The History of Daddy Claxton

I'm a casual fan of The Secret and the philosophy that if you're thinking positive about things, that's half the battle, and that things will line up in the universe to make that which otherwise would seem impossible become a reality. 

It's hard to be optimistic all the time.  And lately, it's been a super challenge as there have been so many negative things to happen in 2009. 

But here are things in that I'm putting on my list.  These are good things for all dads, not just me.  But hey, I'd be happy having them on behalf of the other dads out there.

So what would be an excellent technology Christmas gift for a dad this year?

1) The Barnes & Noble Nook.  I read more books than I can count in 2009 and bought a good many of them at market price. 
Barnes & Noble, along with competitor, Borders, have rewards and online coupons I receive often, so that saved me money here and there, but a Nook would be fantastic, and for the moment, from all accounts, it's the better investment between the Nook and the new Kindle 3G.  If there is such a thing as an Apple Tablet waiting in the wings for release in January, I suppose it would trump both of them, but for now, The Nook is the best for an eBook.  (Though moms, you might recommend dad download the FREE eReader from B&N.com.  There he can buy books for nearly the same price as he would for the Nook. He just has to read them on his computer or laptop.)

2)  Mom, if your husband is still a PC, it's time to convert him to a Mac.  Then neither of you have to worry about viruses, and the sky's the limit as far as what a new iMac or new MacBook Pro will do.  With that new Mac he'll also really, really love you if you get him the new touch-sensitive Magic Mouse from Apple. 

3) One of my desires to satisfy my computer creativity itch is to eventually have the entire Adobe Creative Suite CS4 before CS5 comes out in about 18 months or so.  Add to that Final Cut Pro 7, complete with Motion.  Sure, they'll set you back about $4,000 for both packages, but if your man is a creative, techy guy, well, you'll be Queen of the Universe to him forever with these two packages. Presently, I only have Photoshop and Dreamweaver.  Both are great, but if I had Illustrator and InDesign, well, that would be the dog's bollucks.

4)  Nikon has a new DSLR out called the D-3000. 
It produces photos with 10.5 megapixels and comes with a reasonable lens 18-55 for starters and only runs about $539 retail.  That would be an excellent addition to the family resources as far as generating high-quality photos for the future.  And again, if he's using a Mac, Aperture 2 is a great tool for managing, editing and cataloging those RAW, high-res photos.

5)  If you're getting your man/wife a new Mac for Christmas and live in a city that has an Apple Store or two, then the next best thing you can buy them the same day you buy the Mac is the year-long sessions for One-to-One training on using the products designed for the new Mac.  I learned how to do Final Cut Express for cool movie editing.  That branched into Photoshop, iMovie, iPhoto, and GarageBand which all blend together to make some pretty incredible productions.   And don't forget to learn how to make .mov movies in Keynote.  (That's the next best thing and MUCH SIMPLER than using Motion!)  

6) If he's getting all the stuff above, then done forget to include a cool video camera.  HD is preferable.  And there are a range of options here, from a customizable Flip Camera that shoots in HD, all the way up to a Canon XL2 video camera that will turn your man/wife into a Hollywood producer at home.  And hey, if they have any/all of the stuff mentioned above, they practically will be.

7)  There are a host of books, (Back to the Nook) out there for helping learn to use this stuff, and to serve as a reference guide.  For the work I've been doing in DreamWeaver, I use the Adobe DreamWeaver CS4 book.  Adobe's Photoshop CS4 Classroom in a book series also is one of the best I've used.  There also are good books out there for using Aperture 2 and iPhoto. 

8)  If he has all that or it's just out of the budget, gift cards for iTunes always are good things, that way you're not seeing expenditures in the checking account! 

9) External hard drives are becoming more and more reasonable in price with more and more memory.  A new 500 Gig Western Digital portable drive will run about $100 and provide much needed options if he still has a hard drive with only 160 Gigs on it.  Remember, all those RAW photos, the movies, the iTunes music, etc eats up drive space FAST. 

10)  A flat screen monitor, particularly if he's doing video editing, also comes in handy, particularly for play back of projects as they're being worked on in Final Cut Express or Final Cut Pro.  The more detail that can be seen in the editing process, the better the final product. 

So there you have it.  How much would all this cost?  No idea.  I don't expect anyone to have the funds to go out and get everything on this list.  Of course, if you'd care to send me the goods, I'd be more than obliged to use them.  But if your man is like me, you'll probably have to race him to the store to get some of this stuff as most dads I know don't wait for anyone to buy
them something as a gift.  I think it's a guy thing. 

Anyway, if you have additional questions about particulars, let me know. I'm happy to answer.   Oh, and one more thing, though I'd like to have sponsors sending me products to try out, at this writing, that hasn't happened yet, so these suggestions are as straightforward as they can be.  Just thought you should know. 

I saw this piece on Engadet today and thought about the frustration I used to suffer driving down 635 here in Dallas and suffering the angst of another dropped call on my iPhone 3G.  Well, the solution I learned from an Apple Genius was to simply turn the 3G function off unless I was doing something with a lot of data.  Yes, I'm paying for 3G, but it was explained to me that AT&T had over extended its towers with the launch of the service.  When I went back to EDGE on my phone for making phone calls, the problem went away almost completely.  But here's the Engadget piece just in case you missed it.

Apple Genius says 30 percent iPhone call drop rate is average in New York

by Donald Melanson  posted Sep 30th 2009 at 12:29PM

To be sure, a certain number of dropped calls are to be expected when you're dealing with the wonders of cellular communication, but some phones do seem to fare worse then others when paired with certain carriers in particularly congested regions. Apparently fed up with such problems in New York, Gizmodo reader Manoj decided to stop by an Apple Store to see if something might be wrong with his iPhone — this, after apparently being assured by AT&T that everything was all right on its end.

After a few tests, the Apple Genius determined that Manoj's phone was dropping 22 percent of its calls, which turns out to actually be "excellent" compared to most iPhone users in the New York area, where a dropped call rate of 30 percent is said to be average — according to the dude at the store, anyhow. The Genius further went on to confirm that the phone was indeed "fully functional," and that the problem is "consistent with the service provided by AT&T." So, nothing to worry about, folks — everything is "normal."

[Thanks, Canis]