June and July came and went.
In June, the Hall family took a vacation. Maddy lived it up at the beach in Hilton Head, SC just before Alisha’s birthday. My dad needed a beach buddy at the ocean so he invited Maddy. Of course the parents had to come along 
. Then we drove up to New Jersey to visit family. We went to the board walk (the Saturday night we arrived), had fathers day with my dad, uncle and grandpa, partied at my Aunt Janice and Uncle Don’s with my cousins DJ and Becky and their daughter Arianna, Uncle Steve and Great Aunt Mu. The vacation ended with a trip to my Uncle Barry and Aunt Sue’s. Pictures are up.
Then in July, the Hall family took a second vacation/wedding trip. We went up to Michigan to see our buddies Gabe and Rachel (Dagani) tie the knot. On the drive up, we took a week long detour in Indiana to see the folks. It was a great but busy vacation. Boating, yearly party with college friends (who all now have kids), parks, The Children’s Museum, The Indy Zoo and even an Indians baseball game. Pictures are up for that too. On the way back from the wedding, we had a chance to stop in our Honeymoon destination: Saugatuck/Douglas. Hasn’t changed much aside from the sheer number of people. We were there in the off season (late October) and had the run of the town. This time it was filled with yuppies, families and older folks. Nice to relive the old times though.
Now it is August and we are preparing for the fall semester to start. Alisha is busy designing websites and pushing through grants and appointments. I am busy planning for my last set of experiments before graduation (May), leveraging collaborations, looking for jobs, mulling over job offers, preparing to teach in the fall, and publishing research. I even spent some time to hammer out a title and outline for my thesis (thanks phdcomics.com!).
TTFN
I am with Verizon wireless and in search of a new Cell phone. I recently got a hold of the LG Chocolate. Too over hyped…they put out a product that is difficult to use at first, with some crappy features that will probably cause it to bomb. First off, it is a MP3 phone, but you need an adaptor to listen with headphones. The adaptor is crap and when plugged in, gets in the way of all the buttons on the left side. Second is the touch pad front. No matter the sensitivity, it was either too much or too little. Because of the lag in response, you never know if you hit the buttons. Third, how the hell do you stop music playback? Every music player should at minimum have a play/pause, stop, forward and back button. I realize the IPOD stops by holding play down, but this is counter intuitive. Last, the shiny front garners finger prints.
Listen up Cell phone makers , my requirements include: >=2", 320×240 px screen or larger with >=256K colors. No more tiny colorless screens. 64K vs 256K is a huge difference in image quality. External microSD card slot compatible with up to 2.0GB cards (how else am I going to play my MP3s? I sure as hell am not going to pay for the Verizon V Cast system when I have all my own albums in MP3 format. Fast UI with lag times around 50 miliseconds. 1.3+MP camera for those times when I don’t have my good digital camera and just have to take that picture of the life size Shreck on the toilet (thanks Dan!). Clamshell design with color screen and music controls on the outside (I don’t want to open the phone to go to the next song). MP3 capabilities either with iTunes (yuck) or Windows Media Player (blah). Bluetooth. EvDO or better internet access because the phone can be used as a modem ANYWHERE. Headphone jack on the phone (no flimsy adaptor to get lost or in the way). >50MB of onboard memory for the Get-It-Now programs, pictures. USB 2.0 connection (bonus with charging through USB like the RAZRs). ~100g weight. Speakerphone. Slim design. I don’t necessarily want the PDA type phones, but they are nice. I want something small enought to fit in my pocket with my wallet, sunglasses, pen and keys.
So in my search I came across the new Moto RAZR 3vMaxx and the Samsung SGH-Z560. They are basically the same type of phone, but I think the Sammy will win out in quality and the Moto will be more popular from name recognition. Neither phone has been released in the US, but the Moto is slated for Q4 2006.
And the search goes on. In either case I will be purchasing the Invisible Shield for protection.
Mobiledia.
