Just yesterday I was commenting on Heather’s post over at Justanothermobilemonday where she confessed a fascination with NKOTB - New Kids On The Block - and to enjoying their songs on her Zune (of the two confessions, the Zune might be the more embarrassing). In the followup comments I admitted to really liking music from the 1980s. This year I’ve seen the Village People perform at the Mohegan Sun Casino as well as Loverboy and 38 Special. Last year I watched Eddie Money front row and live at corporate even (video). When I’m in the car, usually it’s tuned to the 80s channel on XM Satellite radio. I guess you could say I’m musically still back in the 1980s. If you also share a love of music from that decade, I found a web site you’ll enjoy. This site offers over 1,000 music videos from the decade when MTV actually still played music videos! These all are hosted online and there is a lengthy alphabetical list from which you can select your favorite video from the 1980s. PS - When you get sick of the videos, check out their retro games site for classics that you can play through your web browser including Space Invaders, Galaxian, Asteroids, Pac Man, Centipede, Tempest, Missile Command, etc.

80′S Music Videos
Retro 1980s Games

Amazon has Steve Miller Band Greatest Hits (MP3, 256 kbps) on sale for only $5 as part of their “Friday 5″ MP3 album download deal. Each Friday they spotlight 5 albums and mark them down until Monday. While I’m not the worlds biggest Steve Miller fan, the years 1974 to 1978 seem to encompass all but one of his greatest hits (Abracadabra in 1982). Not everyone knows this but their #1 hit “The Joker” is a playable track in “Guitar Hero World Tour”.. and, yeah, I totally looked that up on Wikipedia.

Steve Miller US Hot 100 Hits included on this album:

Swingtown - # 17 in 1977
Jungle Love - # 23 in 1977
Take The Money and Run - # 11 in 1976
Rock’n Me - # 1 in 1976
The Joker - # 1 in 1973
Fly like an Eagle - # 2 in 1977
Jet Airliner - # 8 in 1977

Amazon - Steve Miller Band Greatest Hits - $5

Digital cameras seem to be everywhere these days, and I am pretty sure you are all familiar with the basic premises of composing a photo on them.  Set subjects in place, aim camera, scream “everyone smile!” point, and shoot as everyone smiles or says cheese, or whatever other instruction you gave them.  Pretty simple.  Simple, that is, if you are not trying to take pictures of children.  My six year old and three year old are a mile a minute.  They rarely sit still, let alone, smile on command.  And even if one does listen, it is almost impossible for both to sit still, smile, and look at the camera at the same time.  This can become an exercise in frustration and futility.  Fortunately, the latest Cybershot camera from Sony provides a solution.  This camera will refuse to take a picture if your subject is not smiling, and then will snap one each time they smile at the camera.  Incredible!  Let’s take a closer look.

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I know what you’re thinking. This USB privacy pedal is for guys who view adult oriented material on their home or work computer. You figure they’ll use this so the boss, wife or girlfriend won’t catch them viewing naughty sites. You’d be partly right. One click on the USB pedal automatically closes all Windows, the current Window or (boss mode) switches to a specific open window on your computer.

However I prefer to see this in a more positive light. Let’s call it a “gift anonymizer”. Haven’t you ever been up at 3am in the morning searching the web for a gift for your significant other when they come walking downstairs? Now with this USB pedal - you never worry that they “ruin their own surprise” by seeing you ordering the book of love poems or dozen roses. Runs on Windows Vista only. Another great reason to upgrade…

IHTHT (Deal only good Saturday 9-6-2008) also available here via eBay

Initial advertisements for the Blackberry Pearl 8220 started to appear around the end of August - apparently as advertising fliers were readied for mailing or insertion to Rogers’ subscribers statements. Several of those subscribers now report (BBunderground via Twitter) that they’ve received the flier advertising RIM’S very first flip phone at the 3 year contract price of $149.99. Seeing as all current models of Blackberry phones are widely available via Amazon for free or even negative (they pay you) - I suspect you’ll see the pricing on the new device fall quickly. The only mystery remaining is when Rogers will start accepting orders. UPDATE: A call to the Rogers weekend customer service desk asking if the 8220 was available brought the response of “4th Quarter 2008” and “sorry we sent the mailer early“.

HOFO

Robert Oschler teased us with glimpses of Wrex, the junkyard dawg, several months ago. Now that sassy canine has crossed our borders, and Robert has the scoop!

Hello Judie,

WowWee’s hilarious and ill-behaved robot junkyard dog has finally popped up in the USA for ordering. Amazon has it available for about $140 (USD) and lists it as “in stock”. Hammacher Schlemmer, who offers a “lifetime guarantee” on their products (about 9 years) also has it with an expected ship date of 9/26/2008 and a price of $130. Buy.com has it available for ordering with Free Shipping, but lists it as “Temporarily Out Of Stock” and at a price of $150. So far the other major retailers like Target and WalMart don’t have it yet.

Here are the relevant links:

Amazon
Hammacher Schlemmer
Buy.com

Detailed Video Review of Wrex The Dawg:

Detailed Written Review

Thanks,
Robert Oschler
RobotsRule.com

MSNBC is featuring a newly revised hurricane tracking map on their web site. In addition to following the big hurricanes, you can track tropical storms and depressions on the map as well. Information that is displayed includes — projected path of the storm, 12 hour intervals of approximate tracking and estimated wind speeds along the storm path. This is one of the best weather tracking/forecasting tools that I’ve ever seen and caused me to wonder whether someday the TV weatherman could be totally replaced by this type of computerized information.

PS - TV weathermen have already been replaced by computers - but we keep them around just to watch their on-air freak outs.

MSNBC Interactive Hurricane Tracking Map

Some additional images of the rumored new iPod Nano are leaking out across the Internet. These photos appear to confirm Digg founder Kevin Rose’s original post about the new design which is expected to be announced at the Apple Lets Rock event on September 9. In addition to a Nano re-design, the other rumors floating indicate an upgrade to iTune which will include a “Pandora like” music recommendation capability, an iPod Touch slight revamp and pricing gymnastics for iPods (cheaper).  Update: Engadget has another, more fully unboxed, image here which they seem a bit unsure about.

New iPod Nano

One of my favorite hobbies is working on my family’s genealogy; because it was also my uncle’s and grandmother’s hobby before me, I have access to a treasure trove of photographs, historical documents, family charts and other paraphernalia that they and others had collected. What’s not in my personal files is kept at the Angelo State University library in their West Texas Collection, where it is easily shared with me and any other interested familial historians.

I guess because I have always had such a relatively easy time collecting and accessing some of (what I consider to be) the most amazing old photographs and documents, and because there are still family members alive who remember the colorful anecdotes which accompany many of the photographs, I was a bit surprised when my boyfriend mentioned that he didn’t have very many pictures of his mother’s father, the grandfather who had died before he was born. Kevin also doesn’t know very many stories about this grandfather, because his mother has also passed. One of the few pictures that he does have of his grandfather is a formal photograph taken perhaps at age five or six; the photo measures 5″ tall x 3.25″ wide, and it has a little bit of damage and fading.

When I was offered the opportunity to review the Photofiddle process, and once I understood what they were capable of doing, I knew immediately which picture I would ask them to use…

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I’ve been accused of keeping food a little too long in the refrigerator. So much so that I’ve noticed my daughter now removes all my leftovers and writes the date on anything dad saves to make sure that it isn’t spoiled when I finally get around to serving it as a meal. Here’s a great idea that’s guaranteed not to go bad no matter how long you keep it - an emergency food kit that has enough food to feed a small family for weeks AND lasts 20 years!

Included are 275 separate servings of:

# 30 Servings - Potato Bakon
# 25 Servings - Corn Chowder
# 25 Servings - Ala King
# 25 Servings - Cacciatore
# 25 Servings - Western Stew
# 25 Servings - Country Noodle
# 25 Servings - Rice Lentil
# 45 Servings - Whey Milk
# 25 Servings - Blueberry Pancakes
# 25 Servings - Barley Vegetable
# Total Weight: 23 lbs.

Costco - $74.99 via FW