Author Archives: Peter

Apple Store Derby Street

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fff|ppp|The Facade

The Facade

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On Saturday, I attended the opening of the seventh [Apple Store](http://www.apple.com/retail/) in the Greater Boston area. The first six were [Northshore](http://www.apple.com/retail/northshore/) (our “home” store), [CambridgeSide](http://www.apple.com/retail/cambridgeside/), [Chestnut Hill](http://www.apple.com/retail/chestnuthill/), [Rockingham Park](http://www.apple.com/retail/rockinghampark/), [South Shore](http://www.apple.com/retail/southshore/), and [Burlington](http://www.apple.com/retail/burlington/). Saturday’s grand opening was the [Derby Street](http://www.apple.com/retail/derbystreet/) Apple Store, at the Derby Street Shoppes in Hingham, MA.

The Derby Street Shoppes is a ‘lifestyle center’, a new and growing breed of shopping establishment. This is an arrangement with various stores of the type you’d find in a mall, only the store fronts are outside. I call it an overgrown strip mall. In any case, the Apple Store is located in between The Children’s Place and Burton’s Grill. It’s an average size Apple Store, with all of the features one would expect – lots of Apple and third party hardware and software, plenty of things to play with, and technical help at the Genius Bar.

I arrived at about 8:30 a.m., and at that point nobody was in line. A bunch of people were waiting around in their cars – a wise move, considering how cold it was. At about 9 a.m., the management came out and set up the velvet ropes. After that, people started getting in line. I ended up being about #20 in line after taking some photos. Once I was in line, I shot some more photos from my spot, and shot some video as well.

Since I’ve already been to many other Apple Stores, I wasn’t entralled as much by the store and its contents, but rather by the grand opening event, and all of the hoopla and crowds surrounding it. To that effect, you can check out my [photo gallery](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/geekiness/apple_store_derby_street/) of the event, as well as a [movie](http://prwdot.org/movies/apple-store-derby-street/) that I shot with our new camcorder and edited in iMovie.

Enjoy!

Update

Here’s some other coverage from around the Interweb.

– [Cape Cod Cyclist made a day of it](http://www.capecodcyclist.8k.com/weblog/archives/2006/02/apple_store_der.html)
– [V1Beta showed up to get a t-shirt](http://www.v1beta.com/social-experiment/the-kentucky-derby/136/)
– [Jishman goes to see yet another Apple Store](http://www.riddlemethisjishman.com/?p=258)
– [TUAW has their call out for reports](http://www.tuaw.com/2006/02/18/apple-store-derby-street-your-reports/)
– [IFOAppleStore noted V1Beta’s photos of the grey-stone facade](http://www.ifoapplestore.com/2006/02/18/derby-street-shoppes-photos/)

A Cheese ‘n’ Taters Valentine

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fff|ppp|Mmm, cheese!

Mmm, cheese!

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Tonight, Becky and I had a Valentine’s dinner, sharing some foods that we love. I made Becky a plate o’ cheese, with five kinds of cheese (gouda, gruyere, muenster, monterey jack, and cheddar) and cheese-flavored Ritz crackers. There are few things in this world that Becky loves more than cheese. Luckily, I’m one of them. 🙂 Becky made me tater tot casserole, one of our favorite dishes. She also made some cute Valentine’s decorations, and I got *two* cards – one from Becky, and one from the baby! I’m not quite sure how the baby was able to write a card… maybe it was dictated to Becky telepathically?

Anyway, it was all good. Hope everyone out there had a great Valentine’s Day!

Finally, some snow

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fff|ppp|Out the front window

Out the front window

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So we’re having a bit of a snow storm today. It’s not going to compare with any of the really huge storms we’ve had in the past few years, but it’s certainly more than we’ve had this season so far. We might take a step outside later today, but for now, we just have a few shots from inside the apartment. 🙂

Update @ 6:38 p.m.
We did venture out a bit this afternoon for a walk down Cabot Street. We took some photos for [Michelle](http://mikao.blogspot.com/)’s [Hometown Six](http://mikao.blogspot.com/2006_02_01_mikao_archive.html#113926251616343914) project, and we also shot some video using our [new camcorder](http://prwdot.org/2006/02/12/video-killed-the-photography-star/). The streets were pretty quiet, though we did greet a few adventurous walkers and snowplow drivers. Dunkin Donuts was open, and quite busy. Bell Market and Family Dollar were open as well.

I added a photo of Cabot Street to today’s [photo album](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/events/2006/snowstorm_february_12/), but the video will have to wait – we had to order a FireWire cable so that we could transfer digital video from the camcorder to our Mac. It should be arriving in the next day or so, and we’ll upload the video as soon as we have a chance. We did play back the video on our television, and although I can’t say much for my videography skills, the audio and video produced by the camcorder were quite good.

Video Killed The Photography Star?

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fff|ppp|PV-GS150

PV-GS150

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Thanks to some closeout pricing, funding from various sources, and a hefty amount of research, we have purchased our first camcorder. We decided on the [Panasonic PV-GS150](http://www.camcorderinfo.com/content/Panasonic-PV-GS150-Camcorder-Review.htm), a compact [MiniDV](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minidv)-format camcorder. It uses [3CCD](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3CCD) technology to capture excellent video, and it fits in the palm of your hand. We have yet to take it out for any serious testing, but I think that you can expect to see some new movies on our site within the next few months, and definitely plenty of them after the baby is born. (I know, not everybody on the web wants to see every delightful moment of our baby’s life. We will do our best not to go crazy with it.)

The only trick for me now is going to be trying to balance my existing interest in photography with my new interest in videography. The PV-GS150 does have the capability to take still photos, but it’s not anywhere near as capable as its cousin, Panasonic’s [DMC-FZ20](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/geekiness/panasonic_lumix_dmc_fz20/). We’ll probably end up carting both of them around, and maybe Becky and I will do a bit of cross-training to split up the photo and video tasks. Hopefully the quantity and quality of my photography won’t suffer.

Passion Lives Here

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fff|ppp|Italian Flag Pizza

Italian Flag Pizza

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Yes, the Wood household is passionate about the Olympics. We have thrown several parties for the Opening Ceremonies of various games, most recently for the [Athens 2004](http://prwdot.org/2004/08/14/a-holiday/) summer games. On Friday night, we threw a party for the Opening Ceremonies of the [Torino 2006](http://www.torino2006.org/ENG/OlympicGames/home/index.html) winter games. (Warning: that site has up-to-the-minute scores, so if you’re waiting to watch a taped broadcast, don’t look!)
Continue reading →

Kickin’

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In the past week or so, Becky and I have both been able to feel the baby kicking. Becky had been feeling it a bit somewhat earlier than that, but it wasn’t until recently that I could feel it myself. It’s an incredibly exciting sensation, feeling those quick but solid taps from her belly that mean there is an active, growing baby inside. The baby tends to be the most active when Becky is less active – when Becky is moving around, it tends to lull the baby into relaxation and/or sleep. So just after we wake up, or just before we go to sleep, it’s pretty easily to feel some little kicks coming from inside. We’ve also been playing some musical selections for the baby – mostly classical, but also some more laid-back popular music. And I’ve been having semi-regular chats with the baby, since it gets to hear Becky’s voice all day, but only gets to hear me when I’m at home.

There are just about three months left until the baby’s due date. In one month, we’ll be starting childbirth classes! It should be fun to go and see Beverly Hospital’s facilities, as well as learn more about the childbirth methods that Beverly Hospital practices, and meet some other people who are going through pregnancies. All reports we’ve heard indicate that Beverly Hospital has one of the best programs in the Boston area, so that’s good to know.

We haven’t got a nursery set up or anything, but we have been preparing in other ways – organizing our finances, cleaning and reorganizing the apartment, getting rid of stuff we don’t use any more that’s just taking up space, making lists of things we’ll need to acquire before the baby arrives, and researching baby gear. We hit [Babies R Us](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/browse/-/540744/) a couple weekends ago, just to get a feel for our options and see some of the baby gear up close. I’ve also been reading over the [Consumer Reports Best Baby Products](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0890439869/), partially to read reviews and compare available products, but also partially to learn what the heck all of this stuff is. 🙂 Becky has a lot more of a clue about it than I do, so this is very helpful for me.

It seems fairly likely that we’ll still be living in our apartment when the baby is born, so we’ll probably convert our second bedroom from an office into a nursery – or at least make enough room in it for the baby essentials. Since our apartment building doesn’t allow many modifications, we won’t be doing it over in a new color scheme – and even if we could, we still probably wouldn’t since we don’t know whether we’re having a boy or a girl.

Other than that, there is not a whole lot of news about the baby. As Becky reported in [an earlier post](http://prwdot.org/2006/01/17/this-pregnancy-is/), last month’s prenatal appointment was just great. She’s been feeling pretty good recently. Overall, we certainly have a lot to be thankful for!

Computer Science!

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Last night, Becky and I got together with some other [Gordon](http://www.gordon.edu/) computer science folks for dinner at [Acapulcos](http://www.acapulcos.net/). I had planned this little shindig with my friend and fellow computer science grad Lesley Anderson. Since she is in the area for a week, we thought it would be fun to get together with some folks in the area who we hadn’t seen for a while.

I had reserved Acapulcos’ private room, so we were able to eat and chat for three solid hours. In attendance were Lesley, Becky and I, Chuck and Hannah Bartholomew, Lucas and Christi Berger, Derek and Becky Day, and Professor Levy and his wife Kathy. We had a great time catching up with each other on life since Gordon, as well as chatting about topics from computers to stalking Sheryl Crow.

After the get-together, a few of us headed over to Sarah Joy (Ameden) Salagala’s home to throw a surprise birthday party for Lesley. Lesley received a call just as she was leaving the restaurant, asking her to run “an errand”, which allowed the rest of us to get over to the party before she arrived. It was pretty funny to see her reaction, after having just come from having dinner with us, to seeing us again at her surprise party.

Altogether, those two events made for one of the latest nights Becky and I had experienced in quite some time. But the friends we got to see and the fun we had was well worth the late hour.

We also have some photos from the [CompSci Get-Together](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/events/2006/compsci_get_together/) and the [Surprise Party](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/events/2006/lesleys_surprise_party/). Enjoy!

The Even Biggser Picture

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On Saturday morning, I drove up to [Claremont, NH](http://www.claremontnh.com/) to visit [Jeremy and Angela](http://thebiggspicture.org/). Part of the reason for the trip was to watch the first few episodes of this season of [The Shield](http://www.fxnetworks.com/shows/originals/the_shield/) with Jeremy. We have carried on our tradition of watching the show since the first season… and it’s hard to believe that it is now in its fifth season! It’s certainly not a show for everybody… its “TV MA LSV” rating is certainly well-deserved. But the continuing intrigue of the plot and the development of the characters keeps us watching.

The other reason for my visit was to help them out with some of their website woes. They’d been having a lot of trouble with [Blogger](http://www.blogger.com/), so I moved their blog over to [WordPress](http://wordpress.org/). I’ve been working on prepping for the transition for the past week or so, and it’s been quite an enjoyable experience. I created a WordPress theme for the Biggses that replicates the overall look and feel of their old website, with a few XHTML and CSS improvements here and there, and some extra additions that come with the WordPress package.

WordPress is a really wonderful blogging system, and this is the first time I’ve really spent a considerable amount of time digging in to it and learning about how it works. I even rewrote one of my Movable Type plugins as a WordPress plugin, just as an exercise. It was actually pretty easy. Will you see World Wide Wood switch over to WordPress soon? I can’t say for sure, but I wouldn’t rule it out.

Anyway, I got them switched over to WordPress, and I also installed a Windows plugin that should make it very easy for them to upload photos to their gallery. I didn’t quite get through all of the items I wanted to cover, but I think I took care of the most important stuff. Overall, they seem to be very happy with the results. You can read Jeremy’s take on it in [his latest post](http://thebiggspicture.org/2006/01/21/new-holiday-peters-the-man-day/).

Here’s to the return of frequent posting on The Biggs Picture!

**Update**
Corrected the link to Jeremy’s post.

Bowling With Becky

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fff|ppp|Becky winds up for a roll|ppp|fff

Yesterday, I threw a little birthday get-together for Becky. I invited some of our friends over to go bowling at the Bowl-O-Mat in Beverly, and then back to our apartment to hang out and have some food.

This was the first time we had visited Beverly’s Bowl-O-Mat, and I have to say that it’s definitely a lot more fun than it looks from the outside (I failed to take any outside pics, but suffice to say, the place looks pretty run down). The Bowl-O-Mat does [candlepin bowling](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candlepin_bowling), the traditional New England bowling style. It’s quite a different game from [ten-pin bowling](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten-pin_bowling), for those of you who have never experienced it. Being from Ohio originally, I was pretty weirded out when I first played a game of candlepin several years ago. Bowling balls that you can hold in the palm of your hand, skinny little pins, three balls rolled per frame, dead pins not being cleared away between rolls… weird. It’s actually a more difficult game than ten-pin, because the ball is not able to knock over as many pins at once. It requires a bit more precision. Anyway, the overall feel of the game and the atmosphere it creates is more or less the same as ten-pin bowling, so it’s still lots of fun.

In attendance at the party were [Chris, Naomi, and Carl](http://members.verizon.net/mocasonline/), [Jenny](http://www.livejournal.com/users/raingirl3179/), [Corey](http://corey.prwdot.org/), [Jeremy and Angela](http://www.thebiggspicture.org/), and, of course, Becky and I. We have [the evening’s photos](http://prwdot.org/gallery2/v/events/2006/bowling_with_becky/) online, as well. Becky had a great time getting to hang out with everyone, and of course she loves bowling, so all in all it was a great day!

Update
Jenny [blogs it](http://www.livejournal.com/users/raingirl3179/108042.html).