One thing I pick up on right away is the fact it doesn’t list all the tags I’ve used in the past, allowing me to select ones I want from a list. It makes it a touch inconvenient having to remember the different tags that I use as I don’t want to always keep adding new ones, or having to go bag and fix the tags later.
The other problems I have with it are things that are lacking in the writing of a post. Seemingly I can’t use the more tag or split something in to multiple pages. Also missing is an easy way to add links, and especially to shorten them. These are small things, but things that really should be part of a mobile app.

I know the app is a work in progress and it’s not as if WordPress has massive developer resources that they can throw at the problem. Still I’ve seen some well thought out and feature-filled apps released by just a couple of developers so I don’t think it’s much to as to see a WordPress app with a little more usability.

I’ve got some high hopes for version 2.6. Hopefully I’ll be blown away.

I’ve already gotten in on the recent group buy for bulk grains.  Now that I can do reliable all grain mashes and no longer just mini-mashes, 55lbs sacks of my base malt are going to be essential.  For now I think I’ll be going with Maris Otter, but that may change later down the road.  I’ve always liked Maris Otter – it’s a very clean grain with good extraction.  I’ll also have to start picking up some 10ish pound bags of speciality malt so I can give my beers all the character that they deserve.

My first all grain batch with the mash tun was an IPA primarily using Ahtanum hops.  I’d been wanting to try these for awhile so I figured an IPA was the best way to showcase them.  I also decided to try and get a little bit fancy with this IPA and put about 8 ounces of Gambrinus honey malt in to it. I’ve heard people saying the honey malt barely adds any honey flavor, to people saying that even a tiny amount imparts a huge taste.  I guess a lot of it is a matter of perspective and soon enough I’ll find out how I feel about 8 ounces of the malt.

The IPA just went in to the keg today so now it’s chilling down and carbonating.  Come this weekend I’ll get to taste test my first all grain batch that actually fermented like a mad demon.  It smells great, it looks great, and I can’t wait to find out this weekend if it tastes great!

To be prepared for writing this I went ahead and Googled myself.  It had been awhile and I was curious as to what I might find.  Under “Alex Schwartz” it took until page 22 to reach a reference that was actually to me and that was a link to Dan’s florn.net podcast.  Under Alexander Schwartz the first reference I hit was after a few pages, and that was a link to my Amazon profile and wish lists.  Nothing terribly damning there other than learning which X-Box games I long to play, and what books I want to get next.  Trust me, it’s not that interesting, take a look if you don’t believe me.  Googling me doesn’t reveal much of anything about me(yahoo and Bing both turn up next to nothing while searching my name). In some ways it’s a good thing because I don’t have to worry about people finding out things about me that could be damaging.  I’ve been pretty good about avoiding putting anything online that could be taken the wrong way.  By the same token sometimes not finding anything speaks volumes.  Are people going to wonder if I’m secretive?  Not very interesting?  Haven’t done anything with my life?  A luddite (well, okay, checking my Amazon wish list, or the fact that I run my own domain, disprove that theory in a hurry)?  Not even real?  It leaves a lot of room for people to speculate and just plain wonder.  Paranoid?  Maybe a touch, but let’s face it, online life has been, in many ways, merging with our real world lives.  People have lost a shot at a dream job simply due to a dumb comment, or inopportune picture posted to the web.  Just like at a face to face meeting, you want the first impression of your online identity to be a positive one.

So assume rather than my meager innocuous findings, I discovered several things during my search that I’d rather other people, especially potential employers, not see.  Not everything is lost.  Many sites allow you to easily remove the comment or photo in question.  Even when they don’t have a mechanism in place for you to do it yourself, writing the maintainers of the site a polite e-mail will often yield great results.  People who manage web pages understand these sorts of predicament and will often be more than willing to help out so long as you’re polite about it.  If they aren’t willing to remove the offending material your list of options becomes quite short.  I’m not sure if there are legal methodologies that can come in to play, you’d have to consult with a lawyer about how to handle that situation.  If the situation can’t be remedied before someone might be inclined to run a search on you, then you can either keep your fingers crossed, or you can be upfront about it, let them know what they might find if they search for you, and explain it, put it in to context to help disarm the situation.

With this new setup I should be able to do approximately 24 pounds of grain in a single bash.  That means I can pump out some high gravity monsters of five gallon batches.  I’ve got all the ingredients lined up today for making an IPA.  14 pounds of grain are all crushed and ready to go in to the mash in just a little bit.  This will only be my second brew since Gabriel was born, and my first all grain batch in I can’t remember how long.

All seems to be right.  Looking through this page and back posts reveal the malicious site in question is no longer linked anywhere.  Anyone can screw up, but if it happens again I might be looking about for a new web host.  For now, however, it seems no harm, no foul.

It hasn’t been so bad, really. It’s just I find myself constantly relocating around the house in search of a room where they aren’t banging away just outside. This of course involves not only moving Gabriel with me, but also an army of little toys, seats, mats, blankets, and other assorted baby paraphernalia. This of course makes it a bit of a production number for me. I’m the one looking for little escapes for awhile. As for Gabriel, he’s napping away on his play mat while they tear large sections of wood siding right outisde the window.

My favorite example is when we went to replace the rather ugly and weather worn front door.  We bought a brand spanking new door from Home Depot.  Nice, clean looking, great window in the middle, and highly energy efficient.  We watched videos on replacing your own door and had some good printed material.  We’re both fairly handy and felt that the job was well within our means.  When we tore out the old door we discovered many things.  The first was they used no insulation in the walls at all.  The second, and more damning, was the fact that the door frame was cut at an angle.  We always thought warping caused our door to stick, but no, it was because it was put in at a bit of an angle.  Lots of sanding and pounding with a chisel later we had a frame that was much closer to resembling something straight.  A few dozen shims later and we had a door that looked good and opened and closed with ease.

All of this brings us today and the newest discovery of previous owner ass-hattery.  While stripping the siding above our deck one of the works idly kicked at a board on the outside wall of the house.  Next thing we knew our deck partially collapsed.  Yes, while on one side of the deck they dug posts, poured concrete, and all that jazz, on the side attached to the house they attached it to the masonry with wood lags.  And went less than a 1/4″ in to the masonry.  Seriously, a tiny bolt meant to hold some wood together was the only thing keeping our porch vaguely attached to the house.  That it never collapsed before this is a bit of a miracle.  Fortunately no one was hurt, and now it’ll get attached properly.

We knew there would be something that would got beyond the initial estimate.  There pretty much always is.  This certainly wasn’t what we had been expecting it to be.  With fingers crossed we hope this is the last deviation from the master plan of home repair, but you just never know.  Stay tuned.

I have no regrets about our decision.  Watching him being born was one of the most singularly happy days I’ve ever had.  It’s impossible to not believe in miracles when you watch that tiny little person being born.  A life being brought in to the world.  A life you helped create.  There aren’t words in any language that I know of sufficient to describe that feeling.

Sure, before he was born I read a lot about babies, and did some research.  I really knew next to nothing about babies in general let alone how to care for one.  I wanted to do my best to be ready for the experience.  During the entire pregnancy I knew he would one day have to come on out of the womb, but it wasn’t entirely real.  That feeling that I was going to be a parent hadn’t quite registered in my brain.  There were brief moments where I began to see the light, before some part of me slammed that door, locked it, and pushed several dresser sets up against it.

I had braced myself for it as best as I could, and the second he was born that all went right out the window.  Any last bit of of prepared that I had felt evaporated like a drop of water fizzling away on a hot skillet.  My feelings of happiness were tempered by feelings of absolute terror.  I’m not sure it’s possible to ever be ready for when you’re first child is born.  You can go through all the motions, do all the leg work, but once that moment is upon you and there’s no denying that everything is absolutely real, the game changes.

Four months later there are still many moments throughout the day where I find myself wondering what I got myself in to.  But still, I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

I’ve played with it for a little bit now, and it does feel snappy.  I’m not sure it actually feels faster than Chrome (which I had been using), but then again I haven’t run any tests on it.  Still, my initial feeling is that it certainly is a speed improvement over the previous version of Safari.

Apple also boasts vast improvements with HTML5, but seeing as how HTML5 isn’t an official standard yet it’s really hard to say if there’s any real improvement in that area.  It would require some actual development work to see how it plays with the HTML5 standards (even though those standards haven’t been set in stone yet).  I’m sure it’ll all be worthwhile, but so far there’s not much to say in that area.  I guess it’s good that Apple is focusing on it now before it becomes a widely adopted standard, but at the moment it’s not much of a selling point to the vast majority of users.

Something that has the potential to be quite interesting is Apple adding developer extensions to the browser.  This is going to allow developers to create their own extensions (much like with Firefox or Chrome) that will work with Safari.  While it seems Apple is still going to exercise some control be using digitally signed certificates, it certainly is a much more open move than they have been with the browser in the past.  All of these extensions will be sandboxed so that extensions won’t be able to access other resources or data on the users hard drive.  It’s a good step towards extension security.  Right now it’s such a new feature there isn’t anything out there yet, but it’s something to watch.  Hopefully developers will be quick to start releasing useful extensions for the browser.

Finally, a new feature that I am the most interested in so far, is their “Reader”.  In the address bar, while you’re reading an article on a website, the Reader icon will appear.  Clicking on this brings up a PDF like view of the web page, bringing up the text and related pictures, but not any of the other cruft that populates a webpage, in theory making it easier to get at the meat of what you’re trying to read by eliminating all the other distractions.  It also has controls for zooming, printing, or e-mailing of the information on the webpage.  It seems like it’ll be rather useful, especially on some sites that make reading articles fairly difficult by littering them with advertising that goes throughout the text.

Safari 5 seems to be a lot more under-the-hood style of improvements opposed to Safari 4 which was much more of a cosmetic release.  Safari 5 holds a lot of promise and it’ll be interesting to see what people do with the new improvements.