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Everyone who has commented on here about my new digital camera (the Digital Rebel XT) in previous posts has been quite helpful, so I'm going to ask another question: what's a good tripod?

I've got a cheapie Kodak one now. It's got twisty legs and it's heavier than it should be. So, what I'm looking for (my preliminary list) is something that:

• is relatively lightweight.
• is priced competitively.
• has a handle so I can smoothly pan.
• has tick marks on it (for taking a series of phtoos for stitched panoramas).
• has clip-lock, three-section legs for easy length adjustment.
• comes to eye level with the center post seated (I'm 5'10").
• possibly has a removable center post that can be attached horizontally.
• has the option to be converted to a monopod (not a requirement, and probably unlikely).

Any ideas or recommendations? Feel free to link to reputable dealers like B&H.

Question: Which of Microsoft's six new fonts do you like the most? Why?

My Answer: Like Todd, I like Corbel and Calibri. I think they'd make excellent text for websites (like The Sand Trap, which currently uses Trebuchet MS), if Microsoft sees fit to release them in a way that guarantees at least 50% of the computer world has them, including multiple platforms. We shall see, I suppose… I won't get my hopes up.

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.

You'd be amazed how frequently people got CDs stuck in their computer, and as ForeverGeek suggests, eject cd in open firmware is the easiest way to get a disc out of your Mac. Never, ever did I as a Mac Genius have to use drutil tray eject or use a paper clip. The mouse trick also works, but far more reliably on older machines and is more likely to work if the mouse is plugged into the computer and not a hub.

Open Firmware, by the way, is great, and even has its own song.

Oh the stories I have…

Question: If you print your digital photos, where do you get them printed?

My Answer: Wal-Mart recently dropped their price to $.19/print, but I'm not sure where I'll go to get 8x10s and 5x7s and things. A local photo store? iPhoto? I don't know… The only prints I've ever had done I ordered through iPhoto. Some pictures of Flint. And I never saw much value in buying a dedicated photo printer.

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.

I had someone - a lawyer, no less - insist to me today that posting comments on a blog using someone else's name and email address is illegal, a "federal fucking crime" in his words.

At the bottom of this entry, you'll see a space for adding a comment. If you don't sign in via TypeKey, you can enter any name you choose, like "Steve Jobs," "George W. Bush," etc. You can even provide an appropriate (if fake) email address and URL.

Typically, I delete the comments. Sometimes I change the name to "I Made Up a Name" or something like that if the comment is at all worth keeping (it is usually not). But are these people breaking the law? According to the lawyer above, they are. For "hacking into someone's site."

The lawyer, of course, is critically clueless. But in a not-very-amusing sort of way.

Question: For those with digital cameras, do you shoot in RAW?

My Answer: I would do RAW+JPEG, but the XT's ".CR2" files are currently unreadable by Lightbox, iPhoto, and Photoshop. So for now, it's JPEG only. Harumph. 🙁

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.

I've watched more commercials lately. Ever since that episode on The Apprentice where they made a cucumber porn to advertise some body lotion.

Driving home from the social security office today, I tried to think of a commercial for perfume that didn't feature women. J.Lo has her own perfume. Britney Spears does too. Back in the day, so did Debbie Gibson (Electric Youth, right?). Anyway, there are lots of perfumes out there… yet none are endorsed by men.

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Question: How often do you "Send to Apple" the crash reports that appear when an app goes down?

My Answer: Never. I'm still hoping Apple provides a away for an application to provide contact information for the developer so that we, not frickin' Apple, get the crash reports. What the heck do they care if PulpFiction crashes when it tries to fetch some badly malformed feed? It's highly unlikely the crash is in the AppKit or Foundation frameworks, and if it is, who better to create a use case or example and submit a bug to Apple: the end user or the developer of the app?

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.

Stupid server. I have no idea what '-DPHP' means, but I do know that whenever I see it - in conjunction with 152 processes - that my server is not working. Were it my own server, to which I have root access, I'd apachectl restart or reboot the whole box.

It's not. It's a shared box to which I have shell (but not root) access. No apachectl restart for me. Instead, I wait an hour or two for Interland to reboot the damn thing.

root     14480  0.1  0.5 14152 10540 ?       S    12:49   0:01 /usr/sbin/httpd -DPHP
root     14492  0.0  0.4 13592 10240 ?       S    12:49   0:00 /usr/sbin/httpd -DPHP
apache   14493  0.0  0.5 14312 10884 ?       S    12:49   0:00 /usr/sbin/httpd -DPHP
apache   14494  0.0  0.5 14292 10876 ?       S    12:49   0:00 /usr/sbin/httpd -DPHP
apache   14495  0.0  0.5 14152 10692 ?       S    12:49   0:00 /usr/sbin/httpd -DPHP
apache   14496  0.0  0.5 14292 10764 ?       S    12:49   0:00 /usr/sbin/httpd -DPHP

Joy. As far as I'm concerned, DPHP stands for "Dinko Philan Herkkôla Phïp." That's Kliptonese for "you're screwed."

I realize that some of these things are in fact MovableType issues, but so be it. Here, regardless of origin of fault, are my wishes for an improved Ecto and MovableType.

1. When I attach a TrackBack URL to a story and post it to the blog as a draft from within Ecto, they should still be there when I re-open the darn thing later.
2. Ecto needs to offer a better way to set primary and secondary categories (coming soon I hear).
3. I'd like access to the "Future" publication scheme, please.
4. I'd also like it if Ecto could tell the difference between published articles and those merely saved as drafts.
5. Once the above is granted, I'd like the ability to keep all drafts in my article list, regardless of whether they're not "the most recent 15" or whatever my preference may be set to. I'd like, in effect, "last 15 + all drafts."
6. I'd like to see a column of authors in Ecto. Not every blog is run by just one person.
7. I'd like ecto to automatically update the articles that need updating. Manually fetching each time is tedious. MovableType saves "last changed" dates, so it should make them available.
8. Purely MovableType: a per-author archive.

I'm sure I have others, but that's my list for now.

Question: Do you go mad in March?

My Answer: Yeah, from all the friggin' basketball on TV. I've often said that I'll play any sport, but basketball is just about the only sport I won't even watch on TV. I'd rather watch bowling or curling. I don't watch NASCAR (but then again, I don't consider it a sport). Everywhere I look, friggin' basketball. It's maddening.

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.

I'm interested in buying this short course, an e-book, except it comes on CD-ROM? How about letting me download the darn thing? $19.95 could probably be dropped to $14.95 if they didn't have to mail me a CD, and I'd get the satisfaction of being able to read right away.

And how about a few sample pages, eh? I've stared at the page for a few minutes several times today, and each time I've decided not to purchase because of what I've just written.

One of the first pictures I took with my camera today. The lot of them were very washed out, very "midtoney" or low in contrast. I bumped the contrast on this one up a bit, made it a tad darker, and slid around some of the colors.

It's nothing spectactular, that's for sure.

Went to the driver's license center for the third time this week. Monday was "pictures only" day. Tuesday I found out that there was a problem with my FL license. Today I was told that, despite the fact that I had all the proper paperwork on Tuesday, things had changed and I'd need to get yet another form and come back yet again. Fun. Joy.

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Question: Here's a situation. You're pushing a cart to your car after shopping at Wal-Mart (or anywhere). Next to you, a woman empties her cart. She's carrying only her purse and has no company, and certainly no children. She pushes her cart in front of her minivan and turns to get into her car. The cart return bin is quite literally 15 feet away Do you say anything?

My Answer: Hell yeah I do. I did. I said "yeah, cuz that's where it goes" under my breath but loud enough that I'm pretty sure she heard it. As she backed out of her space, I made a point of going out of my way to get her cart and mine and returned them both to the designated space, glaring at her for a second or two along the way.

It's just decent behavior, folks. Call me snarky if you want, but I can imagine that it sucks rounding up carts in the winter in Erie, PA, and don't really care to make it any more difficult for the high school and college kids doing the work. The lady's behavior disgusted me.

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.