Today at noon (our time, anyway), Apple put a black t-shirt on Uncle Steve, and like Willy Wonka, he proceeded to extoll the virtues of all the new things we didn’t know we needed.

First off, let me start by saying that I want a guitar like the one they used for the signature image from the keynote:

Now on to the fun stuff. Beck, @braddog and I went to lunch — regular Wednesday occurrence for us — knowing that during lunch, Uncle Steve would begin the presentation. As it ends up, the place we frequent has apparently put in a wifi hotspot. Score!

Apple had announced that they would stream this event live, so with the discovery of wifi, I set up my iPad to watch the keynote live. Jay had his iPad following the Engadget live text feed from the auditorium floor, and I did the same with my iPhone. Yes, it was geekapalooza.

So what’d Steve announce? Well, in no particular order…

New iPods were all over the place. There was a refresh of the iPod Shuffle announced. Apple decided that the pill/hairclip/borg-implant format of the now-previous version of the Shuffle wasn’t exactly a big hit. I mean, there were no buttons on it anywhere. Aside from providing a mystery for our childrens’ childrens’ children when they cull through the landfills we left behind, there’s really no use for a device with no obvious interface. Enter the new Shuffle… or, is it the old Shuffle? It was really a back-to-the-future moment to see the new Shuffle rolled out, looking almost exactly like my old trusty red Shuffle. It’s a tad bit smaller left-to-right, but still sports the great big ol’ alligator clip on the back. Hurray! Nothing new for me though. Mine’s a 2GB, and I think the new one will go to 4GB. For what I use it for, there’s not much need for the extra capacity, Voice Over, Genius Playlists or any of the other new little things.

The refresh of the iPod Nano was definitely a cooler machine… kinda. About the size of an iPod Shuffle, the new Nano has no click-wheel, with everything controlled through a touch-screen interface on a teency screen. This one also has an alligator clip on it, which I think is a great addition for something that small. But — and there’s always a “but” — there are some missing features. The new Nano does not have a camera, leaving the Nano 5G as the oddball of the line for having one. I’ve also been led to believe that you can’t watch video on the new Nano. These are both kinda big things — philosophically — for me. Uncle Steve sold us on a Flip video killer last year with the 5G Nano, with the ability to shoot 640×480 video, as well as watch video shot with the thing or imported from iTunes.

My guess is that the drop of the whole video concept has a lot to do with the success of the iPhone 4, and the introduction of the new iPod Touch. The new Touch has a front-facing camera for FaceTime video chat, as well as a rear facing camera (although my understanding is that it’s not as high resolution as the one in the iPhone 4). Cameras have been rumored for a looooong time on the Touch, and it’s nice to finally see them show up. The Touch also gets a high-resolution Retina display, just like the iPhone 4. I was disappointed though that the capacity wasn’t really increased from the current top end of 64GB. If I remember right, the original introduction of 64GB to the Touch happened mid-model year, so maybe an increase to 128GB will happen a little later.

And to support all this, iTunes 10 was announced. Frankly, these are normally just updates to handle the new devices, but this time, there’s the addition of a social networking element to sorta tweet your music purchases, preferences and likes to an opt-in community of other music fans. This sounds kinda cool, but until I see it, my jury is still out. You see, I kinda expected to come home tonight, and be able to download it. No such luck so far. Even the iTunes site at apple.com is still sporting iTunes 9.2 with a “coming soon” for version 10. Uncle Steve probably said something about it not being available yet, but I missed that.

Another cool announcement was for iOS 4.1, which is available next week. Instantly, I thought my iPad would finally get the benefits of multi-tasking and folders, but this was not to be. That’ll come in iOS 4.2, which is due in November. Bummer. However, Uncle Steve threw us a bone. Along with bug fixes, iOS 4.1 will add an HDR feature to the Apple-supplied camera application. This is cool, cool territory, and definitely a bit of a trendsetting move. Basically, it’ll take three shots in quick succession — not three images from the same pixel capture on the sensor, apparently — and then blend the underexposed, properly exposed and over-exposed images into a single image with a broader range of light captured than a single image can produce. This has been easy to do in software on the desktop for a while, but the addition of this into iOS 4.1 will really rock. Can’t wait until next week to try it out. (Privately, my prediction is that by the end of 2011, it’ll be hard to find a camera that doesn’t have this feature built-in.)

The last big announcement — the “one more thing” moment — was an updated version of AppleTV. This product’s been around for a while, and has sorta been the stepchild of everything at Apple, being called the “hobby” by Uncle Steve. Well, no more. Basically, the new device is a streaming device for your TV, letting you rent streaming content (films and TV episodes) to your TV, stream content from iTunes on your computer, stream photos from iPhoto, and apparently loads of other new things. No storage, a quarter the physical size of the current Apple TV, and no power brick (man, everyone should get that message!), all for $99. No subscriptions, no contracts. Way cool. And yes, I ordered one. It’ll be here in four weeks. At that price, it’s hard to make a mistake in picking one up, even if the thing is incredibly crappy, which I’m not expecting.

Yeah, I know I haven’t mentioned AirPlay yet, but frankly, I’m not sure I understand enough of what it does to describe it yet. One thing it does seem to do is allow you to stream video or audio from your iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch to your TV through the AppleTV unit. That’s as much as I know about that one so far.

So… what’s the score?

• Thumbs up on the return of the old iPod Shuffle design.
• Thumbs down on the dropping of video and camera from the iPod Nano. (And because of that, my iPod Nano will now be relegated to the “don’t get rid of it” pile here at the Deauxmayne.)
• Thumbs up for the cameras on the iPod Touch, and…
• Thumbs down for not increasing the capacity on the Touch.
• Thumbs up for HDR in iOS 4.1.
• Thumbs down for not bringing iOS 4 to the iPad until November.
• Half a thumb up for the new iTunes 10.
• Thumbs down for not having iTunes 10 available now!
• Two thumbs up and a toe for the new AppleTV.

I think Uncle Steve wins!

EDIT: iTunes 10 is available for download now!!!!!

Becky visited the Blue Owl Restaurant and Bakery in Kimmswick today, and brought me back a small version of their apple pie — the Mini Levee High Caramel Apple Pecan Pie. This thing is huge! It’s five inches tall, and around four inches in diameter, and full o’ apples, with a hard caramel shell. Wonderful dessert!!!!

The girls were playing in the backyard, and Becky decided to see if we could get them all to be nice and pretty for a photo. It’s amazing what a little snack will do!

There’s a pretty active set of musicians at work, and last night, ten of them rented a studio space downtown at Utopia Studios for a jam session. As a newb to the whole thing, I was invited along. “Bring your guitar,” I was told. And I did.

The room was big enough — 34 x 18, part of an old converted warehouse — and was really rustic. Frankly, had I not been so interested in playing (and learning to play!), I would’ve loved photographing this building and the warehouses and alleys near it. It was a really cool spot.

We started just past 6.30, and when I left at 9.30, folks were still in full steam mode. The studio stays open until 2am, and I wouldn’t be surprised if our little group was pushing that time. We had a bassist, dobro, drums, bongos, and nine six-string guitars (including me). Needless to say, that many guitars made for some interesting music on some tracks!

So did I play on every song? Nope. In fact, I probably only played fully through three or four tunes, while I plinked along with the chords I knew on many others. But, man, did I ever enjoy being part of the music for once. As someone for whom music has been such a big part of my life for so very long, wrapping myself in the tapestry of live music, and weaving my own little corner of the sound was such an amazing experience.

It wasn’t without a few lessons learned though:

• My cheesy little music stand I bought Thursday wasn’t really up to the weight of the music I had on it last night. I’ve gotta get something more substantial.
• I need to have ready access to picks on the stand.
• I need a water bottle holder on the stand. Reaching to the floor for my drink proved to be a precarious situation for my guitar.
• My stand needs to also have a light. The side of the room I was on was pretty dang dark, and made it tough to see my music.
• When printing my tabs for the night, I need to use a bolder, larger font. That’ll help with the dark, and frankly, makes it easier for me to focus on what I’m playing instead of trying to figure out what’s on the page.
• I’ve gotta remember to take my guitar stand next time! I didn’t have anyplace to put my guitar during the night.
• I’ve gotta find some way of keeping my picks out of the body of my guitar. I’ve dropped three in there over the last few days, and I accomplished that feat again last night.
• I need to work on my chord transitions desperately! I couldn’t keep up on many songs because I kept having to think about what chord shape I needed next. That’s just practice, but definitely something of note!

In the end, I had a blast! I thoroughly enjoyed a few hours of playing last night, and absolutely wanna do it again!

(BTW, click for a Flickr set of last night’s fun!)

Once again, I’ve taken my iPhone 4 to the bottle containing a carbonated beverage. This time it’s Sprite, and this time the bottle is plastic. With the bubbles I see in the bottle, it seems like there’s a great long exposure opportunity!

It always seems like we look at baseball — my favorite pastime — through a filter of time. It’s measured in terms of records, how long they stand, and the parade of aged heroes, revelling in the wonderful accomplishments of youth. And with the resurgence in throwback architecture in recently built ballparks, the haze of time is thicker than ever. Yes, new records are being set and broken, and re-set, and the heroes we’ll talk about seeing in their prime are still playing the game I love so much. The game, though, is a reminder that although there’s clock in baseball, baseball lives by the passage of time.

After many weeks of class, Bailey passed her CGC (Canine Good Citizen) test yesterday. She’s been in heat for the last two weeks, so she’s got mush for brains right now — I am really surprised that she was able to pass given her lack of attention span right now.

So now both her and Molly have their CGC’s. I’m betting Bailey adds an RN (Rally Novice) this year to follow in Molly’s pawsteps.

Congrats Bailey!

I found this big ol’ spider munching on a little snack near midnight. He wasn’t too skittish, and let me get close to him with my macro lens.

Tomorrow would’ve been Dad’s 70th birthday. Mom would make him a pineapple upsidedown cake for his birthday, and tonight, Darla surprised me by making one in honor of his birthday. He was such an influence on me, and I love that we still honor his memory every year. Seems fitting.

This is a simple shot. I started with a Coke bottle, about half-filled with Coke — you can see the color of the bottle throughout the image. Then I took my iPhone 4, placed the camera lens right on top of the mouth of the bottle, turned on the flash, and grabbed this image.??To me, it almost looks as though there’s an eye, staring back at me from the bottom of the bottle.