RSM: eBooks and physical books, my dream solution

I am a gadget girl. I love gadgets. I love anything that Apple makes but I also just love gadgets. I had a Palm V back when they first came out. I have a Barnes and Noble 3G + WiFi eInk nook (the version before the Touch) and have been thinking about the Nook Color even though I already have two iPads. I have the original iPhone, the original iPad, and several versions after.

Yet, I also dearly love books and the feel of paper in my hands. I will read a physical book over an electronic book if given the choice. If I am traveling, spending time waiting in a doctor’s office, etc. I appreciate the convenience of having books in my iPad (or the nook). But in the end, I want a physical book. I have more faith that the books sitting in my library will still be there in 10 years than I do in Amazon or Barnes and Noble or even the ePub format itself. For all the embracing I have done of digital technology, I still feel that digital media and digital content is fleeting and non-permanent. Books are moreso. I have books I inherited from my grandparents. I hope to pass some of my books along to my grandchildren. I don’t see the same thing happening with eBooks.

For me, eBooks are easy to carry but not archival. I use my nook to check out eBooks from the library that I want to read but don’t necessarily want to own. Books I own I reread the same way that DVDs I own are movies I want to be able to watch again and again. I guess that in the simplest terms, for me, digital content is for renting, physical content is for owning.

Reading on a friend/blogger I follow’s facebook status today, her publisher, ECW Press, has just announced that you can get a free eBook copy of any of their books when you buy the physical book. You can’t go back and get eBooks of past books you purchased, but starting today, with the proof of purchase, you get an eBook to go with your physical book. That is awesome.I love this independent publisher for doing this and I plan on supporting them like crazy now, especially since I’ve been meaning to buy Nikki’s Finding Lost series of books on the Series Lost.

I’ve been saying to anyone who will listen that Amazon should have offered free eBooks with the purchase of a physical book from the day it launched the first kindle. They easily know what books I buy. It would be simple to give me the eBook as well. I know, then they can’t change twice for the same content like they do now. The thing is, with me, they don’t. I buy either the physical book or the eBook. More often then not, I just buy the physical book.

The only eBook I bought in addition to the physical book was the Steve Jobs Biography. That one, out of respect or homage to Mr. Jobs, sits on my night stand and also in my iPad’s iBook shelf.

In the same way that I only buy Disney DVDs that include the digital copy, I’d spend an additional dollar to buy a book that came with an eBook download code. I am not sure if the industry will ever get there, but as a consumer who likes to own actual books, but who’d like to take them on travel with her in her iPad, this is a model I would love to see happen. I am not sure what barriers there are in the industry to make this happen, or even how much theft might result, but as an honest consumer, this is what I’d love to see.

Books are great. I want there to always be books.

I think eBooks and paper books can live in harmony. At least they do in my house.
RSM.

Three Little Kittens

It all started when I went out to feed our outdoor cat, KeeKee, yesterday morning.

For some background, we were adopted this summer by an old lady cat, and I’ve made her a nice heated outdoor home on our porch so she can weather this winter. Since she arrived, she’s back to her healthy weight, and while she used to just sit in our bushes all day long over the summer, now she spends all day off in the woods doing her thing, and only comes back for meals and to sleep in her shelter overnight.

It’s a good life and I am happy I can provide it for her. If someone is going to dump a sweet cat in the country, the least I can do is make her a nice home to compensate.

Back to yesterday morning.

When I was feeding KeeKee, I heard the faintest of mews coming from under the porch. It was so faint, in fact, that I thought I was hearing wrong and that I had mistaken a creak for a mew. Until it mewed again. Yup, that sure sounded like a kitten. So, I walked down the steps and what should poke it’s head out from under them but a tiny black and white kitten.

He was adorable.

We already have one cat inside, and one cat outside. My husband is indulgent but only so far. There is no way I am bringing another kitten inside. So I put out more food. Gave it some hugs (it let me pick it up), and continued with the morning routine of getting the kids ready for school. It was a huge feet of deception that I was able to get them past the meowing kitty at the door and convince them that it was just the old outdoor cat.

I worried about this little kitten all day at work. How was I going to take care of it and keep it from the kids. As anyone who knows me will attest, I am horrible at lying. I knew that was out of the question. My decision was made. I’d tell the kids when we got home, then I’d walk to the neighbors houses to see if anyone lost a kitten. Perhaps this little guy was an escapee and his children were looking for him/her.

As soon as the kids saw the kitten, my son fell in love and my daughter freaked. My son is just like me and if everything were up to us, our house would be full of cats. My daughter is a bit reserved when it comes to animals and she has to warm up to them as much as they have to warm up to her.

I went around to the neighbors houses who were home and none of them claimed this little kitten, although all of them thought he/she was adorable. How can you not? It is a fundamental fact that kittens are cute. It is natures way of protecting them. Having no luck, I returned home, put out more food for the kitten and KeeKee, and fed my kids dinner.

After dinner, then insisted on coming with me to the last house I had not yet knocked on. We brought the kitten with us and it meowed and meowed. We’d just started up our neighbors driveway when a meow answered back and out from the bushes another identical black and white kitten dashed toward us.

Now there were two little kittens.

We made our way up the neighbor’s driveway with two little kittens and two very excited children, only to find them still not home. So we returned to our home. Setting down the two kittens now with KeeKee (who gave me a look that can only say “seriously?!”), we went inside to finish up the kids homework. When asked if they could go back outside to see the kittens again, I said they had to finish their homework first.

In what was a record for them, they finished their homework, got on their pajamas, put away their toys, and got coats, slippers, and mittens on to go back outside. The kitten motivation sure is something.

As my son opened the door he said “Mom, you have to see this. Now there are three kittens.”

“What? Three kittens?” what my incredulous reply.

“Yup. Three kittens.” he answers.

And there were. A third little black and white but fluffy kitten had joined the first two short haired black and white kittens. It was obvious that these three are siblings from the way they wrestle and play together. I set out more food and the kids and I spent about a half hour in the cold playing with the kittens on the porch. Setting out a box, blanket and more food, we told them goodnight and that we’d see them in the morning.

Although KeeKee the outdoor old lady cat has a heated shelter, she didn’t invite the kittens in to stay with her. I am just happy that aside from a hiss or two, she’s been fairly “whatever” about the arrival of these interlopers. She’s not pleased that they are eating out of her foodbowl, but she’s not doing anything to stop them.

The kittens were still there this morning, waiting for more food and playtime from my kids. The weather is going to get up to the 50s today, so they will be ok, but it’s going to be frigid by the end of the week. The countdown begins. Time to find these babies a home.

My son wishes it could be with us, but even I can’t get my husband to accept three more cats.

Wish us luck!
RSM

Reflections on the end of the 2011

Today is the first day of winter, Yule in the Pagan calendar, and the start of the lengthening of our days. Seems like a perfect time to post a little bit here to the blog that I have neglected for a couple of months now. I apologize to those few readers who have stopped by this last week to see what I might have posted.

This has been an interesting year. I spent a major part of it in a detail position as a branch chief. That’s Rocket Scientist speak for serving temporarily in a promotion as a manager. Because it was only a detail and not a full blown promotion, I had all the responsibility for my people but no real power to make decisions or cause things to happen. It was a good run, though, and I was able to learn whether I liked being a manager (I did). In spite of the limited “power,” I was able to help my branch stay afloat in the chaos that is where I work. My own branch chief has been called higher up to help fill other needs. I don’t know when she will return, and I am grateful that she asked that I serve in her place.

The bad part of spending time being a manager was that I internalized a lot of stress, so much so that my hair started to fall out. If you know me, you know this is huge. I’ve had hair almost down to the small of my back for most of my adult life. A month ago, I had my husband cut 8 inches off because it looked so thin. Eight inches because that is the minimum needed to donate. I think I’ve come to terms with it (losing the hair) but have yet to fully relax and unwind.

At the end of the year, as I look toward a new year with a fresh start, my promise to myself is to work harder on that. Work harder on relaxing. In the coming year, I may or may not be able to get into management. There is so much up in the air at work. I do know I liked it but I also know that I let things get to me. Lesson learned. Relaxation is key to well being. To be the best I can be, I must be kind to myself. Those are things I already knew but was caught by surprise how little I actually put them into practice.

My wish to all of you reading this is to also be kind to yourselves. In everything you do, go ahead and do your very best. That’s all that you can ask. After that, accept the outcome however it falls. If you’ve done your best, you have nothing to worry about and nothing to be ashamed of. Worry will make your hair fall out. I am proof of that.

Thankfully, I have a loving family and super awesome kids to focus on. That’s what I’ve been doing, and it is helping. They are the light of my life, and my main reason for being.

Merry Christmas to those who celebrate, whether it’s for Baby Jesus or Santa. Happy Hanukkah to those who are celebrating the festival of lights. Happy Yule to my pagan friends. And best wishes for the new year to everyone.

All my best.
RSM.

Childhood memories

A wonderful woman I follow on twitter prompted her followers to share their childhood memories yesterday. She asked that we keep it to the happy memories. She’s a really positive person, which I love her for, and wanted to send out only happiness to the twittersphere (something that’s often hard to do).

I came up with two, but the one that has brought me here is both happy and sad. I tweeted the following”

“Only one to make friends with girl with cancer in gradeschool. Became best pals. So sad when she passed. #childhoodmemories”

When I was in third and fourth grade, there was a young girl in my class who had cancer. Looking back, I don’t remember what kind of cancer she had, only that she walked with crutches, and her hair thinned and then started to fall out and I can’t remember her name. I didn’t know what was going on in her life, and I never asked why she was sick or why her hair was falling out. All I do remember was that the other kids tended to stay away from her. I guess they were afraid.

I have always been one of those shy kids who keeps to herself. I’d prefer to be alone on the playground playing with my toys rather than searching out other kids. She was a shy kid too, but thinking back on that as an adult I wonder if she was shy because her illness made her stand out and be different or because she was shy.

Either way, she and I became friends. I can remember spending time with her on the playground. I can remember helping to carry her things as we changed classes. Somewhere along the 3rd grade/4th grade we started to switch classrooms for subjects rather than stay in the same room with the same teacher all day long. With her crutches, she couldn’t carry much. I was more than happy to help. I didn’t have to be asked. She was my friend and I wanted to help her.

We moved out of state when I was in fifth grade, and I had to leave all of my friends at school. She was the one I was most sad about leaving. I wrote to her only a couple of times after the move. I would have written more, but shortly after we moved away, she died. I can remember the letter her mother sent to me to let me know that my friend had died. The thing that I can remember now as clear as when I was 9, was that her mother thanked me for being a friend to her daughter, and how I’d helped her to have a wonderful time at school. I was so sad that she’d died, but more sad that I hadn’t been there to help her through whatever happened at the end.

Shortly after getting the letter, I started to keep a journal. I keep one to this day, although not as often as I used to now that I have kids. My first entry was about my friend with cancer who had died. I need to find that journal, if only to find her name and maybe get in touch with her mother. It’s been a very long time, but I can still remember spending time with my friend. As a mother now, I feel like it might be of some comfort that although her daughter’s life was short, she touched me so deeply that I have never ever forgotten her.

RSM Goodbye: All My Children

Just read the news, via Twitter of course, that ABC has announced today that it will be cancelling both All My Children and One Life to Live. I can’t say that I am surprised by this move. The ratings have been going down as more women are working during the day (we were their original target demographic) and as more programming options are available. Making a daily soap opera is probably cheaper than a reality program, so I can understand the cost issue.

The thing is, it didn’t have to be this way.

I started watching All My Children when I was about 8 or 9 years old. My Mom, who didn’t work when I was younger, watched it in the afternoons. I would have the pleasure of getting to join her during the months of summer vacation home from school. When I was in high school, we got a VCR, so we were able to tape them. By this time Mom had gone to work to help the family pay for stuff, so she wasn’t home in the afternoons either.

When I went off to college I soon found out that friends of mine mostly fell into the group that watched the soaps on ABC. I was always an ABC soap kid. Never watched any other network. That seemed to be how everyone was. You either watched ABC or CBS or NBC but you rarely found someone who watched cross-network.

It was in the summers between graduate school years that I found usenet newsgroups. rec.arts.tv.soap (and then the subgrounds for abc, cbs, nbc) was my group. Watching my show (on tape delay) and then logging onto the university computer systems to read what other folks around the country thought about this or that thing that happened, or sharing spoilers that we’d heard from our local soap opera reports, was the most exciting thing back then. I am sure that today, it seems quaint since just about every show has a blog or an official site somewhere complete with forum and fans. But back then, in the 1990s, we had usenet and usenet was a haven for soap fans.

I kept watching All My Children (OLTL was always one I’d leave and return to from time to time) up until I had kids. Once they came along, by TV time was limited. It was about that time, too, that the soaps forgot what they were supposed to be about (family, and the human condition that is living life) and started to go for flashy camera tricks or short range stories and stopped rembering what kept viewers coming back.

To say that other things affected viewership is a disservice to those viewers, like me, who grew up watching these shows. We didn’t grow away from them, they forgot who they were. The new writers came in and forgot that the shows should be about families. I could tell you every member of the Martin family on AMC, but when I watch it now, I can’t hardly tell who is related to whom. This might sound silly since Soaps were stereotyped as places where the outlandish was commonplace (characters died and came back to life with regularity) but in the end, it wasn’t the stunts that kept the viewers, it was the payoff: the reunion of our favorite couple, the happy ending.

I stopped watching AMC for good when they killed off Dixie Martin with a plate of poisoned pancakes. Not only was that a ridiculous way to die, her death meant the death of any chance of a reunion of Tad and Dixie. If Tad would never again be with Dixie, then this was a world that I wasn’t interested in visiting any longer. When Agnes Nixon started All My Children, she understood this sort of feeling, this sort of ownership of characters. The writers of the last 10 years simply have no idea.

So, while I no longer watch AMC, I am sorry it will not be around again, because like the Tad and Dixie reunion that I will never see, I will also never see a time when AMC returned to the storytelling it was so good at back in my day.

RSM.

Dreaming of vacationing in Hawaii

We finally have some nice weather in my part of the world, and this feeling of spring has me longing to go on vacation. Yes, I am aware that I just got back from spending spring break in Florida, but after the week that followed my return and all of the furlough preparations that cluttered my mind and my days, I find I am in need of another vacation.

Taking a trip to Hawaii has always been the dream vacation of mine. Although Hawaii became a more interesting destination once Lost became my obsession on TV, I have wanted to go to Hawaii since I was a kid. My grandparents went to Hawaii on one of their anniversaries, and came back filled with love for the place. I still have a photo of them in their Hawaiian garb taken at a luau they raved about for years. Looking at that picture has always made me happy. For me, Hawaii has become this mythical wonderous place that I hope to see before my time on this planet has come to an end.

Now that Disney is building a vacation club resort in Hawaii (Called Aulani), my husband and I figured this was our chance to go. We are DVC members and absolutely love staying on Disney properties. So, combine the two, and it’s got to be the time. I had started to get my mind set on a Hawaii in 2012 vacation (end of the world and all) for us and the kids.

That all changed when we were in Disney World over spring break. The kids let me know that they are not, in fact, insterested in going to Hawaii next year. They just want to return to Disney World again next year (as we’ve done for every year since 2005) since that’s our family tradition. Mind you, they said all this through tear stained eyes so that it would have the most effect. No, the tears were real. My kids love going to Disney World as much as I do. The thought of not coming back for one year fills my heart with sadness. Apparently, it does the same for them.

I am a huge Disney World fan, and would go a couple times a year every year for the rest of my life is school schedules and money were no object. Odds are, even if next year does become the big Hawaii trip year, we will probably end up making time to head on down to Florida as well. I might not be able to go a year without visiting Mickey Mouse and friends.

Time will tell.

I still really want to see Hawaii someday.
RSM

RSM Review: Barnes & Nobel Wi-Fi + 3G nook

Over the holidays, I decided to treat myself to an eReader. You might wonder why I needed an eReader if I already have an iPad. Can’t I download all of the free eReaders out there (Kindle, Nook, iBooks) and buy eBooks and just read them on the iPad? In theory, I could. The only trouble is that I don’t ever get to use it when my kids are around and awake. By the time they finally go to bed, I’m usually too tired to read and end up turning in myself.

This was the story when my sister told me she was considering an eReader. She’s a book collector, but is quickly running out of room to keep all of her books. (We have a lot in common there) So, she’s thinking going eBooks for those one-time reads, and only purchase the coffee table books, or something she wants to keep. She, like me, loves the feel of a book in our hands, so the transition to eBooks won’t be exclusive for either of us.

Since I am an engineer, I immediately set about to doing research on the options. I’ve used the Amazon Kindle app on my iPad, and I buy a lot of things from Amazon.com (you can’t beat their prices), so I was immediately thinking the Kindle was the obvious choice. The Kindle currently comes in graphite with three models: Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi + 3G, and the Kindle DX with a larger screen as well as the Wi-Fi + 3G. With the new models that were released last year, I was almost 100% sure the Kindle was the one to buy. I already had a number of free books in my Amazon Kindle bookshelf, and had been reading them on my iPhone and iPad, so I’d be ready to go.

Borrowing books
Then I started to look into borrowing eBooks from our local library and found that the Kindle didn’t support the ePub format that the nation’s libraries have standardized on. IN addition, if my sister was also going to get an eReader, I wanted to be able to lend and borrow books with her. This led me to the Barnes and Nobel’s nook. The nook, also uses the black and white E Ink technology, has been out for a year now. An additional color nook was released last fall.

While doing this research, I decided I, too, wanted to be able to check eBooks out of the library to read. There are a number of popular books out these days that I’d like to read, but don’t want to buy and sit on my already full bookshelves. Since I just wanted to read regular books, I wasn’t considering the color Nook. At the time of this purchase, the Nook was the only eReader with this Lending technology. (After I purchased the nook, Amazon announced a Kindle Lending function, reducing the differences between the two).

Since I wanted this to be a backup for when I wanted to read and couldn’t use my iPad, I wasn’t interested in spending a lot of money. The nook comes in three models similar to the Kindle: Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi + 3G, and Color. The Wi-Fi model starts retail at $149. In doing research on pricing, I found that Barnes & Nobel has an eBay shop where they sell their refurbished models. Just like Apple, the refurbished models are tested and come with the same warranty as a new model. The only difference is that it is a preowned model, with everything that entails. I decided to take a chance and purchased the Wi-Fi + 3G model off of the eBay store for $125 with free shipping (at the time of this writing, that model had come down in price to $119).

Initial Impressions
The nook arrived in perfect condition, in the original packaging, with all of the cables and a small users guide. It was already fully charged, so I didn’t have to do anything other than turn it on. It’s much smaller and lighter than the iPad. At 11.6 oz I immediately understand how this is easier to hold and read for hours at a time. I finally understand what the eReader proponents have meant when they said the iPad was just too large and too heavy to be an eReader. I needed a case or cover to protect it while it travels with me to and from work, so I ended up buying a home made one from the online craft storefront “etsy” from a talented young woman at the store nerdypop. She made fabric covers for eReaders and happened to have one with astronaut themed fabric.

Since I bought the model with the free 3G, it was immediately able to connect to the Barnes & Nobel servers and once I put my B&N login information into it, it accessed the B&N library I had set up the week before. Like Amazon, B&N has a number of free public domain titles available, so I loaded up some of them and began to test out this E Ink screen.

B&N came out with a system software update last November, which, the Nook told me, had not been applied. So, after entering the password for our home’s Wi-Fi network, the nook connected to B&N’s servers and ran the update, rebooted and was ready to go.

Speed
The speed of page flips increased but it is still much slower than what I had been used to on the eReader applications (Kindle, iBooks, GoodReader) on my iPad. The E Ink display is amazing. It looks just like paper, and is very easy on the eyes. For reading, I am going to enjoy the nook experience almost as much as actual paper. Hopefully, with future system updates, speeds can increase more.

Getting Content onto the nook
The nook comes with a mini-USB port and cable to connect to your computer. This is how you add content to the nook outside of what you purchase through the B&N store. I was surprised at how simple this was on my Mac. When you connect the nook, it mounts like another drive and shows up in the finder. You can drag and drop files to it with ease: images for the wallpaper, audio files to listen to songs of audio books, pdf documents in the “My Documents” folder, etc.

In addition to dragging and dropping, in order to get content checked out from the library with the associated DRM onto the nook, you use an Adobe application called Adobe Digital Editions. ADE is much like iTunes, in that it manages a library of digital book files and can be used to pull content on and off of the nook. To use it, you have to sign up for an ADE account, and authorize your computer with that account. You can authorize multiple computers/devices to that account. When you launch ADE, with the nook plugged into your USB port on your Mac, it loads as one of the folders you can put content into within ADE. I have already “borrowed” a book from the Cuyahoga County Library and have put it onto the nook with no trouble. Since you can authorize multiple devices, I have authorized both my home and work computers so I can move technical pdfs onto the nook from work to take with me to read.

So far, I’ve found the nook very easy to use. I don’t think I’d pay $200+ for one, but the refurbished price at around $120 was a better fit. The speed of the processor and page turning is noticeably slow, but not so much so that it’s unusable. It feels less sophisticated than the iPad, but it’s not trying to be a tablet. As an eReader, it does a good job. I like the ability to borrow books from the library but wish that Cuyahoga County had more copies and more titles available. If you are in the market, a nook or a Kindle would probably fill the same need; it depends on where you want to get the eBook content. For me, the nook and use of the ePub format was a better fit for the things I wanted to read in eBook form.

References for public domain and other eBooks
epubbooks
Library Books on you eReader
www.webscription.net
Project Gutenberg
http://www.planetebook.com/
mobileread forum

Links for the tools and hardware
Nook

Adobe Digital Editions

RSM: Taking a weekend break

Since I know I won’t be able to post anything while at home with the kids over the weekend, I thought I’d put this up to let myself off the hook. I will set up a drawing to post on Monday morning (I managed to do another one today), to get me ahead of things. If my some miracle, I manage to finish up an article about another MobileMe feature and equivalent replacement, or do another drawing, then you and I will both be pleasantly surprised.

Have a great weekend. Good luck drawing, and keeping your resolutions.

RSM

RSM Stats – 2010 in review

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads Fresher than ever.

Crunchy numbers

The Leaning Tower of Pisa has 296 steps to reach the top. This blog was viewed about 1,100 times in 2010. If those were steps, it would have climbed the Leaning Tower of Pisa 4 times

In 2010, there were 48 new posts, not bad for the first year! There were 21 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 13mb. That’s about 2 pictures per month.

The busiest day of the year was December 3rd with 138 views. The most popular post that day was HerUniverse: Stuff for Geek girls.

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were facebook.com, twitter.com, healthfitnesstherapy.com, alphainventions.com, and gnmparents.com.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for rocketsciencemom, rocket science mom, rocket science for kids, castle beckett, and dvc vinylmation.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

1

HerUniverse: Stuff for Geek girls December 2010
4 comments

2

RSM Review: Castle Episode 3:04 Punked October 2010

3

RSM Review: Castle Season 3 Episode 3: Under the Gun October 2010

4

RSM Review: Castle Episode 3:09: Close Encounters of the Murderous Kind November 2010

5

RSM Review: Castle Episode 3:02 – He’s Dead She’s Dead September 2010

Happy Holidays, however you may celebrate

Cinderella Castle in holiday lights

We just got back from a week’s vacation in Orlando where the we took the kids to see Disney World all decked out in it’s holiday finest. We had the most wonderful time. You can take that with a bit of a grain of salt because we are tried and true Disney fanatics. We used to go every year, but the past two years we’ve gone twice a year. That might sound like a lot, but we really love the place and the message that Walt Disney planted everywhere in his “kingdoms”: Always bring magic and heart into whatever you do.

Here is wishing you and yours a happy holidays, no matter how you celebrate. Whether you believe in the baby Jesus, or celebrate the Festival of Lights, or nothing at all, may you have your health, your happiness and your friends and family around to share love and good times.

Since this is what I celebrate, I wish all of you a Merry Christmas.
RSM