Thursday, April 30, 2009

WebcamXP for Blogger - Streaming Video

Pretty cool eh?

You guys remember when we were messing with the web cams a while back? I just started working on WebcamXP again, with adding it to my blog as a goal - it's really easy to do as it turns out.

The newest version of WebcamXP seems to use significantly less CPU to run, and it's free now too. Still seems to have relatively poor documentation and a somewhat confusing interface - but lots of features for the more advanced user. Get your camera working in Windows, install WebcamXP, and you can probably figure it out. Check your right-click options.

Once it's working - you will be able to click the bottom link: "http online..." and see your cam on a web page (with your pc as the server) - once you can; go to Tools/Generate HTML, (take the defaults) and copy the code. Go to blogger and "add a gadget - HTML/Javascript gadget". Paste the code, save and view.

I did a good little bit of searching for streaming/video/Blogger/webcam/etc, didn't find a thing. Have you ever seen a blog with streaming video? I didn't think so. Rock star.




...Maybe not so Rock Star; overnight it crashed my internet connectivity, rebooted router, still not fixed, wonder if Comcast is involved? - going to have to investigate tonight...

Offline again at the moment...


And it's back... Frickin' Comcast...

Sunday, April 26, 2009

At Work.

Keith is Whale-ish (Welsh) - get it? ...Jeff is the evil genius.
Oh-oh, whale fight!

Saturday, April 25, 2009

Northern Waters Smokehaus - Duluth



Smoked salmon and all the fixin's. Dill and Traditional. Thanks Mom.

Dropbox File Transfer Is Good.


For god sakes post something new.

Ok, well, let’s see…

I discovered a couple of ways for easily transferring files across the internet...

You may have noticed on a couple of recent rants - since Morphine where it started - that there have been links to downloads in my posts. Not websites, but downloads. Click the link and the pop-up asks you were to save the file - And also a couple where you click it and it asks to launch your music player to play a song directly. You probably didn’t notice them...

There’s an application called Dropbox that Sean was asking me to set up to work on a file with him. The plans changed before we got there and I didn’t install it. But I later went back and checked it out - this was a fairly large file we were going to move in the original plan...

Once it’s set up (free and easy), there’s a folder (the Public folder inside of the main one) on your desktop that you put files in, any files, like an MP3, or a 700 MB movie -Yes really- You put the file into the folder, then right click it (the file) and choose Dropbox/Copy Public Link. Done. Then you paste it into an email or embed it into a webpage and when the recipient clicks the link it downloads, or plays.

If you check the link right away it gives you an error message, give it a bit, It did work. Two gigs of space free, more available cheap.

The other discovery is that you can easily transfer files with RDP too. Start/Run/MSTSC/Options/Local Resources – Drives. I guess I haven’t tried it across the internet yet, but it works great on my network. Drag and drop.


It's international Wales day today. Yes the country.

Saturday, April 18, 2009

Sunday, April 12, 2009


Saturday, April 11, 2009

Spring Ride - Downtown jump-spot


A couple weeks ago. Between the hotels. On that path down to Loring. Too bad I'm on a road bike. - and it's night... - and I'm old... :)


Steve's last gig.


at the Hex. - or as Heath likes to call it; the Octagon. :)

Sunday, April 5, 2009

ArtCrank at One On One

My new poster: 136 of 160.

Wednesday, April 1, 2009

First, Last and Analog

In the earlier 80s I once borrowed my friend Ron’s Walkman and his fairly poor home taping of Aerosmith’s Toys in the Attic, and was completely blown away. Not by the album so much - but by the incredible stereo sound of cranked up headphones exploding in my brain. Lead guitar in the left ear, rhythm in the right, drums pounding in both – the singer was right… inside… my head…

I can still remember walking home from school that day, jamming, smiling - a new door had opened.

Not so mind blowing now – everyone owns an IPod, but I don’t think I had ever really listened to music on headphones before then.

Since then I have always had a “Walkman”, from: many years of high-quality vinyl-to-cassette tapings via Bill and Randy Maas’ high-end gear, though CD Discman units in the 90’s, to MP3 players and IPods today. I’m pretty sure that’s the actual model of walkman I first had – the WM4 (from 1982) - I can almost feel the knurled buttons moving under my fingers...
Sometimes I hear songs that make me think of specific places, not in general, but specifically; viewed from a certain angle – always the same - almost like a déjà-vu. When I hear the song, or the riff, or the lyric, I picture a place, usually outside, often a building or a street – frequently from many years ago. Sometimes I feel like I can remember a little bit of what I was thinking about then... I suppose we all do to some degree.

The other day I flashed-back to walking around in the later 80s (with the cassette walkman – somehow the tape warble, hiss and pulley-squeek a vivid part of the memory) thinking: “oh, here’s this cool album again, I wish I knew who it was…” It was different than other stuff I listened to, it was driving and catchy, but stark and minimal. It was anguished, and dark but direct and purposeful. Most of the music I listened to then had huge guitars; this had a jagged synthesizer and guitar wash; fluid and continuous over the driving drums and bass which powered the songs - periodically dropping entirely, leaving the pulsing song-skeleton surging along. And deep, clear, vocals.

I discovered at some point later that it was the Sisters of Mercy - a collection of singles actually; Alice, Floorshow, and others… Still a favorite band today.

I remember that the music felt so personal, like no one else could really understand the emotion and the meaning. The dark imagery, the abstract lyrics, the pounding rhythms, the hypnotic bass. I’m walking around in the world with the other people, but I’m in a different place; separate and isolated from their poisonous thoughts by my curtain of sound.