Author: SilentBen

Not often silent, but undoubtedly always Ben.

Applefication

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Apple is surrounding me.  It seems like almost every other day, someone else around me buys some Apple product.  At the current rate, it won’t be long before everyone around me is using all Apple products.  So far I’ve held my ground.  But I can’t say that I haven’t been tempted (see my previous entry on the subject).

It started a number of months ago when my manager at work traded in his BlackBerry for an iPhone and his PC laptop for a MacBook.  Then more recently a few of the Flash developers at my company switched to MacBooks.  Then a month ago another co-worker got an iPhone.  Then last week two of my friends from work switched over – one got a MacBook and the other an iMac – both for home use.  Now my dad made the switch for a new job.  As I sit here typing on my PC laptop, I wonder if there is any avoiding this slow trickle continuing to grow until it becomes a landslide. Read more “Applefication”

Home Alone

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It’s quiet.  Maybe eerily quiet.  I’m sitting here in silence at my laptop – my only noise accompaniment besides the clicking of the keys and the slow cadence of my own breath is the sound of the washing machine wooshing upstairs.  At this time of the night, that isn’t really that unusual – if my wife is still up, she will often also be sitting at her laptop typing away.  But tonight I type alone.

The reason for this is simple:  I AM alone.  From basement to attic, the current head count in my house is one (counting me).  This has been the population peak since Monday afternoon and will not likely be surpassed again until Saturday night.  Why, you ask?  My family has taken to the road. Read more “Home Alone”

Dancing in the Dark

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Despite the images this title may conjure (whether you know who Bruce Springsteen is or not), I’m referring to how my family participated in the Earth Hour.  If you are not aware of what Earth Hour is, it is an environmental awareness initiative where anyone who interested in participating would turn off their lights and any non-essential electronics from 8:30 to 9:30 PM on Saturday local time (obviously this time-frame has passed here, but there may be areas where this hasn’t by the time this is read).  We made a slumber party out of it. Read more “Dancing in the Dark”

Extraction Update: Check Please!

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So I wrote a few days ago about the fact that I had two of my wisdom teeth removed.  I considered writing a follow-up at the end of the day after – if I had, it would likely have read generally of how the pain wasn’t as bad as I’d expected and that I may not even need the stronger pain meds they’d given me.  If I had written that, I would have been writing a scathing retraction the very next day. Read more “Extraction Update: Check Please!”

Death Masks

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The tally continues – so far Dresden has help his own against demons, sorcerers, mobsters, vampires, fairies, ghouls, ghosts, and werewolves (not necessarily in that order).  For Jim Butcher’s next trick, he will take on angels (fallen angels to be specific) … while still occasionally dealing with the usual vampires and mobsters, etc.  In Death Masks, Harry finds himself re-teamed up with Michael Carpenter – one of the three Knights of the cross.  And once he has a couple run-ins with some Denarians (fallen angels who partner with human hosts for a corporial form), he finds himself playing backup to all three of the Knights. Read more “Death Masks”