Mario surfs the web, switching between windows of various political forums and news

sites, whistling in merriment. His wife agreed to go self-employed full-time as a speech

pathologist and he can’t wait to write off 33% of his expenses as business related costs. My

future is bright, he thinks to himself, now if I can find a way to get fired and still collect a

paycheck.

“Now Mario,” he remembers Jocelyn saying last night, “When I work full-time and leave

my job at the Board of Ed, we won’t have Medical so you need to enroll for it at your job.”

“Pero, Jocelyn!”

“No buts, Mario. We need Medical.”

Mario curses under his breath and opens up the link to Human Resources. After signing

up for benefits, he closes the window, shuts his eyes and leans his head back.

“I guess I’ll be here a little longer after all” he mutters to himself.

Mario’s phone rings and Alan Milchman’s name pops up on the Caller ID. He wipes the

sweat off his brow and picks up the receiver.

“Hello?”

“Is that the proper greeting, Mario?”

“Uhm no sir.”

“Please make sure to answer with the correct greeting from now on.”

“Yes sir.”

“Now the reason I’m calling is that, according to the system reports, your work flow has

been inconsistent lately. Some days you underwrite 10 files, other days only 5. Do you know

why?”

“Well not all files are the same and I guess I have some off days.”

“Well according to corporate it isn’t inconceivable to do 8 files every day. I’ll be

expecting that from now on, understood?”

“Yes sir.”

“Good. You can go back to work.”

“Ok.”

Mario hangs up the phone and buries his face in his hands. The phone rings and startles

Mario. He picks up the phone in annoyance.

“Thank you for calling our mortgage company. How may I assist you?”

“Well it’s so good to hear you’re going by the script.”

Feeling the humor from the other side of the line, Mario can’t help but smile.

“What’s going on Julio?”

“Oh nothing. Just wondering what’s for lunch today.”

“Well I can’t stay out long. I have to keep my numbers up.”

“I’m buying today. Let’s go to the Bengal Tiger Buffet.”

“But I really—“

“Don’t you always say you want to get fired?”

“Well yeah but—“

“And when has this company fired anyone for not reaching their numbers?”

“Never.”

“Ok then. See you in an hour.”

Mario hangs up the phone, unbuttons the top button from his dress shirt and loosens his

tie. Sighing, he continues to look at the credit report of his file.

————————————-

Mario savours his second serving of mutter paneer and chicken mahkani. He cannot wait

to top it off with some gulab jamun. Julio himself is enjoying his tikka masala and is

continuously dipping his naan into the sauce.

“So what’s the occasion?” Mario asks.

“Can’t I just treat you to lunch?”

“No something is up. You’ve never treated me to lunch before.”

“Ok fine. The reason I’m treating is because this may be our last lunch together.”

“What do you mean?!”

“I’m going to quit.”

“What?!”

“Yeah. I’ve decided to go back to school full-time, finish my BA and move in with the

in-laws to save on rent.”

“But you’re not going to have any privacy.”

“Yeah I know but it’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make to change my life.”

“How are you going to pay for school?”

“Well Claudia works there so I’ll be going for free and I’m going to keep my part-time

job to help with minor expenses.”

“Wow. Congratulations.”

“Thanks.”

“We’ve been talking about quitting for years.”

“Yeah we have.”

“So when are you going to do it?”

“Well after I pack up my stuff I’m going to email my resignation letter.”

“You’re leaving today?”

“Well I don’t see any point in staying longer, do you?”

“I would leave too if it weren’t for the medical.”

“Just look for another job during your free time and get out when you can.”

“But I’m already comfortable here.”

“At some point in life Mario, you’re going reach that fork in the road and you’re going

to have to make a change.”

————————————-

Mario stares at his computer absent-mindedly. His collar is uneven, his tie is put away

and he doesn’t notice a food stain on the front of his shirt. He gathers his thoughts and looks at

the screen closely again. He puts in the final conditions for the loan, approves and completes it.

Well I’ve done six so far, so I may hit my goal today, Mario mutters to himself. He gets up

to grab another file from the bin across from him. As he signs his name to the Smith file his

computer makes a ping noise. Mario opens up Lotus Notes and sees an email from Julio.

He actually did it, Mario exclaimed under his breath. Mario reads the email a few more times.

Closing the email He stares at Smith’s credit report and thumbs his pen against the table

mindlessly. After a few repetitious thumpings, Mario gets up and storms over to his manager’s

office.

“Hi, uh Alan sir.”

“Yes Mario, what is it?”

“I’m a little under the weather and I need to go home.”

“I’m sorry but you can’t leave until you hit your numbers.”

“No disrespect sir but I’m going home now and if you want to fire me for feeling sick

then go ahead.”

“Don’t exaggerate Mario. No one is going to fire you. Just go home and get better.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Mario closes the door and lets out a deep breath. On my way home I can get the

classifieds and see what job offers are out there.

This revelation made me have more faith in the magic of gorilla glass and so when I got my HTC One X I didn’t think about getting a screen protector at all. As has been documented I had that phone for at most 6 months and it had a lot more scratches than I ever experienced on my iPhone 4. So this time around, with the iPhone 5, I decided I’ll at least get a case that has a front cover, very much akin to the flip case that Samsung sells for the Galaxy S III. What currently serves that purpose is the wallet case by Hex. Still, I decided to get the screen protector so that I can have the option to switch cases without having to worry about getting scratches on my screen.

I got the screen protector by Belkin and my attempts to install it were a bust. I ended up throwing away both screens that came with the package. Not only that but ironically my attempts to administer the screen protector on my phone may have inadvertently put scratches on my screen. The thing I wanted to avoid ended up coming to fruition. Now the scratches are extremely minor and can only be seen around the receiver in the right light and only if it has been recently cleaned with a glass cleaner and it’s completely devoid of all smudges. But still there they are. Of course, prior to noticing this, I already ordered another screen protector from Skinomi. It’s one of those wet application screen protectors and I’ve just been told that those type of films can actually cause corrosion to the screen. I never heard of this before and all my google searches to confirm this allegation were moot. So should I just send that screen protector back and leave my screen bare or proceed with protecting it?

It’s a little fun to do I suppose. To give ourselves goals to strive for and to try to accomplish them. This past year I’ve improved my health quite a bit, made attempts at eating vegan around March and have lost around 30 or so pounds. Towards the end of this year my good eating habits have gone a bit to the wayside but I still try to recover myself and go back to eating vegan.

What I want to do is improve on my vegan eating efforts of course, find a permanent full-time job with 9-5 hours or something close to it, try to move back into Manhattan (Brooklyn is nice but I’m a Manhattan native and that’s where I belong), and change my TV watching habits. I watch a lot of TV, I know I do and I’m not sure if I can quite curb my quantity. The goal is to improve its quality.

One way I intend to approach this is by no longer checking out new shows. I keep adding on the queue new shows to try them. No more. I have enough shows that I watch that won’t be leaving anytime soon. Plus I have a Netflix account. If I want to try a new show, there is a slew of old great shows that I haven’t watched that I can check out there. In fact, I just started watching “It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia”.

Another thing I’m realizing is that I’m liking British shows more and more as expose myself to them. Doctor Who is a given but one of my new favorites is Downton Abbey (which will be premiering on PBS on 1/6/13). The Masterpiece Mystery and Masterpiece Classics are great platforms to get acquainted with British programming. There is also a slew of British shows on Netflix as well.

So those are the goals for 2013. I think the odds are about the same on how well I’ll be able to keep to my vegan diet or be able to curb my TV watching. Though honestly the TV goal may have a slight edge. British television is really good. I won’t really be twisting my arm to watch.

Here’s an excerpt:

600 people reached the top of Mt. Everest in 2012. This blog got about 2,700 views in 2012. If every person who reached the top of Mt. Everest viewed this blog, it would have taken 5 years to get that many views.

Click here to see the complete report.

This experience has definitely steered me away from any and all Android variants. It’s either the Nexus or nothing from here on. Unfortunately, as I just mentioned, it isn’t readily available. In fact from the inception of the Nexus line it alway seemed that you had to jump through hoops to get one.

As much as I am a gadget enthusiast I’m a consumer first and the consumer experience has always been priority for me. And as reluctant as I am to admit it, Apple is tops when it comes to customer service and the customer experience in general. The iPhone 5 is readily available in all their stores and in all carriers’ brick and mortar store as well. Just walk in and buy one. And I know what to expect with the iPhone. Yeah I mentioned that I’m a little bored of the interface as I’ve used an iPhone for about 3 years and with few exceptions I know all the tricks. But on top of knowing what to expect, there aren’t any glitches with the interface and all the apps I use o iOS are pretty consistent and efficient across the board.

That has been my experience with iOS at least. I can’t say the same for my Android experience. And now that Google Maps is once again available for the iPhone. It’s pretty much a no-brainer. I’m back on Team iPhone. At least for another 2 years. Maybe by the then, Google will have the same great customer service backing their Nexus line which will then make it a more appealing device for me because of its customization abilities as well. We shall see.

 So about a year ago I made the decision to choose iTunes Match and Pandora One for my music needs. By December 20th, my Pandora One subscription will expire and I’ve decided to use Slacker Radio Plus this time around. As much as I enjoyed Pandora One, I missed listening to radio stations offline a lot more than I thought I would. Also I’ve noticed that I in fact cannot tell the difference between 190 kbps (Pandora One sound quality) or 128 kbps (Slacker Radio). Since I cannot tell the difference between those sound qualities, Slacker’s music library and ability to cache their stations for offline listening seems more appealing to me than Pandora this time around. Also, unlike Pandora, when I’m listening to a genre of music, Slacker’s music stays consistent within that genre. That wasn’t always the case with Pandora. Sometimes with Pandora there would songs that would be completely out of left field of the genre that I would be listening to.

So Pandora One is out and Slacker Radio Plus is now in. And what about iTunes Match? Oh that’s still in. You can’t beat all your songs backed up for only $24.99 a year.

Along with that, Black Friday came around and I saw a great deal on a PC on Amazon. I purchased and am now happily using my new Windows 8 machine and my MacBook Pro has been shipped and inspected by Gazelle (looking forward to my check so I can pay off the card I used to buy my new computer). Windows 8 isn’t so bad. I do like the tile interface. It doesn’t seem more than just a skin though. Once you click on a tile to open an application it looks like any Windows computer you’ve used in the last decade, for the most part. My new item was only $200 dollars more than the $249 Chromebook I wanted to get, which still seems t be sold out.

Was happy to have tried the little Chrome experiment even if it didn’t last too long. But at least I know now more than ever, that I don’t have to download that much software on my computer. Just the essential ones. The rest can be done on the browser.

While I have been contemplating about buying the new Samsung Chromebook for my mother, I have been contemplating, or re-contemplating I should say, my own personal computer uses and what do I need to satisfy my needs. My current MacBook Pro is still plowing along, though its AppleCare warranty is about to expire sometime in December and that makes me a little antsy. In general, gadgets tend to expire as soon as their warranties do. It’s quite a feat. The research and development teams of these electronics companies made a science out of this little trick.

That isn’t to say that I’ve experienced this phenomenon as much as I am worrying about it. Most of my Apple products have in fact exceeded their warranties long past their abilities to stay out of the shadow of obsolescence. For instance, as I already mentioned in a previous post, my mom’s current computer is a little frustrating to use because the outdated web browsers on it just aren’t compatible with most current websites and there is no way to upgrade the software on the old PowerBook. Apple is the master of speeding up the obsolescence cycle of their devices. It’s a little frustrating using it at times and I consider myself a bit of a computer literate. My mom must be completely frustrated with that old computer at times.

Of course my 2009 MacBook Pro isn’t quite there yet. I can upgrade my OS to Mountain Lion and have all the current bells and whistles that are being touted as Apple’s current standards. And even though it’s only $19.99 to upgrade I’m opting on looking towards my next computer. I know I definitely won’t be able to afford a new MacBook Pro and even the MacBook Air is out of my price range. I’m intrigued by the new Windows 8 interface, but I don’t want to deal with bloated antivirus programs that I have to keep running because that is the plight of a Windows user. This is leading me to think that maybe a Chromebook isn’t a bad option to consider after all.

I know I previously said that there are some applications that I currently use that would immediately eliminate Chromebook as a viable option but I’m re-assessing that notion and wondering if those applications are really that necessary. With this question bubbling in my mind I decided to undertake a little experiment without having to get rid of my safety-net that is my currently-still-under-warranty-MacBook-Pro. I discovered a blog entry that makes a viable argument to try it as your only computer, though it seems to be a little dated as he mentions which version of the Chromebook he’s using (CR-48, the first Chromebook I believe). He even mentions some Chrome extensions that would alleviate some of my concerns such as cloudHQ which would sync my Good Drive with Dropbox and make all my digital files accessible and easy to email without too much fuss. Or so that is the working theory.

Because of this I decided I’m going try to live through my Google Chrome Browser (which is pretty much the Chrome OS in a nutshell) without using other apps on my computer. Currently as I’m typing this, I’m playing my music on another tab through Google Music, cloudHQ is in the process of syncing Google Drive with Dropbox. So far so good. If this experiment is a success I’ll know that I won’t have to spend more than $249 for my next computer to do all the things I normally do and I won’t ever have to fear obsolescence as much I did with Apple products, for Google promises to keep all models of Chromebook updated and forward compatible. And with $249 being my only expense, whenever my hardware does crap out, it won’t be as hard to buy another one and I won’t have to fear for any of my stuff being lost since it’s all in the Cloud to begin with. We shall see how this experiment plays out.