Thursday, November 27, 2008

Google, Vinegar, and Dents

I received a gift in the mail yesterday. A beautiful calendar from the Computer History Museum. I've actually been planning on creating a vintage computer calendar with the computers from the Personal Computer Museum. The gift is nice, the calendar is great, but I'm more excited about the card that came with it. It's a Google card. If you've ever received one of these cards then you know how I excited I am. Why? Well first of all, it's from Google - do I need to say more? It's also completely Google in terms of simplicity. No copyright notice, no ISBN or UPC code. Just "Google", in colour, with a little "TM" symbol. I have it at my desk. I'm showing it to co-workers like I did when I got my first 100% perfect test in grade school. I'm such a geek.

I've also been playing around with Balsamiq. Like the stuff inspired by its name, Balsamiq Mockups are intended to help improve the flavour of your designs. If you've ever designed a web page or software user interface on a napkin, then you know exactly what this tool does -- only better. I never thought anything could be better than paper but this actually trumps it. Not only that, but you don't need to go through the process of scanning your napkin or paper into the computer you simply tell it to produce a PNG file.

Yesterday I felt better after getting the Google card but not before I realized I dented my car. I was putting away my original tires after getting the snows installed and I dropped the one tire. It fell, "grazing" the back quarter panel of my car leaving a dent around the size of my fist which should soon follow anyways. Hate that.

My week of hell with the JCI Brantford Santa Claus Parade is soon coming to end - and it couldn't be soon enough.

No comments: