King of Pop poped the Internet

Yesterday during the time of Micheal Jackson's death and the insuring news coverage (3-4 PDT) Internet usage spiked 11% from normal. It is pretty interesting to see what happens to our communication grids when major news breaks. To that effect CNET.com asks wither or not the Internet is a reliable source for news and info if it has the ability to slow/ crash at these times. Here is an interesting article/ opinions on that topic.
p.s. This graphic is where the spikes were the biggest.

The Edge is an Interesting Place.

Based on what some of my Ladies with Lenses said, I have noticed an 'outside looking in' kind of feeling to a lot of my photographs. I do seem to be the observer of my family and in a way a self proclaimed black sheep. As much as I have wanted to feel totally included I always have felt more on the edge then in the thick of things. This has more to do with me in many ways then my cousins, for reasons I am not quite sure. I will have to go back and look at the last year to see what I can find that speaks to this.

what my day looked like

At work we have daily status meetings, today's ran long. While some things were being discussed I began to doodle. This is what came out and I got a few complements on it. Not really sure what it means but I know parts of it were drawn when parts of the conversations took a turn. Read into if you want Dr. Freud.

The great edit

I have sorted thought my 506 first round picks from my shooting over the last year, and while I am not done ( I got it down to 98) and I know I have missed some good ones. I don't really know what I want to make from all of it. There are many different routes I could go. For instances, I have quite a few photos of my father. I also have many photos of my family at gatherings, that is what i thought I wanted to document from the start. But then there are still photos from around the house and other places I go that I like, so I don't want to discount them. Here are a few from the selection.

my two cents

I have been thinking lately about how I need to start doing more with my images. I feel I now have some, not all, of the tools to do that. This being said I hope to post more photographs here and start doing what I said I would at the beginning of the year, to post once a week. I have lots of new images, but it seems to be find the time to sit down and go through that that is the hard part. I hope/ plan to change that in the coming month or two. It all starts with making a promise to my self to make some changes and doing my best to live up to it. So there is my two cents.

Tech Support.

Here is a little encounter I had with Gateway. Enjoy.
(background: I was in the process of reinstalling the OS windows XP and was short the apps and drivers disk. I emailed Gateway and here it is)

Orgional email:

Customer (Sarah Gibbons)
05/16/2009 07:51 AM
Hello,I am reinstalling the OS and I don't seem to have the second disk needed, the applications and divers disk that it is asking for. I don't believe I ever received this disk when I bought the computer. Where can I get one of these. I have tried the Drives and Download section of the web site and it is still not working.
Thank you.

Responce:

Discussion Thread
Response (Veena_GWSI351)
05/16/2009 08:55 AM
Dear Sarah Gibbons,
Thank you for contacting Gateway. I would be happy to assist you with this issue.I understand that you are facing an issue with the recovery disk.As per our records, your computer is out of warranty.Gateway updates the Restoration CD frequently. We no longer have the CD needed for your system. These CD's are included with the purchase of a new system and are not sold separately. To download drivers, please visit our Web site at the address below. http://www.gateway.com/support/drivers/ddaStep.aspFor further clarifications, please feel free to visit our website http://support.gateway.com

Have a nice day!
Respectfully,
Gateway Online Technical Support

My reply:

Customer (Sarah Gibbons)
05/16/2009 10:07 AM
I have got the computer working but it will not recognize the various hardware needed to play sound/use the Internet. As I noted I have tried the Driver download page. I will try again since that seems to be my only choice. Thank you for your assistance. As a long time PC user I will no longer be buying PCs, Gateway or others. This would be a non issue if this was Mac computer.

Have a nice day!
Respectfully,
an Ex-PC user.


Should be interesting to see what they say.

* UPDATE: They responded with almost the same message. In response, I got a MacBook Pro.

Closer to Home

Here are a few images from my current series. I have begun to edit down the large amounty of images into something that better encompass the idea of family as identity. These are straight from the camera, I have done no work to them.
This is my father. There seem to be many photos of him as I go though and edit down what I have. I think this for a few reason. One he doesn't seem to mind me taking photos of him, and two, we are a lot alike. He is very interested in my photography. He wants to know about it and how it works and all the new tech stuff. I remember him taking photos when I was younger. He gave me his camera when I started photography in high school, I still have it, and the tripod that he used as well. I am thinking there will be more photos of my father later, in another series. In this image he is being threaten by my Aunty Patricia. He wanted to smoke a cigar at a family baseball game and she said she would whack him if he dared. She won.

Here is my younger brother. I like this image because to me it is both so much and so not Steven. He has change quite a bit in the last year and it is good to see him comfortable with himself. Also Snap wanted to see it.