Wednesday 23 Mar, 2005
It's 6:07AM: Big storms last night. Got a meeting at the 191 Club at 7:30AM. Then I'm off to get a Garmin Forerunner 301 so that I can figure out the file format. A business expense. Heh. Gotta love it.
Update 10:08AM: Ok, back from the meeting. Great meeting. Posted an entry and pics on it. So now I'm psyched about blogging and ready to roll today. Stopped by REI to get the GPS thingy but they weren't open. Can't wait to get the gps-map-to-blog thing happening.
And I got to see Heather before she left this morning. I called her the Pregosphere! Ha! The Pregoshpere... she's so beautiful as a preggers! And she's round! Get it??!??! The Pregosphere!
Update 10:42AM: Got some help from the OpenMap mailing list this morning. A very active member named Don recommended some things. I've made the recommended changes and have sent another query out. I'm at that nascent low-on-learning curve stage with respect to this particular GPS package where I'm largely dependent on the kindness of others. I'm having some trouble making custom layers (or any layers) appear on the image when generated in a servlet without using a monster config file. It's most certainly a problem on my side, but I'm at a loss.
Ok, heading out to REI to get that GPS unit now. It's only a few minutes from the house. Back shortly.
Update 12:29PM: Been back for a few minutes. Thanks to Don's help I've got the map working again on my servlet terms! Wow. Awesome. And not a moment too soon as I'm now the proud new owner of a Garmin Forerunner 301 gps tracker device thingy. Let's call it a business expense, shall we? Full writeup and pics soon.
Took a little longer than expected to get back. Headed to Dick's Sporting Goods for a pilates ring. Unfortunately I didn't call Keith early enough because he returned my call by the time I was on my way back... I wanted to pick some up for he and Dana in case they hadn't gotten any. Problem is that they're mad expensive at Dick's. Keith's gonna check a few places this afternoon to see if there are any better prices out there. $30 for a ring? Suck.
Our baby crib is on the way... just talked to the delivery person on the phone. It'll be here soon! Go Alie!
Update 12:36PM: See, it's the humanity that makes the world a great place. Kind words from Toby regarding the technology.
Update 12:38PM: Garmin toy... er, business expense... er, business toy expense... is charging its batteries. It'll be three hours until it's ready for use. An outside run fits into the weekly training plan nicely. And the weather is spectacular.
Update 12:50PM: Wow, what a busy morning. Crib just arrived. Got it upstairs. Heavy but the delivery guy was very helpful. Ok, now on to some actual work... jeez... you'd think I'm self-unemployed or something.
Update 2:36PM: See, that wasn't that hard. I got some actual work done. Also talked to Heather. One of her birthday gifts to me arrived in the mail... Adidas Dragons... old school Addys. Nice. Can't wait to check them out. Thanks Terpa!
Update 4:13PM: Alright, pretty good progress on the GPS visualization. Not only am I able to draw a map with political boundaries, I can now put lines on it. Little dots aren't far behind. A dot for each blog entry with a gps location defined. Nice. After that it's zoom/pan for a couple days. Then some integrating into the app. Then some UI work. Then some debugging. Maybe a functional beta on joereger.com in a couple weeks, depending on how other stuff goes.
With this success and the completed charging of my new toy, I'm heading out on a quick run. Funny part is getting all the gear on. Polar s625x HRM. iPod Mini. Garmin Forerunner 301. Jeeze. I may ditch the s625X for runs but keep it on the bike where it has more value with the power and cadence. If I put it on I'm like the bionic man... sensors all over the place. Pretty cool really. Double heart rate monitoring. Double speed monitoring.
Ooooh.... that's it. In the long term I won't wear the s625X on outside runs any more... I'll wear it on indoor runs where the accelerometer technology beats the gps technology. Rock. Paper. Scissors.
But today I should wear both so that I can compare the measurements on each. Interesting. Ok, bionic man just for today. This is gonna look assinine.
Update 6:04PM: Back from the run. Tired and a little nutritionally depleted. Too tired to make much of the data from the Garmin and the Polar. But it was fun running with both of them. Heather's on her way home and should be here in about 15 minutes. Time to clear out the strippers... again... sheesh... wives can be so picky about stuff like that.
Update 11:10PM: Good pilates. In bed with the notebook now, plotting a schedule for tomorrow.