Ignoring the  physical, material and 5 senses for myself, there’s my family. Wow.

Then my job, which could be going much, much better now, (Heh) but at least I have a job.
The ability to focus. Seriously. Think about it. The ability to compound my thoughts in a manner to which my attitude changes, pretty much at will; case and point … this blog entry. As I’m typing it I’m mentally listing out what I’m truly thankful for and it’s literally causing me to smile. If that ain’t cool then nothing is …

There may be a lot wrong with life, even in one of the wealthiest countries in the world, but state of mind is one if the things totally within ones control and for those who value it, it can be a lasting, regularly revisited, commodity of the heart.

So blessed.

My Response:

Good article – i’ll assume you don’t have one in your hands yet. For the Android fanboys or iPhone Haters I’d like to clarify a few things IMHO (& from my perspective as an iPhone 4 user).
1. Reception drops, but calls don’t. I know there are at least 5 solid reasons for why they don’t cell tower strength & location being 2, but the biggest reason I even noticed is because Jobs made such a big deal about the engineering of this new antenna! Which is why I assume most others have noticed & complained. (way to go Steve.)

2. Uploading to YouTube: it’s nice to upload to YouTube via a phone, but as a multimedia designer, if I spend the time putting a video project together chances are I’m gonna enhance it on a real computer using real full feature edit-ware & not my cell phone.

3. Jobs said the glass was as hard as Safire and 30 x’s harder than plastic. Oh yeah! I think iFix it posted a drop test. It took 4 drops to even fracture the glass! If you drop your iPhone 4 times in row onto concrete you should either first ensure you’ve taken your epolepsy medicine that morning or simply buy yourself a Jitterbug phone!

4. Yeah color spots on the screen I haven’t seen yet. This display is so so very crisp and nice. Remember this is Apple we’re talking about and not HTC. If your iPhone appears flawed in any way that was not your fault Apple will either replace your iPhone or make it right – no questions asked. Does any other phone company do that?

5. Multitasking – Yes it’s not simultaneous multitasking … At least not for all their Apps, but it is for about 4 Apps so far and many are expected to catch up like Skype, so be patient.

6. Expandable data slot … If you need more than 32 Gb or keep data on multiple cards there are cloud Apps that work quite nicely & provide plenty of Free clouds Apps at that like: DropBox, iDisk ($) and AirSharing ($) to name a few.
AT&T’s data has gone from “C’mon Man!” to “WTF!”, but for those of us still on the unlimited data plan it’s still unlimited. But the necessary evil that AT&T is is the only option now.
* (I don’t understand the complaint about the Keyboard)…
iBooks – Not so buggy in my experience. It did lag a bit once or twice on my old 3GS, but on iPhone 4 it’s just Fantastic.

Play with the iPhone 4 yourself. The reports online will scare you away before you’ve had a chance to see for yourself.

So here we are again … I stated last year that I was an official iPhone fan (I used the word fanatic, which was probably a bit too dramatic).

I still promote this device in ways that should make me leave my job and move over to Apple Inc. But I’ve gotten to know the iPhone over the years. Ever since I first bought the iPhone 3G July 11, 2008 I’ve loved the GUI, the intuitive layout, the power of the Applications in the App Store, the free software updates, the fact that this thing puts my old PDA to shame in so many ways, the sheer star power of not only what holding & using one brings (sappy, I know) but knowing how to effectively use this device to my advantage both for my business and for the dorkiest, gadget junky, Geek reasons!

Which brings me to the newest edition to the iPhone dynasty … iPhone 4.

Steve Jobs announced, as he often does, at WWDC June 7 pretty much one thing – iPhone 4. He started talking about iPad updates but the Keynote was dominated by the new iPhone.

Everyone knew what it looked like despite Apple’s usual cloak of secrecy, all thanks to clumsy (or inattentive) Gray Powell. A name that will go down in the annuls of time as “the guy” who lost an iPhone prototype at a bar one night … sounds like the lead into a corny joke.

But after Gizmodo reportedly paid something like $5K to the finder of that prototype, (thanks Dan) they photographed it, played with it, took video of it and even took the thing totally apart. Fortunately for those of us who actually like the suspense of not knowing, and wondering what Apple will reveal each year at its developer conferences, the owner (Gray Powell???) bricked the iPhone before Gizmodo was able to view the software – iOS4.

So here we are. June 16, 2010.
9 days ago it was announced that iPhone 4 could be Pre – Ordered Tuesday June 15. It didn’t take me long to decide that I would not wait and in fact Pre – Order this new iPhone. So being the loser that I am, swiftly at the stroke of midnight I hopped on my laptop, punched in Apple.com, navigated to the Store and … nothin’. Well, actually there was a yellow sticky note letting folks know that the Apple Store was down while making changes to and updating to the page.

It was a No Go at 2AM as well … ditto at 6:30AM, 7:30AM & 8:15AM

C’mon MAN!

Finally at 9AM it was up! Yay! So to make a long story short Apple’s servers were slammed all day. A few people Tweeted that they were able to place orders on the site, come people even bragged that they didn’t know there was a problem with ordering the iPhone 4 on the Apple site, while other simply gave up and either physically went to the Apple, Best Buy, or AT&T stores to pre-order the device.

While I did consider going to the AT&T website (which melted down for the exact same reasons the Apple site did anyway) I really couldn’t because I really wanted to use the $200 Apple gift card that’s been sitting on my cork board since March.

Finally at about 3:30PM after attempting to Pre – order at least 50 times, I get farther into the Apple Store Pre – Order section than I have all day. I’m typing feverishly fast, thinking that some poor sap who took a break from Pre – ordering is resting his fingers for a few seconds, dropping the bandwidth just enough for one more person to get a chance to reach the Apple Store’s IP … ME!!!

So I pre – ordered using my gift card & now I’m 8 days from the FedEx delivery of Ye Olde iPhone 4.

I read someplace online today that Apple sold 600,000 iPhone’s yesterday … 600,000!

Aside from all the hype I know what it’s missing, but now I know why, which still doesn’t make it any better. I’m talking about Flash. For me that’s the only disappointment.
Since adding the sort-of-multitasking I’m actually happy to see what developers put together to utilize all of its new features & who knows, HTML 5 might just ramp up enough to satisfy me OR Jobs might see the error of his ways and finally go for Flash on the device (highly unlikely).

Glad to see what’s in store … ah yes, iPhone 4!

This afternoon our neighbor across the street had his home broken into.

I don’t know anything beyond the questions I asked the police officer when they rang our doorbell and asked me a few questions trying to find out if I was home and saw anything. I didn’t.
Jafra – that’s his name, the home owner whose home was broken into – he’s a nice guy from Iran. He, his wife and sometimes their youngest daughter are at the place. Apparently, his wife is back in Iran today taking care of an apartment they own & visiting relatives and friends. (Not that I need to emphasize that I’m counting) but this is the 3rd criminal incident on our street in about 3 years.

We actually live in what I would definitely consider a pretty good neighborhood. The subdivision across the street from ours – not so good; lower income, not a secured community and I can count the number of times I’ve seen young black men walking down the street contorting fingers into hand gestures so vividly & consistent that I’ve no doubt they are proudly throwing up “gang signs.” Ah – yes, the suburbs.

So back to my point.
This neighborhood we live in is quite the mix of out-of-towners, mostly coming to the state for work in the field of I.T., programming, project management, I.S. or something computer engineering related. That’s primarily why we came to the state.
This conglomerate of state foreigners doesn’t seem to make for the tightest of community dynamics. Not that I claim to be the Mother Teresa of suburban community members (at all), but we attempted to “reach out” to our neighbors the first couple of years we were here. We tried cookies (home made) at Christmas. Handed them out door to door. We tried chocolate balls (Lindt) another year. Again door to door – complete with a smile on our faces.
We talked, got together with some neighbors, even rented a machine that helps perforate the yard soil, one year, so we could plant grass seed, blah, blah, blah. After all that it still seems to be quite the disfunctional  community.

So today, tragically after Jafra’s home was broken into, what happens?
Seemingly fractured neighbors crawl out of their nests to collect near Jafra’s home & watch as police cars park, investigators crawl over the property and more police officers go door-to-door asking questions. It’s reminiscent of a an automobile accident aside the highway – seriously – gawkers ( who can do absolutely nothing about the situation without making it worse … ) gawk.

In this instance though I suppose the neighbors can talk. Talk about “what happened,” and maybe talk about becoming a closer knit community ( or at least talk That Way to seem nice & friendly – I dunno ). Either way, after finding out from the officer that Jafra and his family were OK, I logically didn’t see the need to chat about the days events. Events I wasn’t an expert on nor was I interested in simply rehashing the unverified gossip I wasn’t qualified to qualify.

So what can I do? Well, pray, S.I.T., maybe renew my mind to and try a little Ephesians 4:32. You can tell by reading this blog entry that I’m a bit jaded when it comes to this neighborhood. Not acceptable for a Christian.

I know.

So that’s what I did. And yes, I’m aware of  Proverbs 18:24 – A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother.

It can just be a bit tough sometimes …

Pray for this place.

Not for a few days or even a couple of weeks, but for an entire month. Now, forgive me if this blog entry sounds remarkably like a complaint because … that’s kinda what it is. A months visit would test even the closest bosom buddies resolve, but that goes double for your spouses parents. Oh yeah & add to that the fact they do Not speak English, yep, you heard me – let the good time roll – Hoo Ah!

So we took a “vacation” to NYC … (vacation – Hah!)

Between forced trips to visit more family (who also don’t speak English … well, even those that do certainly prefer not to), then a trip to north NY to visit a cemetery where more family members are buried, coupled with the down time we all spent staring each other in the face (because retirees like to spend time at home ya know?), it’s a bit much for this American. Throw into that situation my new little 4 month old boy who *everybody* loves … which, makes sense, because he’s so darn lovable, but everyone feels the need to carry, handle, pick-up, hold, play with, yell at (these are older people who assume since they are hard of hearing the baby is too) … it’s just builds over time.

The wife not only finds all of this just plain peachy, but she treats it like the ultimate blast from the past, recalling how her family made her do things, took her places, constrained / convinced / demanded until she gave in – all in the name of love. Uck … In the Oriental custom of ‘constraint’ it’s customary for the person constraining to do so 7 times … this shows concern for the person being asked, a loving effort from the one constraining.
In America we call this being annoying and the result is often a punch in the grill. Imaging being subjected to this for a month … A MONTH!

Yeah, so that’s my pain.

There are however good sides to this (as there often always are). These people truly love us. They truly love our son. They really want to do their utmost to make sure we are happy and our needs our met. They want to repay us for every penny we spend on their behalf … so I have a lot to be thankful for … a lot. It’s just the manner in which they present that goodness. It’s just plain different.

So here I am sitting in the main room of the apartment we’re renting for the week in Queens, NY, (the last week of the month) typing away while the Chinese people chat about … hold on, let me focus … my Chinese is pretty bad … um, baby magazines and how the babies in the magazines aren’t as cute as our son, the iPhone, what’s on TV right now – yeah, that’s it.

So in retrospect, I really have a lot to be thankful for, but just reminding myself of that is the problem I’m facing … The – Entire – Month!

I do think that pondering the future by examining the present, specifically the present devices of today, can be a bit misleading. Trends don’t always occur linearly. Sometimes when a trend seems to head in a logical linear direction get’s severely detoured by either another innovation or by pop culture itself.

In plain English … people *may* get tired of the whole touch screen technology trend suddenly and decide that flip phones are “cool” again. Once that happens, companies trying to grab a piece of their market share will cram loads of hi-tech into the small low-tech shell.

Example: 5-7 years ago it was trendy for college students and young people to “procure” illegal music files (Mp3′s). Bunches of P2P sites went up. When Apple decided to charge people 99¢ per music file download the naysayers laughed.
Kids were fine with d/l-ing paid music and Apple is a hero now!

The Point is people set trends, not hardware or even software. Track what “moves” people & it’ll be clear what the next “big thing” will be.

(My 2¢ …)

We went to the OB/ Gyn yesterday and he mention inducing … totally caught me of guard. In fact, it didn’t really sink in until we were setting up our next appointment. I mean I asked some knee jerk questions while my brain swam in thoughts of … “wait, did he just say induce? Did she just agree to a date? no, no, this can’t be.” I remember saying something about Pitocin and the doctor replied by saying something about not inducing unless needing to and the placenta losing its ability to provide sustenance and then beyond 39 weeks the mortality rate rising to 1 in five hundred – something, blah, blah, natural man vomit words, blah, blah …

Long story short … this was a two doctor practice until last month when the other doctor (our primary doctor at the time) decided he no longer wanted to be an obstetrician … what the f*@# ???
Yeah so we switched to the other guy who loves his work (Yay!) but is known for being impatient … not mean, just hyperactive.

So now he’s the only doctor at this practice. Nobody but him. I’m really believing that he’s not trying to time manage us – especially when (in my opinion) labor needs to begin on it own!

So we’re at prayer point … I guess we’re always at Prayer Point (1 Thes 5:17, Acts 12:5, Romans 1:9 & 2 Tim 1:3) but especially now.

Looking forward to infinity … And Beyond!

Speaking of discomfort … as much possibility as I continue to expect in my business, I become painfully more aware each day just how necessary holding people accountable … let’s be honest … for “my vision” for this business is.
It’s simply life, (no emotion needed), but sometimes the path you go down, with the people you intended to go down that path with, at the speed you intended to set, seems improbable the longer you go.

I’m there now.

I continue to realize that not everyone wants to comply, which isn’t as bad as what they want to do.
I’m living in a different region now with a very different mindset than I’m used to, dealing with some people who are comfortable with a specific pace and mindset. The question I ask myself really isn’t can I pain through this long enough to obtain the goal – pain really is only temporary, especially when contrasted with The Hope and the vast success I still see daily in my life, but regarding this business, since I have specific goals in mind, it may be time to lose some people and replace them with movers & shakers.

Ramble, ramble … another slow morning at work.

I gotta get this business off the ground even if means hurting a few feelings.

I recently read that Pride (Male pride) is actually fear. Fear, not something that keeps the machine of life well oiled, if you catch my drift. I’m currently in a position in which I need to revamp a system I developed by about 50%. I’m a little discouraged (and if I were honest) a little afraid of change.

My business’ vision, while mostly blurred, needs to be restructured and I’m not just talking about firing some people and believing to replace them. I’m talking about refocusing on proven techniques and methods that will yield fruit, benefits for us & our potential clientele and … I forgot what the last thing was … oh yeah, it will yield happier team members and a happier business owner (me).

Today was one of those days.

Sometimes I think people’s identity comes from their past. I know better than that, but after a few successes I think, damn – I’m a pretty good guy. And then I remember that I’m not much different than anyone else. (I really don’t believe that – for one second. But I’m depressed now …) I know I’m different and not just for sociological and ethnic reasons, but for spiritual ones. I’m truly, actually destined for greatness, for eternal rewards, but today … today I feel like ass.

There’s just no other way to put it.
I’m thankful for a Heavenly Father that cares for & loves me no matter what.
I’m grateful for my life and all the blessings thus far. People (present company included) are often the major problem. ” … no good thing in the flesh …” is what Paul wrote.
it’s true … dammit, it’s true.

This is a job for GOD. I really feel like throwing in the towel …
make it stop. I’d like to get off here please …