And Then it is Winter

I received the following little prose on life, emailed to me from my wife tonight.....whom recently lost her father, and thereby me a father-in-law. A man of great stature, honesty, love, fairness and realistically we all saw as still full of life. It just all makes you stop and pause for a minute :(

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Nothing more has to be said.

I FIRST STARTED READING THIS EMAIL & WAS READING FAST UNTIL I REACHED THE THIRD SENTENCE. I STOPPED AND STARTED OVER, READING SLOWER AND THINKING ABOUT EVERY WORD. THIS EMAIL IS VERY THOUGHT PROVOKING. MAKES YOU STOP AND THINK. READ SLOWLY!

AND THEN IT IS WINTER

You know. . . time has a way of moving quickly and catching you unaware of the passing years. It seems just yesterday that I was young, just married and embarking on my new life with my mate. Yet in a way, it seems like eons ago, and I wonder where all the years went. I know that I lived them all. I have glimpses of how it was back then and of all my hopes and dreams.

But, here it is... the winter of my life and it catches me by surprise...How did I get here so fast? Where did the years go and where did my youth go? I remember well seeing older people through the years and thinking that those older people were years away from me and that winter was so far off that I could not fathom it or imagine fully what it would be like.

But, here it is...my friends are retired and getting grey...they move slower and I see an older person now. Some are in better and some worse shape than me...but, I see the great change...Not like the ones that I remember who were young and vibrant...but, like me, their age is beginning to show and we are now those older folks that we used to see and never thought we'd be. Each day now, I find that just getting a shower is a real target for the day! And taking a nap is not a treat anymore... it's mandatory! Cause if I don't of my own free will... I just fall asleep where I sit!

And so...now I enter into this new season of my life unprepared for all the aches and pains and the loss of strength and ability to go and do things that I wish I had done but never did!! But, at least I know, that though the winter has come, and I'm not sure how long it will last...this I know, that when it's over on this earth...it's over. A new adventure will begin!

Yes, I have regrets. There are things I wish I hadn't done...things I should have done, but indeed, there are many things I'm happy to have done. It's all in a lifetime.

So, if you're not in your winter yet...let me remind you, that it will be here faster than you think. So, what ever you would like to accomplish in your life, please do it quickly! Don't put things off too long!! Life goes by quickly. So, do what you can today, as you can never be sure whether this is your winter or not! You have no promise that you will see all the seasons of your life...so, live for today and say all the things that you want your loved ones to remember...and hope that they appreciate and love you for all the things that you have done for them in all the years past!!


"Life" is a gift to you. The way you live your life is your gift to those who come after. Make it a fantastic one.

LIVE IT WELL! ENJOY TODAY! DO SOMETHING FUN! BE HAPPY ! HAVE A GREAT DAY!

Remember "It is health that is real wealth and not pieces of gold and silver."

LIVE HAPPY IN 2013!

LASTLY, CONSIDER THE FOLLOWING:

TODAY IS THE OLDEST YOU'VE EVER BEEN, YET THE YOUNGEST YOU'LL EVER BE. SO - ENJOY THIS DAY WHILE IT LASTS.

~Your kids are becoming you......but your grandchildren are perfect!

~Going out is good.. Coming home is better!

~You forget names.... But it's OK because other people forgot they even knew you!!!

~You realize you're never going to be really good at anything.... especially golf.

~The things you used to care to do, you no longer care to do, but you really do care that you don't care to do them anymore.

~You sleep better on a lounge chair with the TV blaring than in bed. It's called "pre-sleep".

~You miss the days when everything worked with just an "ON" and "OFF" switch..

~You tend to use more 4 letter words ... "what?"..."when?"... ???

~Now that you can afford expensive jewelry, it's not safe to wear it anywhere.

~You notice everything they sell in stores is "sleeveless"?!!!

~What used to be freckles are now liver spots.

~Everybody whispers.

~You have 3 sizes of clothes in your closet.... 2 of which you will never wear again.

~~~But Old is good in some things: Old Songs, Old movies, and best of all, OLD FRIENDS!!

Stay well, "OLD FRIEND!"

Send this on to other "Old Friends!" and let them laugh in AGREEMENT!!!

It's Not What You Gather, But What You Scatter That Tells What Kind Of Life You Have Lived.


AND THEN IT IS WINTER

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I am not sure who sent this to her or who wrote it, but the realism, love and humour all strike a chord with us at the moment....enjoy life, it is all you have!

My quick time with the HTC One XL

I had a quick play with an HTC One XL today and came away a little confused at what HTC have done with the core navigation and contact management in Android. In my opinion I do not think they have added anything to the user interface or experience and in most instances have made it less intuitive and added steps to what is in the vanilla Android experience pretty clear and simple.....a couple of examples.....

The first is the recent apps interface. The HTC has a dedicated "Recent apps" software button, as do all recent Android devices, but it then displays the apps in a horizontal full length preview and only shows you one app in the center of the screen at any one time. This means that you have to actually scroll/swipe if you want to switch to anything other than the last app you were using and that you have no idea how far along the list you will have to go until you actually land on the app that you were after. You may as well go to the home screen and re-open the app directly. Kinda broken.

The next is the contacts interface. Upon opening the list you are not presented with a list which has the default android "quick view" (my way of describing the ability to click on any contact image for an overview of their information and ways in which you may like to interact with them), instead you just have a long list of contacts where you need to fully open up their contact card to see what you "know" about them. Not a big deal but still a small step back from the simple and intuitive access in vanilla Android.

The other part of the contacts which took me second to adjust to was the way in which you control which contacts you actually see. By clicking on the "People" label at the top, you have to wait a second for some weird reason while it loads your contact sources, and then you can open/expand each of them to select which "groups" you would like to see. The only reason I raise this is that I see this as more of a settings option than a primary interface option, so it did take me a while to find. Again, not a big deal, but a creep away from them beings "settings" and back into user land display.  This may also be considered a nice easy way to access this display control feature, but seriously now, how often to you change that "setting"?

My last gripe is, again possibly minor, but in my opinion another break in the user experience, where I continually found the "menu" (the three little dots for the context sensitive options/menu/settings access) to be at the top of the screen, whereas the default Android system applications place this at the bottom to the right of the main navigation software buttons. Just means that you have to shift your hand/finger to the top of the screen, a little harder than tapping the bottom right when operating with one hand or two for that matter.

I guess my point in all of this is that Google has spent countless hours in research, statistical analysis and user interface and experience design to come up with and be where they are now with Android core. Now it just seems to me that with all that in mind, you would need a very, very, very, very good reason to make a change to that and if you did you would want to make damn sure that is actually improved every aspect of the UI you were touching.

I say NO to all manufacturer skins. I have yet to see one that actually improves on the entire system. Sure if you want to replace the camera app with something smarter (although with 4.2.1 that will be a hard task) or a better dialer (again, getting harder and harder) or any other app for that matter, consider what you are undertaking and consider why...cause I am not sold on any of them yet and have seen and used quite a few.

The other big point is that these "skins" delay handsets from receiving recent releases from the Android project and add to the argument of fragmentation of Android. Nexus and Google Experience Devices (GED) all the way!

/end rant