My 11-inch MacBook Air is here.

These are just first impressions, off the top of my head, based on almost no use. If you're a Mac fanboy, save yourself some grief and don't read this piece. You won't understand it and you won't like it. If you ignore this warning don't complain to me!

1. There are tradeoffs.

2. The screen is seriously small. No Ethernet.

3. If I'm seriously expected to think of this as a netbook, I really resent that it costs almost $1000 more than the last netbook I bought.

3a. That netbook cost a lot less, but did a lot more. Longer battery life. Larger disk capacity. Three USB's not two. Ethernet. SD card slot. I know why we need all those things. All of them. Why does Apple think it can ship so much less and charge so much more and not force product comparisons? They're depending on the Reality Distortion Field keeping from people from being even slightly pragmatic in reviewing this product.

4. Haven't decided whether I should leave this guy hooked up to Dropbox. It's synching unbelievably slowly, over my fast FIOS connection. It says it'll be done in 59 days. Let's see where it is tomorrow morning.

5. I'm going to DC on Saturday, overnight. I will take the Air. Should I also take my iPad? (Probably will. But to be fair if I travelled with my 13-inch MacBook Pro, I would have brought the iPad as well.)

6. I'm thinking about returning it. Not sure if this is going to fit into my workflow.

7. iTunes still sucks.

8. The thing that really ticks me off is this -- why not, for all the extra money and missing basic features, push the envelope. That's what I used to like about Apple. They built in networking into every Mac in the 80s. It was something extra that the other guys didn't do, all to build a market. How about putting a Wimax modem in there. Make it a better netbook, instead of just taking features out and jacking up the price.

I guess basically, at this point, I'm not thrilled with this purchase. But that's a first impression. Don't trust it, I don't.

PS: I called it Hooterville.

PPS: If you're wondering why I bought this even though the specs are out there, and I "should have known" it was an overpriced ripoff before I bought it, I have two answers. 1. Please read my previous piece. It explains, carefully, how Apple and Amazon team up to get over those objections. 2. I watched Jobs roll it out (only the second time they've broadcast a SteveNote) and was told it had magical properties you could only understand by possessing one. He held it with reverence. Said it would make me a better human being. (At least implied that.)

PPPS: I want to outlaw Apple Fanboys the same way Apple is outlawing Flash.

 10/28/2010; 9:17:51 PM.   .

Are the bike lanes in New York working?

Will bikes in New York ever become a safe and common mode of transport, as they are in Amsterdam?

Imho: Only if there are a lot more bikes in the bike lanes, all the time.

Because there are so few bikes on New York avenues, the lanes are being used for cars and pedestrians and conversations, which make them more or less useless for bikes.

Bottom-line: If we want bike lanes to work, more bikes have to use them.

 10/28/2010; 8:55:19 PM.   .

Today's ride took me to the East River, up and down, but this isn't going to cut it as a regular trip.

First, the ride to the east is truly dangerous. In one place I was riding up a two-way street that was about to turn one way (the other way). A cab enters the street on the wrong side, headed straight for me. I had to ditch between two cars.

Anywhere that you have to share a narrow street with cars is really dangerous. The moving cars cut real close to you, leaving you no option but to ride real close to the parked cars. And there's nothing you can do if a door opens into your path. I hate that kind of riding.

Trucks routinely park in the bike lanes on the avenues. The only way around them is to pull into traffic or ride around them on the sidewalk. Which choice do you like better?

The actual riding on the bike paths, what little there is (compared to the west), is pretty good. But to the north there's a problem with the United Nations. They can't run a bike path through there, apparently. So the path just ends, with the UN in the distance, with the 59th St bridge beyond that. Today was a gorgeous day and a nice picture was possible.

Turning south, I went as far as the Williamsburg Bridge, again a very nice ride. I just wish there was more of it.

I like the west side so much better. And it's not really that much more of a schlep to get over there. So the next time I go out riding, I'll just head west.

The map for the day. 47 minutes. 6.65 miles.

 10/28/2010; 6:11:59 PM.   .

On gulker.com, a headline we've been anticipating.

Chris has died, and it's covered, on his personal blog.

A natural-born-blogger, to the end.

Reminds me of a story...

I was at Dean HQ in Burlington, on the night of the Iowa primary and The Scream. I had the keys, I could post to the home page of the Dean blog, thanks to Nicco who I had just met who thought it was a fun idea to have me in the room, blogging for Dean on the big night. It felt hugely powerful. It might have been the most-watched place in the blogosphere that night.

They're projecting Larry King on a screen in the office where we all can see. The Candidate is on and he says is clearly and unambiguously. We lost Iowa. But we're still in it. On to New Hampshire!

So I open a new post and enter a title: We Lost Iowa (or somesuch). The body of the post quotes Governor Dean as I heard him on TV. Short and sweet. I posted it to the home page and kicked back with a satisfied feeling of a blogger who got the scoop.

As people in the office refresh the home page, a meeting convenes in a private office with the door shut, where it's decided that the post will come down. We only run positive news, it seems. But Dean, using his instinct for putting out the real story as soon as possible, to be the source of the bad news so people know we're still here, there will be a tomorrow, he understood that the blog should just acknowledge it.

So like it or not, it makes perfect sense for gulker.com report the end of Gulker. And like it or not, though we lost Chris, we're still here, there will be a tomorrow.

My two cents...

People play different roles in your life.

In mine, Chris Gulker was a teacher.

He taught me about web content management at a time when that's what I most needed to learn.

He's still teaching me

Thanks man!

PS: I'll seeya soon enough.

 10/28/2010; 9:58:10 AM.   .

I am blessed with friends who love me, and who I love. Each for who they are, never trying to impose an ideal of mine on them. Like a lot of people, I did that when I was younger. Learned the lessons. Learned to appreciate people on their own terms.

NakedJen is one of those people. She calls herself a fairy. It fits. Once, on a trip to NY, we rode to Staten Island on a boat, for free. We stood at the front of the boat watching its intricate docking procedure. When we landed NakedJen was the first fairy off the ferry. This became our mantra for the day. First fairy off the ferry. First fairy off the ferry. First fairy off the ferry. First fairy off the ferry.

Anyway...

 10/28/2010; 8:14:08 AM.   .

This is how it goes with me and new Apple products.

First I go to the page on the Apple Store, and I go through all the configuration options. I get to the last screen where I have to say Go For It, and back out. Invariably it's the lack of instant gratification that does me in.

Then, if I'm really interested, I go to an Apple Store and check it out. That's where guilt comes in. I really don't need this. I already have too many xxx's where xxx could be mouse, keyboard, router, phone, laptop, desktop.

Then I go to the Amazon page for the product and that's where my resistance meets its match. I go to the page one time and stare. Read the reviews. Think about it. Think some more. Leave. Then a day (or hour) later I'm back, staring at the 1-click button at the top of the screen. If I just click the button, it will be here tomorrow. If I just click the button. If I just click the button. Yadda yadda.

Then the thought metamorphizes. You know you're going to give in at some point and click the button. If you click it right now you can enjoy the product tomorrow! Turns out that's just the right amount of instant gratification. Not so much that I have to feel the guilt now, that gets postponed a few hours. And by the time it arrives, the guilt has been replaced by acceptance.

This thing is going to be part of my repetoire now. Part of my chorus. My supporting cast. One of my fellow team members. Posse. If it's a computer or a router I'm thinking about its name. I'm thinking about what I'm going to do with the old version of whatever it is I'm buying. I'm getting good at mothballing these suckas.

Anyway, I write all this today because yesterday I went through the last two stages of the ritual on the new MacBook Air. I bought an 11-inch laptop (still not ready to call it a netbook), with 128GB of disk. I'm thinking of giving it an ironic name like Hooterville or Green Acres, because it's such a big city computer, so slick, might as well make light and give it the name of a bumpkin. Maybe Mr Haney or Arnold The Pig?

Ohhhh they've so got me trained to give them money.

 10/28/2010; 7:37:10 AM.   .