Wanted!

There's just something about Angelina Jolie laying over the hood of a car with a shot gun while the car is going 90 MPH that gets a guy excited!

This weekend, mom and I went to see her new movie "Wanted." It's also got Morgan Freeman in it. To say the least, it was something different. If you get the chance to check it out, it's a must see. This is one that I will have in my Blue-Ray collection.

Here's a few more images for your viewing pleasure...

Mom & Aerosmith

My mom's headed this direction today. It may be midnight before she gets in, but it'll be great to see her. She's bringing me a new box springs and mattress that she isn't using. It's practically brand new... my bed sags in the middle and kills my back, so I'm pretty excited about the whole thing. It doesn't hurt that I have the coolest mom in the world either. That also slightly adds to the excitement. ;-)

Other than swapping out the bed, we don't really have any plans. I'm not sure what we'll do, but a whole lot of absolutely nothing may be a lot of fun anyway. One thing I am stoked about is that the new "Guitar Hero: Aerosmith" game comes out on Sunday. I've got my copy reserved and I'll be at Game Stop on Sunday to pick it up. Maybe we can get a little game action in. Mom is certainly not a gamer, but she loves Aerosmith. (Honestly, what self respecting music lover doesn't love Aerosmith at least a little bit?) Whatever we do, I'm sure we'll have a blast.

Bill Gates Isn't Immune To MS Bugs After All!

Check out this link: http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/microsoft/archives/141821.asp

There's an internal e-mail here from Bill Gates complaining about issues he's having while trying to do a simple download. The e-mail was written in 2003 and,IMHO, the MS web site hasn't gotten any better. I still have problems with their web site similar to the one's Bill complains about in this e-mail. Not only is the front end like this, but I've also had multiple problems with the partner end of their site. It seems that there's no bias. If you're using Microsoft's site, no matter who you are, be prepared to be annoyed. I understand that Bill Gates has very little to do with MS anymore other than a strong influence, but it's crazy to see that there are so many MS issues that haven't been addressed even when he complains about them.

On one hand, it looks like MS is doing their best. I mean, it's only the entire planet that's using their software. I'm sure they have hundreds, if not thousands, of issues that come to their attention every day. Since it's debut, XP has only gotten better and more stable. I'm hoping to see the same from Vista, even though it is a resource consuming black hole. If MS lacks anything, it seems to be organization. Their web site is a perfect example. It's near impossible to find anything without jumping through hoops. It's usually easier to use Google and find a 3rd party web site with the same information. Finding information this way not only easier, but usually more accurate as well. Hence... "Google is your friend."

Another issue that seems to plague MS are problems that have been around since Windows 95. Some things just won't go away... for example... copy and paste something from a folder. While it's copying, copy and paste something else from the same folder... instead of finishing one and then doing the other or finding some way to do it at the same time, Windows will copy a little bit of one, then a little bit of the other, and then go back to copying the original again. This is annoying as hell! It slows down the entire process. Hence, you just have to learn to wait for it to finish and don't forget about the other thing you forgot to copy in the first place. It's not like MS isn't aware of these issues. I know I'm not the first one to gripe. But it seems they're more worried about making it look pretty than making it functional. Vista is a great example of this logic. It looks beautiful! However, on MANY brand new machines, it runs worse than any other OS. It's slow, buggy, and a complete pain. (The one exception to this being Windows ME... even MS admits that was a total flop.) SP1 has greatly helped this in Vista. The main thing is to make sure you have the hardware to run it. Even so, I usually disable the sidebar and remove as many of the startup items as I can get away with.

In the end, here I sit on my laptop running Windows XP. MS is where it's at, plain and simple. Linux, Lindows, Apple, etc. all have great advantages and are awesome in their own way, but Microsoft is the standard... period. They are the OS of the planet. The trend does not seem to be changing either. I'm ok with that. There's a lot of great things about MS and windows... but isn't it time to fix a few things instead of just making them look prettier and require more resources?

Raises Don't Suck

I got to give someone a raise for the first time today. I liked it. It was easily the best part of my whole day. I wish I could give them out all the time. Bar none, they're one of the best motivators out there. We did the whole evaluation thing. The cool part is he had no idea he was going to be evaluated. I could tell he was nervous and I think I enjoyed that part of it a little too much. Regardless, it was pretty quick. The evaluation was pretty generic... 3 things you suck at and 3 things you're good at... Here's a raise, now get better at the things you suck at. I really like the guy and he deserved it. He's a good worker and does what I ask him to. That's a lot more than I can say about employees I've had in the past. So... if you ever get the chance to give a raise to someone who deserves it... relish the opportunity.