Google's new Click to Call service

Google's new Click to Call service

Do these guys ever run out of great ideas? They are starting a new service that will put a small phone icon next to any vendor's ad. When you click it, it asks you for your phone number. You fill it in and wait a few seconds. Your phone will be called, with the vendor's number coming up on the callerID. When you answer, it starts ringing the vendor. They answer and the connection is made on Google's dime. This type of direct connection between customer and vendor should be a great incentive for advertisers to use Google. I'm smelling $500 a share before long. I'm still kicking myself for not taking my own advice and buying GOOG when it went public.

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Happy Fall Y'all!

We are really enjoying Fall this year. Halloween with Griffin was a particular treat as he is old enough to really "get it". Here's our latest pics taken over the past month or so.

Happy October!

I hope everyone is doing well. We've had a great couple of months, and are really enjoying the changing weather. Click the pumpkins above to see some of the pics we've taken recently.

Gatesway Balloon Festival 2005

This weekend saw the return of the Gatesway Balloon Festival here in Tulsa. In 2003, they were severly rained out. Last year, they took a hiatus. A move across town from Broken Arrow to the West banks of the Arkansas river seem to be a positive move, with reports of record-breaking attendence for this year. We tried to go see the glow on Friday night, but we drove through rain and lightning the entire trip across to the park. Upon seeing the mass exodus of people, we went home and tried again on Saturday. This time, it wasn't raining...but it was hot as all blazes. We all had a great time, though and really enjoyed the scenery. Griffin was particularly pleased to see an exotic animal rescue exhibit, where they let the kids see and pet all kinds of interesting animals. They had tortoises older than anyone reading this blog, camels, snakes, alligators and lots of birds. I think GT was just as taken by these animals as he was at the huge fire-belching balloons.

As luck would have it, though...just as the sun was setting and many of the balloon operators were preparing to fill for the evening glow, a concentrated cell moved right over us. Crack!! The first good lightning strike hit. Literally within 60 seconds, every balloon the place was laying on the ground. Another 5 minutes and every one of them was flattened and bagged up. I was amazed to watch this synchronized process of a balloon team.

All in all, it was a great time. I wish the best for the Gatesway Foundation, who uses this event each year to raise money for its work with disabled children and adults.

Oh yeah...I must commend my somewhat less than patient wife. On the way home, I ran into some construction that prevented me from heading back to I-244 the way I normally would. This resulted in us taking an extended scenic trip back to East Tulsa via Sand Springs! It was a nice night for a drive anyway, I attempted to explain. She was remarkably understanding, calm and only dished out sample size portions of grief over my lack of orientation skills. For this, I was truly grateful.

Originally posted at Lost Tulsa on Friday, July 29, 2005


KOTV Coverage of Lost Tulsa

I was somewhat taken aback when I received a phone call this morning asking for an interview. It appears that KOTV news reporter Steve Berg had stumbled upon this site and wanted to do a feature on it. You can view the video segment online here.

Thanks to everyone who have left comments!! I'm so moved by some of the stories. It really changes my perspective on many of these places when I read memories like this:

"I especially liked the picture of the old Mayo Motor Inn sign. My Dad worked there when I was very young, 3 or 4 yrs. old. He would always let me ride up on the 'lift' and take me across to the Mayo Hotel coffee shop and buy me a cherry limeade. I miss my Dad and I miss those great days!" - Linda Hodges

Wow...I mean, WOW! Before, I loved the clean art-deco styled lines of the Mayo Motor Inn. But now whenever I see that building, I'm going to think of that little girl and her dad back during the structure's grander days. Completely different perspective! This is why I created Lost Tulsa.

Only A Parent

Only a parent would ever utter the words "Hey now, don't put Gumby in the mashed potatoes".

Panoramic Bliss!

I linked to a QuicktimeVR panoramic photo of Boulder, CO's Pearl Street Mall the other day on Lost Tulsa. If you've never viewed a QTVR before, you're really in for a treat. Once you have the browser plugin loaded, you can view 360 degree panoramic images that allow you to spin around, look up and down and even zoom in and out. This gives you a completely new perspective of a place that you never get from simple photographs. It's almost as good as being there (and in a lot of cases such as large events...probably better!).

Check out Panoramas.dk for a collection of over 150 awesome QTVR pics...from the Eiffel Tower to the Petronos towers in Malaysia...from the Christau saffron Gates in Central Park to shots of Live8 in action...they're all here in beautiful high resolution. It's absolutely worth dealing with Apple briefly (to load the QTVR plugin) to view these. Use the pulldown list in the upper right hand corner to choose your selection.

Strawberry Pop-tart Blowtorches

Back in 1993, I was running Windows 3.1 when I got my first WWW access. I had been using the Internet for a couple of years, but only ftp, gopher and telnet sites (I really miss the MOO/MUD that my friends and I used to visit) from the command line. Near the end of '93, when I tried NCSA Mosaic (Internet Explorer's Grandaddy), I was so excited. However, there was a very limited number of WWW sites available...two sites I clearly remember visiting in those first days surfin the World Wide Web were the Trojan Room Coffee Machine, which watched a pot of coffee in a breakroom and this site exploring the phenomenon of flammable breakfast pastries.

A LOT has changed in the 12 years that have passed since then. However, the SPTB site hasn't changed one bit. Check out that awesome HTML 1.0 webpage layout!

Why did I feel the necessity to blog about this?...hmmmm....dunno...I was discussing the early days of the Internet with some co-workers yesterday and it reminded me of these early web sites. It's pretty amazing to see how far we've come in a little over 10 years. Now, I can't imagine a life without instant access to information worldwide right at my fingertips.

Last week, when London experienced terrorist attacks on their transportation system, Wikipedia had a complete entry for the "event" fully established and quite thoroughly detailed within 6 hours of the first blast. This is a perfect example of what is usually referred to as a "living document". The information was being compiled, updated and presented in realtime even as Londoners were still evacuating the tunnels. This is so far away from the World Book Encyclopedias I grew up with, it's not even funny. By the time Griffin hits grade school, I can only imagine how much more it will evolve.

Live 8 Video Clips

The Live 8 concerts last weekend were great. However, I couldn't believe that MTV felt the necessity of having their "commentators" start yapping during such a historic moment as a reunited Pink Floyd's set. It made me really happy to see Roger Waters up there with his old bandmates. His smiles and enthusiasm really showed how he felt about things (or was he just visioning all the $$ he was making from this gig?!).

For those of you who missed the shows, here is a site that someone has put much effort into setting up. It's a list of all cities that had Live 8 performances, with decent quality video clips for most of the songs and MC banter that took place.

Awesome storm pics

These aren't mine, but rather a set of photos posted up by Greg Webster. I have no idea who this is, I just figured I better give credit where it's due. These are some of the best storm cloud shots I've seen. If you're a fan of weather, like I am, you NEED to see these.

Update: I just found these pics that are just as incredible. These are of a relatively rare cloud formation called mammatus. Gee, wonder where the got the name? Very cool.

Joshua's 4th Birthday!



Yesterday, we got up early and drove to Stillwater for cousin Joshua's birthday party. They held it at a really nice kid's gym. Everyone had a great time. No one got hurt, and Griffin ran so much that he passed out 2 hours later on the way back to Tulsa. It was great to see my folks, who I see way too infrequently for someone living in the same town. I also got to visit a bit with my sister Tina, who I rarely get to see since they moved to Stillwater. Thanks Kirk, Tina and Joshua for a fantastic Saturday morning!

Happy Birthday, Joshua! I can't believe that you're already 4 years old!

Lost Tulsa



Since I can't even keep up this blog, today I did the most sensible thing I could think of...I started up a new blog, Lost Tulsa.

This is basically an amateur photography site focusing on the dying, dead and otherwise interesting (at least to me) sites in the Tulsa, OK area. This may seem like it's coming from out in left field, but it's actually been in planning for a long time. I started taking photos for the project a few years back. I believe that I have enough content gathered up now to keep this thing going for quite a while.

Drop by sometime if you're bored.

Griffin says "Hi!"



GT's been enjoying the Summer. He misses school, but he's been playing with one of his classmates about once a week. Today, they are going to go swimming. Water is a parent's best friend. It's one of the few things that can actually wear a kid down. They say a tired cattle dog (blue heeler) is a good cattle dog...same goes for children.

Have a great week!

The face of a child can say it all, especially the mouth part of the face. - JH

I see you.

Sorry for the downtime

I apologize for the site being down. Apparently, I had an old credit card on file with my host. I've been working on closing out most of my cards, and I had paid this one off and closed it. When my host tried to verify the card last week, it refused it, so they locked my account. I've updated my info now, and we're back in business.

Guess this means that I need to actually start posting some new stuff up here! ;-p

Griffin had his end of school year music presentation this morning. This was the first one that I've had a chance to attend, and it was great. He had his finger in his nose much less than the others around him and he actually stayed up on stage until the last 2 songs! Actually, he didn't really have his finger in his nose (there were some that did), but he did keep reaching in his pocket and pulling out fruit chews that he had stashed in there earlier this morning. Kind of hard to sing when you're mouth is full of gummy chews! He was precious nonetheless.

We've been thoroughly enjoying the Spring weather (although it was a bit cold this past weekend). The yard is slowly getting into shape. Griffin helped me mow for the first time on Saturday. He thought that was the coolest thing EVER!

Again, sorry for the downtime. I'll be back soon...I promise.

Happy 3rd Birthday Griffin!!

It's hard to believe that it's been 3 years now. I look back on the early entries in the blog archives and I smile. I knew that I was in for a life-changing experience. I had no idea how much it would change my life. Griffin is my pride and joy. He's been an absolutely rotten 2 year old and I've loved him every minute of it. I do look forward to the changes that I'm already seeing in him each day. He's quite the young man. He's all boy, but there's a very sensitive side too. He's stubborn and combative sometimes, but he's also very open to new experiences. He is facinated with space. We sit, sometimes for hours looking at pictures of stars, planets and galaxies on the web. We've been watching the moon and stars most nights since he was 1. I do my best to explain which ones are Venus or Mars and finger-draw some of the constellations for him. Unfortunately, I can only remember a fraction of what Donnie taught me about astronomy...so I have to improvise sometimes. He loves the school he attends two days a week. Everyone yells his name when he shows up in the morning. He's very popular, and is learning how to play well with others. Some of his schoolmates and family members are going to come over next Friday to celebrate his birthday at our house.

I just got home from a 53 hour work week. I managed to get 22 servers built and shipped, so I'm going to put the computer down for while.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GTB, I LOVE YOU!!!

Still Kicking!

Yeah, yeah...I've been slacking quite a bit with the blog here. Life sometimes goes by so fast, you don't have time to stop and document it as well as you'd like.

Things at work have really picked up. I've been moved to a different position within my group, leaving operational support for server builds. I'm the lead of a 3-man server build team. We are configuring and cranking out lots of Windows 2003 servers for our Meridio project. These are going all over the world, so we're on a tight deadline to get them shipped (so they can wait for weeks in customs). It's a lot more fun than troubleshooting end-user problems with an application. The skills and experience that I'm picking up with the servers stuff will hopefully help me get a "real" job someday. That is an area that I have been weak in, primarily because of lack of exposure to the hardware.

Things are going great at home. Griffin just keeps growing so fast, I sometimes want to put a brick on his head...which is better than smacking him in the head with a brick...which is also a thought sometimes (just kidding! ;-) He will turn 3 this Friday, which hardly seems possible. He's really enjoyed the warmer weather, taking advantage of having his own yard this year. Amy's really happy to see some warm weather too...as having a 2 year old cooped up inside a house can be challenging sometimes. As usual, I've taken lots of pictures over the months, so my next task will be to get some of them posted up here for y'all to see.

One of the other milestones that was reached earlier this year was the 3rd anniversary of this blog. I know that I haven't kept it up to date as much as I (or everyone else) would like...but it's been a great way to be able to communicate with lots of friends and family who would otherwise just have to wonder about our lives. I can't say that I'll do BETTER this year, but I'll at least continue with the pace that I've set over the past 3 years.

Have a nice lunch.

Picasa 2 Now Available!

I've mentioned this neat little utility before, but I want to bring it up again. Picasa is a digital photo management application. It's offered for FREE by Google. It has been referred to as "The software that your digital camera should have come with". This statement is very accurate, as it blows away any package I've seen included with a digital camera. It is a very powerful application, but also very simple to use. New in version 2.0 includes some very cool filters (12 new lighting and color effects), a new collage tool, CD burning (for backups and sharing) and the ability to send pictures via Gmail (email me if you want an invitation to create a free 1GB Gmail account).

Download Picasa 2 here.

New Porcupine Tree Album

From www.porcupinetree.com:

The newest Porcupine Tree album Deadwing is scheduled for release on March 21st by Lava Records / Warner Music. Recorded between March-October, the album has been mixed in both stereo and 5.1 versions. Once again the 5.1 mix was done in collaboration with Grammy award winning producer Elliot Scheiner.

There are guest appearances by Mikael Akerfeldt of Opeth, and Adrian Belew of King Crimson. The final track listing of the 60 minute album is:

1. Deadwing
2. Shallow
3. Lazarus
4. Halo
5. Arriving Somewhere But Not Here
6. Mellotron Scratch
7. Open Car
8. The Start of Something Beautiful
9. Glass Arm Shattering

I'm really looking forward to this album. I was very impressed with In Absentia, which I only discovered last Spring, after Steven Wilson worked on the O.S.I. album. They also released a 5.1 version of In Absentia, which I've heard is awesome. Someday, I'll have to invest in a decent audio system to appreciate this type of technology.

Here's a really great teaser video clip covering all of the songs on the album. The new songs sound like a fantastic mixture of crunch, melancholy, groove and ambience.

Porcupine Tree - Deadwing Video Teaser [19.8MB .MOV - runtime 2min - NSFW]

Sorry for the video format, and its length. I'm having problems converting this Quicktime clip into a more friendly format. If you want to watch the clip, don't download Quicktime from Adobe. Rather, just download Quicktime Alternative. It's completely ad-free, and requires no registration. It's sister program, Real Alternative is also a fantastic option to the ad-ware ridden Real media player.

If you like creative, intelligent hard rock, you really need to listen to Porcupine Tree. Check out the clip, it's worth the time to download. They are truly one of the great underrated bands of this decade.