Despite being a heavy Mac user I’m thrilled to see MS newest projects. My main search engine is still Google but I really enjoy Bing. The search results give me more angles to explore and graphically is simply looks better. Too bad the SERP’s are not up to par with Google’s.

This morning I was blown away by the Microsoft Courier. It just looks amazing! I totally can see me using one of these in the process of designing websites! The courier is an electronic sketchbook with endless possibilities. I don’t think it’s fair to compare the Courier with the iPad but I’m leaning more towards the Courier.

The loading speed of this website was just horrible. Having a ton of plug-ins, heavy javascript and automated installed it is asking for trouble. I’m giving up on the looks, bells and whistles. It’s back to basic! Simple layout, no fuzz, lot’s of white space and some nice fonts. Mindplunge converted to the Modern Clix WordPress theme. Just what I was looking for. I simply don’t have the time to develop my own WP theme again so why not use a free theme!

Rodrigo Galindez is a talented designer and his  Modern Clix WP Theme is beautiful. Over the next few days I will trick it out a bit but the delivered framework is and will be the work of Rodrigo. Well done!

One of the guys I’m following on Twitter is @Jason_Pollock. He’s a Filmmaker, Writer, and Activist. On June 3rd he got the news that his movie ‘The Youngest Candidate‘ will see it’s world premiere at the Los Angeles Film Festival in Westwood village. So if you’re in the neighborhood go check out the movie!

Movie Synopsis

‘The Youngest Candidate’ is a feature length documentary film directed by Jason Pollock. It is produced by David Letterman’s company, Worldwide Pants, in partnership with Oscar winner Lawrence Bender (producer of ‘Pulp Fiction’ and ‘An Inconvenient Truth’, etc..) and Balance Vector Productions.

It follows the story of 4 teens that ran for public office in America. Funny, inspiring, poignant, and ultimately uplifting, ‘The Youngest Candidate’ is not just a film about running for office. It is the coming of age story of four idealistic young adults who dared to confront the corrupt political systems in America. Through their journey these young candidates learn about fair play, leadership development, racism in politics, the importance of family, and many other lessons that they will carry with them throughout their lives. In the face of great adversity, these four young adults braved all the odds to make it to Election Day to show that regardless of the outcome, it didn’t matter… It’s all about how you play the game.

Christoph Rehage planned to walk about 5,000 km from China to Germany, taking a photo of himself every day for one year—and not shaving once.

You will see in the video that he grew a “mighty long beard” throughout that time. The original goal was to reach Germany from China; however, he did not accomplish his goal on foot. Rehage did walk from Urumqi in the northwest of China to Beijing, which is still a feat, all on its own. Watch the video to his transformation.

I’m raising the bar on my running regime. I’ve set a pretty high goal and this goal is approaching relatively fast! I intend to run the Rock ‘n Roll Half Marathon in San Jose CA. The run will be on October 4th so less than 4 months… More about this ambitious plan in my next post. For now just a talk about running in general.

As you might know I started the C25K (Couch to 5K) last year. Basically a program to get you running a 5K within 12 weeks. Since I’ve completed the program I’ve been running 5K on a regular basis. I’m extending these runs lately and for the past two weeks I’m running 8K (Kilometers) almost daily. You can find my full schedule at twiike, runner+ and the Nike+ running websites.

The challenges on the Runner+ website are a great motivator as you try to outrun your fellow runners. It’s quite competitive but I must say that the running community, although always on the run (pun intended), is a pretty relaxed. You know what I’m talking about once you become a runner.

My favorite time to run are the early mornings. No traffic, cool breeze and it is just stunning to see the sun come up. I’m privileged to run in California. Not only for the weather but the views are amazing. I run through walnut orchards towards a dormant volcano (Mt Konocti) and passing some vineyards. Yes, I’m blessed.

So yeah… 4 months to go. San Jose, here I come!

I’ve been working hard for the last two weeks to complete the new design for mindplunge. As you might have figured out I’m starting as a freelance web designer and needed to dust off my portfolio. What better way than working on my own domains!

Color scheme is slightly darker but overall the same kinda blue-ish. Sidebar has been stripped to an accordion-style navigation. Click the large buttons to reveal more content! I’m sure you can figure it out.

There are still some elements I need to work on (pagination, trackbacks and several plug-ins) but I couldn’t wait to put some stuff already live. More soon!

Update: Apperently the wp_head() function isn’t playing nice with accordion.js. Had to roll back to the old theme. Oops

Update: All good. The ‘lightview plus’ plug-in was interferring with the accordion. Lightview plus is now replaced with shadowbox.

Well… it’s mainly work related at this point. The New Year started of with a bang which means a bunch of workload on my desk at the dental website design company I work for. Given the current state of the economy not a bad thing but it’s eating up my weekends as well. Again, not a terrible thing but it also keeps me away of updating this blog. So finally a little spot in my schedule to give you an update.

Saturday we will be in Oakland. Our best friends Jason and Cindy getting married and A. is one of the bride maids. They will go shopping for a dress which means Jason and I will chill out in Oaktown! Since I’m shopping around for a netbook we probably will be roaming the city for this little gadget. I’m really drawn to the HP mini 1000 MI edition and apparently it’s only available at HP’s online store. We’ll see if we can find it somewhere.

So far the weather’s been pretty forgiving with temperatures in the lower 70′s but yesterday it finally started to rain. And rain is what we need. It’s been so dry here in NorCal and this could mean some potential problems later this year. California is notorious when it comes to water meaning no water at all…

Other then this I’m consistently working on my two other sites, richardlemon.com and eightdegree.com. Another reason I neglected this blog. Too bad a day has only 24 hours…

Oh yes, before I forget: mom, you can see my twitter updates here and here. The second one is mainly SEO orientated so not much of a fun to read…

Had to share this: Sacrifice 10 friends from Facebook for a free WHOPPER®.

Facebook and Burger King are teaming up to give you a free Whopper–as long as you “sacrifice” 10 friends to get it. The world of social networking is getting meatier all the time.

My Yahoo! Fantasy Football league is coming to an end and I clinched a spot in the playoffs. I ended up second place in the regular season and this weekend the FF playoffs will start. The #1 and #2 (me!) will have a bye week meaning we just can sit and relax this weekend. The other 4 contenders will play and decide the semi-finals.

My team has a pretty difficult match up this week so I’m glad I’m on a bye week. Winning next week will guarantee cash money so hopefully none of my star players will get injured this week. Adam: I hope you win this week so I can kick your ass for a third time in a row!

We’ve all been there, zapping through hundreds of channels and nothing interesting to watch. It only get worst if you forgot to record a show or something similar to your DVR. You still want to watch the damn tube but at the end of the night ended up with unnecessary purchases of some retarded infomercial channel.

But there is a ‘new’ way of watching TV and the best thing of it all, it is free!

Well, not completely free but for one thing you can cancel your subscription with your TV provider saving roughly 40 bucks a month. That’s almost $500 per year! In extreme cases (DirecTV premier package $82/mo) you will save $984.00

How to save money and still watch TV?

You need a few things but I bet most of it you already have. Let’s go over the list:

• TV (HDTV recommended but any TV could do the trick)
• High Speed Internet
• Apple TV
• Boxee account
• Flash Drive

Since you are curious on how to save money on your monthly TV bill I’m guessing you already have a TV. You wouldn’t be able to read this post so you can check of internet access as well. A flash drive is a pretty common household item these days especially if you’re a geek. Flash drives are pretty cheap these days. Just do a Google search. Cheapest flash drive I found was 5 bucks.

That leaves you with the Apple TV and the boxee account. The low end Apple Tv (ATV) is $229 and is sufficient for the job. The next thing you’ll need is a Boxee account. If you don’t have one leave a comment with a valid email address and I’ll send you an invite. Boxee accounts are free!

The set up

Very simple. Connect your AppleTV to your TV. You just enhanced your TV viewing pleasure! Movies and/or music videos rented or bought through iTunes can now be viewed on your TV. Playlists can be streamed or created on the ATV.

But it doesn’t end here. There is more you can do with your ATV. Way more…

How to hack your AppleTV

To get the fullest of your Boxee account you need to hack your ATV. It sounds scary but it’s not. All it takes is five minutes. If your not tech savvy I recommend buying your AplleTV with Boxee pre-installed. If you think hacking is your thing head over to atvusb-creator and follow the steps.

Basically what you’re doing is download a program on your usb stick (flash drive) and stick it in the back of the ATV. The usb port on your ATV is only used for diagnostics when you bring it in for repairs but with the atvusb-creator you just have opened up this port!

Congratulations! You have just hacked you ATV! Wasn’t too bad huh?

You’re all set up! Boxee is a media station and offers a wide variety of channels: CNN, Hulu, CBS, Comedy Central, YouTube and as of today: Netflix. Netflix isn’t ready for the ATV yet but I’m sure it will in the future.

So what’s the big deal?

Well, since I’m only interested in a few shows I was able to cancel my account with Dish networks. The shows are now being streamed by hulu on my boxee. And it gets even better. The title of this post mentioned RSS feeds. I was able to successfully add video RSS feeds to my boxee account (Since I’m Dutch I added some Dutch TV programs) and I’m now able to play those feeds through boxee on my ATV.

There are tons of other video feeds out there and you can add the ones you like. It’s like creating your own TV station. No more zapping around to find good content. You decide what to watch and when to watch it!

What about the news or Sport events?

That’s a personal choice. Live broadcasting can’t be viewed on the ATV. I decided to give up those perks simply because I was becoming a couch potato. I read the news in the morning. No need to see it live. All it showed was another murder in town and it became depressing. I miss out on sports though. But hey! Go to a friends place and watch the game together! Have a social life!

Need a Boxee account invite?

So if anyone is interested in a boxee account lemme know. Leave a comment and I’ll send you an invite asap!