Trusted Adviser in Information Technology & Business with a focus on Native American success. IBMer, Tribal Business Expert, STEM Educator, and Fly-fisher!
Author: Dom
Husband, Father, Pueblo of Laguna Tribal Member, Avid Fly Fisher & Tyer, IT Storage & Performance Expert, Inventor, Consultant, Teacher, & Speaker.
When it gets hot here in New Mexico there are a limited number of places to cool off due to the lack of water in the state.
Since I love flyfishing, I knew of a place that was a small enough river for my young boys to handle a gentle current.
We ventured up into the Santa Fe National Forest just north of Jemez Pueblo and took a dip in the Jemez River.
The La Junta day use parking area is just north of the intersection of New Mexico Highway 4 and Highway 485, about a 35 minute drive from Bernalillo, NM (don’t speed in Jemez Pueblo).
As you can see by the video my kids and niece had a blast cooling off.
My real goal is to see if my boys like the moving water in hopes they may one day take to flyfishing like their dad 😉
My dad taught me to drive, and there are several phrases he used to say while I was driving. He said them so many times that I hear his voice often when I drive today. I would like to share them with you:
For every 10 miles an hour in speed you are driving on the highway, you should be that many seconds behind the car in front of you. 10 miles per hour = 1 second.
Always stop so you can see the rear tires of the car in front of you. It gives you a chance to move in the event of a stalled car and keeps you from hitting someone if rear ended.
A right turn is always safer than a left turn.
Always try and drive ahead of yourself, if you see traffic slowing down ahead, slow down too.
Always try and know what/who is around you, check the mirrors often, you never know when you have to swerve and it would be good to know the space beside you is not occupied.
18 wheelers can’t see very well, be prepared for them to pull in front of you (cut you off) on the highway (this happened just when my dad was telling me).
Large vehicles & trucks are heavy, you don’t want to be in front of them if they have to slow down or stop quick.
Keep both hands on the wheel, it puts you in better control if a tire fails.
Try not to drive when you are tired, accidents happen when you are not mentally alert. Rest if you need to.
They are not motorcycles, they’re called donorcycles (he meant organ donor). In a wreck, a vehicle is physically around you to help protect you.
Make sure the people who ride with you wear their seat belts.
Ok, I’m waiting for a email from iSkin.com on when their new iPhone 4 silicone cases will be available, no email yet, it’s been a week since adding my name, and 2 weeks since the phone has been out. You can also see my iPhone 4 review here.
In the meantime, I took my iSkin revo case which I had for my original iPhone and modified it somewhat so I can use the 2 cameras on my new iPhone 4. The older cases are still being sold on the iSkin website for $20.
Here is what the new modified case looks like, I removed material on the left side of the earpiece opening so the front camera is not covered & increased the camera hole size in the back to show the full lens and the led light. The tools used, a paper hole puncher and small wire cutters.
These photos were taken using the iPhone 4 & uploaded to twitpic while waiting for a to-go order at the local Lotaburger (they have purple tables).
Additional photos below of the iPhone in the modified revo case below.
Now I can take pics and shoot video with the iPhone protected by a case.
I was teaching in San Ramon, CA when my new iPhone 4 arrived at the house last week. My wife and I have had some of the original iPhones for several years and liked them (we also protected our phones using the iSkin revo). We decided to continue with the new iPhones due to being grandfathered into the unlimited data plan, and I can use the phone when I travel internationally (because it uses a GSM radio versus CDMA).
I activated our phones after getting back on Friday (7/2) and started using our iPhone 4s.
I can say these phones are beautiful and no picture I can take will do any justice to the ones on the Apple website here. My brother Pat, who is an expert working with stainless steel was impressed with the new industrial design.
I was disappointed to find the lack of cases available for the new iPhone 4, it’s one of the first things I put on any mobile device that I will own for any number of years. I did hear about the “bumper” through Apple, but I don’t like the lack of protection at the front and back of the phone (2 pieces of glass to worry about now). I’m going to wait for the new iSkin case for the iPhone 4. I really like this case because of the removable plastic display cover to protect the multi-touch screen. Since one is not available, I’m using the original iSkin revo case on our new iPhones, they work quite nice. Here are some pics (original iPhone on left, iPhone 4 on right):
I’m not too concerned about the antenna issue that seems to be swirling around the new iPhone (maybe because I have a bit of background in the electrical engineering area 😉 ), but the exposed antenna on the edge of the device did surprise me (things like this are usually insulated), glad the iPhone will be in a case. It’s funny, the “bars” on the phones are from the analog days of mobile phones, with the new digital phones, either there is a signal or not, pretty simple, more bars don’t mean better call quality. Most of the newer phones have internal antennas and can experience the same effects when a hand or body gets in the middle of the phone and the tower it needs to talk to (also because of the cellular technology one can be switching between towers at any time). This also reminded me that not too long ago we had antennas on the outside of our mobile phones, I still have one lying around:
Of course, the new iPhones are quicker, many of the tasks I performed on the older iPhone are so much faster now. But then again, when you let almost 3 years pass before updating hardware, it will be faster since hardware technology changes so fast today.
Here is some test video from the iPhone, the video was shot, trimmed, and uploaded all from the phone. Even though the iPhone records in 720p HD, the process (without iMovie) compresses the video BEFORE uploading to youtube, hence there is no HD on the sample video here. I guess that can be expected when uploading using the 3G connection, AT&T does not want all kinds of HD video clogging up it’s already stressed network. Will try iMovie for the iPhone sometime soon and see what happens.
Here is the same video, I used iPhoto on the Mac to “copy” off the .MOV file then uploaded this version to youtube. As you can see this video has the HD option and is a bit clearer when you switch to the 720p setting. The raw .MOV file details are: 1280×720 res, 24fps, AAC mono 44.1kHz, 10.4 mbits/sec.
BTW, the iPhone was held in the tripod using the ProPrompter Wing hardware.
Overall, the HD video will be nice for on the fly video recording, replacing the Flip HD we have. Moving up to GPS is a plus, and it looks like we are going to enjoy our new iPhones once we have cases that fit well.
Last night I attended the book signing of Dr George Blue Spruce Jr (Laguna Pueblo / Ohkay Owingeh) and was very delighted to meet him for the very first time. The room was full of family, friends, & most of all future medical students. Roughly about 100 people were in the room to hear Dr Blue Spruce Jr talk about his life story. A story he finally wrote down into a book titled “Searching For My Destiny”. I have a previous post on my blog here, which contain some of what I was able to find on the internet about him.
I particularly enjoyed his jokes and how he overcame adversity being the only American Indian among many groups growing up. What struck me most was how Dr Blue Spruce Jr had to develop the independence and sense of self worth to continue alone for many years away from his tribal home. His life dedication and thoughtfulness of others helped craft Indian health policy to benefit not only the tribes he was from but those of so many others as well.
I am proud to have met this man, and I sincerely hope to continue the conversation again.
Dr Blue Spruce Jr and the family allowed me to video the event and share it. Here is the full MP3 audio & download link from his talk (almost 43 minutes long, and 20MB in size), and a highlight video. Enjoy!
Dominic Pruitt 