love his use of massive amounts of text, monochromatics, and the highly technological feel that he infuses into his creations.

For a real treat, take a look at his "Broadcast Reel" -- a 3½ minute video resume of commercial projects Adam has done. It can be found at http://www.helfet.com/. Also on the site are a number of Macromedia Flash games that Adam created while learning about programming Flash.

Enjoy the site and if you appreciate his work, drop him an email. I'm sure he'll appreciate it.

Mis-used word of the week: Gender

It's Monday. Welcome to my weekly rant about words. Yeah, words, darn it!

Today we feature a word that people use because they think they know what it means and because it sounds polite and educated.

Instead, they come off sounding like a bunch of dufi. (That's plural for "dufus". Have fun looking it up.)

Today's word is: gender. (Man, this is starting to sound like an episode of Sesame Street.)

The people who use this word incorrectly believe it is synonymous with sex. Sorry, Charlie -- it ain't.

Gender has two, and only two, appropriate meanings and contexts:

1. When talking about words that have feminine vs. masculine attributes, you use the word gender. While this mainly applies to languages derived from Latin, (e.g.: French, Spanish, Portuguese) there are a few examples in English. Her has a feminine gender, whereas Him has a masculine gender.
   
   So words have gender. They do not have sex. (Though I'm sure some of you out there would like to watch them try.)
   
   
2. When referring to psychological, behavioral or cultural traits, it is acceptable to use the word gender in place of sex or sexual. So the phrase "gender identity" is perfectly acceptable, since it is a reference to a set of psychological traits.

Using gender in any other context is wrong.

The most blatant example of this error is on those probing forms that you fill out when applying for insurance. So often, there is a box that says "Gender: _ Male _ Female". Wrong-o. That box should read "Sex: _ Male _ Female".

I've heard people talking to pregnant women asking them what the "gender of the child" will be. How the heck is she supposed to know? According to the sonogram, the sex of the child is female, but hey, maybe she's going to be a tomboy in twelve years. Who can know about gender, eh?

The other common example that irks me is in electronics. There are male and female connections of all kinds in the electronics world. Those connectors have SEX, not GENDER, people! (Yes, I've seen a few dweebs in white coats get all excited over that, too. Immature little putzes.) As cute as the name "Gender Mender" is, it is just plain inappropriate usage. (To make things worse, I once saw a product in a catalog that was proudly dubbed "Gendar Mender" -- that was just pathetic.)

So, friends, let's get this one right. There is nothing wrong or impolite or inappropriate about the word sex. Use it with confidence when the situation warrants.

Next week we'll delve into the pronunciation of iodine and caramel. Hoo-boy, won't that be exciting?

Justice Out.

P.S.: My sex is Male.

Really, Mom, I'm Okay

Am I the only one?

I mean, seriously. I know some of you are just as guilty as I am.

When given a choice between playing a male or female character in a video game, I will always pick the hot chick over the dude.

And the reason is simple: If I'm going to spend 40+ hours watching someone's butt as I manipulate them through a game, I'd prefer it to be a female butt -- and female legs -- and female... well, you get the idea.

This leads to two problems:

1. In this psycho-analytical society of ours, an observer might jump to the conclusion that I choose female characters because I identify with the female mind better than the male. They will assume that I'm choosing an avatar more in line with my innermost self-image -- a digital doll that I can festoon in frocks, frills and braids.
   
   Try again, Sherlock. She's a buxom babe and I'd rather watch her jiggle her stuff than some hunk of man-meat. My "problem", if you want to classify it as that, is one of mild prurience, not sexual identity.
   
   
2. On-line play. In games like Microsoft Links 2004 or Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2005, the sex of the character you choose is permanent. In both games, there is an RPG aspect where it takes many hours of off-line play to develop your character's skills -- hours totaling often into the triple digits. So, naturally, I choose to create a female character since I plan on spending a number of weeks playing the game.
   
   Now picture this: I go on-line with this character that I've carefully trained and crafted. But I'm a guy... with a svelte babe as an avatar. I can't see my opponents' faces, but I can hear the look that's coming over my headset. The look that says "you're a little off your nut, now, aren't you?"

Somehow, I get equated with those weirdos who prey on children by going into chat rooms and pretending to be a 13 year old girl. (Little do they know that the "14 year old girl" they are chatting with is also a 53 year old, 350 pound man wearing a teddy.)

Unlike those perverts, I'm not masquerading. I'll tell you up front "I'm a guy who prefers to stare at women instead of men, okay? Deal with it."

And yeah, I'm wearing pants.

So be forewarned, if you want to play online with me on a game that has a developable character, she will be the busty, red-headed Valkyrie in a leather corset and go-go boots with legs that go all the way up.

And if you are a guy, I dare you not to stare at her during the match.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go play a Real Time Event in Tiger Woods... I'm pretty sure this one unlocks those green capri pants my character has had her eye on...

The Dilemma

I have a real bad habit.

When it comes to new technology, I tend to be in the group of early adopters -- people who buy a product as soon as it is introduced.

Now, I'm not your typical technology lemming. For example, I don't have an iPod and have a very limited desire to own one.

But when it comes to technology that I have a real interest or use for, I go in, gung-ho, on day 1.

The Yamaha WX7 is a good example. I plunked down a 50% deposit on that puppy the day that the product was announced -- a full six months before it would be available for purchase. In that case, I was fortunate: the product was well-developed and has served me faithfully for over 18 years.

More germane to where I'm going with this, in 1996, I bought one of the first US Robotics Pilot 1000 handheld computers. In a matter of hours, it had replaced the leather-bound Dayrunner that I'd been carrying around for years. All of my contacts and appointments were immediately accessible in a unit that I could carry in my pocket. And -- bonus -- you could play games on it as well.


3Com bought US Robotics and created the Palm division to continue the Pilot line. Soon after the acquisition, they delivered a set of sleeker, sexier, more powerful handhelds. My Pilot 1000 was beginning to seriously show its age at that point. (It was nicknamed "Ziggy", after the computer in Quantum Leap, whose hand-held unit needed a good slap every once in a while to get it working.)

When the Palm Pilot 5x was introduced, I bought one, transferring all of my precious data from the aging Pilot 1000.

This was about the same time that the PCS cell phone was becoming affordable, and for some time I was carrying around a cell phone and the Palm 5x. I soon began wondering when a hybrid device would become available, combining the Palm OS with a cell phone.

Within a week of the death of my cell phone, Samsung introduced the SPH-i300, a Palm driven device integrated into a cell phone. Early adopter that I am, I immediately bought the SPH-i300. I put my Palm 5x into retirement and moved everything to the Samsung, in a technophilic rapture of having my PDA and phone integrated. All was well for a couple of years as I gleefully ignored the hybrid PDA market.


Until THE DROP.

One day, two years ago, as I was getting out of my car, the SPH-i300 fell out of my shirt pocket and onto the asphalt. The impact was a bad one that shattered the liquid crystals inside the LCD screen.

Suddenly, I was once again in the market for a hybrid device.

As fate would have it, that very week HandSpring (soon to be purchased by Palm) was releasing the Trēo 600 for Sprint's network. As a Sprint subscriber, I was desperate to become an early technology adopter once again. After canvassing no less than six Sprint stores across Southern California, I finally found one. (Apparently, I'm not alone in this early adopter mind-set. For almost two months following my purchase, stores could not keep Trēo 600s in stock.)

My 600 looked just like that picture to the right, until it too experienced a DROP. Fortunately, this time the unit was under warranty and palmOne was happy to trade my broken 600 for a refurbished unit. The new phone now sports a palmOne logo in place of the HandSpring somersaulting man icon.

Now, the 600 has a lot of great features: a fairly fast processor, a bright screen, upgradeable Palm 5 O/S, PCS Vision support, a keyboard that even my large thumbs can operate easily, a VGA camera and a host of other nice features.

But it lacks one thing that keeps me itching: Bluetooth. That little wireless technology that allows you to easily create short-distance communication channels between various devices. In my case, the device I want to connect is a Jabra FreeSpeak headset. I have one that I use with my Trēo 600, but I have to hang this clunky Bluetooth receiver off the bottom of my phone and, frankly, it takes all the fun out of having a wireless headset.

And so now I have the dilemma: the Trēo 650.

This update to the 600 came out several months ago and it features a faster processor, a high resolution screen (4 times the resolution of the 600), an easier to use keyboard and built-in Bluetooth.

The technophile in me has been screaming lately to trade in my 600 for a 650, but the economist (who was obviously repressed last Wednesday) keeps telling me that I'm only going to get $100 for the trade-in and I really won't get any real value out of the $400+ that it would cost to upgrade.

So far, sanity and economy are winning valiantly in this struggle.

But there's an evil little thought that keeps popping in, hoping for yet another DROP.

Oops!

Who mourns for Spring?

No, not the season.

I'm talking about the new character that was supposed to be in Hypnotix's Outlaw Golf 2. I distinctly remember advertisements touting that OG2 would feature "a new character, Spring, Summer's younger (and hotter) sister." Summer, pictured at right, is Outlaw Golf's stripper with a PhD. (I'm not sure what her doctorate is in, but I'm guessing it has something to do with anatomy. )

I thought of this as I was playing the game last night. I was running through Tour Mode attempting to unlock the final character (Harvest), when I realized I'd never seen Spring anywhere in the game. I even checked to see if she could be downloaded on Xbox Live, but, alas, there was no downloadable content available.

Wha-hoppen?

I know that Hypnotix went through some difficulties when their publisher, Simon & Schuster, decided to get out of the game business last year, but how did Spring get lost in the shuffle? Did the new publisher, Global Star, give her the boot? Or has Hypnotix totally lost track of quality control? (Their web-site struggles to keep up to date, still listing OG2 in the "Coming Soon" category, even though the game was released nine months ago.)

Whatever the reason, it appears that poor Spring has suffered a digital stillbirth, never to revel in the stardom for which she was destined.

So who mourns for Spring?

I do.

This tear's for you, kiddo.

Blame it on G-flat

Wednesday, July 6, 2005 may mark the day that I began my inexorable spiral into dementia. Either that or I'm exhibiting mid-life crisis with a rather unusual set of symptoms.

I bought three saxophones over the Internet.

Yes, three.

• a Yamaha YBS-62 Baritone;


• a Yamaha YTS-875B Custom Tenor with a black lacquer finish;


• and a Yamaha YSS-875B Custom Soprano with a black lacquer finish.

And now I feel like a kid waiting for Christmas: I can't wait for these horns to arrive.

I've never owned a real saxophone. (There's a crusty old 1930s-vintage C melody tenor that I bought from a high school friend for $65, but that hardly counts. It had no recognizable branding and leaked worse than Starr Jones on a diuretic. I ended up leaving it behind in my townhouse when I moved to Tennessee in February. Maybe the new owners of the townhouse can make a nice lamp out of it.) In high school and college, I always used school instruments. So the prospect of now having not one, but three professional quality horns has me almost giddy.

Okay, so I'm full-on giddy -- and that's not a pretty state for a man of my years and presumed dignity.

"So, " I hear you asking, "how did this all come about?"

I blame the key of G-flat.

I play wind synthesizer in our church praise band on Sunday mornings. With the exception of myself, this is a group of pro musicians. The band leader, Rex, plays guitar and writes all of the arrangements for Disney on Ice. Our pianist can play just about anything you throw at him on the first attempt. I'm the only exception: a horn-playing hack who rarely practices and just manages to get by.

The band runs through the morning's music on Sunday mornings, about a half hour before the first service. This past Sunday, Rex pulled out a chart he'd arranged: a straight-ahead blues version of "God Bless America." I looked at the chart and saw that it starts in the key of F -- no big deal. But toward the end, the music modulates.

To G-flat.

For a horn player, G-flat is evil. Every note, except F, is flat. Even C is flat, which is insane, since C-flat is really B, which is just confusing.

I stared at it for a second, and was honest. "Rex, just beware that I might freak out at the key change."

Rex seemed unconcerned as he counted off the tempo.

Well, I survived the key change. It was in no way a great solo -- I just hung on to the notes that I knew were safe and prayed for the double bar to show up as soon as possible.

I followed the same formula for the services -- not embarrassing myself, but certainly not playing anything I'd want to ever listen to again.

I began thinking that it is finally time for me to get serious about learning my chord and improvisation theory if I don't want to go through another experience like that.

The next day, July 4^th, I started seriously thinking about taking classes at the Nashville Jazz Workshop. I mentioned this to my parents, and my mother, of all people, said that she wished I'd start playing saxophone again. I was actually thinking the same thing, but knew that saxophones are not a trivial purchase, but it was nice to have my mother not only endorsing, but presenting the idea that I should buy a sax.

So the next day I went in search of the NJW. It's in the old industrial section of Nashville, along the waterfront. Most of the buildings in the area are condemned factories, many with no walls. The NJW itself is in the old Neuhoff meat-packing plant. Outside, it's an old brick factory building with a bit of character, surrounded by the crumbling remains of its former competitors. Inside, it's a hipster's dream, with artistic lighting and jazz-related artwork scattered around.

I had a chance to meet with the founders, Lori Mechem and Roger Spencer. I told them what I hoped to gain from attending NJW and was given a list of courses that would be appropriate. Roger also suggested I get in touch with a private teacher, Dennis Solee, to sharpen up my sax chops after such a long hiatus. Roger told me that Dennis would also be my best contact for finding a new axe.

On Wednesday, I hooked up with Dennis on the phone and we had a great conversation. It turns out that he also has played wind synths in the past, a Lyricon and a Yamaha WX7, but lost both of them in a fire last year. (I have two WX7s, a broken Lyricon II, and a Yamaha WX5.) He also is a big fan of Yamaha saxophones, which, while surprising, was in line with my impressions of Yamaha instruments from 20+ years ago. I always like the way that the Yamaha horns felt under my fingers and the solid "blow-through" -- you felt like your breath was actually doing something as it passed through the instrument.

I did have a concern that Yamaha horns were infamous for being too bright sounding for "legit" playing, but apparently that has changed. In fact, according to Dennis, the YTS-875 Custom has a sound that is often considered on the verge of being too dark!

Dennis suggested that I should spend a couple of weeks searching for horns on the Web, where I would have a better selection and would likely get a better deal than any brick and mortar dealer in the Nashville area. Plus, it turns out most on-line instrument dealers, including many of those on eBay, have a "try and return" policy, where you can audition an instrument for 30-45 days and return it for a full refund if you don't like it.

So I began my research, but I had a real dilemma: do I get a bari, a tenor or a soprano? (I've never really enjoyed playing alto, for some odd reason.) The more research I did, the more I was tempted to get all three.

And unto temptation I did yield.

So here I am, giddy as a Japanese schoolgirl before a Takuya Kimura film, waiting for my three Ferraris, er, saxes to arrive sometime next week.

Oh, my poor neighbors...