February 29th's Leap Day Robs Us All

The idea of February 29th is a cute concept in some ways. It's quadrennial appearance has notoriety, and is a date often targeted by expectant mothers and fathers who think they can keep their children artificially young, by limiting the number of birthdays over their lifetime. But if you think about it, if you're a salaried employee, the very fact we have a February 29th this year means your employer gets this day for free. In fact, every single paycheck you get this year is less because of February 29th, and they never even asked your permission to dock your pay!

What do I mean by this? Well, in 2007, we had 365 days, in 2008, we have 366, and next year, we will have 365. Yet you're paid the same this year, if you're on salary, even though you put in the extra effort!

To make the math easy, let's pretend your salary is such that you take home exactly $73,000 a year. Under this scenario, in 2007, you would take home $200.00 even per day, but in 2008, for the same amount of work, you'd only be taking home $199.45. And those 55 cents can add up. Over the 366-day calendar, your employer has taken away a full day's pay from you. If instead you take home $109,500, that number jumps to $300 in lost pay for similar productivity! (See below chart)


Over time, a few cents a day starts to add up...
And you can see this in every single one of your paychecks. If you get paid over a 14-day pay period, at the $73,000 rate noted above, you would see only $2,792.30 coming home every two weeks, instead of the $2,800.00 you would have received in either 2007 or 2009. That's messed up, right? You think we want to be reminded 26 times this year that employers worldwide have asked us to come into the office and work for free?

I propose that from now on, all salaried employees should have the option of taking February 29th off. After all, if we aren't getting paid, why show up?

2007 Christmas: Four College Graduates Take On a Stupid Tree

After getting up way too early (as previously noted), the festivities kicked off in earnest around 9, when my wife started up an unbeatable brunch, complete with eggs, bacon, and homemade blueberry muffins. With the home full of good smells, my parents and youngest sister arrived, fresh off a 2-hour ride from Sacramento, their first time holding Christmas with us in the Bay Area. They ended up staying a full, eventful, eight hours.

As much fun as it is to receive gifts, it's even better to give, as we all know. This year, my wife was the recipient of a new suit (and matching skirt), our first camcorder (a Sony), dog calendars of the twelve-month and 365 day desk calendar variety, a new blue sweater, and a working cellphone, on Verizon. While I wasn't as giving with the rest of the family, we did get them a handful of games, both for playing with us, and with one another. As for me, I mostly gained a few items from my Amazon wish list.

But the hit of the day was the inexpensive remote control airplane I got my dad (similar to this one), still a kid at the young age of fifty-four.

We took the airplane out to a local elementary school, practicing take-offs and landings, and got some good air, but the winds were too gusty, and too many obstacles spelled certain death for the new toy. So the five of us packed into the car and headed to the football field at Palo Alto High School with the goal of a more successful venture. Yet, no sooner than we arrived did we find more trouble.

After seeing the plane bump, bump its way into a few false starts, we would start the motor as I threw it aloft, and into flight. On our second try, it spun, spiraling ever higher and further away, as my dad guided it through the sky. Eventually, it was out of reach of the remote control signal, and kept going despite my dad's shouts. Sure enough, it came to rest in a tree on the opposite side of the fence, a good 20 feet into the air, nearly obscured by branches.

We made our way to the crash site and eventually spotted the plane, but had no easy way to get it down. The tree was unclimbable, and as my dad got on the roof of one of the school's portable classrooms, he could not shake the limb to dislodge the plane. From below, I threw tennis balls, but could do no damage. Later, we moved upwards to throwing a softball, which would more likely hit a branch and make me cower below than anything else. Then, I found a soccer ball, and started to throw it toward the plane. No luck.

Sure enough, the soccer ball too got stuck. Then, so did the softball. For those scoring at home, we now had four college graduates, and a college senior staring at a tree with a plane and two balls stuck in its branches. What to do? I looked around and found a thick stick I could throw javelin style, at the plane, or the soccer ball. It stuck too. That led to a 2 by 4 plank of plywood, which after a few tosses, made its way into the tree, making the score one plane, two balls and two planks of wood for the tree, and nothing for us.

At this point, my mom and my wife took off to go get a ladder, laughing at our foolishness. But we didn't give up. I dislodged the plank of wood, and later, the softball, and after just swearing the softball would be useless, I hit the branch holding the plane, and it fluttered down to us below, making the endeavor a success. At this point, I'm plenty dirty and sweating a little. My hands have splinters. The soccer ball is still up there, as far as I know. My dad is on the cell phone, calling my mom to abort "Operation: Ladder Retrieval". It turned out that the actual search for the plane was more fun than flying the plane had proven to be, and we can all laugh about it now. My wife and mom returned, shaking their heads at us, as we piled in the car, and headed home, swearing the next time that plane flies, there will be no wind, and no trees, period.

Coming home, we battled one another on the Nintendo Wii, alternating bowling with tennis, and said our goodbyes. It wasn't a textbook Christmas, but the silliness and togetherness made it even better than had it been scripted. I hope that you too enjoyed your Christmas, and that you aren't one to leave that plane behind when it seems even two sticks, two balls and a little sweat won't get the job done.

Santa Needs a Quieter Sleigh

While Saint Nick has clearly sustained viability in a go-go world of e-commerce, e-greeting cards and PayPal, his transportation vehicle is in serious need of an upgrade - and I for one call on Silicon Valley to aid him in his quest to more efficiently deliver gifts to children young and old worldwide, in less time, with less ruckus and more efficiency.

Depending on which part of the world you reside, Santa may stop at your home anywhere between 12:30 a.m. and 4:30 a.m. local time on Christmas morning, from what I understand.

This year, he reached Palo Alto just about 3 a.m. I know this, because he woke me up, and we haven't been to sleep since.

His overburdened sleigh, with the unmistakeable clattering of hooves and heavy breathing from the crew of reindeer, out of shape from their months of inactivity, delivered such a clamor that it not only startled me awake, but jolted our two dogs and a cat out of their slumber, sending us on a so-far unsuccessful quest to get them back to rest and comfortable in their beds.

Now, nearing 5 a.m., while Santa is no doubt well west of here, his impact is still being felt. The presents are glistening in the living room, but while we're awake, there's little we can do, until my wife wakes up, and my parents arrive later this morning. Christmas morning, for us, has started far too early, and there's a certain jolly old man we have to blame.

Silicon Valley, if you can harness the power of the sun to energize homes, and send data across the world at the speed of light, surely you can find a way to reduce the drastic amount of burden left on this one man each year, and give those of us with sensitive ears and a restless stable of critters a chance to get through the night without interruption. This is your call, and duty.

FestivusFeed: FriendFeed Airs Your Grievances

What do you get when you cross the holiday season with Web 2.0 technology, some free time and a sense of humor? If you're FriendFeed, you develop a new service called "Festivus Feed", letting us FriendFeed Addicts air our grievances toward one another, and the technology market in general, in the Festivus tradition, "Airing of Grievances".

The new service, which debuted late last night, celebrates the Seinfeld-inspired alternative holiday, and features the much-famed Festivus Pole, as you can see below.


My Grievance: Robert Scoble joins every network but this one. :-)
While the Festivus Feed is wrapped in fun, it does mask a true innovation, the ability to post directly to the FriendFeed news feed, in an interesting cross between Twitter and traditional chat. Now, FriendFeed offers the ability to combine your activity from services around the Web, it lets you post individual stories through its bookmarklet, and gives the option to post comments directly. I can't wait to see the new innovations this company has planned for New Year's Day.

See also: ParisLemon: FriendFeed Morphs Into FestivusFeed for the Holidays! and Paul Buchheit: Twas the night before Festivus... or follow me on FriendFeed here.

Our Beagle and Friends Get in the Holiday Spirit

In our house, getting ready for Christmas doesn't always mean a tree and lights, but we start in our own, special, way - by putting up small items of Christmas cheer and decking out the animals (live and stuffed) in Christmas outfits. With temperatures in the mild Bay Area dipping down to the 40s, nobody was complaining when we gave them a few extra layers, including our 18-year-old beagle, who finds this lap of luxury sufficient for her needs, staying inside near the heater, on our couch.


Molly sports a red Christmas sweater and Oakland A's blanket.
This year, she shares the living room with a pair of teddy bears in holiday spirit.


The first also is donning a red sweater and chats up a reindeer.

The second, Bradley, likes his green slippers and Santa robe.
We won't be in our condo on Christmas day, so we're not going to be making a big production of things, but it's nice of our stuffed animals and beagle to do their part to set the mood - don't you think?

Shopping for Your Mac Geek This Holiday Season

Want to really get your favorite Mac geek on the road to happiness this holiday? Aside from dropping two large on a new MacBook Pro, or latching them to a long-term AT&T contract by getting them an iPhone, one of the more unique ways to ensure they'll love you forever is to get them some rare Apple schwag. And a few choice sites have just the thing for their Apple itch - be it Apple t-shirts, Apple watches, Apple caps, posters, stickers, or jackets.

You'd think the best place to get Apple gear would be from Apple themselves, but aside from the retail store at their corporate headquarters in Cupertino, you're basically S.O.L. (That stands for ... uh... Store Offers Little)

Thanks to the scarcity of Apple-branded merchandise, it's unlikely you'll find major bargain basement pricing, but for years, Red Light Runner and The Missing Bite have done good business online selling to Mac afficionados like me. On top of all my Mac hardware, I've probably got 5 shirts, a cap, a pair of fleece jackets (for my wife and me) and several Apple watches. And despite this plethora of riches, I'm always looking for more. In fact, my latest purchases arrived today. (A new Tie Dye Shirt for me, T-shirt for my wife, and... another watch)


Images Courtesy of The Missing Bite
As many in the Mac world know, Steve Jobs famously shot down Apple's licensing program, not just for Mac clones, but for a line of "Think Different" watches, which feature the Apple logo, and run backwards - thinking different indeed. I bought a pair of these watches for $59 or so five years ago, and thanks to scarcity, have seen the offering prices only skyrocket to nearly $200 today. But trust me, I wouldn't sell mine even if you offered me $400 apiece. They're that good and unique. In fact, by this point, when I look at a so-called "normal" clock, I have to mentally reverse the hands to get the time right.

You've got just over two weeks until Christmas. And while I wouldn't mind it if you purchased me an iPod Touch off my Amazon.com wish list, I'm not expecting it. So make some other Apple geek happy and get them to show off their Apple love in style!

Buy Your Favorite Bloggers a Gift this Holiday

In my house, Christmas and Amazon.com are intertwined. Around this time every year, I update my Amazon.com Wish List, let friends and family know, and one by one, watch my requested gifts transition from the "Unpurchased" to "Purchased". But Amazon.com's Wish Lists are often made public, giving you the option to send gifts to friends, family, or people you've never met - including some major names in the blogosphere.

Updated: Dec. 3rd at 7:00 p.m., editing Steven Hodson's list...

While some of their lists are quite out of date, if you're wondering how can you make a leading blogger happy this holiday? Let's take a look...

1. Om Malik (GigaOM)
Amazon Wish List

Om wants both a new digital camera and a camcorder. He's settled on the Sony Cybershot DSCW55 7.2MP Digital Camera with 3x Optical Zoom and Sanyo Xacti VPC-HD2 7.1MP MPEG4 High Definition Camcorder with 10x Optical Zoom. The first retails for $165, and the second, for just under $600.

He also wants some CDs, and has been waiting since 2003 for someone to buy him Jim Rogers' Adventure Capitalist: The Ultimate Road Trip". Those last items are significantly cheaper.

---

2. Richard McManus (Read/Write Web)
Amazon Wish List

Though he hails from Wellington, New Zealand, Richard's list is filled with U.S.-created music and books, ranging from Nirvana's With the Lights Out box set to Michael Lewis' Coach: Lessons on the Game of Life, and Mediated: How the Media Shapes Your World and the Way You Live in It .

Most items are in the $10 to $40 range, something you just might be able to afford.

---

3. Kevin Rose (Digg and Revision3)
Amazon Wish List

Kevin's pearly whites made the cover of BusinessWeek in 2006 as he gave a goofy smile and thumbs up to the magazine's story on a new "brat pack of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs". Despite this, Amazon.com lets us know he still needs an Oral B 7850DLX Professional Care Power Toothbrush, which retails at just over $100.

While he still may need the toothbrush, some of his older items I doubt are still on his most wanted list, including the 3rd generation 10 gigabyte Apple iPod, and Pirates of the Caribbean - The Curse of the Black Pearl (Two-Disc Collector's Edition)> DVD.

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4. Cory Doctorow (Boing Boing)
Amazon Wish List

Cory is looking for a Walt Disney Treasures DVD on "Tomorrowland: Disney in Space and Beyond" from 1959, as well as a number of books from Jane Jacobs, including Systems of Survival: A Dialogue on the Moral Foundations of Commerce and Politics and Cities and the Wealth of Nations.

Sounds thrilling.

As fun as those may or may not be, they'll do him more good than the pair of Handspring springboard modules he asked for back in 2001 to deliver GPS and remote control capabilities to the line of now-extinct handhelds.

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5. Guy Kawasaki (How to Change the World)
Amazon Wish List

Guy is a simple fellow. He's looking solely to get Total Hockey: The Official Encyclopedia of the National Hockey League. It looks like you can pick up a used copy of the 2003 edition for just under $5. Given how little he opted to spend on making Truemors, maybe this budget is just what he's looking for!

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6. Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook)
Amazon Wish List

Mark can probably buy just about anything he wants now, which explains why his Wish List is empty. However, when he was back in Dobbs Ferry, New York, before heading West to fame and fortune, he did ask for the Unrated version of American Pie, and Cruel Intentions, starring Sarah Michelle Gellar and Ryan Phillipe.

Maybe he'll refill his wish list soon. And maybe not.

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7. Loic Le Meur (Loic Le Meur.com)
Amazon Wish List

Similar to Guy, Loic only has one item in his wish list, a 2004 book titled We've Got Blog: How Weblogs Are Changing Our Culture. It retails for about $15. With his Seesmic application growing like crazy, it looks like he's got this Web app and blog thing nailed, but I'd feel better if somebody bought him the book.

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8. Maryam Scoble (Maryamie)
Amazon Wish List

While Robert Scoble's Amazon.com wish list isn't easy to find, you can still support the family by getting his wife, Maryam, a good book. She's quite the reader, looking for help on Babyproofing Your Marriage and solving problems with the Baby Whisperer.

When not reading, Maryam wouldn't mind a pair of ladies' Italian leather dress gloves (which Robert didn't get her last year, it appears), along with greatest hits albums by Elvis Presley and The Beatles.

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9. Steven Hodson (WinExtra)
Amazon Wish List

Steven, aiming to become the best Windows developer he can be, has asked for programming books on the Windows Presentation Foundation, including Programming WPF and Code + Markup: A Guide to the Microsoft Windows Presentation Foundation.

Unlike his prior list, which was stuck in the 2004 era, he swears this one will be updated more frequently.

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10. Kent Newsome (Newsome.org)
Amazon Wish List

Like Om, Kent is looking to upgrade his photographer cred by adding more hardware. Specifically, he's asking for a Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro USM Lens and the Sony Cybershot DSCV3 7.2MP Digital Camera with 4x Optical Zoom. Of course, they're not for the faint of heart. Buying either will set you back in the neighborhood of $500.

If you have a smaller budget, Kent also has a list of books he'd like, ranging from The Long Tomorrow by Leigh Brackett to False Dawn, by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro. Also, way back in 2004, Kent asked for a number of CDs from Howlin' Wolf that has yet to go fulfilled.

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11. MG Siegler (ParisLemon)
Amazon Wish List

Now here's a good list. MG Siegler wants Al Gore's book, The Assault on Reason, the Unrated version of SuperBad on DVD, and shockingly, an AppleTV.

Unsurprisingly, MG also wouldn't mind if you bought him a new MacBook Pro, worth $2,500, or some games for the Wii, which typically retail around $50.

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12. Jason Kaneshiro (Webomatica)
Amazon Wish List

It's no secret Jason loves his TV and movies. That's why his inclusion of box sets for Star Trek, Superman and Battlestar Galactica make sense.

He's also requesting one of my personal favorites, the DVD, Startup.com. If you're buying one for him, buy one for yourself too.

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Know more? Let us know, and we'll hope to add the Amazon wish lists of more famous bloggerati. It'd be great to show them we care by buying a few stocking stuffers. And if you're on this list, and your Amazon Wish List is in need of an update, let's get it done! The same goes for those of you who I searched for and couldn't find anything for certain. That means you, Steve Rubel, Gabe Rivera, Michael Arrington, Robert Scoble, Dave Winer, Pete Cashmore, Mathew Ingram, Ryan Block, Duncan Riley, Ross Mayfield and Hugh Macleod!

Apple's One Day Sale Lacks Premium Product Discounts

As the company does every year, Apple is holding a one-day "Day after Thanksgiving" sale, encouraging buyers to get an early jump on the holiday rush. But while iMacs, MacBooks, and low-end iPods were on sale, at roughly 5-10% discounts, the company's most sought-after products, including the iPhone and iPod Touch, didn't get a single dollar's worth of reduction.

As many Mac-focused sites reported, including MacRumors and Chris Pirillo, you could save from $51 to $101 off the price of a new iMac, the same $51 to $101 off from MacBooks, and anywhere from $11 to $31 apiece on iPod Shuffles and the iPod Classic.


While Apple billed the sale as letting customers "save big on some of our best sellers", it seemed you're really only able to "save small" on some of their products. The company's front page also stated, "Save big on iPod, iPhone and Mac gifts," but instead of discount iPhones, you instead have the option to get price-reduced bluetooth headsets, or carrying sleeves. Not exactly the same thing.

If you were interested in getting a new iPod Touch, iPhone or MacBook Pro, there's no sale for you. So not even this Apple fanboy will be reaching for his credit card for this sale.

Blogosphere Vacation KOs RSS Feeds, Down 60%

I don't believe we've yet reached the stage where one family member will Twitter from one side of the table to "Pass the Gravy" and another will update their Facebook status to complain the turkey "is" a bit dry. In fact, when the real world takes a vacation, it appears the blogosphere does as well in a big way. Using my Google Reader stats as one non-scientific measure, the total number of new items in my RSS feeds dropped by more than 50 percent from a typical Thursday, and you could see total traffic beginning to trend downwards as early as Tuesday this week.


On a typical Thursday, I read about 700 new items from my RSS feeds. According to Google Reader, Thursday is my 2nd-most busy day, behind only Wednesday, in this metric. But today, with about an hour left in Thanksgiving, we haven't yet broken through the 300 barrier.

(Note the above graphic has highlighted Saturday and Sunday in light blue. Today is red.)

That's not to say nothing has happened today. Mashable reported on some of the year's failures, and Robert Cringely covered Apple's patent settlement with Burst, while others pontificated on a rumor that News Corp. might be looking to add LinkedIn to its stable, next to MySpace, in a two-pronged attack against Facebook.

I expect tomorrow to be light as well, as most people took a four-day weekend. While the stock markets will be open, real business won't kick back up until next Monday. Should make for a pretty slow weekend on the Web.

Indulge Your Sweet Tooth With Old Time Candy

Growing up, many a Saturday morning was spent walking to the neighborhood store with my younger brother with a little more than a few dollars in our pocket. As regular as Saturday morning cartoons, we were on our way to get our fair share of 1 cent PAL bubble gum, 5 cent Atomic Fireball cinnamon candy and 16-ounch Pepsi Cola (which I preferred to Coke back then).

For some reason, while most adults passed that particular stage in their lives, I never really have. I still have a sweet tooth, and it's uncommon to not have something around the house or at work to fill that craving. And recently, I happened upon a brilliant site that helps not only fill my need for sugar, but nostalgia too. OldTimeCandy.com has a diabetes-inducing array of candy available for individual sale or in bulk, and aids the cavity creation process by offering sets of candy from particular decades, from the 1950s through the 1980s. In many cases, you'll see names of candy you remember fondly, but haven't seen in stores for years.

It may still seem strange to buy food or candy from the Web, but there's really no other substitute for getting all these candies in one place, from the aforementioned Atomic fireballs to bubble gum cigarettes, Chuckles, Fizzies, Gobstoppers, Hot Tamales, Jujubes, Mamba, Mary Janes, Necco wafers, Pop Rocks, Razzles, Violet Gum, Wax lips and Zotz.

And that's just part of the list.

I bought the 80's mix a few months ago, and absolutely enjoyed it. The only debate was to what I would consume first and how quickly. Now, the 70's mix is set to arrive this week, and I'm seriously looking forward to it. Before you hit your holiday shopping, this just might be a great place to find stocking stuffers, or just to give you a follow-on to Halloween. But you really don't need a reason any more than I do. Enjoy yourself and try some Old Time Candy!

Web 2.0 Logos Celebrate Halloween - You Scared?

It's October 31st, which can only mean that while the kids go door to door to get candy, we're going from Web site to Web site to find out which Web companies are embracing Halloween in the true tradition of logo modification!

Google, which has a very long history of this thing, is of course participating. So is Google's subsidiary, YouTube, and Google competitors, Yahoo! and Technorati. Even Friendfeed, started by some ex-Googlers, has debuted a great Halloween logo.

Can you find any notable Halloween themed logos out there that I missed, and hopefully some that have absolutely zero to do with Google? Post them in the comments, and we can update the picture.

Blogosphere On Holiday Drops RSS Feeds by 40%

On Saturday, I speculated that U.S. Web traffic was down significantly for the Memorial Day weekend, as I had seen a spike in the percentage of international visits to the blog. But the drop-off wasn't nearly as stark as the reduction in total posts received by my tracked RSS feeds in Google Reader for a typical Monday. On the whole, total postings were down on Saturday, Sunday and Monday, with Monday's holiday being down more than 40% off average.


I typically read about 500 RSS items per weekday, and half that number on Saturday and Sunday, according to my Google Reader trends.


My Google Reader stats, by day, with Mondays marked.

• On May 28th, Memorial Day, I read exactly 300 items.
  
• On May 21st, I read 509 items.
  
• On May 14th, I read 553 items.
  
• On May 7th, I read 530 items.
  
• On April 30th, I read 515 items.

Assuming the total number of RSS feeds I read remained constant, the usual 526.75 average I could expect for a Monday had been whittled down by 44%.

Sunday and Saturday were also down, but to a lower degree. On May 27th, I read 259 items, whereas my typical Sunday list tops 280. The decline was only about 10%. On May 26th, I read 248 items, whereas a typical Saturday list is about 260. Saturdays are almost always the lightest days of the week, and the drop-off was miniscule.

Causes for the decline are numerous, of course. With most U.S. offices close, you would see a drop of work-related news, technology events to cover, and press releases to hit the wires. Some took the holiday away from the computer altogether. Others considered Monday a blog holiday as well. But rather than just have a gut feeling that traffic was down overall, Google Reader's stats give us a statistical benchmark.

U.S. Web Traffic Down For Memorial Day?

This being a 3-day weekend and the traditional kick-off to summer vacation season, it looks like even the geeks have left the keyboards behind and headed for more enjoyable places - ostensibly without net access. Robert Scoble's on his way to South Lake Tahoe, and even TechMeme makes it look like it will be a slow weekend.

Of interest, I looked at my own traffic, and I see that nobody from within 1,000 miles has come to the blog in the last little while. Instead of the usual domestic traffic, with much of that from the Bay Area, I've been frequented by visitors from India, Egypt, Belgium, New South Wales, Poland, the UK and a flurry from Nova Scotia. I guess they didn't get the memo the rest of us are on holiday.



Also of interest, it looks like the Register.com laptop theft I mentioned yesterday is leaking to mainstream press. The Inquirer (UK) starts the coverage. Paul Ferguson notes the security breach as well.

Google's Earth Day Logo Makes a Splash

Though Google's home page remains spartan, the company often makes edits to their logo around holidays, notable birthdays, or to commemorate anniversaries of significant events.

Today being Earth Day, Google debuted a logo that shows the Google name partially submerged below water, as an iceberg. The top half of the Google is melting, and much of the mass remains below the presumed ocean.


Today's Google Logo (Earth Day Theme)

Clicking on the Google logo from the home page takes you to a predefined search for the term "Earth Day". So why choose the logo they did? In my best guess mode, I have to assume this is Google's quiet, subtle reminder and buy-in on the theory of global warming, made a topic du jour by the Oscar-winning Inconvenient Truth, fronted by Al Gore.

Google doesn't typically make a stand on political issues. The company has been vocal on the topic of net neutrality and privacy, but steers clear of more partisan conversation. But at the same time, the company houses some of the brightest minds in technology, and with buildings full of Ph.D.'s, it's no surprise they would find the very real issue of global warming as one they would highlight on Earth Day. Good for Google. I hope others besides myself take note.

Update: Welcome visitors from Scoble's Link Blog and TechMeme. Looks like others did take note after all...

Baseball Themed Belated Birthday Bash

With most families seeing April 8 as Easter Sunday this year, and my work-related travels taking me to San Diego this most recent week, today is the day my wife and I set aside to invite friends to our home for an Oakland A's themed birthday extravaganza. Now, with a few dozen expected to arrive in just over an hour, our house is decked out with all things baseball, the colors green and gold most heavily featured, of course.

We have the A's vs. the Rangers playing on both TVs, in the living room and bedroom, a baseball themed birthday cake, green and gold napkins and plates, ballpark food, including polish dogs, peanuts, jelly beans and Skittles (green and yellow hand selected). We have all matter of A's paraphernalia out, from team blankets to pot holders and bobbleheads. Should be a fun time.

I don't typically make a lot of noise around holidays and birthdays, especially my own, but the friends are arriving from all over. From the East Bay and the Peninsula, to lifelong pals driving up from the Los Angeles area, just for the event. As I told nearby neighbors, you will know the party is a success by what time the cops are called. But I was kidding. Or was I? You'll have to wait and see.

Today, Turning 30, I Get to Start Feeling Old

First things first. Today I turn 30. If you're reading this on RSS, click through and make a comment to wish me a happy birthday! (Pathetic, I know.)

After years of thinking I was the younger one at church, at work, or in some social settings, I've come to realize that it's no longer true. The baseball players I watch on TV rarely have birthdates before mine. Many of the elite Web pioneers are around my age, making me realize that I could be lagging in my career trends, and not exactly leading the pack.

But that's just part of my being ultra-competitive, and having highest expectations. Now, my next milestones start to look less like being a kid or a young adult, and more like numbers that represent different stages of life. 35. 40. 50.

While taking up space in the 25-29 age bracket, I got married, changed titles at the company three times, all without changing jobs, moved twice, and racked up almost 200,000 frequent flier miles. Just some things that come to mind. From 30-34, what will change? Will we move and get a new house? Will the family be expanded? What will business look like compared to how it is now? I don't have a crystal ball. But the stake is in the ground.

That's what 30 means to me. It's a signpost, marking one era of my life is now behind me, and we have to keep pushing forward, so when I do reach 35, 40, 50... I'll be pleased with what I accomplished.

Blogosphere Kicks Off April Fools Early

The very best April Fools jokes have just enough truth in them for somebody to secretly want them to be true, and to be delivered in such a way that the person being pranked isn't 100 percent sure the joke's on them.

On the Web, Google has made this a black art of sorts, between their "launch" of Google Romance and Google Mars, interspersed with their very real launch of GMail in 2004 that had everybody confused as to whether anybody in their right mind would offer a full gigabyte of e-mail for free. We all know how that turned out. It was real. Those of us (including me) who were sure it was a prank were fooled.

This year, it looks like the blogosphere couldn't keep quiet long enough for the calendars to officially flip to April 1 in the United States. TechCrunch kicked off the festivities by "announcing" they had acquired Phil Kaplan's F***edCompany.com, effectively bringing their coverage of the startup space full circle - from their launch to their eventual death. Many people, including Dave Winer of Scripting.com, were fooled. This was no doubt due in part to ValleyWag's earlier coverage that the famed dotcom deadpool site was up for sale.

That one was good. Very good. Mathew Ingram thought so as well.

Now, Robert Scoble is back from his self-imposed blog exile, saying that Apple is set to release yet another i-Device, called iReader, in collaboration with Cingular, Amazon and Google. I guess if you make up a rumor, you might as well go whole-hog and drop a bunch of company names in there. I'm surprised Nintendo didn't make the cut. He went the tried and true Apple rumor route, citing an unnamed Apple executive dumb enough to use it in public. It might have been too soon for Robert to return to the blogosphere, but hopefully his scoop won't rank among the best by the conclusion of tomorrow.

Last year's April 1 pranks were pretty good. My favorites were Slashdot.org's changing their look and feel from industrial green to My Little Pony pink and China offering to buy Google. (See last year's summary here)

We look forward to more silliness in this most silly of holidays.

Valentines Day? But Our Christmas Cards Are Still Up...

It hit me while driving home last night. While trying to find a radio station to listen to, I heard the familiar voice of Tom Shane from the Shane Company, offering me a new friend in the diamonds, rubies and sapphire business. His commercial asked me if I knew just what gem I should get for my wife or girlfriend (or both). And I thought immediately... Valentine's Day? Already?

I could swear we just got done with Christmas and then New Year's. We just started back at work after a week off... or so it feels. But glancing at the calendar tells me an entire month has gone by since Christmas, and that it won't be too long until we're a mere two weeks away from candy hearts and valentines. And right now, that doesn't feel very romantic. That sounds like an obligation. One I'm incapable of negotiating with my wife (or girlfriend) to see if we can skip it this time around.

In fact, our Christmas Cards are still up around our fireplace. We have plenty of chocolate at home strewn around the kitchen from various vendors. So we're not ready. I lobby instead that we move the date to give us more time to prepare. It's not that I don't care, it's just that I don't care... yet.