One of “those” weekends is creeping up on me. One of those weekends where you spend the whole Friday-Saturday-Sunday awake so you don’t miss a thing.

That’s right, Gamecon is here, starting Friday! Three straight days of gaming, and just gaming until you drop.

Except, I’ll be spending most of the day trapped in the dealers room, selling games and accessories to the attendees of the con. There was a couple of tournaments that I wanted to get in on, but you know me, Mr. Procrastinator, by the time I found out about it and tried to sign up for it, they were already full.

I hope to make a lot of money for the store this weekend. We have a huge order coming in tomorrow for this and one other con, so I’ll have plenty to sell.

I should have been pushing this for a while, but like I said, Mr. Procrastinator…..

I hope to see you at the con!

Haiku is a form of Japanese poetry, that you can easily find more information about anywhere on the Web.

Well, my beautiful Hawaiian wife asked me if there was such a thing as redneck haiku. Having written a couple some 20+ years ago, I immediately proceeded to assail her with the two that I remembered. After recovering from the initial shock, she asked me to write some more.

Here you go. Enjoy!

Ducks overhead
Shotguns raised on high
Plum blossoms fall

Youre pretty
Six shots, four beers
Its closing time

Wide river rages
Going to jump it on ATV
Hold my beer

Untimely death
Cause was being stupid
Alcohol was involved

No! Stop! Wait!
Overflowing tube top
Thats your cousin

Strippers all night
My money is gone
Lets have breakfast

I just got the protective case for the iPad yesterday. I ordered it back about 3 weeks ago, it took this long to make it in China and ship it to me FedEx. It actually showed up a week early, so I was happy about that. Like the iPad, there were no instructions, other than a picture on how to slide the iPad into its case and tuck the little flap behind it.

The case is very minimalist. It has a tab on the back where you tuck the cover into, and that provides an angled iPad, making it easier to see and type on the on-screen keyboard. It will also flip almost straight up so you can use the Bluetooth keyboard and/or view movies. My only complaint is the fact that the Home button is on the left instead of the right when you use the on-screen keyboard. But, if you use it upright, the Home button is on the right.

Simple, direct, intuitive, like most Apple products. I like it. The only question is how many flip arounds the case can take before failing. Ill let you know in 30-60 days.

The Apple wireless keyboard is another piece of Apple technology that I have acquired for the iPad. It uses Bluetooth to communicate with the iPad, and it is also very minimalist. It did come with an instruction manual, but I just tossed that aside and hooked it up. I turned Bluetooth on in the iPad, hit the power button on the right side of the keyboard, and selected the keyboard when the iPad detected it. It then performed flawlessly. It comes with its first load of batteries already in the keyboard (2x AA) so that tells you the keyboard shuts off automatically when no one is pressing the keys. Once Ive gone through a couple sets of batteries, Ill be able to know how long they last.

Between the base model, accessories, books and apps, I have spent close to $700 on this thing. Its still a deal. It does everything a laptop would, with some additional functionality that a laptop cannot do. I have already described the mild shortcomings of this machine, so there is no reason to go into it again.

The main thing is, I am productive and having fun while doing it. Thats the first and second criteria. I am productive, so I get things done. I am having fun while doing it, which means I will use it more than if I was productive and hated it. Thats what counts.

I spent this past week on vacation from my daytime job. Just because, however, I took time off from the job does not mean that I actually took some time off and did nothing, or took a vacation somewhere.

I spent this past week, delivering my son to a class, the dentist (twice!) and the doctor for a physical. Then my wife wanted to go plant shopping. In the week leading up to this vacation, I developed (and downloaded an iPad app) a to-do list of things that I wanted to get done. Things like clean and organize my office, clean out the garage and things like that.

I am proud to say that I managed to complete 24 of 31 items. That was no small feat. That averaged out to five items a day. And I still have Sunday to knock out another one or two items. The rest will have to wait for Monday nights and Sundays, as those are the only times I am home and not asleep.

So, I am back off to work Monday morning. I’m looking forward to the rest.

I am more and more amazed with this device every day. The iPad fills the bill. If you have a laptop, or if you have need of using a thumb drive/CD/DVD on the road, this is not for you. If you want mobile computing that turns on and off like a light, then this is for you. I prefer this to my company laptop when it comes to personal computing. I dont have to wait for Windoze to boot up, or shut down when Im done.

The question of to 3G or not to 3G is one based on circumstances. If you can jump from Wi-Fi hot spot when you need Internet, then you dont need it. If you cant find hotspots, then you might want to consider 3G, if you can afford the extra cost and monthly data plan.

The phrase theres an app for that is very true. Of the 95% of the things I need this to do, I have found an application that fills the bill. I even bought the Bluetooth keyboard, and the only gripe I have with it is the special things like hitting Space twice to get a period only works with the on-board keyboard.

My final words on this: Two Thumbs Up. If you are thinking about mobile computing, and you dont need stuff like mentioned above, get this device. You wont regret it.

Well, I just discovered that there is a WordPress App for the iPad. It allows me to post directly into the blog, without going through the normal web interface. This is just a test to see how it works.

This story starts a week or two ago. My wife wanted to get into pottery, and she wanted a particular kind of pottery called raku. She has been very excited about this and her plants, so I let her run with it. First of all, she won a potters wheel in an eBay auction. The sticking point was that the potters wheel was in Plymouth, Indiana, 600 miles away. Then she found a kiln on Craigslist in Anderson, Indiana, somewhat along the way.

So, this past Friday night, a friend and I hopped into his SUV and off we went. Driving at night through Arkansas, Missouri, Illinois and reaching Indiana by daybreak.

We arrived at Plymouth, Indiana about 8:30 and picked up the very heavy, cast iron potters wheel. We threw it into the back of the SUV and off we went. On the way up US31, I saw some aircraft sitting out in a field above a hill. Recognizing one of them as an F-106 Delta Dart, we stopped on our way back. It turned out to be the Grissom Air Museum. They had a wonderful inside display, and over a dozen antique aircraft outside, such as a B-47 Stratojet, F-14 Tomcat, A-10 Warthog, and many others.

Here are some pictures. Click on them for a full size shot. I took them at a very high resolution.

We then continued our journey, arriving at Anderson, Indiana at mid-afternoon. The kiln turned out to be an industrial sized machine, capable of firing several pieces at once. I called my wife while we were there and gave her the model number so she could obtain the manual for it. My wife later told me that this was the biggest model sold by the company. My partner and I then followed the guy we had just bought the kiln from to a storage facility where we picked up a bunch of molds and “furniture” which are disks that separate the pieces being fired from each other.

Now we start our long trip back.

Dragging a U-Haul trailer we picked up in Kokomo, now filled with a kiln, we drove south into Kentucky, and eventually spending the night in a Days Inn in Central City, KY. The only real excitement we had was almost running out of gas along the way. We got well into our reserve because we were dragging that 5×8 loaded trailer up and down the hills of Kentucky.

As another sightseeing point, we stopped off at the Land Between the Lakes and looked at Barkley Dam, here’s a picture of the entrance:

After more hours of driving we finally made it home. Now we got to unload everything, then take the trailer to the U-Haul down the street from me, and we were done!

Forty-four clock hours, over 1,200 miles and six states. All I can say is WOW. And to think I was going to do this alone. I never would have made it by myself.

The parting words of my friend was, “If your wife wants to return this stuff, don’t call me!”