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       Stardate: 20190621.2307  
       Location: Family Room
       Input Device: Cybah Rig
       Audio: Dog barking off in the distance
       Visual: Fujitsu Face-Mounted Display
       Energy: 30%
       Mental: 25%
       Emotional: Tired 
       
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       It's already after 11PM and I just finished 
       working.  There goes my Friday night.  Well, that's 
       what happens when I'm on call.  I just don't like 
       that I'm in this standby mode and can't really seem 
       to get into much of anything without worrying about 
       being interrupted and even if I don't worry, I'm 
       too tired to really do much of anything.  This 
       seems to be the pattern whenever I go on call.  At 
       least it is for 2 weeks every 2 months or so.
       
       In this "standby" mode, I've been doing too much 
       looking at stuff to buy online.  Every June, I cash 
       out 2 weeks of my vacation time since I don't use 
       it much and I accumulate too fast.  This cash out 
       is usually used for whatever...usually equipment 
       upgrades, electronic gadgets, vacation 
       spending money, whatever.  This year, I didn't 
       ear-mark it or anything and it's been burning a 
       hole in my pocket.  So I have been going online to 
       see what is out there while in standby mode.  This 
       was triggered by going to some gadget store in 
       Santa Monica that's like a Sharper Image or 
       Brookstone kinda store.  Overpriced gadgets that 
       nobody really needs, some of which is kinda 
       interesting.
       
       In this store, I ran across this projector that 
       caught my eye.  It was called a Puppy Cube and ran 
       Android, which was projected onto a table.  You can 
       touch/swipe/interact with the projection like it 
       was a tablet, but it was just a projected image on 
       the table, kinda like those laser projected 
       keyboards they used to sell for cell phones/PDAs.  
       I never got to try one of those and they seemed a 
       bit gimmicky when they came out.
       
       I played around with the projector for a bit and 
       mostly tested typing, which seemed to work pretty 
       accurately, but felt strange since I was just 
       tapping the table.  I probably couldn't touch type 
       without looking at the keyboard.  Acually, it kinda 
       reminded me of typing on a touchscreen, which I 
       never really enjoyed.  I would much rather have a 
       hardware keyboard.  
       
       I didn't mess around with it for too long but I 
       thought it was pretty neat, so I took a photo to 
       research later.  
       
       Well, I did some research and this thing is 
       expensive...like $999US!  Also, it runs an older 
       version of Android and the manufacturer's website 
       has not been available since April.  This Puppy 
       Cube was one of those crowdfunded devices and there 
       didn't seem to be too much activity going on when 
       they were raising funds...well, not as much as the 
       Gemini PDA.
       
       The device has lots of other cool features, like 
       being a short throw projector, various input 
       options, built in speakers, bluetooth, wifi, etc.  
       After I got thinking about it, I couldn't really 
       see where I would need to use this.  Yeah, cool toy 
       but yeah.
       
       So from there, I start wondering what else is out 
       there and I start getting that itch.  That gadget 
       itch that I want to keep scratching...but then I 
       catch myself and have to apply some self-restraint.  
       I can easily get caught up in that and end up 
       making unwise purchases and wasting time with the 
       research.  I have too much junk as it is and don't 
       need to add to the pile. And in the late nite, TV 
       infomercial, Home Shopping Club state that I'm in, 
       I'm in a dangerous place.  
       
       So I jack out of the web, jack in to the gopher and 
       create some plain text content.  I can't really buy 
       anything here so I should be safe for the time 
       being.
       
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