Egads! Another Online Photo Printing Service?

I am often asked what company I use to print out my photos. I look for a place that has a combination of good quality and price. I think you should never pay more than 15 cents for a 4x6 print. I remember in the early days of online printing where they charged 35 cents a print! If I need the photos in an hour, I usually just upload them to Walgreens and pick them up at my local store. It usually costs 19 cents a print, but they always have weekly promotions to bring the price down to 15 cents or less. However, a lot of it does depends on the actual store that will be doing the printing. I used to get my prints developed at Costco, but the last few times, I was not satisfied at all with the quality. I tend to think that stores with a high volume of orders are not able to give each order the adequate amount of attention, in regards to reviewing and tweaking colors. I have a friend who pays a little more to get his prints developed at his local Wolf Camera, but he feels it is well worth it, due to the quality of the prints.

In regards to ordering online, I used to be a member of Dotphoto, which at the time had the cheapest prices for 4x6s. But a bad experience with them deleting photos without my permission caused me to look elsewhere. I have also spent time with Snapfish, Ofoto (now Kodak Gallery), and Shutterfly in the past. Yes, I will admit it, I am a online-photo floozie.

My current choice is a new site called Artscow. Strange name, I know.
Part of it probably has to do with the fact that they are based in Hong Kong. Can you say lost in translation? I heard about the site about a month ago while perusing one of my favorite bargain sites. For all new members, they are offering 200 free 4x6s, 200 free 5x7s, and 1 free 8x8 photobook. I couldn't resist that offer, so I signed up right away. The site itself is a little cheesy, kind of like a lot of things that come out of Asia (teal + pink + bright yellow clothing with bunnies anyone?) but nonetheless, functional. With my Mom's birthday coming up, I decided to make her a photobook. They were also running another promotion at the same time where for every photobook you created and ordered, they would give you 3 more photobook credits. Since they are just rolling out their service, they want to test out their printing capacity, and so want as many members to order as possible. The book itself was free, but it cost $13 for shipping/handling, understandable since it is being sent from across the globe. (Ordering products from Hong Kong is not unusual for me. When I needed a new pair of glasses, I ordered them from here for less than a third of the price I would have paid at my local Lenscrafters. Thank goodness the world is flat!). Two weeks later, I received my book in the mail. What did I think? Ha ha, well, you will just have to read my review (with photos!). Berry, the crazy CEO of Artscow is running another promotion where you post your review of your book on their online forum, and he credits your account $10. Cha-ching! Berry, you are my kind of guy, you crazy yellow fellow! I think I am in love.

I have not ordered any prints from them yet, but am planning on it and will let you know how they turn out. In the meantime, have a cow, or at least Art's cow, and join me at Artscow. Full disclosure time: I don't work for Berry, but if you join through the above link, I will receive some photo credits. Honesty is the best policy. :)

What should I blog about?

Happy 4th of July everyone! In honor of Independence Day, I need to become less independent and more dependent on you, my readers (ie Vanessa, Hannah and Tim). What should be the overall theme of my blog? Right now, it's just a bunch of random stuff, which is fine I suppose, but I would like to focus on a specific topic more. Perhaps I should leave this site to random stuff, and create a new blog.

The experts say the first step to a successful blog is to pick a topic to blog about that you are passionate about. I guess that's the hard part for me - I am a jack of all trades and master of none. There's not much I am passionate about, but there are a lot of things that interest me. In no particular order - my family, my friends, the Christian life, parenting, technology, gadgets, slick deals, lifehacking, photography, web design/development, the NBA, a good book, current events, graphic novels, humor, witty people, the Wii, sentimental stuff, creating stuff, making new friends, downtime, travel, exploring new places, BBQ...and the list goes on. Yeesh, I am definitely all over the place.

The second step to a successful blog, besides updating often, is to get to know your readers. I know my wife pretty well (love you!) , and I've know Tim and Hannah for awhile. For example, I know Hannah has no interest in all things NBA, despite the fact that her hometown Celtics are once again the reigning world champions. So if I were to focus my blogging on the latest NBA news, I would immediately lose one of my most devoted readers. Boo, wouldn't want that to happen. But, Hannah does love all things parenting, and she has some great posts about her experiences with parenting and with life in general. Another example - I enjoy Tim's posts on his adventures on the bike, but I know my dear wife has no interest at all in bicycling, sorry Tim. What is my dear wife into? She loves making her cards, which I'm pretty sure don't really garner much interest with Tim the biker. Is there some way, pardon the cliche, to have your cake and eat it too? Hmm, guess the lesson is that there is no subject/topic that appeals to everyone, so maybe I am asking the impossible in regards to focusing on a specific topic while at the same time keeping everyone interested.

Looking back at my past blogs, the post that generated the most response in regards to comments was my post on our water heater woes. Now I know no one in their right mind is really interested in water heaters, but seems like the story behind what happened is what appealed to everyone (all 4 of you). Maybe the first order of business is to finish the story with part 2. Problem is, it seems like it happened such a long time ago, and I already forget more than I remember. Looks like that is another lesson I need to learn - less inspiration, more perspiration in regards to timely blogs. So without further ado...

Things in my life that I need to blog about sooner rather than later

• Water heater woes part 2
  
• My cousin's wedding in Cleveland
• Getting in shape with the Wii Fit
  
• My new job
• How fast Benjamin is growing up
• My HTC Touch
• My sister's going to Kenya
• The family video I am working on
• Foundation repair on our house
  
• Pros & Cons of moving to Mueller
• Useful websites
• Nerds vs. Geeks
  

Okay folks, I've gone on already for way too long. Remember my question readers - should I focus on a particular topic, or remain random and rambling? Enjoy the 4th, and be careful with those fireworks! (I almost burned down my neighbor's house when I was in middle school due to a stray Jumping Jack, so I know what I'm talking about) Stay safe and hydrated everyone!

Where's Matt? Still Dancing...

He's back, and this time he invited a few friends to come along for the dance! Just watched this tonight for the first time, and I thought it was funny as well as heartwarming, believe it or not. Good job Matt! Coincidentally, according to his website, Matt arrived in Austin today, June 22. Hmm, maybe he's getting started on the 2009 edition! If anyone knows where he's going to be filming, let me know. This might be my chance to showcase Benjamin's amazing dance skills.

Water (Heater) Woes...part 1

Whew, this last week has been a crazy one. This past Wednesday night two supercell thunderstorms rolled into town for a little visit. Texas thunderstorms are pretty amazing, nothing like the wimpy showers in Seattle. Thankfully, we were able to avoid the wrath of the first one, but weren't so fortunate for the second. We lost power around 1 am, Thursday morning. By this time, we were all wide awake, due to the continuous thunder. Thankfully Benjamin was able to go back to sleep easily, and I was able to enjoy the lightning show, but Vanessa was a little worried about possible tornadoes. After about 20 minutes, the storm died down a bit and we were able to go back to sleep, although with no A/C, things were a bit stuffy.


We wake up around 8am, still without electricity. I decide to call Austin Energy to report the outage and to see if they have any idea when it might come back on. The AE rep tells me to try and reset the breaker, so I head downstairs to the kitchen, where the breakerbox is located. I come down the stairs and as I am about to enter the kitchen, I step into a pool of water. No bueno. I let out an audible "oh no!" that almost results in Vanessa having a panic attack. She comes downstairs and asks me what is wrong. Turns out our water heater must have gotten frightened by the intensity of the storm, for it had leaked all over our kitchen, dining room, and downstairs bedroom. The photo below is not my water heater. If only...

I immediately shut off the water supply, and come to realize besides having no power, we now also have no water. No bueno. But surely, the electricity would come back soon, right?


Thankfully, Benjamin had his Mothers Morning out on Thursday, so Vanessa took him out to breakfast and dropped him off, while I proceeded to try and figure out our next plan of action. I called my friend Manuel who lives close by and asked to borrow his wet vac to remove the standing water. After I pick it up, it dawns on me that without power, the wet-vac is about as useless as my neighbor's Chinese-crested hairless dog. I then decide I should call a plumber to come check out the water heater to see what needed to be done. He shows up around 10 o'clock, and tells me we need a new water heater, and to purchase it, install it, and bring it all up to code, would cost $986. It was now my turn to have a panic attack. I called my father-in-law who works selling plumbing supplies to contractors and asked him what he thought of the price. He told me he sells his water heaters for $170 at cost, and that if I ended up paying that much for the water heater to be installed, he would have to ask for a divorce from me being his son-in-law. Those might not have been his exact words, but I got the gist. I then turned to Mr. Plumber, thanked him for coming out, but told him that I still wanted to have a happy relationship with the in-laws, and that we wouldn't be able to use his services...


Not longer after he left, Vanessa returned with breakfast tacos, and we decide to head to Home Depot to check out the prices there. As we strolled down the aisle holding hands, I was thankful to the Lord that He provided me with such a wonderful partner and friend...sniff sniff. Okay, so we found a water heater priced at $280, and decided to have it installed through Home Depot as well. We are now proud owners of a 12 month no interest Home Depot credit card, yippee. The nice lady at the counter let us also charge our almost-dead cell phones while we waited for our new card to be charged. The cost of installation was going to be $225 if nothing else needed to be fixed, which most definitely was not going to be the case for our late 70's era townhouse. After getting our cell phones working again, we called a neighbor to see if the power was back on yet. No dice, so we headed off to a coffee shop to try and get me some internet access so I could do some work. Unfortunately, I couldn't concentrate too well, and Vanessa was hungry, so we headed to old faithful Chipotle, and had a quick lunch before heading off to pick up Benjamin from his school at 2pm. We were faced with a slight dilemma, since there was still no power and no water, we didn't want to take Benjamin back home. Then I remembered one of Vanessa's good friend's lived close-by and needed her router fixed. Vanessa called her, and she told us to come on over. Melanie graciously allowed us to hang out there while we waited to hear from the Home Depot plumber. Melanie makes some pretty cool stamps, and turns out her husband Paul is pretty skilled as well - Benjamin had a blast playing with Jonathan and William on the cool jungle gym that Paul built a few years back -



Where was I when those oh so useful handyman skills were being passed out? Oh yeah, that's right, glued to the tv, playing Nintendo...sigh. But before I get sidetracked even more, back to the story...

I get a phone call that the installation crew is on their way to our house, so I jump in the car and head over to meet them, leaving Vanessa and Benjamin with Melanie and the boys. On the way home, I call Austin Energy to get an update. The nice lady I talk to tells me that we won't be getting our electricity back Thursday, worst case scenario not until Saturday. When I pull into the house, I realize that she was right. Still no juice. The installation crew gets there not too long afterwards, two young guys in their twenties, who seem like they belong in one of those Partnerships for a Drug Free America commercials. They proceed to tell me that it would be best if the electricity was working so they would be able to test out the water heater after they installed it. I couldn't argue with that, and told them I would reschedule. As they were pulling out, I heard one of them shout out, "We're done early! Yeah, baby!" I was glad at least someone was getting some satisfaction out of this entire debaucle. . I headed back to Paul and Melanie's to pick up my family. Paul had gotten home by this time and we started talking. I told him what happened and he told me there's no way I should have to pay that much for installation. He then offers to come over on Saturday to help me install the water heater. I am touched by his offer and quickly accept before he can come to his senses. By this time, Vanessa and I have decided it would be best if she and Benjamin headed to her parents for the next couple of days while I try to get the house back to normal. We thanked Paul and Melanie for being gracious hosts and headed home, where Vanessa quickly packed up, fed Benjamin dinner, and hit the road. I then decided it was time for some decompression and went to go play basketball with some friends. Then we all went to Pluckers and watched the Spurs stomp the Hornets in game 6, and suddenly, everything was better. I ended up staying the night at some friends (thanks Allen & Kristen!) since our house was still without electricity at 11 pm, and for all I knew, it wouldn't be back until Saturday. When I woke up Friday morning, I called Manuel and discovered that the power had come back on at 1am. Can you believe it, I survived a whole 24 hours without water and electricity! Yeah, boy! I am a survivor! Is that all you got? Come on, how about a real challenge? Bring on the living dead! (of course, I am being facetious. I am no MacGyver, I have never watched Man vs Wild, and if I were in an airplane crash in the Andes, there's no doubt in my mind that I would be the first survivor to be eaten by my fellow passengers.)


Part 2 coming soon, in which Sam watches in awe as Paul installs a water heater. Seriously, there is no way I would have known how to do that by myself. Guess that's what I get for spending my formative years with a fake plumber.