Author: J T. Ramsay

J T. Ramsay http://jtramsay.com

I Want to Run

I want to hide, more accu­rate­ly. I’ve run just once since Char­lie start­ed sleep­ing more sound­ly, but that has to change. Not only do I need to run to blow off stress, I need to do a bet­ter job of man­ag­ing my weight. I can’t do that exclu­sive­ly through exer­cise though. Some­thing I need to do a bet­ter job of in 2012 is eat­ing smarter. I know I’ll feel bet­ter if I eat right.

I need to get to the gym, too. Right now I’ve paid $120 for one gym vis­it. There’s no good excuse for that. Can’t wait to get my act togeth­er in 2012!

Making Tech Resolutions for 2012

Did­n’t fol­low through on any of my res­o­lu­tions last year. Those CDs? Still in box­es or in the rack that dom­i­nates a full wall in our walk-in clos­et. New goal? Get them out of the house by the end of Jan­u­ary. DVDs, too. I’m going to go wild with Hand­brake and get all the Cri­te­ri­on Col­lec­tion titles I nev­er get around to watch­ing onto the new iMac I plan on buy­ing first thing next year.

Upgrad­ing the home stereo, too. Thanks to the Wire­cut­ter, we’re going all in with a Pio­neer VSX 1021. I can’t wait to take advan­tage of Air­play like nev­er before and final­ly get some good use out of my beau­ti­ful Axiom Audio speak­ers I bought back when. Can’t wait!

Impor­tant­ly, I need to unplug more. It’s one thing to stream music through the home and anoth­er to be glued to my iPhone. Need to cut down on that and spend more time away from glow­ing screens and non­stop news­feeds. I’m an info junkie through and through, but I need to give my eyes a break and make time for oth­er things.

What are your per­son­al tech res­o­lu­tions for 2012? Any big pur­chas­es on the hori­zon? Ser­vices you’re plan­ning on optimizing?

Taking Ripfest to the Next Level

You know what makes this blog great? It’s always remind­ing me of my short­com­ings. No, not that I post once a month; that I post res­o­lu­tions every year and nev­er ful­fill them.

This year I planned on rip­ping all my CDs to my Mac­Book. Did­n’t hap­pen. It’s tedious, there’s nev­er time, the litany of excus­es goes on and on. That changes next year. 

Why? Because if we’re plan­ning on buy­ing a new home in 2013, I need to shrink my por­tion of dig­i­tal goods con­sid­er­ably. There’s no excuse to not have every­thing loaded onto a com­put­er that can be accessed via home shar­ing. Flip­ping con­tent from com­put­er to oth­er devices in the home is real­ly awe­some and I’m final­ly see­ing that potential.

What does it mean? I need an iMac. While every­one is going small­er — whether that’s iPads or Mac­Book Airs — I’m real­iz­ing that I need a machine that can com­fort­ably store all the CDs and DVDs I own local­ly that I can then access on mobile devices. My Mac­Book just won’t cut it. I want some­thing that can whirr qui­et­ly upstairs and be the clas­sic home com­put­er. I think iMac fits the bill.

Wish me luck in 2012 in get­ting our dig­i­tal life togeth­er! (Do peo­ple still even buy used CDs and DVDs?)

Things the Internet Needs: App Highlander

Want some insight into how much I want to opti­mize my iPhone usage? I’m search­ing des­per­ate­ly for charts show­ing the work­flow dif­fer­ences between Instapa­per and Safari Read­ing List.

But it’s not lim­it­ed to that! I strug­gle with all man­ner apps. It does­n’t mat­ter if it’s food-relat­ed or maps or GTD apps; I need some­one who can be the Dun­can MacLeod of app selec­tion to explain how to get the most out of each app, avoid dupli­ca­tion and opti­mize the expe­ri­ence on all man­ner of platforms.

Know some­one who’s doing this? Let me know and I’ll sing his or her prais­es from the rooftops! There can be only one!

I’ll leave you with this rel­e­vant Queen video, embed­ded below.

How I Fell in Love with the iPad

I know I’m the last per­son on Earth to admit this, but I’m in love with the iPad. Strike that: I’m in love with my wife’s iPad, which I gift­ed her two years ago. At first i thought my iPhone was all I need­ed. I start­ed play­ing with it Thurs­day night and now it’s on my lap non­stop. I’m writ­ing this post on it!

Favorite app? Cur­rent­ly obssessed with Flip­board. Real­ly changes the way I engage my feeds and browse the web. It’s fun again!

What am I look­ing for­ward to? Read­ing. I’m des­per­ate to embrace dig­i­tal books because I can’t shoe­horn anoth­er in our mod­est home. Hope this screen is addic­tive for read­ing as it is every­thing else.

If you have an iPad and are a fan, let me know what your favorite apps are in the comments!