Lunch in Natomas

Once the alarm man had gone I set off to the local cluster of shops. I
grabbed a tasty luncheon pizza and decided to patronize the grocery
store. Turns out to be run by a Seikh couple from Birmingham. Good
peeps and our new neighbours. I'm really hoping they can point me
towards a decent cuzza eatery. Best of all they sell Fosters! Summer
shandies just aren't right with any other lager (ask lazy Tom).

I'm locked out!

But I have my iPhone. My keys got confused and out of sync with my
pocket after several trips to and from the car. Moving house one car
load at a time you see.

However, from the old residence balcony I have so far managed to reply
to my emails, check today's blog feeds, write this blog and actually
enjoy a cool yet sunny Sacramento morning in the fresh air. Just
waiting for my Jamba Juice delivery and to be let back in the house now.

Consolidating in The Cloud

Having installed iPhone 2.0 and several new freebie applications, I took a look at the new Apple Mobile Me website. This prompted me to take a look at the various apps (both mobile and PC-based) that I was using and pare down the (too many) options.

I've been using Yahoo email for years now although these days I POP the mail to outlook and hardly ever use the online website to send mail. I've also been using Gmail for a while too along with Google reader and the shared calendars.

Weighing up the various mail, calendars, contact books and so on took the plunge and imported my entire outlook mail archive to Gmail. Took a few hours for the upload but the whole process was a doddle thanks to this how-to guide.

Next step was to forward all my incoming Yahoo mail to Gmail. I need to keep the account for Flickr logon anyway. I love Google Calendars but haven't yet found a way to sync ALL the calendars to outlook and then to my iPhone. However the Google mobile browser does a fine job of keeping tabs and now I have access to my email history and more via my iPhone.

The only drawback is the contacts didn't import nicely from outlook, losing the address info in the process. I really liked the Mobile Me outlook format but I don't want to use more than one service provider if I can help it and I certainly don't want to pay $99 per year for the service I get free with Google.

So for now Google is my one-stop shop.

Teenager finds bat asleep in bra...

...gives curious cat idea for somewhere new to lurk now that the inside of the matress is out-of-bounds.

Photos gone!

Now there's something I didn't foresee (and why should I?).

Having moved my Blogger blogs over to my new and current email address (by giving my new e-mail log-on admin rights on those blogs and then deleting the original account), I discovered many missing pictures on many past blogs.

After a little investigating it appeared to be only those blogs written since last July. I eventually twigged that pre-one-year-ago blogs were written on my even older original yahoo account, last years on the old gmail account and yesterday's (most recent) on the new account. Conclusion: It's possible to move ownership of a blog but deleting your gmail account will delete all blogger image files associated with it.

Smog

Took the truck in for emissions testing. Quicker and much less rigorous than a full MoT test but oddly just as expensive.

We're signing our lives away!

After I had to head back to base to get my passport as they wouldn't
accept a UK driving licence as issues by the British Government.

Monopoly at Apple

My iPhone purchase of last year is now feeling like the wise
investment of a hotel on Mayfair - the Monopoly game version that is.

Despite the initial high cost it is now reaping the benfits of Apple's
applications store and just keeps getting better and better as a
result. Just like watching for opponents to land on Mayfair (or Park
Lane perhaps) I'm watching those new apps appear daily.

Favourites so far include:-

Evernote (popular with tablet users everywhere for notes)
Jott (for recorded note-taking - missing on iPhone until now)
Urbanspoon (for looking up local eateries, literally with a shake of the iPhone)
Rotary Dialer (have to have a dial phone emulation)
Shazam (let the phone hear the music and you get the song info) and
Pandora/Last.fm (at last!).

With any luck we'll soon get a video camera.

We know where you are!

Seems to me that with all the interest in location-based services on
phones with GPS, we're enabling our own tracked-future.

There won't be any need for the government to forcibly supply the
population with RFID tagged IDs or insurance companies to require
black boxes in cars for speed-tracking.

Instead, thanks to out own social-networking needs we will do it
ourselves.

I recall the previous fear of Big Brother style cameras was turned on
its head thanks to the general public's frenetic use of camcorders and
more recently mobile phone cams.

Tray of delights USA

Choccy digestives (and Maltesers - not shown due to having been eaten)
from Cost Plus in Arden.

Smoked Wensleydale cheese from Hawes Creamery via Rayley's in Natomas.

Mr John's American cousin...

...well the American cousin of Mr John's car that is. Spotted at the
Natomas cinema this evening on my way to see Hulk Smash!

Sac Second Saturday

Street events, art exhibitions, DJs, bands jamming and all the usual
good food and drink.