I was waiting for a call-back from a Best Buy business account person… here’s the Google Voice transcript from his call:

Yeah this message is for Sara. Gould, slash on the keep calling the best bet for business and calling in regards to your request for I’ve had at this time to our business channel. We don’t have any access to this model. Yeah, I am going to controls the the in 34 on these units nickel. Fun Center door stores sleeping, we would see would be all the only through the The Store location so I just want to follow up and let you know. I’ll send you an email as well. Thank you. Bye.

I read the last line and decided to wait for the email…

From: McC, Sean <Sean.McC…@bestbuy.com>
Date: Tue, Jun 22, 2010 at 4:18 PM
Subject: iPads
To: sara@inaflashlaser.com
 Sara,

At this time due to constrain issues the iPad is only available through our retail channel.

Sean

Which would you rather get?

So far I’ve seen ‘I’ve had’ and ‘my Pants’ for the word iPad(s)   But that’s to be expected unless it’s Apple doing the voice recognition programming.

Back in March, a week or so before the iPad came put I picked up the most boring domain name I have owed so far – iPadLaserEngraving.com. I added minimal content since I didn’t even have the laser yet. Apparently Google likes it when your domain name is the same as a search term. The site received 1000 visits from google searches in April. I’ve now engraved 6 iPads and expect 8 more soon, not counting Don’s. It turns out that corporate orders are the easiest, they already have their artwork, their logo.

For the iPad focus I want to create an “artist series” of engravings. This would be helpful for individuals who want an engraving but don’t know quite what.

The laser is such an amazing thing. There is so much variety that I’m overwhelemed sometimes. Since I already have Slides In A Flash I think focusing on engraving photographs makes sense. A photo can be engraved on wood, stone, tile, sometimes glass. A friend of mine suggested wood cutting boards, and someone else I know does granite coasters and placemats. Shipping an order of stone is a big expense though so I definitely need to find out who has what locally.

I’d like to coordinate with wedding photographers directly and let them offer tiles as part of their print packages. To get fancier, I can add text or border frames. Some people use watercolor pencils and add some color. If they’re sealed then they can be used outside.

Along the kitchen line, Corian, the countertop stuff, can be engraved And cut on the laser. It can’t cut stone/tile/glass so that’s a nice plus. And after engraving, things can be filled with paint to add color.

It seems like kitchen designers would be good to partner with. Or architectural work in general. Just so many options. One guy locally has a laser that he uses to make cardboard animals. About six people have asked me now if I know him. I wonder if he knows how locally-famous he is.  (and I only just now realized how globally famous his creations are, wow.)

My next personal project is to make some really cool laser-cut business cards. But even here I’m not sure what material or design to focus on. I have an acrylic card that punches out to become a spirograph. Then there is a papercut card that’s made up of gears that really move. I also have some thin veneer that could be an awesome wooden business card, and want to order aluminum cards and make some of those too. See what I mean about focusing?

Edited to add pictures and Lots more photos here!

aaaannnd.. that as far as I got…. d’oh…

YouTube Link
Songs played: Sesame Street, It Don’t Mean A Thing (slow ballad start), When I’m 64, Amparito Roca (Spanish March), Diversions In Denim Movement 2 Idlewood, Diversion Mvmt 1 Excursion, Salvatore, Three Shades of Blues. (think I got them all!)

I haven’t annouced it here yet have I? May 14 is my last day at USJ.

People seem to think it’s Rupert’s “fault” that I’m leaving but it’s really not that specific. I like what I do here and I’ve worked for a lot of difficult people in other places before Rupert.

I’m making the leap to self-employed entrepreneurship and this feels like a good time. It’s hard to run a side business and not want give it everything you’ve got… And now I’m about to have two side businesses.

You’ll hear all about it soon.

I’ve been there four times over the last five years staying around a week each time.  The town is small but very nice to walk around with many places to visit.  You don’t need a car once you are there because you can walk right to the ski lifts.  The gondola offers free transportation to the more modern and built up side of the mountain called Mountain Village.

The skiing is a fabulous mix of miles of beginner runs that take half an hour to make it all the way down and tons of lovely expert terrain with enough steeps and trees and bumps to wear anyone out.  Then there is the Hike-To terrain, and even back country access and heli-skiing right from Telluride… things I’m only dreaming about since in my brief visits I’ve never run out of in bounds terrain.

Last year I skied with a local who showed me some cool ‘between the lines on the map’ glades. This year I went into the woods by myself and didn’t have a very good time of it not coming out where I expected and taking much longer to find my way back to where I was meeting Don.  Thankfully I ended up in territory I saw last year with my guide and knew where I was then. It’s always nice to be shown around by a local who calls a new resort their home.

Someday I’d like to get out to experience skiing something like this:  Touring in Telluride

Arnt Joakim Wrålsen posted this message to: Deaf and Signing Couch Surfers

A Norwegian Sign Language dictionary can be found here:

http://www.tegnordbok.no/

(Click on the link that says “Klikk for å åpne Tegnordbok – Beta”.)

To sign “Happy Birthday” – look up the three signs for the words “gratulere” “med” “dag” (“gratulerer med dagen” means “Happy Birthday” in Norwegian).

You can also look up any letter you want.

This morning I heard the beep on my car telling me I left my lights on. They were on only because it’s a bright sunny day and my commute is mostly due west and people can’t see what’s behind them (or coming towards them on a 2way road if they’re going into the sun). In that case it’s absolutely easy to forget to turn them off. The beep is very high pitched and not very loud because several hearing(?!) people told me before that it didn’t make a sound at all.

I noticed something odd Monday when I was up and off to work an hour earlier than normal, everything sounded loud and uncomfortable, much like when I first got the CIs and put them on after having them off all night. I hadn’t experienced that in many months, I guess my brain was still asleep?

Daylight Savings Time has been especially hard this year because for the last few months I’ve been waking up without any alarm. I do use a ‘sunrise simulator’ light that turns the light on gradually (sometimes gradually and sometimes after a power outage it will turn on all at once instead! it’s a flaky sunrise). Yesterday I didn’t wake up until 7:44 and that was because Don poked me because my iPhone was playing music. That alarm was set for 7:30, so I guess it was playing for a while? I was late for work by about 20 minutes. Last week I was considering going to the gym before work, I think I need to wait a bit longer to adjust before adding that too.

I haven’t written a lot about having bilateral cochlear implants. Basically it’s awesome! I don’t think about localizing sound that much, I sitting outside I can definitely tell where bird sounds are coming from. I need to set up a bird feeder and just sit in the back yard listening to them some more.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muCPjK4nGY4

The transcript of this NPR show looks interesting. I haven’t gotten to listen to this yet (forgot to bring headphones to work, forgot to bring spare battery for CI #1 too! 3 weeks away sure messed with my morning routine).

Here’s a snippet:

Mr. JOSH STOHL (Doctoral Student): So we’re going to listen to the “Talk of the Nation” theme in its original form, as you and I would hear it.

(Soundbite of “Talk of the Nation” theme)

Mr. STOHL: Now we’re going to hear it as a cochlear implant patient would hear it.

(Soundbite of altered “Talk of the Nation” theme)

Mr. STOHL: And here is one of the algorithms that we’re currently working on, so you’ll notice an obvious improvement.

(Soundbite of altered “Talk of the Nation” theme)

The whole transcript and sound clip are here:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4961269

One friend has already said that their clip representations don’t sound like music with his CI at all… so I’m curious what others
think of the examples.

I know for me, music started out sounding very beepy and monotone with only a few different pitches, but over 8 months the rest of the pitches have filled in and it sounds close tow what I remember music sounding like.  It’s still a bit thin, and short notes don’t have much of a pitch to them, but it’s much much better than it was at initial turn-on.