Michael Sampson

New Blog Address

In line with some other changes, I have finally bitten the bullet and shifted this blog to a new address, henceforth currents.michaelsampson.net.

All of the content on this site has been shifted across ... comments, trackbacks, and all.

This will be the last post here ... from now on the new material will be added at Currents.

I have set the RSS feed to update automagically ... let's see if it works!

Please update your bookmarks!

Check out the size of that Wacom ...

120cm x 80cm Wacom, per W700 page on Lenovo.

Isn't that supposed to be "mm" not "cm"??

Bag Troubles (Take 2): Victorinox Rolling Trevi

I was absolutely stunned when one of the handles of my Victorinox Rolling Trevi came away when I lifted it down some stairs in San Francisco on Friday. This is not a cheap bag, and I expected a lot more from Victorinox, but there was a huge difference between how the handle was sewn on at the front of the bag (two lines of stitching) and on the back of the bag (4 cm x 2 cm rectangle of stitching, plus an X of stitching in the middle of the rectangle). It was just poles apart.

I have owned this bag for less than three months, haven't used it all that much, and have not been rough with it. It's gone back to the shop for repairs ... but it has shaken my perception of Victorinox bags.

Have you experienced anything similar? Is there a more robust bag I should have purchased instead?

Martin says "Samsonite" (October 1)
Email from Martin earlier today:

"The thing about Victorinox is that they do not make their own bags – they make penknives and have jumped on the luggage bandwagon

My large Samsonite suit carrier lasted 18 years and some 30 countries, I have a carry-on which has lasted eight years and a shoulder bag that has been all over the place and lasted four years. The stuff never wears out and they make it all themselves so spares and repairs are easy. And it rhymes with Sampson! What more do you want?

Go buy!!

Regards

Martin"

Bag Troubles (Take 1): Targus Urban Messenger

Since I was taking three laptops to the US for my presentation last week, I needed a slim-line laptop bag to fit within the airline guidelines for taking 2 carry on pieces. I looked around a number of shops, and of the bags I surveyed, the Targus Urban Messenger looked the best fit.

But it was not to be. Within 20 hours of purchasing it ... and 15 hours of those sitting on a plane (thus it getting very little use), one end of the handle broke off when I reached San Franscisco (see above). Needless to say, I was not a happy camper. So I lugged a malfunctioning bag around California for a week, and then returned it for a refund yesterday.

My take: Don't buy this bag.

Staple Free Stapler: Highly Recommended

One of the things I purchased while in the US last week was a Staple Free Stapler (I love seeing how new things work). This little device makes a small cut through the pieces of paper you want to join, and then folds the cut under and through a slit it makes in the paper. Everyone I've shown it to thinks it is neat.

At US$10, it's not expensive (and say good bye to buying staples).

Big Storm in Canterbury

I'm not in New Zealand at the moment, and so am missing the big storm in my home region of Canterbury, as well as the wider South Island.

Look at the size of that tree ... !!

4am at the Airport -- Say What??

Traveling internationally requires a 2 hour pre-flight check-in, so when you have a 6am flight, you have to be at the airport at 4am. It always makes me smile at the utter craziness of what you find at the airport at that time of the day — people walking around fully clothed and ready to roll, and it's only 4am! And everyone is walking around or drinking coffee and eating muffins as though this is an entirely normal thing for intelligent people to be doing at 4am. It's like stepping into another parallel time zone where the normal laws of what you should be doing at 4am are suspended.

And then you go to the bank at the airport to get foreign currency … and there are tellers there at 4am (I wish the normal branches would learn something from such "apparently normal" behavior, and be open when people actually need to do their banking)! And people serving and making coffee at 4am! And people selling wine, clothing and bags at at 4am!

Surely there's something wrong with this picture …

Does the Same Apply to Computer Screen Sizes?

From the local rag today:

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Update: Please wait while you are re-directed to http://www.michaelsampson.net/getnewsletter.html.

The Dark Knight Trailer

The Dark Knight, the sequel to Batman Begins, is coming later in the year, and I happened on the movie trailer today. It looks great ... but I have one great sadness with the movie: I won't be able to compare notes with Marc Orchant, a rabid Batman fan. When he and I were discussing Batman Begins back in 2006, he said that it was "the Batman movie I waited my whole life to see", and he raved about the actors (on Christian Bale, "I can imagine him as Batman") and the effects. I was greatly looking forward to talking with him after seeing this sequel, but with his untimely death last year, that isn't to be. And actually, I would have called him tomorrow to see what he thought of the trailer ... but again, that isn't to be.

I do have one other Batman friend however ...