I bought a MacBook Air a few months ago to use as a travel computer so that I could travel light. I had planned to use it just when away for work. A project I was working on required that I set-up a test Mac OS X Server machine. The only machine I had that was capable was my 17-inch MacBook Pro. As a result of this I’ve been using the Air as my only Macintosh portable machine. I’ve had to add a 4-port USB hub and an external USB drive for my iTunes folder. But apart from that the machine has met my needs perfectly. The screen was a bit small for my tastes but I’ve got used to it. I use Spaces in Leopard to increase the real estate I have. The lightness of the device is the biggest plus point. My shoulder will thank me if I think I keep the Air as my portable Mac and use the MacBook Pro as a mobile music workstation for Logic Pro, EZDrummer and GarageBand. I’ll also use it to record midi drum information from my Roland drum kit. Iv’e had to put that in a different room from my other stuff.
Archive | General
Glad I got a hybrid car
I wrote about getting my new Honda Civic Hybrid in January. I got this model because I liked the body shape, the interior and the technology it uses in its IMA Hybrid Engine. I didn’t buy it to reduce the amount and cost of the fuel I used. The Honda sales guy kept offering to do calculations in a spreadsheet to show the fuel savings I would get. I kept telling him I wasn’t interested and I wasn’t getting the car for that reason.
Given the rise in petrol costs, I’m interested now! I filled the tank yesterday from reserve. It took 37.68 litres @ 117.98 pence per litre; or £44.42 to fill the tank. This is about £10 less than it took to fill the tank on my Renault Laguna late last year. Plus the petrol was around the 95 pence per litre price point then, if I recall correctly. One of my colleagues in work drives a large 4×4 Volkswagon and it costs him about £120 to fill the tank. Another one who drives a diesel Audi A4 (I think) fills his tank twice a week at £70 each time. He was asking me how I like the hybrid during the week…
Honda claim an extra urban miles per gallon reading for the Hybrid of about 65 mpg. Hmmm. For general start, stop driving around Belfast I’m getting (according to the onboard computer) about 42 mpg. Not too shabby all the same. I did some testing on longish runs recently and got the following fuel consumption figures:
Dual carriageway (50 MPH speed limit – cruise control set for 50 mph) = 55 mpg fuel consumption.
Motorway (70 MPH speed limit – cruise control set for 70 mph) = 46 mpg fuel consumption.
So the claimed 65 mpg is probably for 30 or 40 mph cruising. Still; I’m very happy. The Honda is a lovely car. It’s comfortable, well made and has enough grunt from the engine for normal driving. In fact it feels much the same as the 1.8 petrol Laguna’s I’ve driven for the last 6 years. The Honda has a 1.4 litre engine, drinks petrol like a 1.0 litre and drives like a 1.8. Works for me. Over the 3 years of the leasing agreement I have it on I should save quite a bit on fuel. If the cost of fuel continues to rise it’ll just get more beneficial.
Are you changing your car soon? Get a hybrid!
New Nina Kinert album
Just got the new Nina Kinert album. It’s on my iPhone, but I haven’t listened to it yet (apart from snippets on her MySpace page). The last album was brilliant. I mentioned it here. Looking forward to hearing the new one, Pets & Friends. Now where are my headphones…
Update: The album is good. Not sure if it’s as good as Let there be love.
Delicious Library 2
I’ve been using Delicious Library since it was released. The new version has been in development for a long time. It won an Apple Design Award at WWDC in 2007. I didn’t think this was right. Applications should be available to win an award.
I really liked Delicious Library 1 and the interface that it presented. I liked the flow of the eye from left to right in the window. Indeed this was used as an example of good Mac OS X application design. It was however a bit slow.
Various snippets of information that have come out about Delicious Library 2 have outlined how it would require Mac OS X 10.5 and it would use lots of the technologies that Leopard delivers. Well it’s out now. What’s it like? In my opinion its a step backward from the previous version. The new one is certainly snappier but they have changed the Interface and moved the info section from the right of the window to below the shelf view. The whole concept of the flow of the eye from left to right has been broken. On my MacBook Air with its small screen the new version is largely unusable. I’m really, really disappointed. You can’t even double click on an item in the library and get a separate window to view detail information. Plus there are bugs, such as: it shows links to Amazon as Amazon (null) in the Item menu and the Context menus. I expect this should be Amazon (United Kingdom) in my case. I store my iTunes Library when using my MacBook Air on an external disk with an Alias to the iTunes folder in my Music folder. It doesn’t seem to like this and the iTunes import didn’t work. I’ve been waiting for this for ages to replace the slow v1. I’m afraid the new version isn’t for me.
Instead I’ve bought the Bruji bundle of their 4 ‘pedia apps to store my book, DVD, Game and Music info. Those apps imported my info from Delicious Library with no problems. They are fast on the MacBook Air. They give me a better view of the data on the Air display than Delicious Library 2 did and the CDpedia app imports my iTunes music info. One downside is that there are 4 apps instead of one. I’ve created a small Applescript app to start all 4 at once and have stuck that in the Dock with a nice icon showing a storage box. So a single click gives me access to all the apps.
The bundle cost me 3 times what the Delicious Library upgrade would have. I think it was worth it. If Delicious Library 2 wins another Apple Design Award this year it’ll be a travesty.
Good news
MP’s in the UK House of Commons have rejected moves to block scientific advancement by throwing out amendments to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill that would have banned hybrid embryos and tissues typing to select IVF embryos to make it suitable for use as a tissue donor.
The voice of reason has triumphed. A good day for the UK. There are more votes to come tomorrow but they are not as important as today’s votes. Only about 2% of abortions occur after 20 weeks so if the time limit is reduced it’ll not matter (beyond emboldening the anti-crowd). I think that abortion on demand up to 20 weeks should be available. After that it should be available if there is a risk to the mother (either physical or mental) or if the foetus is found to have defects that would lead to severe complications after birth.
The other contentious amendment to the bill about not having to consider the father in deciding who should have IVF treatment hasn’t really registered on my radar. I’m nit really fussed about it one way or the other although if pressed I would support the right of single women and lesbian couples to get IVF on the NHS if they are in a position to provide a good secure home for children.
Gosh!
Keith Olbermann comments on a recent George W. Bush interview. See the 2 YouTube videos here. Wow!.
More from The Hot Puppies
I’ve written about The Hot Puppies before. They’re excellent. They have some new stuff out and a new album forthcoming. The new stuff isn’t on iTMS yet but there are 4 new tracks on their MySpace site. Well worth a listen. I love a lot about their music. The vocals are exquisite. But the good thing is that the rest of the music complements the singing really well. I see they are playing a gig in Cardiff on May 10th. I’ll be in that general area working. I might stay for the Saturday and go see them. Here there are live performing Shoot em in the head –
Change to comment settings
I’ve changed the settings that govern comments here to remove the requirement for registration before comments can be made. I had the registration set to guard against spam. Several people have told me that they have had trouble registering, or that they don’t like to register on blogs. So from now on people can comment without registering. Comments from new posters will be held in moderation until I approve them. A name and email address (that will not be published) will still need to be entered as per most other sites.
Love Soup – BBC
Love Soup from the BBC is excellent. It’s very funny, insightful and has Woody Allen influences all over it. Tasmin Greig is wonderful in it, as she was in Black Books.
You can watch recent episodes on the BBC iPlayer (time limited link – will not work after programmes expire).
New finds: CSS and The Bastard Fairies
I discovered two new bands in the last few days.
CSS – first seen performing Let’s Make Love and Listen to Death from Above on Later with Jools Holland filler on the BBC HD channel. They are very good. From Brazil but the vocals remind me a lot of the music coming out of Scandinavian countries recently. Such as The Knife, Nina Kinert, Victoria Bergsman, The Concretes, and others. Excellent stuff.
The Bastard Fairies – first seen via a Youtube link to their We’re all going to hell video. Good fun 🙂 Their album is good as well. Check out the ukulele group version of Brand New Key.